Financial Power

“There’s something we’re overwhelmingly lacking. That is—financial power, and sheer numbers of people.”

“That’s true. In the desert, money hardly circulates in the first place, and there aren’t many chances to use it…”

“So you’re going to make up for that by selling World Tree Fruit?”

“Yeah. And since we’ve all worked together to build this village, I was also thinking that this would be a good opportunity to sell our local specialties in the kingdom, too.”

Simurg-san had said that a single World Tree Fruit could sell for a thousand platinum coins.

If we dried them into dried fruit, they should keep for a while, and we could also ask a water-magic user to freeze them in ice.

Either way, selling them should bring in an outrageous amount of money.

Of course, I didn’t intend to stop at just selling World Tree Fruit.

The dried fruits everyone had made, Element Fruits, peach ointment, even fruit tea.

I planned to sell the fruit that had only ever circulated inside the desert—inside the kingdom itself.

Not to brag, but our fruit was far sweeter and more luxurious than anything that ended up on the plates of ordinary royalty and nobility.

Up until now, our trade with other villages was mainly to spread our name, so we’d been selling at what you might call “friends’ prices.”

But this time, I intended to target the kingdom’s wealthy and sell at a proper, fair price.

I didn’t know what the kingdom’s fruit market looked like, but there was no doubt our goods would fetch a very high price.

Premium fruit branded with Wenti—so good that one taste would make you addicted.

While earning money, I would also put Wenti fruit onto the kingdom’s distribution networks, making people recognize the “Wenti fruit” brand.

And with the profits from that, I planned to solve the other problem—population.

“With the money we make from fruit sales, I’ll have Ran-san… purchase slaves.”

“Slaves…?”

“Slaves, huh…”

Aira and Nadja didn’t look pleased.

Both of them must have complicated feelings about slavery.

For citizens of the kingdom, it was normal to have a bad image of the word “slave.”

Even I had felt uneasy about it many times, even if it had become a familiar part of life.

“For now, I’m planning to buy up war slaves and labor slaves. At this point, we can make most daily necessities in Tree Village and Guinea Village, so I’m going to pour almost all the money we earn into it.”

There were three kinds of slaves: war slaves, labor slaves, and criminal slaves.

War slaves were, as the name implied, slaves taken as prisoners through war.

Recently, the kingdom hadn’t fought any large-scale wars with other nations—at most, minor conflicts—so many war slaves currently circulating in the kingdom were often soldiers of the kingdom who had been enslaved due to conflicts between lords.

Labor slaves were people who couldn’t repay debts, or who, for one reason or another, had fallen into slavery.

Criminal slaves were those who committed crimes and were reduced to slave status as punishment.

For criminal slaves, labor itself was part of the sentence.

But war slaves and labor slaves were essentially bound by a slave contract.

That meant the buyer could free them from slavery, and a slave could also buy their freedom by paying the amount equal to their price.

Those freed from slavery would live as freefolk.

The children of freefolk became commoners, so “freefolk” status wasn’t inherited across generations.

A slave’s child was a slave, but once someone escaped slavery, their children would not become slaves.

Among countries that used slavery, I thought our system was comparatively moderate.

Some countries banned it outright, and compared to those, it was still… well.

“At least for now, slavery is legal. If it’s legal, then there’s no problem with us using it however we want, right?”

“What are you planning to do with the slaves, Woody? It might be a quick way to increase the population, but… slaves lack motivation. It could become a problem later.”

Slaves were basically best thought of as extremely low-wage laborers.

From the perspective of those using slaves, they naturally wanted to keep labor costs as low as possible.

So no matter how hard a slave worked, it rarely reflected in their daily compensation—meaning industries that relied on slave labor often didn’t achieve high productivity.

But I’d already accounted for that.

“It’ll be fine. Because once I buy a bunch of slaves… I’m going to free them right away.”

“You’re going to pay a large amount of money to buy slaves… and then free them?”

Aira looked like she couldn’t believe it.

In the kingdom, where it was common to regard slaves as property—an owner’s assets—it probably seemed strange.

But I wasn’t freeing them out of sentimentality—like obligation, compassion, or pity.

The reason I intended to free them and turn them into freefolk living in Wenti was a rational judgment: it would unquestionably lead to a better outcome, for them and for me.

“Wenti doesn’t need a labor force you can use for free forever after you buy it once. What we need right now are residents who care about this place, who look up to me, and who are motivated to work.”

Just freeing them would earn their gratitude—honestly, from my side, it was nothing but profit.

Free them from slavery, give them food, clothing, and shelter, and let them live properly.

That alone would build Smile Points, and both they and I could end up happy.

“Whatever we do… if we can, I want everyone living in my territory to be happy.”

“…Hehe. Woody-sama, you really haven’t changed.”

“That’s my Woody!”

“He’s my Woody-sama too, you know.”

“—What did you say?!”

While the two of them started bickering again, I decided to eat a peach I took out of the Harvest Bag.

My aptitude was an amazing one—one that held the potential to make everyone happy.

I used to dislike it, but now I felt truly grateful that the aptitude I’d been given was Tree Planting.

Other nobles might call it naive.

But with the power of Tree Planting, if I could, I wanted to share a little happiness with everyone living in the kingdom.

So first, step by step—I had to move forward steadily.