The matter came to an end, and then Lance redirected the topic back to the drought mentioned earlier.

After all, there is such a task lying in his mission menu.

【Task】Drought in Gulu Ridge (not completed)

Mission description: Your territory is suffering from the ongoing impact of drought, which will sharply reduce the grain output in your territory. Try to mobilize nearby water sources to solve this problem.

Mission time limit: two months.

Lance looked at it and left Lance with plenty of time for this task, unlike the first two times that were instant, and now he is idle anyway, so he began to ask the squire present if he had any good suggestions on water diversion.

The headless corpse on the ground was not cold, and no one had forgotten it. Lance just now had swear to accuse Kelsu of telling lies before killing him. But now Lance turned against him faster than reading the book, so he turned around and forgot about this matter. He actually talked to everyone seriously about how to cure the drought.

But who has the courage to expose it? Lance's horror has been deeply imprinted in each of their brains with this meeting. It is estimated that it will take a long time. Lance doesn't need to worry that these local rich people will stumbling on themselves secretly.

Of course, Lance actually knew in his heart that violent suppression and intimidation could only play a temporary role in suppression, but he could not convince the public. If he wanted these gentry to do it sincerely with him, it would not work without showing some real results.

He felt that this drought could actually be an opportunity to accumulate reputation, whether it is the gentry group in Guruling or the civilian group.

If you look at the public opinion index in the Demon Lord system, you will know that civilians (43/100), squire (21/100) [Fear], the people of Guruling do not trust the newly appointed county magistrate, especially the series of thunder strikes on the squire group after Lance took office. Although it has increased the public opinion of the civilian group in some ways, from 30 points at the beginning to 40, and then to 43 points now, the squire group directly plummeted to 21 points.

It should be noted that after the public opinion level is less than 30, the order issued by the lord will be negatively responded by the group personnel, which means that the completion level will be reduced. When the public opinion level falls below 20, the order may be ignored, and even more serious riots will occur.

However, there is a label of [Fear] behind the squire group. When the label exists, it can be immune to the two effects of negative response and ignoring the order, and even briefly improve the effect of completion. However, [Fear] is a complete double-edged sword, because if this label is not removed or the public opinion itself is increased, the public opinion will continue to decline and eventually develop into two possibilities: [Hate] or riots.

From the perspective of Lance, he did not kill these troubled guys directly, but chose Huairou because he knew that the squire still had its own value.

This is not complicated. The reason is that Lance himself represents the ruling class of the abyss nobles. He needs absolute obedience from the people and the prosperity of the territory. However, no matter how the territory he established will develop and change in the future, one thing will not change, that is, Lance's control over his own territory.

But after all, a person's energy is limited, and Lance cannot take on everything alone. He needs someone with the ability to share the remaining work for him and fulfill his expectations - it is obvious that these squires are now the younger brothers that Lance has set. Of course, Lance can also select a group of capable assistants from the people to promote them, but it is found that training takes time. When those ignorant civilians are ready to use, I wonder if Lance is exhausted.

This is why Lance stayed with Mosen and others and actively won over.

Now it seems that although the starting point of these squires is indeed a bit low, at least they control the capital to make Guruling work normally. With their help, Lance will be more at ease. What's more, Lance is going to build his own team. If the Lord's Fort force a nobleman to come to him, Lance might kill the person the night the other party arrives. Who knows if this is another spy sent by the boss or the second brother?

So after an indiscriminate beat, Lance will start to change his strategy and win over the hearts of the people.

The most obvious thing is that Lance didn't lie lazily on the bed like he had just now. He finally got off from it and sat upright, although his eyes still looked like he felt troublesome.

"Anyway, let's discuss it for a moment and come up with an idea. If the grain output is greatly reduced and the tax rate is also reduced, I will have a headache. Isn't this just a joke for my father and two brothers?" With the excuse that seems real and fake, Lance scratched his slightly sleepy hair: "They will definitely say, Ah, Lance is such a useless guy, and even this little thing can't be handled...then I will be very angry, and if I get angry, something bad will happen."

Everyone present had a slight heart in their hearts again.

Hey, why do you say again...

"Hahaha, don't be so nervous, I'm just kidding." Lance shook his hand and laughed, but his eyes didn't smile, which made it even more terrifying: "Everyone expresses his opinions and tell me what to do when it comes to this matter."

Of course, no one dared to treat Lance's words as a joke. Even Mosen, who had already surrendered, could not understand the meaning of the young county magistrate, but one thing he was as sure as everyone else, that is, if this matter was not done properly, someone would definitely be in trouble.

Everyone present worked hard to start their decayed brains, but in fact, there was not much tricky thing to deal with this matter. They were nothing more than just storing water in drought and flooding and diversion from other places with sufficient water sources.

In the abyss land, drought is actually a common and wide-area thing. In this land, most areas lack water sources and the land is dry, so the survival of crops has always been a problem. It is far from the only place that has troubled Guruling. Because the land is barren, the demons are very vicious about the fertile land on the surface, and the war with the ground races has never stopped since they come into contact with each other.

However, this is obviously not the focus we need to pay attention to at this moment, but just a little extension.

With this foundation, the atmosphere finally became more lively, and the topic finally returned to the main topic.

"Mr., as far as I know, there are two places with sufficient water sources near Gulu Ridge, one is the nearby Shulin Lake and the other is the reservoir in the mountains." The speaker was Lorma, a lower-ranking gentry class. After coughing gently, the man from the Ghost Tooth tribe continued: "But drinking water from these two places will cause a lot of trouble."

"What trouble?" Lance asked.

"I won't say much about the forest. It's a place where wild animals entrench. Entering the forest is an extremely dangerous thing, not to mention that the construction period is still long..." Seeing Lance's thoughtful look, everyone remembered that this guy is not a merciful person. He quickly added a little more so that he could completely dispel the idea of ​​diverting water from the forest: "And the lakes in the forest are scattered far away. It's okay to rely on the lake water alone in the short term, but it will definitely not be enough to water the fields in the long term."

Because there is loss in this process.

Hearing this, Lance nodded and asked again: "What about the other side of the mountain road?"

Several people looked at each other. In fact, Kelsu had mentioned this question before, but out of taboo, everyone present consciously ignored the name of the headless corpse lying on the ground: "Sir, the terrain of our Guru Ridge is low and the surrounding mountains are stretched, so there are multiple naturally formed reservoirs among the mountains..."

When Lance heard this, he thought to himself that this is not a natural water diversion site?

But he knew that things were not that simple. Sure enough, he heard Mosen sigh and said, "But what should I say? First of all, if I have to get water from the mountain road, the engineering is a big problem. Moreover, if I don't operate well, it may cause mountain torrents, and it may even flood the fields and houses."

This way, it is not possible to finish just by killing a few people.

Lance couldn't help but remain silent.

It has to be stated here that compared with the surface world, the technology and production of the abyss world remain in a relatively primitive state. However, for this world that advocates power and the law of the weak, using external forces to achieve its goals will be regarded as a symbol of the weak. Although the ground races including humans, elves, and dwarves have proved the power of their technological innovation and strategy in the war with the abyss demons again and again, in the eyes of most people in the abyss, they are still stubbornly sticking to their old ways.

"If this project can be carried out in construction, is there anyone able to design drawings for the water diversion channel?" Lance suddenly thought of something and turned his head and asked again.

Everyone thought Lance had given up because anyone could know that this was an extremely dangerous and hopeless proposal, but unexpectedly, Lance refused to give up and said this.

The gentry couldn't help but look at each other, some worried and fearful. Some of them wanted to persuade them, but when they thought of the temper of the newly appointed county magistrate, this one might irritate themselves, and that wouldn't be done.

The gentry had no choice but to slander the anger on the dead.

They are all you damn Kelsu. You have nothing to say about drought. Now that I have lost my life, it also makes the rest of them feel uncomfortable.

According to the gentry's idea, if the drought can be improved, they will be willing to make more food, so that they can work more and make more profits - after all, this matter is linked to their actual interests.

In fact, Lance has always misunderstood one thing, or that he was misled by Sir Raven.

After he arrived at Guruling, Sir Leiwen told him that the taxes in Guruling were collected by the four great masters, and the information itself actually contained Sir Leiwen's small abacus. At that time, he thought that Lance took over the territory and wanted to take over the tax collection rights originally attached to the gentry, so he said this on purpose.

But what is the actual situation?

Taking Gululing as an example, in fact, most of the ridges do not have their own arable land, such as the Layla family, but her father still works in the fields without any storm and rain, which is not for themselves, but for the landlords to earn food for the whole family.

From this perspective, the person who owns real estate is the one who is actually taxed, and the one who owns the most real estate in Guruling does not need to use his brain to know that it is the group of squires at the moment, so Lance actually didn't figure it out. He thought he was doing things for the common people, but in fact, no matter what the result was, the direct beneficiaries were the squires in front of him.

However, even if Lance knew this, he would not change his mind. However, this incident finally laid the groundwork for Lance's tax rate reform later. However, the incident is still a bit far from happening, so I will look back to the present.

When Lance was unhappy about the fact that this group of trash can't make a decent suggestion, Comrade Goul, who had been in a state of dizziness, raised his head carefully - he had not completely recovered from his fright: "Well, the county magistrate, if I were to build such things, I would have a good candidate."

Lance couldn't help but be overjoyed.
Chapter completed!