Ch.174Forced Labor (2)

*Hiss… Hissss…*

“…Ugh?!”

The prisoner, who had been pushing water with a wooden paddle in a large puddle reaching up to his ankles, involuntarily bends over from a sudden stinging pain.

His feet—the entire skin of his feet—hurt terribly.

It feels as if he’s being pickled in salt while still alive.

Well, that’s not entirely wrong, come to think of it.

“Huk… Huuuk…!”

“What’s happening?!”

“Ah… I think he cut himself on a fragment!”

“Tch, get out of there for now!”

“Come on, let’s go.”

A fellow prisoner shouts to the supervisor in the distance to report my situation, then supports me as he drags me out of the water puddle.

Blood gushes from the wound with no sign of stopping, spreading into the puddle. Unlike ordinary water, this sticky, glistening liquid transforms the blood flowing from the prisoner’s feet into a grotesque form.

“Wow, that looks pretty bad. Let me see…”

The supervisor removes the prisoner’s shoe, which is covered in sticky blood.

The shoe is filled with water and not serving its purpose, but no one here seems to care about that.

After all, these shoes exist not so much to keep water out as to protect against stone fragments and salt crystals.

“Ugh… disgusting.”

The prisoner’s foot, which had been soaking in supersaturated salt water, is revealed.

Since it’s salt water rather than fresh water, the prisoner’s foot is so shriveled that even the supervisor can barely look at it directly. The skin has been so waterlogged that it’s completely bleached white.

“Stone fragments… and look, there’s salt too, quite a lot. Tch, can’t believe there’s a hole in the shoe.”

Salt water can make even the toughest and thickest skin on the human body—the sole of the foot—extremely vulnerable, and worse, through osmosis, it tears open wounds and draws out bodily fluids, causing excruciating pain.

The combination of salt water-weakened skin and sharp fragments creates an incredibly grotesque scene.

“What should we do?”

“What else? If he goes back into the salt flat in this condition, he’ll ruin all the salt. He’ll have to stay out until the wound heals.”

“Thank… you…”

The prisoner expresses gratitude for the supervisor’s merciful words.

Escaping this place is truly equivalent to escaping hell.

‘I want to get away from this terrible salt field as soon as possible…’

A few months ago, Claude, wanting to utilize criminals’ labor without dangerous tools, thought of salt flats.

Since the tools weren’t dangerous, there was less chance of prisoners causing accidents like with treadmills, and they could produce useful salt. Claude created numerous salt flats for prisoners to work in and distributed them, even specifying that salt flats were the king’s monopoly to block interference from vassals.

Of course, facilities run solely by prisoners would struggle to function properly, so all salt flats basically use the original workers as a base and utilize prisoners as supplements.

If the workers are the core muscles like the spine, pelvis, and abdomen, the prisoners are like artificial arms and legs that can be easily replaced.

“Shouldn’t we give the prisoners leather shoes too?”

“Hmm… no. Too expensive.”

“I suppose so…”

Good equipment is primarily given to the regular workers.

That’s only natural. Otherwise, all the workers would run away.

No matter how much tedious work and simple tasks are passed on to prisoners, salt flats are still salt flats—extremely labor-intensive work.

……….

Hmm… is this right?

I’ve introduced crop rotation and developed fertilizers, but this is still the medieval era. Compared to the future with its magical innovations—genetically modified super-wheat that produces insane amounts of grain, machines that plow, sow, and harvest just by passing by, or fertilizers made from air—it’s extremely poor.

This means that, from a general perspective, I should focus more on agriculture to feed people rather than industry. It’s no coincidence that the vast majority of the world’s population worked in farming until the Industrial Revolution.

‘Looking at it now, I’ve really stirred things up…’

Considering what I’ve done so far, I must have caused quite a commotion on the ground.

All my policies have distracted farmers from their work.

Most farmers, with restricted freedom of movement, are still tied to the land and continue farming, but if things continue this way, it’s clear that something will eventually explode.

The farmers’ families are the problem.

In a traditional rural family, daughters would be married off and sons would all take up farming tools to work the land. But recently, rural families aren’t following this pattern. Farmers are often sending one or two children to the city without much thought.

Of course, if these surplus workers could be properly utilized, the problem wouldn’t grow… but most of them end up breaking the law and going straight to prison.

‘Should I weaken the laws a bit…?’

While the frequency of serious crimes remains similar to before, the frequency of common crimes has greatly increased.

This is the result of my enacting various laws.

If I don’t establish detailed laws, the common people—raised in what I, as a modern person, consider the harsh medieval environment—commit terribly inappropriate acts.

Defecating near city streets or wells, selling spoiled food, stealing, resolving conflicts with violence, kidnapping women—these are just a few examples that come to mind.

What’s more troubling is that they don’t do these things deliberately as acts of deviance. They don’t even realize they’re doing something wrong.

‘…No, laws must exist.’

So I can’t relax the laws.

To instill the awareness that certain actions shouldn’t be done, establishing laws to prohibit them is the fastest method, regardless of era or background.

Of course, it’s the fastest method, not necessarily the best like cultivating civic consciousness through education… but how can I explain things one by one to people who don’t even realize they’re doing something wrong? And to hundreds of thousands of adults at that?

It’s not that medieval people are particularly uncivilized; it’s just an unfortunate situation created by the limitations of the era and education… but I need to judge based on results, not causes. Besides, I’m already providing education.

Since I can’t relax the laws, I’d at least like to reduce the number of criminals going to prison, but another problem arises here.

Serious criminals who commit robbery, murder, rape, or assault obviously can’t be released, and I’d like to let those who commit moderate crimes work in society instead of prison and pay their penalties with fines. But if such criminals don’t pay their fines and run away, it would be a disaster.

Due to administrative limitations, we can’t track down escaped criminals, and it would be a great dishonor to me as someone trying to implement the rule of law.

I can’t relax the laws, and I can’t release them without detention, so all that’s left is to maintain the status quo.

“Sigh… I don’t know.”

Even with people leaving rural areas, agricultural land isn’t being left idle, and we’re still producing enough food to export. Plus, many prisoners can be put to work, so it’s manageable.

Just by not letting people starve and feeding them well, I deserve to be called a wise ruler. I’m even making various industrial products to make life easier. There are some questionable aspects, but I should just continue this way.

Wow, looking at it like this, maybe I’ll be recorded as a wise king, or even a great king in the future?

……….

“What’s this…?”

“Your job. Since you can’t enter the salt flat, you need to do something else, right?”

The prisoner, whose foot skin has been completely stripped due to the combined work of high-concentration salt water and stone fragments, looks at the huge mountain of salt placed before him after receiving basic first aid.

It’s not pink like the salt he’s seen in society. It’s snow-white.

The taste is completely different too. Rock salt is very sweet and salty, but this white salt, despite its clean appearance, tastes terrible.

He’s tasted a bit before—it starts with a mud-like flavor and ends with an intensely bitter taste, making it completely inedible.

He’s heard that it needs special processing to be fit for human consumption… but well, he’s never tasted the processed version.

“What, does it hurt?”

“Yes… it still hurts.”

“But your legs are what hurt, and this job doesn’t require using your legs.”

Modern prison guards generally use polite speech with prisoners, but here, such politeness is nonexistent. No, respect itself is absent.

Prisoners know this very well, so they don’t particularly bristle when guards speak down to them.

“How would a prisoner eat if he doesn’t work? Do you want to feed a prisoner who doesn’t work?”

“Well… that’s true.”

‘…Disrespectful bastard.’

Of course, while they don’t show their irritation, they can’t help feeling angry inside, being human.

There’s nothing to gain from getting on a guard’s bad side.

“You need to fill these sacks with the salt brought in by cart. All sacks are the same size, so you don’t need to adjust the amount carefully.”

“…Yes, I understand.”

“Good. Hey! This one’s got a bad leg, so let him sit here and fill sacks!”

The prisoner watches emotionlessly as the guard shouts to a worker.

…Tch, I thought I could rest today because of my injury, but not even an hour has passed and I’m back to labor… I feel like a slave.

“Haaah…”

‘Thirty days left, was it?’

The reason His Majesty creates such strict and demanding laws is… probably to bring innocent people like me to labor camps and work us like slaves.

I wouldn’t say this to others, but His Majesty—no, the king—is truly a money-obsessed miser.