I Became a Witch and Started an Industrial Revolution

Chapter 23: When the Old Man and the New Transition

“Put down what you are holding! Put down what you are holding!”

“Don’t point it at me—point it at me again and I’ll kill her!”

The officer inside shouted as if mad, the long sword in his hand pressing against the girl’s neck from time to time; blood had already begun to seep from the place where his hand gripped her throat, running down her torso.

The young sergeant holding the gun said in a low voice, “Put down your weapons and surrender. I guarantee the domain law will give you a fair trial.”

“No! I won’t! I want you to let us leave safely!”

“Me, me, me! And us!”

Release was absolutely impossible, so the situation froze at that moment.

The disheveled girl forced her head up, revealing eyes hidden beneath her tangled hair.

She looked at the sergeant outside the door; he was looking at her too, his eyes full of compassion.

A faint smile barely appeared on her swollen, reddened face; she nodded.

“Bang!”

After a gunshot, a spray of blood burst from the girl’s forehead, and silence fell.

The sergeant lowered his long rifle to hide his trembling arm, and a few words squeezed out between his teeth:

“Everyone — dismount! Don’t kill them outright; fix bayonets.”

“Yes!”

“Understood!”

With a clatter the main force swung down from their horses, drew the 30 cm triangular military bayonets from their belts, fixed them to the muzzles, and strode to kick open the wooden door and rush in.

After a brief burst of gunfire came screams, and the constant ‘ppp’ of blades stabbing flesh.

The old village elder followed into the house in a daze, ignoring the bloody scene around him; he took the still fairly intact clothes from the bed and dressed the girl.

“Little Ni’er, I didn’t hide you well enough — it was my fault,” he said.

The sergeant also stepped in and stood behind the old village elder, looking at the dead girl’s youthful face.

The old village elder turned and glanced at him, saying softly, “Thank you, soldier. Whatever is in my house, you may take it.”

There was no emotion in his eyes — no sorrow, no hatred; the girl’s death had not changed his expression, only indifference and numbness.

That was how the world was: if you lived, you lived; if you died, you were released.

“Sorry, we were late.”

After saying that he walked out.

Two soldiers carried a corpse out in pairs; at the village center they erected wooden posts, tied death knots, and hanged them up.

“All villagers listen: all land is now taken into the Astal territory. From today, each person may cultivate two plots of land tax-free; previous taxes are abolished, all waived.”

“All villagers listen: all land is taken into the Astal territory.....”

Soldiers of the Fourth Division rode their warhorses through the villages, slapping up proclamations and loudly announcing the new policy, each horse dragging more or less a corpse behind it.

They had plundered so much from this land; they must take some flesh in return.

Small detachments of the same scale and the same methods repeated across all the villages of the four domains.

Finally they converged and advanced straight toward the actual landholdings of the noble estate owners who administered the small villages.

At first the domain guards were puzzled when they saw the galloping columns — they did not think these riders were soldiers; after all, they wore no armor and carried no swords or spears.

Only when more and more mounted units gathered did they sense something was wrong; these forces, amassed to greater than a battalion, had begun an assault.

The cavalry charged toward the city with long-barreled muskets, firing at the guards gathered at the gate to intercept them.

Gunshots rang out; the soldiers at the city gate fell one after another, and the gate was breached with ease in a short time.

The noble household retainers who arrived afterward were cut down helplessly under concentrated musket fire.

Then the standardized procedure followed: they found the noble estates, went in to search and seize property, executed on the spot any nobles found guilty or resisting, hung their guilt plaques and displayed them at the manor gates.

They then posted notices throughout the city and announced the new domain policies: land redistributed to individuals, full tax exemption, distribution of grain, and so on.

That earlier offensive campaign against the Astal territory had drawn away most of the forces from the neighboring lordships, so Mitia encountered relatively little resistance when implementing her policies.

Part of this was also because many nobles did not take serious precautions.

Mitia had once been a noble herself, which made them assume both sides belonged to the same class; defeat would at most cost them some money, and their personal safety would remain guaranteed.

Money was the one thing they lacked least.

They thought they could simply extract more from those beneath them.

But that was only what the nobles assumed.

Mitia was the state agent who had opened the era of national collectivism; by nature she was opposed to the noble class.

The old nobility occupied the vast majority of land, industry, commerce, and population; the national-social policies she pushed required precisely those things.

She needed people and resources; the people needed to be fed and clothed.

Industrial advancement allowed her to meet the people’s needs, and then the people became her strength.

So a noble class that did not produce, wasted labor, disrupted markets, and kept private troops — what use were they?

This was an irreconcilable conflict between the new interest class and the old era’s vested interests, destined to end with the complete withdrawal of one side.

If that was the case, it was better to have them contribute a little during their exit — for example, their heads and family property.

She was already merciful enough not to hand that power over to the peasants and slaves whom the nobles had long oppressed.

However, as Mitia’s actions progressed, more and more nobles woke up, fleeing with their families or consolidating and scorched-earthing as they holed up in their castles and stubbornly resisted.

With their resources, even if surrounded by heavy troops and cut off from water and food, they could live comfortably for a long time on their reserves.

Mitia’s strategy was to launch a bounty program for capturing nobles alive: seize a noble and you would receive one percent of his confiscated property, up to a cumulative maximum of ten percent.

That sum was enough to support a family for three generations at least, making many nobles unable to hide and greatly undermining the class stability inside sealed castles, plunging them into chains of suspicion.

Of course, it was not purely strategy: with territorial expansion they acquired more mineral resources.

Titus territory had a medium-sized magic-immune mine, which made the miniaturization of field artillery feasible.

After a while, when they manufactured field guns, those turtle-shell defenses would inevitably be shattered.

The new governing team gradually took over major domains, began merging farmlands, remeasuring land and allotting plots to households, and again promoted the cancellation of onerous taxes and the new tax code.

The Astal territory currently only levied progressive agricultural and commercial taxes.

For commerce, the initial tax threshold was 100 silver coins, taxed at 2% of profit; the more one earned the higher the progressive rate, up to a maximum of 30%.

Agricultural tax was imposed when annual yield exceeded 300 jin per household member; below 300 jin there was no tax.

At 800 jin they taxed 1%; within 1,500 jin they taxed 8%; beyond that it capped at 16%.

Only luxury goods were heavily taxed, starting immediately at 30%.

This tax policy effectively excluded the poor peasant class from taxation — they were all in the tax-exempt category; as long as one didn’t reach the threshold, one would never be taxed.

Of course, renting land still required paying rent, usually ten percent of total output.

If one did not want to pay rent and taxes and wanted full rights to a plot’s produce, then one should enlist.

Enlist, and land would be granted; after discharge from the army the land would remain tax-exempt for twenty years — only that route.

A plot exempt from rent might not seem like much, but if a household had three members serving in the military, three plots of land with full exemption plus twenty years’ rent-free status was a real difference.