Holy Roman Empire

Chapter 1013: Chapter 27, Different Worlds

The welcome banquet was lively, and though the reception wasn’t of the highest standard, it was practical and generous.

To welcome the two thousand new laborers, Viscount Autres had 50 cattle, 100 sheep, and several chickens slaughtered without hesitation, plus the chefs carefully prepared bread and vegetables.

There was no way around it; there were many mouths to feed. As a good lord, Viscount Autres naturally invited all the common people to join the large feast.

While 50 heads of cattle might seem like a lot, the cattle of 19th-century Africa were all naturally reared and not very large to begin with, and certainly not the genetically modified beef cattle of later generations, so the yield of meat was not particularly high.

A steak per person, and the 50 cattle were quickly consumed. As for the 100 sheep, they were just for making soup; if they had been used for roasting, there clearly wouldn’t have been enough to go around. In comparison, the supply of chicken was much more plentiful.

...

Of course, meat was not considered a luxury in Europe. Especially after the opening up of Austro-Africa, the price of meat products kept plummeting.

With its vast land and sparse population, the African continent provided a solid foundation for the development of livestock farming. Take the lands of Viscount Autres, for example, spanning over 7,000 square kilometers but populated by just over ten thousand people.

Excluding the elderly and children, there were only about five to six thousand able-bodied laborers, and so much land could certainly not be fully cultivated; livestock farming became an attractive alternative.

For aristocratic lords with enough land, the cost of raising cattle and sheep that grew on grass alone was incredibly low. When many people engage in raising livestock, the price naturally drops.

What truly caught everyone’s attention were the white bread rolls on the table – the pure kind, without any additives. To the laborers who were accustomed to dense, dark bread, the impact was staggering.

White bread was naturally available on the European Continent, but because wheat production costs were higher than those of rye, the price of white bread soared correspondingly, making it a status symbol of the wealthy.

For an ordinary welcome banquet, the fact that the lord served exclusively white bread surpassed everyone’s expectations.

Many people gazed at the white bread in front of them, hesitant to touch it for fear that the chefs had made a mistake, serving the wrong kind of food. It was only when they saw that everyone around them was also served white bread that they were certain it was no mistake.

This beautiful misunderstanding added fodder for conversation at the banquet. Such a reaction was only to be expected from newcomers to Africa; those who had stayed longer were no longer surprised.

There was no other reason, the crux of the issue lay in the fact that rye thrived in cold climates, growing well in temperate zones. The African continent was like a blazing furnace, and rye couldn’t survive, no matter how high-yielding the strain.

In contrast, wheat was less demanding of its growing environment, and adapted to a variety of climates, naturally becoming the staple on the dining table.

One could tell from the unlimited supply of chicken that Viscount Autres was a lord with an abundance of food. In fact, over ninety-nine percent of lords across the African continent had encountered issues with surplus food production.

Due to the African Localization Agreement, the African continent could not export its food to Europe to disrupt grain prices, effectively cutting off the export of foodstuffs and halting such ideas.

However, there has never been anyone in this world who died from having too much food production, only those who were starved due to a lack.

The smart Aristocratic Group was not frightened by the surplus of food production. Initially, everyone reduced food production capacity to instead cultivate cash crops.

Later on, it was discovered that the profits from cash crops were highly unstable, with one price this year, another the next, and even the risk of crops rotting in the ground the year after. While the returns could be high, their ability to withstand risks was very weak.

Soon, a new method arose. If grain couldn’t be exported, it didn’t mean that meat products couldn’t be. After all, the goal was to make money, and developing a side business to share the risk wasn’t a bad idea.

Poultry farming became the preferred option due to the short breeding cycle, low barrier to entry, and their ability to consume insects.

The key was in the “eating insects” part. One of the biggest reasons people disliked migrating to Africa, aside from the climate, was the abundance of poisonous insects that were a great nuisance.

It was discovered that after raising chickens and ducks in settlements, the caterpillars that used to be seen everywhere and often crawled into houses suddenly became scarce.

Of course, this alone wasn’t enough to convince everyone to make up their minds. It was the “locust plague” that truly convinced everyone to start breeding chickens and ducks.

Due to the dry climate, many regions of Africa had always been a hotspot for locust plagues. In those days without pesticides, “locust plagues” were the bane of agricultural production, yet chickens and ducks could control the locusts, and with this advantage, they suddenly became everyone’s favorite.

Due to the poor management of some lords, domestic chickens and ducks had strayed into the wild, and by now they were nearly overrunning the place.

The overpopulation wasn’t entirely without benefits; not only were there fewer poisonous insects and the locust disasters were being contained, but the prevalent diseases weren’t as rampant as before.

Of course, whether the decrease in disease was due to the reduction of poisonous insects or the elimination of the viral sources was a topic of much debate within the medical community, with no definitive answer for the time being.

In fact, it wasn’t just chickens and ducks that were overrunning; cattle, sheep, wild boars, and rabbits were also becoming a problem in some regions of the African Continent.

It wasn’t an issue of invasive species, but rather a result of the vast land with sparse population. Additionally, aristocratic lords, in the interest of the safety of the common people, had excessively hunted down predators, disrupting the ecological cycle.

Once anything overruns, it leads to a decrease in profit. As the livestock industry’s sun was setting, someone started up the grain industry.

One by one, small workshops emerged, the most common of which naturally involved refining vegetable oil, brewing, making alcohol and dried meats; the more upscale ones made sugar, starch, seasonings, and so on.

To this day, the local supporting grain processing industry has been almost entirely relocated here. The only problem was that the self-sufficient economic model of the lords restricted the development of these industries.

However, to the parties concerned, these weren’t considered issues. They even scoffed at the external assessments that labeled their economies as “primitive and self-sufficient.”

How else to make money if not this way?

The proliferation of these small workshops was out of necessity. Shiinra occupied over eighty-five percent of the African Continent’s territory, yet had a population of less than sixteen million; one can only imagine the extent of its sparse population.

With so few people, one can’t expect good transportation systems. Although the Vienna Government had built several railways in Africa, these were only main lines and did not cover the vast majority of the nobility’s territories.

There was no railway network nor was the road system well-developed, with the main means of transport being horse-drawn carriages, ox carts, donkey carts, and camels—automobiles were only present in the most developed areas.

For an inland territory like that of Viscount Autres, all large mechanical equipment had to be disassembled into components, transported in, and then reassembled on site.

Under these circumstances, if not for the dispersal of small workshop processing, how could one possibly expect all the grain to be transported together for processing?

As for the development issues of small workshops, they could be considered once the roads were clear. Anyway, thanks to the advantage of abundant land, small workshops would remain competitive for a very long time into the future.

One only had to look at the international market to understand. Thirty percent of Europe’s meat products came from Africa. Alcohol occupied forty-three percent of the market, with beer production leading the world… @@novelbin@@

The original restrictions on grain exports not only did not constrain the economic development of Africa, but on the contrary, they promoted industrial upgrading.

The shift from exporting raw grain to processing in small workshops was a significant step forward. Although humanity had entered the industrial age many years ago, production was still predominantly carried out by small workshops.

The large factory economic model only existed in a few countries. Just “existed,” because until the era of great monopolies arrived, workshops with about a hundred and eighty people were the mainstream.

…

The banquet had ended by evening, and upon returning to the assigned eight-person dormitory, the men greeted each other and went to sleep due to a lack of a common language.

For ease of management, dispatched laborers were allocated in a dispersed fashion, and the eight people in this dormitory each came from different countries.

In this world where “ten miles can change the wind, a hundred miles can change the customs,” even within the same country there are many languages, so it’s natural that workers from eight different countries would not be able to communicate.

Although they had received language education on the way here, talent in language is something you can’t just force.

For the most part, after more than a month of language learning, most have only grasped simple everyday phrases. Some dullards only learned limited vocabulary such as “hello,” “eat,” “sleep,” and “work.”

It’s all right to greet each other, but to engage in deeper conversation in Austrian, probably only the workers from Switzerland and Belgium could manage it, and just barely at that.

But the thing about free communication is that it’s not enough for you to know Austrian, others have to know it as well. Of course, if they know another language that would also work, but if someone knows a foreign language, would they really fall so low as to live in an eight-person dormitory?

You get what you deserve in this cruel world. Even in labor dispatching, there is a clear hierarchy.

Had there been language prodigies, they would have shown their skill during the Austrian language lessons and by now would have been promoted, taking on the role of temporary squad leaders and occasionally moonlighting as translators.

Although the salary hasn’t increased, the living conditions have, moving from an eight-person dormitory to a four-person one, which is a small privilege in itself.

Suddenly arriving in a strange new world, anyone in their right mind would feel uneasy deep down. The lively welcome party only served to temporarily ease the anxiety among the people.

Despite Viscount Autres trying his best to be approachable, the aura from years in a high position still made everyone tense.

Becoming close was even more impossible.

“Monsters do not frolic with shrimps and minnows; mythical birds do not swim with common sparrows.”

Viscount Autres could be approachable, but the people couldn’t afford to overstep their bounds. Don’t think that just because there are many recruits, there aren’t any thresholds for admission.

In fact, to be selected for this place, you had to be someone who has been battered by society and accepted the realities of life. Rebellious and self-important folk were turned away early on.

As an ordinary person, Ya Mani, living in an eight-person room, suffered from insomnia that night.

Even though Viscount Autres seemed kind, like a benevolent Lord; based on previous workplace experiences, the kinder the leader appears to be, the more ferocious the underlings managing them usually are.

Thinking about all the difficulties he might face in the future, Ya Mani found it hard to sleep. His mind uncontrollably conjured images of being bullied and the ways he might deal with them.

There was no choice – earning money was tough.

With the economic crisis wreaking havoc back home, and having to support his family, he had to keep this relatively well-paying job.

Moreover, now that he was here, in this utterly unfamiliar place, even if he wanted to leave, Ya Mani wouldn’t know where to go.

The officials in charge of labor export back home had bid them goodbye as soon as they were on the ship. The so-called joint management by government officials from various countries was highly unlikely to happen.

From the moment they left their homeland, they had become rootless drifters. If they lost their jobs, they wouldn’t even know what they would eat for their next meal.

…

The next day was sunny, a perfect day for hard work. Ya Mani, with dark circles under his eyes, naturally joined the labor force.

Wanting to “rest”? No problem. However, according to the contract, the salary would start being calculated from the day you commence work.

From the time of departure from their country until now, nearly two months had passed. Apart from resting for a week upon reaching the African Continent, the rest of the time was spent traveling by ship, train, automobile, and horse-drawn carriage, which everyone had experienced thoroughly.

Despite being physically and mentally exhausted, the pressures of life left them with no choice. As foreign laborers, after arriving at their destination, they had to bear all expenses, including earning their daily living costs.

Most people were penniless and had to go to work to get their meal, or they would soon be starving.

No need for anyone to spur them on, they all got up early, waiting for work assignments, fearing they would miss out and delay a day’s work.

Ya Mani admitted he wasn’t that devoted to work, getting up early to queue and fearing tardiness was one aspect, but more importantly, he feared missing breakfast.

Only those who have suffered hunger understand the value of three meals a day. Despite being an industrial era, in reality, two-thirds of the world’s population cannot eat their fill.

Even in economically advanced Europe, many people still can only manage to eat twice a day. Especially after the onset of the economic crisis, hunger became a common phenomenon in the lower classes.

A loaf of bread, a cup of milk, an egg, a few lettuce leaves, and jam, made up the lavish breakfast for people like Ya Mani.

On the European Continent, what only middle-class families could enjoy each day had become a mere work meal here.

Severely lacking in labor, Viscount Autres, who could have been a mayor, had the misfortune of becoming simply a town mayor.

All the food was locally produced, green food without any fertilizers or pesticides, even the seeds were kept for themselves, and with a production model of broad acreage and sparse yield, the input costs weren’t high.

To curry favor, Viscount Autres naturally didn’t scrimp on the food. Many European laborers chose to stay in Africa, and one of the main reasons was the good quality of the meals.

It was very apparent in the satisfied expressions on everyone’s faces that people were indeed very pleased with the breakfast.

At least, the European capitalists wouldn’t be willing to provide common workers with such generous “free” breakfasts.

The work was simple; apart from a few skilled workers taken aside for different tasks, all the laborers, including Ya Mani, had the same job: road construction and digging ditches.

What was different here was that everyone’s workload was fixed.

Groups of sixteen were formed, with a group leader elected for each. Management staff divided the work segments, and each group drew lots to determine their work segment, all done openly, whether you ended up luckier or unluckier depended on if God was smiling on you.

The working hours still followed the age-old “work from sunrise to sunset.”

Pay was determined by the work completed; if you didn’t want to earn your salary, you were free to do as you please. If someone demonstrated poor conduct, with three-quarters of the group members voting, they could report it to the management to request removing the person from the group.

Those removed would be put into separate groups, and if they still performed poorly – they would be dismissed.

Hearing the word “dismissed,” Ya Mani felt a chill. This was the African Continent, and being dismissed was more than just losing a job.

Even though there was a severe shortage of labor in the region, once you were dismissed by the Lord’s mansion, you couldn’t hope to find work in the town again. As for leaving, you’d first need to ensure you had the travel expenses.

Starting trouble was out of the question; the town might be small, but it had everything needed.

Viscount Autres took on several roles, including town mayor, judge, chief of police, and head of the militia. In short, he had the final word on everything in his territory.