Ch.165Economic Criminal (2)

As our dear lord Camille de Alzar had rambled on earlier, currently in this pioneer settlement, all currency circulates in the form of a kind of virtual currency called “ledger currency.”

True to its name, it’s a ledger created with columns for recording the quantities of gold, silver, and copper coins—the three musketeers of currency—next to the names of the villagers. It’s a type of pseudo “virtual currency” consisting of numbers recorded in a ledger kept at the government office.

There are mainly three ways to acquire it: selling goods (primarily grains) to the ledger administrator at the government office, participating as a worker in construction projects led by the village and receiving compensation, or exchanging values between two villagers with mutual consent.

Originally, it was merely a temporary measure born out of necessity because there were too few physical coins to circulate within the village. However, it unexpectedly proved more convenient than anticipated and has now become universally used throughout the entire settlement.

Although some metal coins are still kept and used for external trade purposes, this situation arose because there wasn’t much need for external trade in the first place.

This currency itself is nothing more than a few characters written in ink on a ledger, yet it has managed to secure a proper position as currency in the current village.

Of course, one might wonder why mere characters—with no intrinsic value and easily erasable with a few strokes of a quill pen and “ink-removing” cotton—that even require the inconvenience of visiting the government office and requesting a transfer of ownership from an administrator, are used so widely.

However, there was a perfectly valid reason for this phenomenon that completely contradicted its apparent insignificance: this currency, despite appearances, definitely possessed “material” value.

Specifically, in the sense that it could be used to purchase grain owned by the lord’s representative.

With his K-Confucian mindset that a ruler should never let his people starve, Camille de Alzar sells affordable grain flour at the village level for the welfare of the working class.

This flour is typically measured and sold in portions of about 500g, and these bags of flour serve as the practical medium of exchange within the village.

One bag of mixed grain flour (500g) has a precisely fixed value, and this applies equally whether it’s a bag of wheat flour or flour from any specific grain.

As a result, the most expensive wheat flour is used as high-value currency, while cheaper rye flour serves as low-value currency, enabling a form of barter.

Of course, this system has its drawbacks—purchased grain flour cannot be refunded, and particularly, since the village only buys “grains” whose harvest has been directly verified, converting it back to ledger currency is impossible.

They sell grain flour but buy the actual grains at a slightly higher price, eliminating any possibility of exploitation.

Though it was inherently a stopgap currency system and formed like a patchwork with various makeshift policies applied, it was a monetary system that somehow managed to function, albeit creakily.

…In fact, the original plan was to use grain bags as physical currency, but since they weren’t difficult to counterfeit, the risk of exploitation led to this deformed structure.

Anyway, this is how the current monetary economy—and by extension, the village market—operates. But naturally, where there’s a “system” and “structure,” there are those who try to exploit it.

That is, various swindlers or financial criminals.

For instance, there was this merchant.

One of the many peddlers who frequented the village, he one day obtained information about this “ledger currency” and related policies, and like the average merchant of this era, he came up with a certain idea.

That is, the “idea” of profiting by exploiting this policy.

A seemingly simple transaction structure: buy grain flour sold by the village at less than half the market price, then sell it to other villages for profit.

He was about to demonstrate the pursuit of unlimited capital—the most fundamental reason merchants were socially persecuted in pre-modern times.

Even on Earth, merchants rarely had good reputations in pre-modern societies worldwide, and this was less due to political hostility toward merchants than simply because these fellows committed so many misdeeds.

Excessive hoarding was just the basics for a successful merchant, and it was not uncommon for them to deal in literally anything—moonshine, drugs, smuggled goods, even diverted military supplies—without discrimination.

By modern standards, they would be considered tame if they merely engaged in corporate-level reselling. If necessary, they wouldn’t hesitate to spread disease in remote villages and then appear to sell fake medicine.

Since they themselves knew they lived fleeting lives, most were literal opportunists.

Issues like quality control or establishing regular trade networks were mere jokes to the merchants of this era.

They would supply flour mixed with sand to the army through bribes and perform the miracle of “reviving” rotten meat through a bit of magic (bribery).

It’s not just a simple metaphor—the merchants of this world were truly just swindlers, and anyone from reality would be considered a paragon of conscience by comparison.

Thus, given this historical background, this merchant attempted to recruit a quasi-serf who had been bound to the village for 20 years after originally intending to commit fraud as a peddler… and this recruitment was actually quite successful.

Blinded by momentary gain, the serf joined the merchant’s plan to buy large quantities of grain and then smuggle it out for conversion, but…

Frankly speaking, in a situation where there were documents clearly showing all financial flows in the village, what would one think if a person living alone suddenly started selling mysterious goods to buy grain?

Naturally, the government, realizing this was some kind of scam involving external forces, quickly abducted the farmer, ascertained the facts, and then captured the merchant as well, thus preventing this fraudulent scheme.

The merchant received the punishment common for swindlers in this era: “having his tongue cut out.”

Not only was his tongue cut out by the roots, but he was also sent to the underground prison of Baron Alzar’s domain. As for the farmer who participated in this plan, his mandatory residence period was extended by another 10 years.

His social reputation plummeted, and had the plan been discovered after succeeding, he would have faced hanging—what can one say but that it was inevitable?

Well, losing nearly 20 years of life as the price for violating a “contract” might be considered reaping what one sows.

In addition to these externally-driven swindlers, there were surprisingly many fools with vain desires trying to pull stunts.

For instance, there was one idiot in the pioneer village.

This fool was originally an adventurer-thief who had planned to plunder the village and was now bound by a 20-year mandatory service contract as a kind of quasi-serf.

Naturally, among the terms of his contract was a clause preventing him from harming the village, but this quasi-serf, like a typical human, selectively ignored the disadvantageous parts when perceiving his current situation.

And if one were to try to view the current situation from such a perspective, there would be no guarantee that this serf wouldn’t commit the same crime twice or more.

Therefore, he attempted a very “minor” effort to manipulate the ledger kept in the village, but of course, this ledger was protected by various magical powers, making it impossible for a mere farmer to tamper with.

As a consequence of violating the “contract,” 50 years of his lifespan evaporated. The fact that his remaining lifespan became negative, resulting in instant death, was just an added bonus.

Well, besides these, various incidents occurred within this seemingly flimsy yet surprisingly robust quasi-monetary economy.

There was an incident where an outsider without authority over the ledger currency insisted on his rights until the end, only to learn that in this era, iron fists were closer and stronger than individual property rights.

Cases of people trying to buy ledger currency with cash or, conversely, attempting to exchange ledger currency for cash and being punished.

Even a tragic(?) accident where a troublemaker from another village, who had only heard about cheap grain sales and came without warning, caused a disturbance and ended up disabled after directing verbal abuse at Gretel.

Thus, while this strange monetary system seemed to face crises as various incidents occurred, over time, experience accumulated, leading to the stabilization of the system.

In any case, as the system matured, the village was gradually taking firm root in this land.