Chapter 149: Building a Cage
When Gervis arrived on the first floor, before he could send someone to find Thomas, he was stopped by a servant.
"Sir, Captain Laurie has returned to the castle. He asked you how to deal with the body of the monster!"
"Oh, I almost forgot about this. Tell Laurie to find Jimmy the cook and deal with him the same way as we did with Storm Wolf last time!"
After hearing the report from the servant, Gervis remembered that Laurie had just returned to the castle with his spoils. He had just been focusing on the green elf bugs and had forgotten such an important matter. Of course, the dead monsters could only turn into monster meat, so Gervis did not go to check. Jimmy did a great job on these things. The fur of the storm wolf was the masterpiece of Jimmy's superb knife skills.
"By the way, after you notify Laurie, go to the stables and ask Thomas to come to the hall. I'll be waiting for him there!"
"Yes, sir!"
The servant responded quickly and walked out of the inner castle quickly.
Next, Gervis came to the hall alone and sat on the sofa. Soon, a servant brought juice, cakes and other snacks. Gervis leaned comfortably on the sofa and looked at the wall: "This time, the tri-colored deer specimen should be hung on the wall. If I kill a few more monsters, I think I can fill up the hall!"
"Grenade is still not powerful enough to deal with monsters. If you want to use it against monsters, you must triple the amount of explosives to seriously injure low-level monsters!"
"No, we don't have much saltpeter left. Both muskets and ice making require a lot of saltpeter, so we should save it. If we don't have that many monsters to fight, it would be a waste to make more!"
"grown ups!"
Just when Gervis was lost in thought, Thomas had already come close to Gervis and called him back to reality with a careful voice.
"Thomas, come sit down for a moment!"
"Thank you, sir!"
This time Thomas did not refuse, because he was not sitting on a sofa, but a wooden chair specially reserved for distinguished guests and confidants.
"Thomas, you will lead the caravan to Winterfell tomorrow, so I need you to take care of some things for me today!"
Since becoming the lord, Gervis finally understood what those powerful people in his previous life meant when they said that talented people were rare. His territory is now in a state of disrepair, but Thomas is the only one who can help him manage and make arrangements. Anna is a girl after all, and her temperament is a little weak. She is definitely not as smooth as Thomas when it comes to managing people and arranging things. So Gervis plans to let Thomas arrange his affairs this afternoon, and by then Gervis only needs to send someone to supervise and it will be done.
"Sir, please give me your orders!"
"First of all, I have been the master of Storm Territory for such a long time, but I haven't done much for the affairs of the territory. In order to better develop it in the future, I have formulated a five-year development plan. The first item of this plan is to make sure the serfs have enough food first!"
Gervis slowly told the plan he had made in recent times, paused for a moment, drank a sip of juice and continued: "Eat enough food, this thing is actually already being done. As long as your caravan can make money this time, the serfs can support themselves by looking for seafood or picking grapes in addition to farming."
"After having enough food, the second thing is to develop infrastructure! We don't have the manpower and material resources to build a large-scale project, but we can start small, that is, building public toilets."
After talking for a long time, Gervis finally finished what he was saying and stopped, waiting for Thomas's questions.
"Sir, what are these public toilets you are talking about?"
To be honest, Thomas really didn't understand some of the words Gerves said, such as infrastructure. It was only later when he heard Gerves talk about large-scale construction that he slightly understood that Gerves wanted to build something.
"It's a toilet! But I want to build a toilet that can be used by multiple people, and more than one!"
"Your Excellency is wise!"
Thomas had a very useful brain. After hearing what Gervis said, he immediately understood the benefits of building public toilets.
"It's just that, sir, the serfs are used to dumping waste randomly. I think you need to issue a decree that anyone who dumps waste randomly will be punished. This will encourage them to go to the public toilets!"
"That's a good suggestion, Thomas! But there must be rewards after punishment!"
Gervis nodded and smiled at Thomas. He had also thought of what Thomas said, but his solution was slightly different from Thomas's. That is, Gervis also increased the reward. So Gervis told Thomas his idea.
Gervis plans to build 20 new toilets in Storm Territory, each of which can accommodate 20 people at the same time. Moreover, in order to prevent serfs from being unwilling to go to public toilets and to keep the streets of the town clean, Gervis also plans to divide the toilets by area for the serfs to use and maintain. In an area, if the roads are clean and not as filthy as before, Gervis will reward them with black bread per person every week.
"Sir, you are too kind. In fact, you are already an extremely kind lord by building public toilets for them. I don't think you need to spend other money to reward these serfs, otherwise they will become greedy!"
As a native, Thomas really felt that Gervis possessed the qualities of a legendary knight, but as a butler, Thomas had to consider Gervis and put forward his opinions directly.
"Thomas, I'm not worried about them becoming greedy. That's human nature. But if they want to get more, they have to show their due value and make more contributions!"
Thomas didn't understand, but Gervis knew very well that if he wanted to motivate the serfs, he needed to give them motivation. If he used whips to drive the serfs to work like other nobles, he would basically not be able to accomplish anything big. Only by using both carrots and sticks could the serfs be full of enthusiasm and complete the tasks assigned to them well and quickly.
If you want the horse to run, you have to feed it with grass. There are only about 2,000 serfs in Storm Territory. Each person has a meal of black bread a week, which costs only a few silver coins. However, these few silver coins can not only win people's hearts, but also make the serfs take the initiative to be responsible for street sanitation. Moreover, after building the public toilet, Gervis will not only suffer a loss, but he can also make compost, which can be used in the spring of next year. This is a deal that kills two birds with one stone.
"Thomas, remember this matter and do as I say. There will be punishments and rewards! The reward period is one year!"
Once the habit of cleanliness is formed, it will be difficult to return to the original dirty and messy state, so Gervis set this date of one year.
"Yes, sir. I have made note of it!"
"Well, I need someone to help me with one more thing. Find some serfs to work. I'm going to build a new prison cage on the cliff by the sea!"
The cage that Gervis mentioned is actually a closed courtyard, which is prepared for the orcs in Eve's space. Gervis does not plan to open Eve's space again in a month. Instead, he will wait until his guards are equipped with equipment, and then open up space in the cage courtyard to release the orcs and see what they look like.
"Yes, sir!"
(End of this chapter)
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