The special envoy sent by the royal court soon arrived at the Royal City of Polyvisia. He was a somewhat serious-looking old man, about fifty years old, with a standard Mediterranean type, and an expression of bitterness and hatred.
, it seems that everyone owes him money. His name is Don Bajiro A. Davidlid, Viscount of the Kingdom. It is said that he is related to King Frederic I. His Majesty wants to call him his cousin. He has been serving in the Ministry of Justice of the Kingdom.
Duties of Deputy Director and Chief Inspector.
The royal envoy also brought a regiment of guards with him this time, with the purpose of escorting the gold and silver reserves worth more than one million gold crowns from the former Nasseri Kingdom's treasury back to the royal capital. Claude and Bolognik
The general held a welcoming ceremony as usual and held a banquet to welcome his arrival. But what made Claude feel a little strange was that the Viscount Don Bagelo seemed a little absent-minded, as if he was hiding something, and soon he
He left the table with the excuse of being too drunk and went to rest.
On the afternoon of the next day, the two sides began to hand over. Claude provided the account books and gold and silver reserves of the Nasseri Kingdom's treasury that had been seized, saying that he had not lied in this regard. The value of the gold and silver coins and gold and silver ingots originally reserved in the treasury.
It should be around 1.89 million gold crowns. According to the principle of distribution of loot captured from public treasury, the overseas autonomous military regions can get 30% of it, leaving another 20% as local maintenance funds, and only about 50% will be handed over to the royal court.
It was just that Viscount Don Bajiro withdrew and asked Claude and General Bolognik privately. He hoped that this time they would be allowed to bring back gold and silver reserves worth about 1.5 million gold crowns to relieve the kingdom's finances.
Crisis. You must know that the guards stationed in the royal capital have been in arrears for three months, and the local administrative officials of the royal capital have been without wages for the longest half a year. Now the royal court relies on this money from the treasury of the Kingdom of Nasseri
funds to continue life...
"No way, Wang Ting is so poor?" Claude was shocked.
Viscount Don Bajiro smiled bitterly and explained to the two generals that last year the alliance army was sent out of the kingdom as a gift. When the enemy evacuated from the royal capital, they took away all the property they could and even destroyed the eastern part of the kingdom.
All the mineral mining bases in the palace. When Frederic I and the royal court returned to the royal capital, they found that what was left to them was an empty shelf and nothing. There was not even a curtain in the palace, all of which had been taken by the enemy.
What a waste...
The entire kingdom has experienced wars in the past few years, people's livelihood has been in decline, and business travel has been sluggish. The taxes that the king can receive can only maintain food and clothing, and there is no money in his hands. Even if the Wang Ting has a good economic recovery,
There is no way to implement the plan. Just like those destroyed mineral resource mining bases in the eastern region, two of the large landfilled gold and silver mines need to invest hundreds of thousands of funds to re-excavate the mine tunnels before they can be mined.
There are gold and silver mines that can be used to mint coins.
But the treasury currently has no money, and Wang Ting is helpless. The overseas dominions have money, but Wang Ting has already overdrafted the taxes and tributes that the overseas dominions will pay in the next ten years. If he wants to continue to overdraw, the Overseas Domestic Council will quit. Overdrafts during the war are fine.
, but now that the war is over, it would be unreasonable to want to overdraft. The parliament said that it can lend money to the royal court, but interest must be paid.
The Wang Ting doesn't care about borrowing money from overseas dominions. Anyway, although the interest rate is high, it is not considered usury. However, the old aristocratic families in the Kingdom are not happy. They think that this is the overseas dominions deliberately expanding their influence in the King's court.
They have bad intentions. If Wang Ting wants to borrow money, he can borrow it from them. With the background of their families, they can still provide millions of gold crowns. But theirs is a real loan shark.
Rolling profit.
His Majesty is angry now. The overseas dominions said that borrowing money is actually like a loan. It doesn't matter if the interest rate is higher, and it can be repaid in two years. But the old aristocratic family forces are offering usury loans, and the interest may compound.
It is simply unreasonable to borrow millions of gold crowns and not be able to repay them in a hundred years. Therefore, borrowing money from overseas dominions is unanimously opposed by all noble ministers, but His Majesty is not a fool to borrow money from established noble families.
, knowing that it is a trap but still jumping into it, so if you don’t have money, you don’t have money, and everyone just endures it.
This time, Viscount Don Bajiro came to transport the funds as a special envoy of the royal court. The most urgent thing was the Marquis Blancat, the Prime Minister of the Kingdom. He hoped to transport back a gold and silver reserve of about 1.5 million gold crowns, so that
It can solve the urgent needs of the royal court. Five hundred thousand gold crowns are planned to be used to pay salaries and stabilize the minds of the officers and soldiers of the Imperial Guard and the administrative and civil officials within the jurisdiction of the royal capital.
Another 500,000 gold crowns are planned to be invested in the royal capital to repair the commercial areas and road traffic destroyed by the alliance army, and attract business travelers to return to the royal capital. As long as business slowly flourishes, the taxes received by the treasury will begin to increase. This is a
A very good way to govern. The last 500,000 gold crowns the royal court plans to use for the construction of mineral resource mining bases destroyed by the alliance army. As long as the two large gold and silver mines resume production and mining, the national treasury will
There will be more than 100,000 gold crowns in the account, and the finances will be more comfortable to do a lot of practical things...
Viscount Don Bargello spoke very sincerely, and had already told Claude and General Bologna all the inside information about the financial difficulties faced by the royal court. Claude actually regretted it. If he had known this, he should have done it earlier.
The troops were sent to harass the coalition camp. At the very least, what was the name of the supreme commander of the coalition army? It was said that he was the Duke of the Hicks Kingdom. He so easily took the wounded soldiers of the Hicks Kingdom and looted from the royal capital.
The property was withdrawn to the Kingdom of Hicks. After a loss, it was obvious that the property taken away from the royal capital by the alliance army was not a small amount.
No wonder that guy was so generous, keeping so many grain and grass reserves, military supplies, weapons and ammunition in the coalition camp without destroying or burning them, just so that we could easily give up the pursuit of their retreating troops.
Obviously, the Duke knew in his heart that if he burned these supplies, the Thunder Legion would not let go of their evacuated defeated soldiers even if they died. Even if they chased them to the Menbamark Kingdom, they would be driven out and killed...
What a cunning guy. It was precisely because he left behind a intact coalition camp and so much food, grass, military supplies, as well as weapons and ammunition that Claude felt there was no need to pursue him so hard that he just let him go.
After passing them, it turned out that now the Duke took away so much property looted from the royal capital when he evacuated with the wounded soldiers, but now it was too late to regret it. Claude only thought about the big loss...
...
"What are you thinking about?" General Bolognik pushed Claude, knowing that he was distracted again: "I just agreed to the special envoy's request and asked him to take away 1.5 million gold crowns of gold and silver reserves to relieve the pain.
The kingdom’s financial woes…”
"Please rest assured that the kingdom will not forget your loyalty and dedication. The Prime Minister told me before I left that because the kingdom has no money and cannot give the brave soldiers the rewards they deserve, so he wants to transfer these seven buildings in the Nasseri area to
The mining rights of small and medium-sized gold, silver and copper mines will be handed over to you for half a year. You only need to hand over one-third of the mineral resources mined within this six months to Wang Ting, and the rest will be used as funds for the two legions of your overseas autonomous military region.
use.
You should be aware of the kingdom’s policy on gold and silver mineral resources, which is basically divided into 70%, 70% goes to the national treasury, and 30% belongs to private individuals. However, within the next six months, the royal court will give you 70% of the allocation, which is already broken.
Let's make an exception..." Viscount Don Baghelo quickly threw out the compensation plan that had been drawn up long ago.
There are seven small and medium-sized gold, silver and copper mines in the Nasseri area, which were the source of gold and silver reserves for the former Nasseri Kingdom's treasury. As for the copper mines, they are basically cast into copper coins directly at the mining base and then put into the market.
to be used for circulation. Claude looked at the seized account books, which recorded that these seven small and medium-sized gold, silver and copper mines can increase the income of the Nasseri Kingdom by about 1.4 million gold crowns every year.
One-third of the mineral resources of 1.4 million gold crowns is about 400,000 gold crowns, so the remaining mineral resources belonging to the Dominion Military Region are about 1 million. However, it is only for half a year. To increase revenue and reduce expenditure, the maximum income can only be 600,000 gold crowns.
about.
"You have a really good plan. You don't have to pay a single black penny, you can just sit back and enjoy the profits for free. Give us these seven small and medium-sized mineral resources. We still have to recruit miners, renovate machinery, and equip refining equipment. We must first invest.
It takes more than 100,000 gold crowns to mine these gold and silver minerals." Claude shook his head: "Also, why is it only for half a year? This time is too short, it must be at least one year."
Viscount Don Bajiro also smiled bitterly: "To be honest, I also want to give you a longer time, but Mr. Xiang and I don't know what will change in half a year. Maybe the resources of these seven small and medium-sized gold, silver and copper mines will arrive."
We no longer know who owns them, and we have to re-sign mining agreements with the owners of these mineral resources...
As for the mining rights of these mineral resources being handed over to you now, you should start mining as soon as possible and send more manpower to dig as much as you can. When the deadline is up, if we have not notified you, then you will continue to mine.
If all these mineral resources are owned, then they will wait until the expiration of half a year before taking over these mineral resources..."
Claude became more and more strange: "There seems to be something else in this half-year period. Can you tell me what is going on? Or is it that Wang Ting is planning to sell all these gold, silver, and copper mineral resources in exchange for funds?
"
"Forget it, you two are not outsiders, you are also the new hereditary nobles of the kingdom. Let me tell you what is going on." Viscount Don Bagelo looked around and noticed that there was no one else in the room.
He breathed a sigh of relief.
"Don't worry, no one dares to eavesdrop on our conversation." General Bolognik reassured the special envoy.
"It's like this. Prime Minister Blancart submitted a plan for the restoration of the kingdom, which was unanimously approved by the National Assembly. Even the Parliament of Nobles believed that if this plan can be implemented, it will enable the kingdom to revive in the shortest possible time.
It returned to its peak and became one of the most powerful countries in the Farea Continent.
In this plan, Prime Minister Blanca hopes to introduce trains from overseas autonomous territories, build railways, and connect the entire eastern region with railways to speed up the flow of materials and freight and facilitate the exchange of people. Rebuild waterways and irrigation in various parts of the kingdom.
system to ensure the stability of agricultural production and bumper harvests. Support manufacturing workshops and businesses of various products that are beneficial to people's livelihood, accelerate their development, and enable them to compete with goods produced in overseas autonomous territories...
There is also the need to reorganize the kingdom's equipment, improve the equipment of the three major legions, learn new tactics and tactics from the two major legions of the overseas autonomous military regions, and strive to become the kingdom's trustworthy force guarantee. At the same time, we must also reorganize a most advanced army.
The armored ocean-going fleet cooperates with overseas autonomous territories to build brand-new armored warships to safeguard the kingdom's ocean-going shipping interests and the security of the entire eastern region's coastal waters.
In addition, there are many details on various aspects of economic reorganization, local adjustment of taxation, and I will not go into them one by one. This Kingdom Rejuvenation Plan considers the current status and difficult situation of the Kingdom in great detail, and proposes various targeted measures.
Solution. There is only one problem that cannot be solved, that is, the kingdom's treasury is empty and there is no funds to implement this plan.
The most conservative estimate of the kingdom's revival plan is that it will cost more than 50 million gold crowns. Prime Minister Blanca hopes to complete the implementation of each project in this plan within five years, so as not to delay the best efforts.
The opportunity for development. But what can you do if you don’t have money, and the investment in the first year is more than 10 million gold crowns, where can you get this huge sum of money?
The Prime Minister decided to break down some projects in the plan, such as railways and trains, which are the largest expenditures. The laying of railway transportation lines throughout the eastern region requires at least 20 million gold crowns in construction funds. Prime Minister Blanca hopes to provide overseas autonomous territories with
Learn how to raise railway construction funds among the private sector and parallel railway shares.
However, there is still a big part in the plan which is the cost of armaments and the preparation cost of the armored fleet. For this part, Blancat is prepared to release national bonds, with three-year, five-year, eight-year and ten-year terms as the basis. Each issue
A progressive interest rate of 5%. For example, if you buy a ten-year government bond of 100 gold crowns, you can get 120 gold crowns after ten years.
The Prime Minister hoped to use the bank of national bonds to raise 15 million gold crowns for arms construction, but his proposal to bank the national bonds was ridiculed by many people. Many economic experts were not optimistic and believed that
The interest rate is too low. A nobleman said to the Prime Minister that if he does not earn more than three or four hundred gold crowns within ten years if he does business with one hundred gold crowns, then his business will be a failure, so this country
Bonds are not attractive at all.
Even if Blanca Blanca's national bonds raise enough funds, there is still a shortfall of 15 million gold crowns compared to the implementation of the entire kingdom's recovery plan. It was originally hoped that the rapid economic growth and tax revenue in the next few years would be able to make up for it.
These lack of funds, but if you think about it carefully, this is impossible. After the war, the economy of the entire eastern region was in depression, and it would not recover in a few years.
Because the Kingdom Restoration Plan submitted by the Prime Minister was really perfect, but there was no possibility of implementation due to lack of funds, Prime Minister Blanchard was ridiculed by many nobles, thinking that he was a daydreamer.
The reason why this Kingdom Restoration Plan was unanimously passed by the National Assembly and the Noble Assembly is that everyone knows that there is no possibility of realizing it, so they are too lazy to argue and spend their own words...
So the unwilling Prime Minister secretly submitted another secret plan to His Majesty. Only a very few people knew about this secret plan. The content of the plan was to recommend that the kingdom re-adopt the feudal system of lords and fiefs, that is, the territorial aristocratic feudal system, and re-confer the feudal system.
The nobles use hereditary feudal territories in exchange for the support and financial assistance of the kingdom's established noble families..."
"Wait a minute, isn't it? Isn't it a retrogression of the kingdom's system to re-confer the hereditary territories of the nobility? In order to abolish the hereditary territories of the nobility, the late king Sterling IX fought for six years in the kingdom's civil war before he won the final victory.
Isn't this the old way of restoring the territorial aristocratic feudal system?" General Bologna and Claude looked at each other, stunned for a moment. General Bologna came to his senses and stood up excitedly, interrupting Viscount Don Bargillo's words.
"No, no, no, General Bolognik, don't misunderstand me, and don't be so excited. The Prime Minister's secret plan proposal certainly has its own reasons, and it has been approved by His Majesty. Please listen to me first."
Viscount Bagillo signaled General Bologna to calm down, and Claude also stood up and pulled General Bologna to sit down again.
"Speaking of this plan proposed by Mr. Prime Minister, I would also like to thank the two generals and the soldiers of your two overseas armies of the Dominion for their bloody battles. They destroyed the kingdom's mortal enemies, the Kingdom of Nasseri and the Principality of Karnas, and recovered all the lost land.
, let the kingdom unify the entire eastern region. It was you who laid a solid foundation for the kingdom's revival, so the Prime Minister came up with the plan to grant hereditary territories to nobles..."
Viscount Don Bajiro pointed to his feet: "This time, the Prime Minister proposed to grant the hereditary domain of the nobles here, not in the kingdom itself."
Claude looked at the floor under the envoy's feet and suddenly understood: "You mean this Nasseri area?"
Viscount Don Bajiro nodded approvingly: "The Kingdom of Nasseri has always implemented the feudal system of territorial aristocrats. The people here are also used to being territorial citizens and relying on their lords for their lives. If you want to implement it in this area, we
The kingdom's four-people system requires at least a large amount of money to be invested in civilian education, which will take twenty to thirty years to bear fruit.
But the kingdom has no money, and at the same time, the people in this area have always been hostile to our kingdom. Under such circumstances, it is not a good thing for our kingdom to implement the same policies in this area as the kingdom itself, because it will make the people here easily incited by people with malicious intentions.
They rose up to carry out riots and rebellions. The four border counties that were forcibly taken over from the Kingdom of Nasseri were under military control for more than ten years, and civil unrest continued for more than ten years. They have taught us the most profound lesson.
Therefore, since the people here rely on the lord, we will give them a lord. In the future, the peace and development of this territory will naturally be borne by these lords, which can be regarded as reducing the burden on our kingdom. The kingdom will tithe these territories.
system, levy a 10% tax and tribute, and review the taxes of each territory once every ten years.
In addition, only hereditary nobles will be granted territories this time, and territories of equal area will be granted according to the size of the title. If you want to choose the territory yourself, you need to pay the land selection fee before you can change the territory you selected. In addition, if the third-generation noble
If you and honorary nobles also want to obtain a hereditary territory, you need to pay a promotion fee to the royal court to upgrade your title to a hereditary noble.
For example, if an honorary baron wants to become a hereditary baron, he needs to first pay 100,000 gold crowns to become a third baron, and then pay another 200,000 gold crowns to be promoted from a third baron to a hereditary baron. In this way, he can obtain the hereditary baron territory granted by His Majesty.
.And you two are already hereditary nobles of the kingdom, and you can directly obtain the hereditary territory. However, if you want to choose a good hereditary territory, you need to pay the land selection fee..."