"We are the Salvation Army of the Holy Alliance, our boots crushing the tyrants!"

"When Eve and Adam are tilling, where do the King and Knights seek?"

"Forward with the long spears, advance forward, level the castles and save the slaves."

"The Holy Banner raised upon the Monastery, bringing peace to countless believers."

"Forward with the Holy Banner, advance forward, let the flames of war reach the Holy Seat Mountain, burning away all sins of the world."

"Forge the plow from the blade, forge the nail from the sword, cultivate millions of acres of fertile land, and build grand towers and long embankments."

"Forward with the Holy Alliance, advance forward!"

"Forward with the Holy Alliance, advance forward!"

The sounds of trumpets and flutes resounded, and the crowd of spectators, including cardinals and representatives, all stood up, placed their hands over their hearts and sang along.

Not only within the Half Moon Theater, but even the people outside joined in singing this war anthem.

The voices of thousands intertwined, raising the ribbons from the ground, dancing rhythmically in the air.

Horn too was standing on a small stool singing, only he seemed slightly distracted compared to other citizens as he was the founder of the Holy Alliance.

Today, within the empire, such a common song representing either an alliance or a city is not uncommon.

Having composers and minstrels create such a "Holy Alliance Song" was not Horn's invention.

But unexpectedly, unlike other city anthems which are often odes, the alliance song of the Holy Alliance is a war anthem.

Throughout, only one line expresses the hope of building a nation, while the rest are all about the exhilaration of battle.

Yet this is quite normal.

The Holy Alliance is one of the few in the empire to have completely established its nation through warfare.

In the early days, the Holy Alliance's combat model was citizens providing money and farmers supplying grain for the troops to fight, with the spoils shared among everyone after the battle.

Externally, it might be exercised through consumption and bonds, but internally, this is its essence.

Back when Horn signed the "Wolf Bridge Treaty," he was under tremendous pressure, with internal factions advocating for attacking all the way to Changge City without ceasing.

Yet Horn knew that once dependency formed, it would be too late to hit the brakes when advancing to Changge City.

After seizing the New Five Counties and Shattered Stone Plain, along with a large amount of cash, Horn finally led the cardinals to begin organizing domestically within the Holy Alliance. 𝓯𝓻𝒆𝙚𝒘𝓮𝙗𝓷𝒐𝓿𝙚𝒍.𝙘𝓸𝙢

Four years passed swiftly, today was the day to announce their achievements over these four years.

Only then did Horn realize that the song had stopped, and even the dancing ribbons gently descended to the ground.

Horn looked around, seeing the crowd sitting down.

"Believers of the Holy Alliance!

When the horn no longer sounds for war, when the long spears no longer point at the chests of compatriots...

Finally, we can gather on this land watered with blood and fire, in the identity of builders!"

"The knights' cries once tore through our fields, the bishops' shackles once crushed the farmers' spines."

"And today—

our war chariot fortresses stand like mountains, the bullets from our holy guns shoot out like clouds."

Our wails are gone, leaving only the songs of the threshing grounds, making the winter nights of death by cold and hunger a dust in history."

"Our mothers and children need no longer to kneel under the lashes of the 'Fugitive Slave Act,' singing 'No priests, no king, when the Saintess arrives, no taxes.'"

The cheers surged like waves, echoing layer upon layer in the theater.

When the applause and cheers subsided, Horn raised his hand and signaled for silence: "But war has left, these four years after 1449 are four years where swords and knives were forged into plowshares!"

When the horn sounds again, it will no longer be for war!

It will be for the navigation of the new canal! For the bell rings of the new schools! For all the free people singing the "Celestial Kingdom Dream!"

For the greatness of the Holy Alliance is not beneath my crown—

But in the fertile soil and busy workshops you have cultivated with your own hands!"

Amidst another round of enthusiastic applause, Horn loudly announced the commencement of the central assembly.

"Hmph, sounds good."

Even though Barry Duke could only see the scene on the wooden platform through the narrow window, he couldn't help but scoff.

The greatness of a nation should rest upon its crown, upon the tip of its sword.

Now, Horn can speak these grand words confidently merely because his sword is sharper, what does it have to do with the civilians below.

Feeling embarrassed as Alaric and Ginijis ignored him, attentively listening to the speech, Barry Duke nudged the shoulder of Nawa Duke beside him: "I'll make a bet with you, two ounces of Dandelion brand coffee powder, that the Holy Alliance's land tax revenue this year won't reach half of 1449's."

Nawa Duke looked at him suspiciously: "How do you know?"

"I don't know, that's why I'm betting. Do you want to bet or not?"

Coffee powder made from dandelion and pearl rice flour mixed with sugar is the hard currency among these high-class prisoners, comparable in value to butter.

You'd have to pedal the spinning wheel until it sparks to buy a few ounces at the prisoner store to satisfy your cravings.

Duke Nava, an old gambling addict, immediately grasped his thumb and shook it: "I'm in."

Duke Barry laughed instead: "You're bound to lose this time, my friend."

He dared to bet because he had already learned that the Holy Alliance had implemented a no-grain policy for three years.

Anyone else might doubt this policy, whether it could still collect grain after three years, but Duke Barry knew it was impossible.

He had personally experimented, exempting a manor affected by disaster for a year, and the result? He still couldn't collect it the next year.

Tax exemption? Ridiculous.

If you exempt it, will the manor steward exempt it? If the steward exempts it, will the manor head exempt it?

What? Are you going to personally speak to each farmer?

Moreover, the land tax of the Holy Alliance is really only ten percent, while initially, Leia Kingdom and the church collected land tax up to fifty percent in the Thousand River Valley.

In the end, Leia took 50,000 gold pounds, the church took 100,000, and King Leia still had to thank the Pope.

At a tithe tax rate, the Holy Alliance's land tax may only be 30,000 gold pounds this year.

They probably don't know how cunning these farmers are, doing everything they can to conceal acre yields.

How can they collect grain without nobles overseeing?

If it were any other time, they might have concealed it.

But he trapped himself by creating an Advisory Council for oversight, so now they can't hide it even if they want to.

"Why?"

Afraid that Duke Nava would back out, Barry changed his angle: "Nonsense, if the Holy Alliance could collect so much tax in these four years, would Horn be dressed so simply?"

"But didn't Horn make a lot of money by selling grain?"

"Is that selling grain? That's Witch Catherine's speculative smuggling!"

"Mumbling about what?" Alaric scolded softly, "Can't you see I'm listening with His Highness?"

Barry instinctively wanted to retort, but seeing Ginijis frown at him, he grudgingly fell silent.

"...Within four years, over 9,000 Hundred Households Districts in the entire Thousand River Valley built a total of 16,128 small-scale water conservancy facilities..."

"...With the promotion of fermentation fertilizers and fine seeds, the average wheat yield per acre surpassed 100 pounds, and the average rice fruit yield per acre exceeded 120 pounds."

"...At the county level, ten flood control dikes and thirteen irrigation canals and small canals were built by the monastery..."

"...Currently, there are 67 million acres of farmland for grain cultivation in the Thousand River Valley Holy Alliance..."

"Can't you hurry up with all this long-windedness?" Barry complained again, having listened for so long without hearing about the land tax.

"Shush!" King Jiji couldn't help but scold Barry in a low voice.

Everyone tensed up, finally hearing a report on the land tax.

"...After three years of exemptions, this year is the first collection of the Holy Alliance's land tax." Qianqian croaked as she reported, "The total land tax in 1449 was 110,000 gold pounds, and four years later, in 1453, it increased to 259,000 gold pounds, a rise of 135%..."

"Lies, these are lies!" Barry couldn't help but shout angrily before Qianqian finished, "Aren't there any people representatives to expose this? They dare call themselves representatives?"

Alaric glared at him: "What lie? If they lie about this figure, what about tomorrow's fiscal budget? Follow the lie?"

Barry's face turned completely dark: "I don't believe it."

"Accept your loss." Duke Nava seemed quite amused, gaining two ounces of coffee powder for nothing.

"Impossible, I'd believe if they said 150,000 or 160,000 gold pounds, but 250,000 is impossible, with an annual base tax increase of 37,000 gold pounds, impossible!"

"What's impossible?" King Jiji was rather calm, revealing a trace of hopeless tranquility in his calmness, "You only mistook the middlemen's gut content as the growth part."

Moreover, don't forget, the Thousand River Valley specializes in grain, plus trade of sugar and grain with Black Snake Bay.

The former food supply from the Shattered Stone Plain's Thorn Garden now also depends on the Thousand River Valley.

The increase in grain output instead filled this gap, preventing grain prices from dropping.

Besides, out of this 260,000 gold pounds, half being currency is already good, the rest should be actual rent in kind."

In fact, though Ginijis only relied on intuition, his intuition was fairly accurate.

The Holy Alliance should collect tax from land yielding 5.6 billion pounds of grain annually, and the actual metal currency collected by the ry Court Barracks amounted to only 103,000 gold pounds.

The local retention of 156,000 gold pounds was just an account figure.

Some were currency, some in kind, and some circulating goods, impossible to distinguish clearly.

When Ginijis mentioned half of the amount, on the other side, Duke Laban of Falan stopped his calculation.

"Roughly between 95,000 to 110,000 gold pounds." Laban put down the quill, rubbing his sore wrist, "I got all excited, and it turned out to be just this amount."