In Eagle Castle, a grand banquet is being held.
Everyone at the banquet was smiling.
The war between the Kingdom of East Francia and the Kingdom of Lotharingia ended, and Otto and Argauland were also on the winning side.
Now that Otto has been granted the title of earl for his military exploits, it is now time for the nobles who fought for Otto to share the joy and spoils of war.
As the saying goes, a person can ascend to heaven if a chicken or dog succeeds. Otto received a good reward this time. If Otto eats meat, the people below must have soup to drink.
However, in stark contrast to the joy of the knights, the faces of the highest-ranking barons present except Otto were not very pretty.
All this was only related to Otto's conversation with them the day before the banquet.
After Otto negotiated cooperation with Bishop Valens, he was not in a hurry to start "avenging his father." He still had many things to deal with at the moment, the most critical of which was undoubtedly the issue of post-war rewards.
Otto's gains from this war were not small, and they were inseparable from the heroic fighting of his nobles and knights. Then, after the war, Otto would naturally give them rewards, which was also the practice of this era.
According to convention, knights such as Knight Wade who have made great achievements in battle should be granted the title of baron and have their own fief.
Although Otto was not stingy with the titles and rewards, he did not want to reward them with land.
No one knows better than Otto that the feudal system implemented in Western Europe is harmful to centralized rule. My vassal's vassal is not my vassal. Otto will never tolerate this situation in his own territory.
Even when playing games, Otto wished he had direct jurisdiction over all territories, let alone in reality.
But if he wanted to change the feudal system and fight against it, Otto today did not have the strength and courage, so Otto came up with a compromise plan.
The inspiration for this plan comes from the "fief" system of Eastern centralized empires. That is, although land is given when conferring a title, only the tax income from the corresponding land is given to the nobles, and the nobles are not allowed to obtain the territory. Governance rights.
The territories of these nobles are still under Otto's control.
At the same time, according to different titles, nobles at each level can form their own private armed forces. These private armed forces can selectively participate in offensive wars launched by lords. In defensive wars, they must fulfill feudal duties. Obligation to fight with Otto unconditionally.
As for the title of nobility, it can be passed down from generation to generation without special circumstances.
This aspect is somewhat similar to the Eastern nobility system.
Of course, even this compromise plan was not sure that Otto would be accepted by the nobles in the territory. In any case, this would weaken the power of the vassals in disguise.
Otto is not worried about the backlash from his vassals after proposing this plan. Now Otto brings the power of the battlefield, has a high reputation, and the size of his territory is not large.
Even if the vassals don't agree, it doesn't matter. The combined size of all the vassal territories is less than one-sixth of Otto's direct territory. Otto has enough strength advantage.
What's more, Otto is only planning to implement the "fief system" for the newly awarded vassals, and the existing vassal territories are not planned to be changed in the short term.
"Master Otto, is there something wrong with this?" As Otto expected, after Otto finished expressing his thoughts, a baron expressed his objection on the spot.
“What kind of noble is a noble if he cannot control his fief?”
"The reason why vassals perform their obligations to their lords is because the lords gave them land. But now that the land is no longer given to them, do the feudal obligations also need to be changed?"
"Hasn't the young master already considered this and modified the corresponding feudal obligations? Besides, there are still titles and taxes. They are no different from before.
I think many nobles don't know how to manage their territories, so they might as well leave it to the young master. "Baron Hill, who had been angry with Otto for a long time, now clearly sided with Otto.
Just because Otto agreed, both of his sons would become knights in this reward, and Otto also guaranteed that both of them would obtain at least the title of baron in the future.
In this case, how could Baron Hill not support him.
At this time, Otto came out to express his position, saying that the knighthood he had previously awarded would not change. As for the future, it will be based on this. It is up to you to agree or not. Anyway, I will do it this way. I just want to inform you.
Now, even Baron Dillon, who had the most objectionable opinions, could only hold his nose and admit it.
The land belongs to Otto, and they have no control over how Otto wants to reward others. Otto was able to negotiate with them and promise not to change the previous feudal treaty, which was a great honor to them. They were really ignorant. Even if Otto deprived them of their titles, there was nothing they could do.
No one thought that Otto was weak and could be bullied. The corpses of several nobles who were thrown into a well in a castle in Neshatto, as well as the numerous bones left after being eaten by wild beasts in the Jura Mountains, proved this. Otto is by no means a good person.
When giving a slap, you should also give a date.
Otto decisively assigned each of the barons a new "fief" to appease them when they were all worried about whether Otto was going to attack them.
However, after knowing that obtaining the fief only increased their income, the barons were not very happy. After Otto reduced the taxes in the direct territories, the income brought by these fiefs may not be too much.
The barons were unhappy, but Otto was quite satisfied. Although Otto, whom he had arranged to take the lead in saying that he was willing to turn his fief into a fief, did not get the support of the other barons, it was a waste of Baron Hill's superb acting skills.
No matter what the barons thought, they still accepted Otto's new policy. The barons were silent, which made it easier for the knights to solve the problem, and they had no capital to negotiate with Otto.
At the climax of the banquet, Otto took a list and began to announce the rewards for this war.
The rewards for the barons have been negotiated privately, this time mainly for knights and "quasi-knights".
Through this war, Otto suddenly had three more barons and seventeen knights under his command, making everyone envious. In the eyes of others with envy and hatred for the lucky ones, no one except the barons noticed the small word change that Otto used fief instead of fief when awarding the reward.
But even if they noticed it, I'm afraid no one would make any association. Under the feudal system, in most cases fief and fief meant the same thing. Who would have thought that Otto had hidden such a skill?
As for the other personnel who participated in the war, each had a corresponding reward, whether it was money, weapons and equipment, war horses, etc. In short, almost all the soldiers who participated in the war received a reward of their own.
While everyone was happy, Otto waved his hand to signal everyone to be quiet. Facing the expectant eyes of everyone, Otto said in a loud voice:
"After discussing with Bishop Valens a few days ago, we decided to open a school in Eagle Castle City in cooperation with the church. We will teach everyone how to read and write unconditionally. If you want to learn knowledge, don't miss it!"
