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  Chapter 269: Eternal High-Quality Leeks

A year and a half passed in the blink of an eye.

October 305 AC.

In the past year or so, the four regions of the North, the Iron Islands, the Riverlands, and the Crownlands have completely completed their reforms, and a large number of family-based enterprises have been established.

To Jack's surprise, not all of these nobles were fools.

Many nobles joined forces with the families with whom they had good marriage relations and quickly occupied the markets in some industries.

Jack only symbolically promulgated the anti-monopoly laws. After all, Jack didn't want Westeros to develop too fast.

These families that transformed from aristocrats to businessmen also changed from initial resistance to current love.

Anyway, no one has military power now, so there is no risk of war. Instead, studying the laws promulgated by the empire has become the top priority.

Moreover, making money in business is really fast, especially when Jack recruits civilians to build infrastructure. The money they earn will naturally be spent on food, clothing, housing and transportation.

The only thing that made them unhappy was that they were treated the same as untouchables before the law and had no privileges at all.

Fortunately, many things can be solved with money.

Compared with the four rapidly developing provinces, the five places of Vale, Westerland, Riverland, Stormlands, and Dorne remain the same.

During this year or so, the long night, which originally only covered the North, has now covered the entire Westeros.

The long night arrives three to five months earlier than expected.

The coal resources in the North are very rich. In the past few years, the North has produced a large amount of honeycomb coal.

In addition, during this year and a half, Jack replanned and utilized the land, used fertilizers, and stockpiled a lot of food.

However, compared with Jack's step-by-step strategy, the old nobles whose supplies were harvested by Jack were not so comfortable.

Due to the backward planting technology and the fact that Jack did not sell fertilizers to the outside world, they did not recover much in the past year and a half.

Now even the southernmost Dorne has entered the long night, which means that the real long night has arrived.

The old nobles who had little reserve supplies found their own feudal lords.

I hope my lord can talk to Jack about the promised interest-free loan of materials.

Now, several major families have gathered in the city of Silor again.

The ones who came to see Jack this time with the most confidence were Olenna and Doran.

The reason is naturally Margaery and Arianne who married Jack.

Even Doran is more confident than Olenna.

Because Arianne gave birth to a son, and Margaery gave birth to twin daughters.

Of course, Jack himself did not have the idea of ​​favoring boys over girls, and Margaery's eldest daughter was still named honorary prince of the Riverlands.

But this is limited to Jack.

Others still favor boys over girls; that's the mainstream.

It is impossible to change this kind of thinking in a short period of time.

With current technology, boys are still more productive than girls.

They thought it would be a very smooth journey to the North, but Jack once again refreshed their concept of cunning.

Jack agreed to lend them the supplies, but the amount was too large, so Jack said he could only lend them little by little.

Two conditions were also attached. The first condition was to allow imperial enterprises to build factories in their fiefdoms.

The second condition is to allow the free movement of civilians.

The first condition was fine, but the second condition was unacceptable to them.

They are not stupid. In Westeros, farmers are actually the private property of the lord.

Although they were legally freemen, in reality they needed the lord's permission even to leave the village.

If free people were allowed to move freely, who would farm for them?

You know, most nobles relied on their farmers to farm and pay taxes.

However, Jack did not give them any room for negotiation, but just threw the words to them directly.

"Either agree to my terms or wait for death in the long night, or you can try to unite to deal with me!"

Looking at Jack's look of "let's be honest, I won't pretend anymore", Olenna and others gnashed their teeth in hatred.

However, they did not have the courage to go to war with Jack, nor did they want to wait for death in the long night, so they finally had no choice but to accept Jack's conditions.

The reactions of Olenna and others were all within Jack's expectations.

Although Jack has the power to forcibly reform the entire Westeros, it will consume a large amount of materials and population, which is not worth it.

So Jack chose to cut the meat with a blunt knife. Jack had too many good cards in his hand, which led to the fact that the old aristocratic forces did not have the courage to go all in and unite to fight him.

These old nobles have been caught in a vortex of "ceding five cities today and ten cities tomorrow".

By the time Jack had almost reaped all the wealth in their hands, they had lost the ability to resist.

By then, we might have to rely on Jack's loan to transform the family business.

Once Jack gets the shares of their family business, they will be the best leeks for life.

(End of this chapter)