MTLNOVEL Chapter 169: Chapter 169: Dany's Kingdom
According to Dany's original plan, she intended to transform the Yunkai Plain into a massive granary, ideally cultivating all 45 million mu of land.
Even with crude sowing methods yielding poor harvests, if each mu produced only 200 jin of wheat and yielded twice a year, the total would reach 9 million tons.
If one person consumed 1,000 jin of grain annually (including meat, eggs, and milk converted into grain equivalents), the Yunkai Plain could sustain 18 million people.
What kind of concept is this?
Dany even doubted whether this world had a population of 50 million.
Anyway, Slaver's Bay had only 1.5 million people. If Her Majesty's "Great Leap Forward" plan could be realized—even for just one year—then when the Long Night arrived, Slaver's Bay, under extreme conditions, could endure for ten years.
Of course, Dany always planned for the worst. The Dothraki had already been marked as "Dragon Queen Exclusive." When the Long Night came, she would have to pull them along.
Well, at least four to five hundred thousand people.
Then there were Volantis and Qarth. The Allied Army was still plotting to slay the dragon, while the true Dragon Queen was already considering helping the people under their rule survive the Long Night.
Such a sense of responsibility!
More critically, according to the calculations of Westerosi maesters, it was late autumn, and winter had already arrived.
Time was running out. The Great Leap Forward had to succeed, or people would die.
Thus, Dany was frantically transferring the new freedmen of Meereen to Yunkai. In two months, 100,000 people had been relocated, and the transfers would continue for the next year.
In her plan, the prosperous Meereen would be left to the Ghiscari and her vassals.
At the same time, she was transferring Yunkai's Ghiscari to Meereen. Astapor and Yunkai were to be given to the new freedmen.
Currently, there was only one Breaker of Chains Earl, but after surviving the Long Night, there would surely be a large number of earls and marquises. These powerful nobles would need fiefdoms.
Dany had planned their fiefdoms to be north and west of Meereen.
Slaver's Bay was a "landlocked lake" embedded in the Essos continent, with land surrounded by mountains on both its eastern and western sides.
Divided by Meereen, the western land contained the two Ghiscari city-states of Yunkai and Astapor.
The eastern side, backed by the Dothraki Sea, held numerous ancient Valyrian city-states that had declined due to the Doom, such as Polash, Tolosi, and Elyria.
In the plan, Yunkai and Astapor on the western side of Slaver's Bay would be royal lands under the Queen's direct control.
Yunkai would abandon the bed-slave trade and be turned into a granary, with the most freeholder farms.
Astapor would first develop its handicraft industry. After one or two hundred years, when the royal population began to swell, the equally vast Worm River Plain would be developed more thoroughly.
The eastern wastelands, with Meereen as their political and economic center, would be assigned to her vassals.
This arrangement was extremely fair, as the wealth of Meereen far surpassed Yunkai and Astapor combined—especially after the Yunkai Plain had been burned.
Meereen's wealth lay not only in its winding, thousand-mile river and the fertile plains along its banks but also in its location. It bordered the Dothraki Sea to the north, Slaver's Bay to the south, and had a river connecting it to Lhazar in the east, making it a crossroads of nine provinces.
It could be said that Meereen was the upper land, Yunkai and Astapor were the middle land, and the ancient cities east of Slaver's Bay were the lower land.
Dany claimed the two adjacent middle lands, while her vassals divided the connected upper and lower lands.
She had subtly hinted at this plan to her commanders, who showed no objection—on the contrary, they were even more motivated. The higher the rank, the closer the fief to Meereen.
Now, let's talk about Dany's Great Leap Forward plan.
Besides Yunkai, Astapor and Meereen were also in full agricultural production mode.
Although large numbers of new freedmen were leaving Meereen, the Ghiscari from Yunkai, captured Ghiscari warriors, convicted slavers, and Yunkai plantation owners were all sent to Meereen.
Together, they numbered nearly 60,000 adult males.
This time, Dany refrained from a mass slaughter. Aside from the Wise Masters of Yunkai, who were directly responsible for the massacre of 50,000 slaves and executed by hanging, the remaining Ghiscari were sentenced to re-education through labor.
The education period wasn't long—three to five years at the shortest, and only ten years at most.
When this sentence was announced, even the free Ghiscari couldn't help but shout, "The Queen is merciful!"
Merciful?
Heh, within two years the Long Night would surely descend, bringing at least five years of perpetual night—a world without sunlight. Even if the Others were defeated, winter would last around eight to ten years.
If 30% of these 50,000 to 60,000 male laborers lived to see the next summer, they would surely cry out, "The Breaker of Chains Earl is merciful!"
Uh, the Breaker of Chains Earl Cleon had gone to Meereen as acting governor.
It was he who led the Ghiscari to seize the pyramids of Meereen and supervised the 60,000 Ghiscari laborers farming on Meereen's estates.
Simply put, Queen Dany embraced the new freedmen of Slaver's Bay with love and smiles, while the Breaker of Chains Earl drove the Ghiscari with roars and whips.
In the end, Queen Dany reaped warehouses full of wheat and rice, along with the love of the entire population.
How could they not love her? With the Breaker of Chains Earl as a contrast, the Ghiscari would realize that Her Majesty the Queen was an angel—a savior.
Hmm, though Count Breaker of Chains has some Ghis blood, his hatred for slave masters and high-class Ghis (nobles, merchants, and landowners) surpasses even that of most foreign slaves under Daenerys.
If not for Daenerys' overwhelming authority, that guy would have probably castrated thousands of young Ghis men by now. During the Queen's council, Cleon repeatedly suggested "an eye for an eye, a cock for a cock," advocating for the complete castration of all Ghis men to turn them into Unsullied.
Later, Daenerys secretly inquired about him from the people of Astapor. Apparently, Cleon was the son of a female slave, born into slavery. It is said that in his youth, Cleon was quite handsome. Allegedly, the Great Masters subjected the young butcher to many unspeakable acts.
In short, after watching the revolutionary plays Daenerys had staged, Count Breaker of Chains was moved to tears every time. He could deeply relate to almost every story.
Sigh, that guy may have poor character—violent and somewhat lecherous, even taking two lovers after being knighted.
But his background is impeccable!
His revolutionary awareness is extremely high, and his resistance against the slave masters and the institution of slavery is exceptionally strong. Moreover, he can perfectly execute what Queen Daenerys wants to do but cannot. Truly, he is a great comrade!
Once the migration is complete, Yunkai will have over half a million people, who will take turns following the Queen to the Great Plains for farming. On average, they will work two days and rest one.
Meanwhile, under the "Queen's Great Leap Forward" plan, Meereen also has 25 million acres of land that need cultivation.
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However, all the newly freed people were summoned to Yunkai by the Queen, leaving the Butcher Count with no choice but to happily exploit the 200,000 or so free Ghis people and nearly 100,000 Ghis convicts—60,000 from Yunkai and another 40,000 to 50,000 sentenced in Meereen.
Aside from Meereen and Yunkai, Daenerys' stronghold—Astapor—also had its own targets under the Great Leap Forward plan: 15 million acres of farmland and 10 million acres of pasture.
It seems like an enormous task, but in reality, it is not too burdensome, as Daenerys had already cultivated 7 million acres in Astapor over the past half-year.
After the battle at Poplar Hill, Daenerys liberated another 70,000 to 80,000 strong slaves. Three days after the war ended, the 30,000 militia recruited from Astapor began returning home, bringing large herds of oxen and packhorses with them.
The newly cultivated 8 million acres will be used for economic crops like flax and cotton for textiles.
Hmm, most of the skilled artisans from Slaver's Bay have been relocated to Astapor—not just weavers, but also blacksmiths, brickmakers, and porcelain craftsmen.
As for the 10 million acres of pasture, Daenerys' khalasar is in charge.
After successively conquering Yunkai and Meereen, her once-small khalasar of barely a hundred members had now swelled into a massive horde of 20,000 riders.
The Queen's Roaring Warriors now numbered close to 4,000—a formidable force even in the Great Grass Sea.
At this rate, even if only 30% of the "Queen's Great Leap Forward" is completed, Slaver's Bay will have no fear of the Long Night.
Hmm, Daenerys is not foolish. Though she planned the Great Leap Forward, she never expected it to be completed in its entirety.
Under the blazing afternoon sun, outside Yunkai, along the field ridges—
"Gulp, gulp..." Daenerys took a large swig of fruit juice from a massive clay jug. Dressed in a slightly bulky training armor, she exhaled in satisfaction and said, "Enough fighting, let's take a break."
Opposite her, Barristan Selmy, dressed in similar gear, removed his helmet, placed his still-unopened blunt sword aside, and picked up a water flask. Drinking the juice, he mumbled, "Your Majesty, your swordsmanship has improved rapidly over the past month! You're on par with Prince Rhaegar at the same age."
Hmm, the highly revered Queen Daenerys shouted the slogan "Winter is Coming, Everyone Must Farm!" every day and led tens of thousands of farmers to the fields at dawn with a hoe in hand.
Yet, she never actually tilled the soil, tossing her hoe aside and focusing solely on training her swordsmanship.
No wonder her combat skills had improved so much lately.
"Heh, don't just flatter me on purpose," Daenerys said cheerfully.
Rhaegar's reputation as one of the "Twin Titans" alongside Arthur Dayne might have been slightly exaggerated, but he was undoubtedly a first-class knight.
"It's true. After nearly a month of battlefield experience, Your Majesty has completely mastered the level of 'wielding the sword as if it were an extension of your body, moving as your heart desires.' You're even beginning to show signs of 'effortless strength.' Plus, you've been growing stronger at a rapid pace—your speed and power have improved by nearly 30% compared to three months ago!"
Barristan took another careful look at Daenerys and noticed that she had grown taller—now reaching nearly 1.7 meters.
Her figure was tall and slender, her shoulders delicately sculpted, her waist gracefully curved, and her limbs long and powerful. Compared to the frailer girl he first met in Qarth, she now had a striking athletic beauty—without any sense of being overly muscular.
Her Majesty's natural talent is incredible. Or rather, the Targaryen bloodline is truly remarkable.
The old knight sighed inwardly.
Daenerys herself could also feel her strength surging over the past few months, growing even faster than during her six months of training in Astapor. She wasn't sure if it was due to her body maturing or the high concentration of magical essence within her.
(End of Chapter)
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