Song Dynasty: Yuan Dynasty, you didn't expect this, did you? I'm still alive.

The 21st year of Cheng'an (1419).

Because the Song Dynasty did not prohibit annexation, many landlords who felt oppressed during the Ming Dynasty went into a frenzy.

In the most serious case, Liu Demao of Quanzhou acquired 500 mu of land in two years, which directly increased his net worth by 10%.

The process of annexation was not one of gentleness, kindness, frugality, and humility, but rather a brutal oppression of one class by another.

The most common method of land annexation by landlords was to buy up farmers' land at low prices when farmers were seriously ill or suffered natural disasters and urgently needed money.

Unfortunately, the Song Dynasty had already been in the Central Plains for two years.

With the substantial financial support of the Zhao Xi Royal Chamber of Commerce, a rudimentary medical system was rapidly established in the Central Plains.

All serious illnesses can be treated for free.

In addition, the Song Dynasty seemed to have a divine mandate, and natural disasters were scarce in the two years.

Since farmers did not have an urgent need for money, landlords had far fewer means of annexing land.

Liu Demao had no choice but to lure farmers into selling their land at prices far exceeding market value, and in the end, he still managed to acquire 500 mu of land.

Despite the high cost, Liu Demao did not feel he had lost out.

What do those foolish farmers know?

Land is the source of all wealth. Exchanging gold and silver, which do not appreciate in value, for land that can continuously generate wealth is a business that can never lose money.

But these landlords soon paid the price for their ignorance, and they also realized an extremely absurd fact—people are the source of all wealth.

Because capital from the Eastern Song Dynasty arrived.

The return of the Central Plains was of extraordinary significance to the Eastern Song Dynasty.

Unlike colonies like India, the Central Plains was defined as the homeland by the Eastern Song Dynasty, meaning that all control measures implemented in the colonies were ineffective in the Central Plains.

The capital of the Song Dynasty could set up factories in the Central Plains without any restraint.

Large capital firms saw the stable profits that the Royal Chamber of Commerce would bring from building railways, so they applied to the Railway Bureau to purchase the construction rights for the Central Plains Railway.

Smaller investors, seeing the abundant labor force and vast market in the Central Plains, flocked there to set up factories.

Stocks on the Xinxiang Stock Exchange rose across the board, and people can foresee the booming development of these industries in the future, except for the military industry, of course.

In this process, the imperial court obtained a large amount of fiscal revenue by selling land and railway construction rights, which enabled it to complete the construction of basic medical care, education, social security and other infrastructure in the Central Plains more quickly.

The effect of flowing silver is absolutely terrifying.

With the construction of numerous railways underway, the demand for labor was so enormous that it would have been necessary to capture all the white slaves in Europe to barely meet the demand. Therefore, capital tended to employ local laborers.

Surprisingly, the wages of local laborers in the Ming Dynasty were lower than the cost of foreign workers in Southeast Asia.

But even with this salary, which is lower than the cost of foreign workers, the income far exceeds what was earned from farming in the past.

Therefore, there were many people from the Central Plains who were willing to build railways.

What surprised the capitalists and factory owners of the Song Dynasty even more was the spirit of self-improvement and hard work of the people of the Central Plains.

The enthusiasm of the people from the Central Plains for work far surpassed that of the foreign workers in Southeast Asia.

They saw the shadow of the first generation of Song people who went to Southeast Asia in the Central Plains.

Even though the land they cultivated could provide enough food for a lifetime, that generation still had to keep striving to reclaim wasteland.

It was this spirit that enabled the Song Dynasty to quickly establish itself in Southeast Asia.

This gave the second generation of Song Chinese in Southeast Asia sufficient resources to devote themselves to education and innovation.

That led to the Industrial Revolution.

That's how the Song Dynasty came to be what it is today.

After decades of affluent life, this spirit is hard to find in the Song people of Southeast Asia.

With the opening of the railway, a large number of factories were established, leading to a greater demand for labor.

The wages offered by the factory were irresistible to the farmers.

The Central Plains witnessed the most unprecedented scene in four thousand years of history.

Without natural disasters or wars, large tracts of land remain uncultivated.

Landlords like Liu Demao from Quanzhou were dumbfounded.

Isn't it human?

Why did they all go to the factory?

Who will farm the master's land?

If you don't come to farm, won't the land be bought for nothing?

Surely he wouldn't grow it himself.

The outdated concept of land as a means of generating wealth was ruthlessly trampled upon in the face of capitalism in the Song Dynasty and was ultimately swept into the dustbin of history.

People are the primary productive force!

Without people, land and factories are lifeless and will not create any additional value.

Of course, this viewpoint has rarely been made public in the past, present, and future.

The foolish cannot understand it, and the wise will not accept it from the bottom of their hearts.

Until one person came along.

Or rather, the emergence of a group of people.

Of course, that's a story for another time.

For the first time in four thousand years, landlords voluntarily lowered land rents to attract farmers back to agriculture.

The factory owners frowned slightly upon hearing the news.

Where did this poor wretch come from?

A massive pay raise, delivered in a flash, rendered the landlords' hard work futile.

Even more fatal was an imperial edict.

Anyone willing to go to the Americas to reclaim land will be exempt from taxes on land up to 100 acres, and the court will assist in capturing a white slave along the way.

This imperial edict originated from a general survey conducted by Zhao Qian in the Central Plains provinces.

The report shows that the median land ownership among people in the Central Plains is extremely low, meaning that the vast majority of farmers own very little land.

Of course, this is the second generation of the Ming Dynasty, and land annexation is not yet serious. In the entire history of the Central Plains, the amount of land owned by farmers is not small.

But that was far too little for the Song Dynasty.

Emperor Zhao Xi was a monarch who could not bear to see the people suffer. Coincidentally, developing the Americas had always been a major strategy of the Eastern Song Dynasty, so the court issued this order.

When the decree was issued, the people of the Central Plains instinctively did not believe it.

How could such a good thing possibly happen?

However, the flour and eggs distributed by the Song Dynasty during its conquest of the Central Plains, as well as free medical care, education, and even pensions for the elderly, soon took effect. The Song Dynasty's credibility in the Central Plains had reached its peak, far surpassing that of previous dynasties.

Even the Northern and Southern Song dynasties could not compare.

In the early days, one million people from the Central Plains signed up to go to the Americas.

As a result, European countries along the Mediterranean coast received an elbow strike.

In order to attract more people to the Americas, Chen Binghe spent money advertising the quality of white slaves in newspapers. By this time, white slaves had become the flagship product of the Eastern Song Dynasty's slave trade.

As for whether the mass capture of white slaves will affect the European market.

With a market of 50 million Han Chinese in the Central Plains, why bother with Europe?

Grab it and refine it immediately!

This imperial decree became the final straw that broke the back of the landlords in the Central Plains.

Ironically, the capital of the Song Dynasty took this opportunity to acquire land from landlords at low prices, intending to establish farms and ranches on these lands.

Some stubborn landlords clung to their land, unwilling to let go, thinking that the land value would eventually rise.

Some landlords harbored resentment towards the Song Dynasty court, but they discovered something that terrified them: they no longer had enough small households and had lost the power they once had to resist the court.

Some enlightened landlords actively embraced Song Dynasty capitalism, using their vast lands to establish farms and ranches, thus completing their transformation from the landlord class to the bourgeoisie.