Chapter 698: Chapter 432 Surveillance
The No Flower Plant’s bloom, transforming the White Flower Sea, lasted a total of three days, and so did the entire celebration across the Tilaimei Plain.
Colin lifted the Grain Decree and took the opportunity to designate these few days each year as the White Flower Sea Festival.
Royalty from various countries took the lead in distributing porridge and grain to the people, and the small vendors who had disappeared from the streets returned.
Children laughed and ran through the streets, their slightly pale faces also flushed with joy, the elderly no longer looked worried and sorrowful, their dry, wrinkled cheeks relaxed and their eyes filled with hope for the future.
After this, the White Flower Sea Festival, just before the autumn planting season, became the grandest annual festival on the Tilaimei Plain.
As for Colin, he had not been idle during these three days.
Before the restoration of the farmland, he had gathered approximately seventy percent of the serfs on the Tilaimei Plain; the farmland was slightly less, but he also reached about sixty percent.
And he basically obtained these farmlands without spending a penny—the nobles who left the Tilaimei Plain had essentially voluntarily given up their original farms.
The legal regulations regarding this in the nations of the Tilaimei Plain were not clear; the abandoned farmlands were theoretically unclaimed, usually to be annexed by the nearby nobles, but only if no higher-ranking noble intervened.
Thus, with Colin’s announcement, those farmlands naturally all fell into his hands.
Furthermore, at the same time, he also had Lillian offer extremely low prices to try to purchase farmland from those nobles.
However, perhaps the prices were not high enough, or maybe the Tilaimei Plain nobility had an obsession with land, so the purchase results were not ideal.
Even so, the amount of land he now controlled could be said to be unprecedented.
Even the Roon Family, at its peak, could not compare to him!
In fact, the farmland and serfs held by the Royal Families of various countries combined might not surpass the number Colin now controlled.
Although it might not be nice to say, it was indeed thanks to the farmland contamination that Colin effortlessly plundered most of the wealth from the stubborn old nobility of the plain!
He could now fully claim to be the number one landowner across the entire Tilaimei Plain!
On the other hand, this significant weakening of the noble class’s power also cleared many obstacles for the reforms he planned to initiate later.
However, owning lots of farmland and serfs did come with its own "happy problems."
During the three days of the festival, aside from the first day when Colin took turns attending the celebrations of various nations to meet with the people, for the next two days, he was busy arranging the preparations for the autumn planting and did not sleep a wink.
Fortunately, when he had settled the serfs before, he had already established a preliminary management structure for his own serfs. Atbolde and Lillian also took on a lot of the work for him; his responsibility was just to orchestrate the big picture.
Otherwise, forget about just two days; he wouldn’t have been able to handle all the onerous work before the autumn planting in half a month.
It was because of these that the day after the festival ended, Colin finally began his own celebration.
With the pollution in the fields resolved and all the burdensome work prior to the autumn planting completed, it was time he took a break for himself.
On this day, Colin woke up at six in the morning, having a rare six hours of sleep the previous night, peaceful and dreamless. Upon awakening, his mind felt clear, his spirit was refreshed, and the pressure on his shoulders had vanished without a trace.
As a result, Colin just stood quietly on the rooftop terrace for half an hour.
It wasn’t until the dim night faded away and the sky shifted from a deep indigo to a soft pinkish-blue, with the orange sunrise ascending, that he gently exhaled and stepped lightly toward the stairs.
And Renee had already prepared breakfast.
Just a simple salty bone porridge with pickled vegetables, leaving room for a lavish midday banquet. Although for Colin, even if he had eaten an entire roast sheep in the morning, it would not affect his ability to eat another two for lunch.
People always have a penchant for the past.
Colin thought, even if in the future he no longer needed to eat to live, he would probably maintain the habit of three meals a day if he could.
He did not want to forget this simplest of joys.
After breakfast.
Shelley, Lillian, Atbolde, all arrived together.
And oh, Bobi as well.
Nasi caught sight of this long-missed companion and flew excitedly over with Demi.
"Bobi!" The latter also flew over joyfully.
Nasi suddenly stopped in her tracks, gestured at herself, then sized up Bobi and said in confusion,
"Little Bobi, you seem to have gotten a bit smaller!"
"Bobi!"
"What is Bobi saying?" Colin asked with a smile as he walked closer to the group.
"It’s saying it hasn’t gotten smaller," Lillian replied, curiously glancing at Nasi and Bobi, equally uncertain, "It seems like Nasi is a bit bigger than Bobi, were they the same size before?"
Colin paused, then turned to look and dredged from his memory, "They were indeed the same size before, but now it looks like Nasi might be a little larger."
After pondering for a moment, Colin suddenly raised an eyebrow and asked,
"Nasi, did you learn the Knight Breathing Method I taught you before?"
"Is Colin referring to what Sister Demi and Sister Renee practice every day? Nasi seems to have learned it."
"Come here and let me see."
Nasi flapped her wings and flew over, landing in Colin’s hand.
Colin felt it out for a moment and indeed discovered the unique fluctuation of Blood Energy of the Red Light Breathing Method inside Nasi.
"Nasi has learned the Red Light Breathing Method?" Lillian inquired.