Statecraft for the People
Unlike the modern age, where new technologies are developed and markets expand by the day, economic progress in the medieval era crawls at a pace that could give a snail a fair race.
There exist neither the technologies to advance existing industries and raise productivity, nor the capital to open new fields and generate fresh demand and supply. In this age, the only ones capable of driving economic development with any real initiative are, at best, a handful of wealthy lords—and even then, the returns are pitiful compared to the sums poured in.
No matter what one attempts, the handicraft system remains an unbreakable cage. What good is mindlessly dumping money into it? Invest for a hundred days or a thousand, and all you achieve is quantitative growth; qualitative growth stays forever out of reach. The first to snap that chain was England’s Industrial Revolution.
Vast colonies seized at gunpoint, and the enormous demand they created. New technologies born to satisfy that demand, and the cascading chain reactions set off by violent swings in supply and demand. The deus ex machina thus born gluttonously drank the blood and tears of humanity as it kicked open the doors to the modern age. Only another century or so later would humanity finally set foot on the threshold of the contemporary world.
What I intend, therefore, is nothing so grand as modern-style economic development. In an era when ninety-nine percent of the population is illiterate, would I be mad enough to force through a gamble that dangerous?
My goals remain strictly limited: securing food against overpopulation, and diversifying the industrial base. Optimizing production processes and spreading new techniques are nothing more than desperate thrashing to squeeze out even a little more output. There is absolutely no political design behind any of it.
“Saintess. Could it be that you plan to topple Count Montpellier as well and take the French throne yourself?”
So why does the world refuse to accept my pure goodwill at face value?
The day after I returned from teaching the city’s fishermen a few modest scraps of knowledge, Miss Matilda Granger—former royal treasurer—casually lobbed that deranged question at me. It was the sort of outrageous remark only a professional traitor who had once kicked Claude V square in the philtrum could deliver.
“No. The coronation was less than a week ago.”
“Then, as I thought, you mean to use him as a puppet and dispose of him at a convenient moment. That would certainly be more stable.”
I was so flabbergasted I simply stated the plain truth, only for her to twist my words however she liked and nod in satisfaction. What on earth is wrong with this unnie? I keep telling her we’re settling in the Low Countries, not here.
“…If things continue like this, Montpellier will surpass the old prestige of Paris, won’t it? Are you truly going to hand this enormous city over to the new royal house intact?”
The concern Matilda voiced was, I had to admit, entirely reasonable.
Once Count Montpellier received the crown and scepter and was reborn as Thomas I, King of France, the kingdom’s balance of power had tilted heavily southward. The Duke of Orléans had first dumped every last scrap of political filth onto the royalist faction before departing, sharply shrinking the central nobles’ standing; the soldiers borrowed from Italy had also drawn sudden attention to the long-undervalued strength of the Mediterranean sphere.
But the decisive factor remained Thomas I’s accession and the relocation of the capital. At the coronation I myself attended, he declared the move, and Montpellier was instantly branded the new City of Light destined to succeed Paris.
I still wonder how a neighborhood that turns pitch-black the moment night falls—there are almost no streetlamps yet—qualifies as a City of Light, but pre-collapse Paris was probably no better, so I let it pass. This world has piled up a history different from Earth’s to begin with. Different history should mean different languages and different place-names… yet the spaghetti code of this world remains undecipherable, so I let that pass as well.
In any case, Montpellier, now stamped as the new City of Light, was certain to suck in vast populations and wealth and become the very heart of France. Growth of the capital where the royal family resides leads directly to the strengthening of royal authority. It is still far too early an age for urban merchants and craftsmen to raise their voices against the crown. Even allowing for the special character of city industry, Montpellier is highly likely to function as little more than an oversized royal demesne.
Fostering the city’s industries therefore means, directly and indirectly, propping up Thomas I’s rule. The more securely the new dynasty plants its roots, the harder it becomes to found a Holy Kingdom in the Low Countries. To a southern dynasty that has made the Oxyca region its nest, a threat from the north simply does not feel real.
I repeat: the economic growth rate of this era is slow enough to race a snail to a draw, the total stock of wealth is finite, and the cost of moving goods or projecting influence rises with the square of distance. The more the new City of Light and its neighboring fiefs prosper, the weaker the northern economic power available for Low Countries development must become. From the Order’s standpoint, anything that hampers the city’s growth is therefore pure profit—unless one intends to topple the very king one just installed, neutralize him, and swallow the entire kingdom whole.
“Hmm.”
I was honestly a little surprised. From the moment I first decided to prepare against famine I had known suspicion might fall on me, yet I never expected this particular person to be the one to call me out.
“…I simply heard various things while serving as royal treasurer. That’s all.”
When I fell silent, startled by the unexpected turn, Unnie Matilda quietly averted her eyes and offered the short excuse. Well, someone who had worked inside the royal court of all places could hardly be blind to politics. In that case, I could put her to more complex use than I had originally planned.
“To cut straight to the conclusion: no. I have no intention of dragging Thomas I from the throne. Nor do I plan to turn him into a puppet and manipulate the kingdom from the shadows.”
I decided to bestow a kind lesson upon this gifted student. Matilda’s analysis had been extremely accurate. Accelerate Montpellier’s development until every scrap of French wealth floods south, and developing the Low Countries becomes correspondingly harder. The same manpower and materials change value dramatically depending on where they are drawn from.
And for exactly the same reason, it also becomes far harder for the Kingdom of France and its nobles to project military force toward the Low Countries. There is no way the upkeep of a hundred-thousand-strong army marching out of Orléans equals that of one marching out of Montpellier. The better I feed the people here and the more solidly I arm them, the safer the newborn Holy Kingdom becomes from French threat.
“…Is that the Goddess’s compassion? Is dedicating oneself to the powerless masses even at a loss the ideal the Order pursues?”
And what of the pioneering costs for the Low Countries that will skyrocket as the price? Let them rise. As long as there are people, pioneering can be done without limit. Because there I intend to cast the forbidden secret art that will tear the feudal system out by the roots.
“No. It is an investment toward a far greater reform… Would you lend me your ear for a moment?”
Matilda Granger. Once the kingdom’s treasurer who managed the royal assets, yet in truth a de-facto commoner who had inherited only her father’s knowledge and profession, never any real power of her own. That she had noticed southern prosperity would hinder Low Countries development and come to confirm it with me in person proved both ability and initiative; the various schemes she had once worked against Claude V suggested her morality was not especially flawed either. If one means to detonate a bomb, the command post must know the target precisely—better to speak now and make her a firm accomplice.
“Right here?”
“Yes. This is a matter that must never reach anyone else’s ears.”
Article 121, Chapter IX of the Constitution of the Republic of Korea. Complete prohibition of the tenant-farming system, with only limited allowance for lease and entrusted management.
“All land should rightfully belong to those who cultivate it.”
The principle of land to the tiller. A modern-flavored nuclear bomb that would blow feudalism clean off the map. We cannot afford to make the entire world our enemy, so various disguises will be necessary; even so, the reality will be a landscape teeming with independent owner-farmers—the farmers’ ideal and the landlords’ nightmare. Plenty of refugees have already been driven from their homes by war and the like; for the next year, while steadily rebuilding the Order, we need only scrape together the population to migrate.
“H-Have you got more of that sort of thing?”
“Far too much to tell all at once… I’ll share them one by one whenever we have time later.”
“There’s a lot? Truly?”
When I simply nodded, Matilda’s face lit up and her eyes began to sparkle—bright, eager eyes full of hunger for new knowledge.
“…”
…And Rebecca, who had stood silent guard the entire time, also for some reason began to sparkle her eyes. Hers were rather more blazing.
Why is she looking at me like that? Did I mess something up? If there’s a problem, please just say it in words.
“No. It’s nothing.”
If not, then good.
I gave an awkward smile and turned my head again. I could still feel a burning gaze boring into the back of my skull.