Lawrence sat down with Roland, Craig and Jacob the next day to figure out the tax code for Lawrence’s new property. The roles of the other three men were as follows.
Roland acted as the Town Chieftain, a role that Lawrence was happy to delegate to Roland so that he could pursue pipe dreams instead while Roland was happy to take the role, with the strict understanding that the original Black Bay Village shall eventually be incorporated to the town of Tears.
Jacob acted as the Chief Agriculturist, where he was placed in charge of Roland’s ambitious agricultural projects.
Craig on the other hand was given a role known as the Chief Tanner because Lawrence had no idea what Craig could really do. Craig, who lived as a hunter, however, was confident in his skills in making tanned leather.
“You know, instead of using flesh and animal fat for tanning, I got a better idea, Goodman’s Hill used cedar oil and other items. However, when the war came, most of the craftsmen died and a lot of us fled. I can try to revive that if you give me a chance.”
Lawrence considered Craig’s proposal for a moment and he accepted. In Lawrence’s head, there were to be three backbones of Tears.
The first would be widespread agriculture. Black Bay Village, though on paper a large tract of land, had severely underdeveloped land which Lawrence would seek to change. Secondly, with the bakery business booming and to expand gradually, Lawrence will also seek to add on more production of goods such as leathers, which could tap on the agricultural sector for the hides. Lastly, Lawrence aimed to reopen the port of Black Bay Village and create a merchant fleet that he was used to running with his clan which they jokingly called the Owl Armada.
That said, regarding the owl…
Roland had been the one to bring up what flag Lawrence had wanted to fly.
“Uh… I don’t know?” Lawrence replied but Roland shook his head.
“You are going to throw the most incredible amount of money in developing an area, you should at least fly a flag. That flag should be the symbol of you, the Carsteins, for your children, your grandchildren!” Roland said adamantly, his growing goatee trembling a little.
“How about you leave it to me?” Roland said assuredly and Jacob clapped his hands together.
“I will get Ludium to send more of Lord Black’s banner here as well. We need to fly your flag and his side by side, lest he thinks we are trying to rebel.” The butcher said, patting his belly and Lawrence nodded.
Craig brought up a map that he had come up with, which included Tears, Black Bay Village as well as the three surrounding hubs that Lawrence had placed.
Each hub had another inn, a stable, rows of empty shops, a large warehouse and an armoury as well as a granary. Lawrence through the interface estimated that there can be enough food for each hub to individually survive for half a year each, assuming their own defensive wall that has yet to be erected, holds.
Lawrence had too many ambitions and he knew that, so he had to rely on the other three to help him with them.
Money honestly, was not an issue.
Roland helped Lawrence draft up a tax bill that was simple and low, to attract businesses to set up shop. Gradually, the thought of visiting Ludium slipped his mind. He simply delegated Roland to run with his idea.
The people that Lawrence hired earlier went about to work, some opting for an alternative proposal that Lawrence had come up with, called the Small-Medium Startup Grant, which was that if any of them wished to try their hands at business, had a sound business proposal was liable to 50 gold in grants, given in tranches of payment whenever the businesses hit a key performance indicator.
Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.
A key performance indicator was the system in which Lawrence had to explain to the businessmen. Basically, both sides had to agree on the points in which everyone can agree that this means that the business is growing.
Gradually, people from Ludium and apparently from as far away as Hasselhoff, which Craig said was many leagues to the north came.
The Tears was finally bustling with life.
Craig’s wife was pregnant again, while his daughter continued working in the Tears branch of The Guardian’s Bakery.
Jacob’s wife has quit her job as a butcher and having closed the butchery, is now assisting her husband in hiring and managing farmers and herders.
An important point to mention was that Jacob had spent no expense in bringing over horses, sheep, cows and lambs. All of them were the most premium livestock that he imported live or with Lawrence’s permission, bought at insane prices.
Lawrence had secretly been flooding the market with cheap foodstuff through The Guardian’s Bakery in order to keep the prices down, but after the first harvest, Lawrence stopped doing so, allowing the price to fluctuate accordingly. Roland, who had anticipated a massive inflation, sighed in relief when the bountiful was more than aplenty, with even previously luxurious items such as milk at readily affordable prices.
Lawrence had also been lenient with the business grants, prompting the shops to be snapped up with all forms of shops, from selling simple furniture all the way to exquisite glassware.
As Tears sprang to life, Lawrence pondered the second step of his plan, as he sat in his cabin in the woods, surrounded by the other three as well as Quenya, who was there to update Lawrence on something regarding The Guardian’s Bakery.
Tears, which has swollen to the size of five hundred people, needed some form of defence. Lawrence also wished to incorporate something.
“First of all, thank you for being here today. Let us hear the reports of everyone here, starting with Quenya.” Lawrence said and Quenya jumped a little, before hastily taking out a parchment from her bag and she coughed, clearing her throat.
“The village chieftain has left me the task of building up The Guardian’s Bakery in Ludium and we have launched four of the pop-up stands at the four gates, and one extra-large one beside the town square.”
“In just three weeks, we have reached a… brea—break…?” Quenya said, puzzled, thinking about this phrase on the paper. It was taught to her by Roland who had helped dictate her report. But it meant…
“Breakeven?” Lawrence replied and she nodded embarrassingly. Roland looked at her and urged her to continue, his hand gesturing for her to go on. Jacob on the other hand, was beaming with pride even at this small let-up. Craig seemed to be holding back tears.
“Breakeven point. We expect that our make-to-order cakes with the recipes taught by the Honourable Carstein will sell even better as the nobles prepare for The Holy Dawn celebrations.”
Holy Dawn?
Lawrence turned to look at them for an explanation.
“The Holy Dawn commemorates the day in which King Carmine’s ancestors held their ground against the Northern barbarians. It’s a national holiday.” Jacob explained and Lawrence nodded.
“For any profits from The Guardian’s Bakery, I would like Roland to invest it in a new system that I have come up with, and I hope that you can pay the farmers for their temporary loss in income from it as they will be buying new seeds,” Lawrence said and Jacob scratched his chin, unsure of what to expect.
Lawrence pulled out a large parchment from underneath the table, unrolling a large schedule as well as a square.
“I shall like to introduce something we did in Singapore, called crop rotation.”
When a single crop is grown in one field for many years in a row, the crop will cause the depletion of particular nutrients from the soil. This depletion of nutrients leads to poor plant health and lower crop yield.
Crop rotation also prevents plant diseases and pests by exchanging crops that may be susceptible to a particular disease or pest with a crop that is not susceptible.
Basically, the crops will grow more efficiently, have a higher yield, and the chances of a famine will decrease.
The plot of land was divided into four sections. One section shall grow peas, the next, turnips, with the next growing peppers and the last growing lettuce. Of course, these are not the only crops. Lawrence had come up with a list for each section.
With this, food can be grown efficiently and maintain the fertility of the lands while at the same time increasing the amount harvested.
Lawrence also introduced another form of a grant, called the Compulsory Livestock Act, where every agricultural household is required to have a minimum of two chickens and two sheep or one cow. 90% of the costs will be paid for by the Town Council, which is really, just Lawrence.
At the same time, with Roland’s advice, Lawrence has built a massive vault underneath his own home with gold that Lawrence is happy to part with.
Under his crafting menu, he had more than a thousand gold bars stacked in piles upon piles in his Bag of Holding. Therefore, he was happy to just place a few hundred gold bars around to show Roland that he was indeed serious about the injection of capital.
Word gradually spread and farmers from neighbouring territories moved almost en masse to Tears, hoping to avoid King Carmine’s high taxes which was felt less painfully here due to the relatively low taxation within Tears.