Many days ago, a large army passed by Qichun Society.

During the stay here, I was completely unlucky and I would also send some sugar cubes to the children of the village. Before leaving, some soldiers named "Engineers" helped the village to dig a drainage canal.

The people in the village are both familiar and unfamiliar with this army.

It is strange because there has never been such an army stationed here.

It is familiar because some men and women in witch costumes in this army have come here, giving them some seeds of food and teaching them some herbs for curing diseases.

This kind of witch costume is the costume of the Mohist doctor and priest, and it combines the sacrificial costumes of the people of Huaiyi and Chu, which are easy to identify.

There are many witches in the Chu State, and many of them are doctors in the village community. The more backward the place, the more women's status is slightly higher, because this is a remnant of the long-standing era.

When the army left, the people in the village were quite uneasy.

Because this army is a very good person, although the language is not clear and only a few people can communicate with them, their attitude is kind.

It was also because many young and strong people in their villages were recruited to participate in the battle, and the target of the battle was the army that passed here not long ago.

This army is very good and good; but the target of the battle is the relatives of their own villages. In this way, I feel quite uneasy, hoping that victory can live a good life like the songs sung by those who can communicate with them in the army; and I am also worried that my relatives will die on the battlefield.

The sun and the moon are not known in the village. Outside the village, it is more than 20 days after the rebellion in the Zhucheng City, and the people from the village are worshiping and praying for blessings in front of the club.

The society is the land god, the original place for sacrifices in various villages and communities.

Such blessings are not done casually.

After the Qin State reform, the Qin King fell ill. Some people from the village community bought a cow and killed it as a sacrifice to pray for the Qin King. However, at that time, the Qin State had reformed the country, and the village community sacrifices must be followed in accordance with the Basic Law and cannot be sacrificed casually.

So the King of Qin said: They violated the law, although their original intention was to love me. But I cannot punish them because I love me, because they may not love me in the future, so they have to rely on power and law. This is the long-lasting thing. Regardless of whether they love me or not, they will abide by it. So they punished the village community with two sets of leather armor according to the law.

However, the State of Chu was still far from reform at this time. Even if the previous King of Chu changed the reform, it would be just the places near the capital and could not effectively manage it here.

Men, women, young and old in the village gathered here. Instead of following the season, they slaughtered a dog and prayed for blessings under the leadership of the village elders.

I pray that the young people in the village should not die in battle; and that the wonderful world that the strange army and those whom they trusted in witch costumes can be realized.

Halfway through the sacrifice, someone suddenly shouted: "They are back!"

The extremely surprised shouts alarmed everyone in the village. Looking along, they saw more than a hundred people walking towards this side, which were the people who went on a war in their village.

Next to the people who went to the village to fight, there were seven or eight people carrying muskets. They recognized them. Although they did not recognize them twenty years ago, muskets have gradually become equipment that military personnel need to practice over the years. Of course, they would not be too surprised.

Those who carried muskets were obviously from the army they had passed by before, and their special military uniforms were obvious.

I only saw someone in the crowd saying something to those who went on the village to fight, and then everyone dispersed.

The sacrificial sacrifices that were originally underway will no longer continue, anyway, that dog can eat them at night.

The family who came back was very happy, and the family was crying without coming back. This was the most obvious thing.

Those who did not come back also included the master of the fief and the slaves around the master. I don’t know if they were dead or what happened.

In the open space of the community, a woman stroked her husband's arm wrapped in white cloth and asked, "What's wrong with your hand? The king raised his troops, was he defeated or won?"

The man with white cloth wrapped around his arms had a strange expression. He said for a long time: "There will be no king in the future."

Although the village and community are closed, people are not fools. They can still distinguish between the difference between the king and the change of the king.

When everyone heard this, they were not too surprised. The king was far away from them. Besides, changing one today and another tomorrow would be far less than the master on the fiefdom.

But where did the king go up? Why did he disappear? Is he dead? Or what?

The soldiers who came back said, "Twenty days ago, we retreated with the army, retreated to a place and were surrounded. The soldiers of the Mo family rode on horseback, but the gentlemen rushed for a while but did not break away. I heard that Zhucheng was captured and there was no place to retreat."

"In the evening, the opposite side sang songs, all of which were sung in Chu language, and they all understood."

"Some people sing, some people preached by Dasheng, saying that the retreat was cut off and the King of Chu would be defeated. They also said that they would give land to the people of the people and ban the labor service of public land..."

"As soon as the singing sounded, we discussed escaping. We hid in the woods before dark, thinking about going to the opposite military camp the next day."

"I went to the Mo family's military camp, and had food and drink, and we gathered together according to the village. As a result, I soon heard that the king surrendered."

"We listened to the preaching in the camp for a few days, listened to some meals, and selected some strong people, so we could come back."

A great battle seemed ordinary in the eyes of these soldiers who fled that day. There were many people who fled that night, and in fact there were no large-scale battles at all.

After hearing this, everyone did not care where the king went, but cared about words like "giving land and banning labor service in public fields", and asked in surprise: "But it is true?"

The soldiers pointed to the mourners who followed behind and said, "Really, that's what they said. They said they wanted to divide the fiefs of gentlemen."

The old man from the village asked in confusion: "Those people are not men? After dividing the land of gentlemen, what should those people eat? Didn't you hear it wrong, but you're re-entrusting the fief to others?"

This has always been the case. The Central Plains region implemented the acre tax system decades earlier, but this system was only implemented in some places where reforms and reforms in Jianghan.

Originally, they were all working with stones and bronze. The production tools were placed here, and it was impossible to impose physical land tax, so they could only choose to exploit labor rent.

This is a simple cost issue. Under the feudal system, the backward productivity level is not possible without enough grassroots officials to effectively collect in-kind taxes.

It is better to directly distribute the land population to nobles of all sizes and adopt the public land labor system.

All ethnic groups had primitive village and community eras. The remnants of clan villages were the public ownership of land. This remnants combined with the feudal system can easily form a labor-service land rent system.

Si Shang has now begun to collect monetary tax rather than physical rent; some cities and vassal states in the Central Plains have also begun to collect physical rent and cloth tax, while more remote areas are still implementing labor rent.

Labor rent has many disadvantages, but it is the most suitable under the productivity level in remote areas of Chu.

The biggest disadvantage is the issue of escape. After the official business, one dares to manage private affairs, work in public and land, and recruitment of the lords are all free of charge and are better than one's own land. In this way, one will choose to escape.

In other words, the farmer has no iron tools or muskets in his hands. Even if there are large wastelands, there are too many wolves, insects, tigers and leopards and need to eat salt, which makes the cost of escape too high.

Under such circumstances, the villagers immediately became excited after hearing the news that they had exempted public land from labor, re-divided land, and granted land.

Yitian has always been a tradition. All the land under the world is the king's land. The land is not the farmers', and the farmers only have the right to use it.

Moreover, due to the backward cultivation technology, the land must be properly fallow. The tradition of villages and communities is to redistribute the land every few years, but it does not include the land that a gentleman can use.

If everyone is not surprised when the matter of dividing the land is not surprised, the rest will be much simpler.

"Did you hear what the difference?"

The people from the village community asked repeatedly, and the soldiers who returned from the village community said, "I heard that. I will measure the fields and fields together, and divide them into fields above and below, one field, three fields, etc.."

"After dividing the cultivated fields evenly, add a portion of the deserted fields, each household with a hundred acres."

"After seven years, you can buy and sell. Within four years, you will only collect the tax on land reclamation, and one for ten. After four years, you will collect the tax on land reclamation and deserted fields."

"A man will serve on the 17th, without military service, only three years. He will be exempted from service for three years. If he is ordered to be recruited, he will pay money every day. Those who do not work will be reclaimed."

Just talking about this, the people in the village no longer believe it.

The tax is not high, the tithes, and only the existing tax on reclaimed land within four years is collected. Compared with the various labors in the past, it is really in heaven and earth.

What they didn't believe the most was that they only needed to serve for three years after the seventeenth year, regardless of military service, which was simply unimaginable.

This has been happening since ancient times and people have long been used to it. However, it is the most scary thing to do with it.

Today we will fight and serve; tomorrow we will build the city and serve... All these, coupled with the labor of working for the land owner, make the village and community unable to bear it.

If you can really be exempted from service after serving for three years, it would be a benevolent and righteous policy.

I don’t know whether this matter is true or not, but the land of the fief’s owner is there. You only need to see whether the land is divided or not.
Chapter completed!