You were made to farm, and now you're the emperor of an empire?

Chapter 71 Arrangement
After lunch.

Roman called Jimmy to him.

This was a blond-haired boy who looked even thinner and smaller than Kao, like a girl.

The latter has a well-proportioned, lithe, and agile physique. Although he is also a minor, he already possesses masculine qualities.

Jimmy looked like a refugee, emaciated with his ribs clearly visible, his body severely depleted and clearly not recovered in recent days.

Roman asked, "How's your study progress lately?"

Jimmy was so nervous he couldn't speak.

Should he say yes or no?

Roman casually rested his chin on his hand, a very elegant gesture, and looked at the somewhat flustered little apostle with amusement, then asked, "What number can you count to now?"

The child saw him smile, and heard his magnetic voice that tickled his ears. He relaxed for some reason and whispered, "100."

"Let me hear it."

He then began to whisper, "1, 2, 3..."

Jimmy got a little stuck when he counted to 53, but he quickly overcame it. Roman didn't rush him and patiently waited for him to count to 100.

In his view, 100 numbers were clearly not Jimmy's limit.

How many letters do you know?

"I know them all."

"Where are the words?"

"I know about fifty of them."

Can I write my own name?

Jimmy shook his head.

The reason I know more than fifty words is because Hans and Gehmann only taught me more than fifty simple words.

To ensure the overall teaching progress, the two teachers taught at a very slow pace.

In fact, they had no other choice.

Have them form a circle in an open area, and then begin the lesson.

There were no textbooks; it all depended on verbal explanation. Whether or not they could understand depended on the individual. Facing over three hundred children, they were always hoarse from talking, and they took turns speaking.

They teach only the most basic things.

Sometimes they felt hopeless about the tedious work, but they had to do it under pressure from Roman. They were paid 1.2 gold coins a year and had to keep doing it.

Some learn quickly, some learn slowly.

Jimmy was clearly among the fastest learners.

"How old is this year?"

"My mom says I'm 13 years old."

"Where's your father?"

"Dad is dead."

What do you want to do in the future?

"He herded sheep for the steward. My father drowned along with the sheep while herding them for the steward. My mother said our family owed the steward a sheep..."

The steward lost his sheep but ate mutton; he lost his father but owed the steward a sheep. They both have bright futures.

"Don't go herding sheep anymore, come and work for me."

Jimmy clearly didn't understand Roman's meaning; he seemed dull-witted and lacked emotional intelligence.

He was still thinking about the sheep, hesitated for a moment, and then lowered his head, unsure of what to do, and said, "I will listen to you, my lord."

Roman turned to Seth and said, "Seth, let him follow you from now on, as a junior clerk. He has a good memory, so you can explain more to him. It's okay if he doesn't understand at first; he'll gradually get it."

Seth witnessed the whole thing and had to admit that the little guy in front of him was a promising talent. Not every child can master 100 numbers and letters in three months.

The education system in this era was monopolized because education was expensive, but there was no difference in intelligence; geniuses could emerge from among the common people, and idiots could appear among the nobility.

But the clerk had a much higher status than the ordinary manager.

He strongly opposed the idea that a child should hold such an important position.

"Take him on as a student and teach him well."

Roman explained it very clearly.

Seth solemnly led Jimmy away. He was firmly opposed to the fact that the clerk of Origin Manor was so filthy and lowly, and he was determined to train him into a qualified clerk.

Since Roman said he has a good memory, let's slowly tell him what a qualified clerk should look like, what he should do in the future, and what rights he should have.

……

Next, Roman arranged for all the valuable apostles he had selected to be in their positions—significantly elevating their status.

Let them adapt to the work first and develop their command and management skills.

But Roman had to keep a close eye on their progress, making them come to him every day to report on their work. Roman would then clearly tell them how to do things, lest the apostles he recruited grow up crooked and become another group of outdated stewards.

In that case, Roman's resources would be wasted.

Then came the distribution of those slaves.

The slaves that Daken brought were of poor quality.

There were seventy or eighty sick and weak people among them.

They are not suited for heavy physical labor, nor for road paving, mining, or blacksmithing.

Roman then had them do some light manual labor, or things like cooking in the kitchen, looking after children under five, or leading the pigs and sheep from the livestock shed to graze.

Anyway, Sig Town doesn't support useless people.

Then, he selected the slaves who had stood at the end of the morning and were of good physical fitness and willpower, and let them freely choose to join either the guards or the blacksmiths.

Most of the slaves chose to become guards without prior agreement.

At this point, the number of guards had increased to over sixty, which was still a bit too few. Let's take it slow.

Five more workers were added to the blacksmith shop—the availability of water-powered forging hammers greatly freed up manpower, but it didn't mean that the number of workers could be reduced.

Roman made them work in shifts day and night.

As long as the river flows, the water-powered forging hammer cannot stop for a moment.

Roman did not forge weapons or armor, but instead ordered them to forge various steel farm implements and tools as quickly as possible.

Shovels, pickaxes, and axes are indispensable and significantly improve work efficiency.

The salt mine workers were also replenished, with a total of fifty slaves joining the task of mining rock salt.

The last hundred or so slaves joined the road-paving team.

The improvement in efficiency is immediate.

The construction progress is almost doubling every day.

After Roman meticulously arranged the distribution of slaves, he...

He then hired all the construction workers in Sigge town, who, following Roman's instructions, built simple longhouses to serve as housing for the slaves.

Making them live in shelters all the time will definitely cause problems. They can't keep out the wind and rain, and at least a quarter of the slaves will get sick when it rains.

Three days passed.

Roman arrived at Vickers' carpenter's shed.

Like Lax, Vickers also renovated and expanded the carpentry shop, as the original small workshop could no longer keep up with the production tasks assigned by Roman. Now it is gradually becoming more like a timber processing plant.

Piles of timber were stacked up like mountains, and wood chips and shavings covered the ground, more than ten centimeters thick, which could be used as fertilizer in the future.

Vichi is leading a group of people to make wooden handles for shovels and axes.

Since the advent of the water-powered forging hammer, the output at the blacksmith's shed has increased rapidly, with dozens of sharp shovels and hoes being forged every day.

Compared to blacksmithing, carpentry has a lower barrier to entry, so Vich has many helpers and a lot of work to do.

For example, the cooper makes about ten wooden barrels for Origin Manor every day, but doesn't know what to put in them.

However, a qualified carpenter has yet to appear.

Because Roman had very high standards for carpenters.

They need to be highly skilled so that they can independently manufacture wheels and carriages, various wooden basins, bowls, plates, furniture, and farm tools—in short, be able to do everything on their own.

According to Vickers' prediction, in two more months, his former apprentices and slaves would become real carpenters, and he would receive the gold coins promised by Roman.

"Master Roman, what brings you here?"

Vicki knew that Roman valued blacksmiths more than carpenters.

Therefore, this lord often went to Lax's side and rarely came to his side.

"I've come for the summer harvest!"

(End of this chapter)