At noon, Owen returned to the camp with the second-tier mercenaries of the Sword of Salma.
After lunch, Feng Chou brought Owen along to visit the mercenary groups in the camp one by one. He used a higher price to purchase a few thousand silver merit coins, bringing the total amount of silver merit coins in his hands to 20,000 silver merit coins.
With twenty thousand silver coins in hand, Feng Chou visited the person in charge of the Benedict family in the town, who was also a Baron.
This Baron Burton was the younger brother of the current head of the Benedict family, Count Benedict, and one of the board members of the Benedict Company.
After bribing this shrewd businessman with a small bag of magic gems worth tens of thousands of crowns, Feng Chou was given the privilege of choosing a territory first.
Feng Chou chose a bend in the river downstream of the Benedict River, more than a hundred kilometers away from the town of Broken Tower, and applied for it as his territory to be developed.
Feng Chou's choice made Baron Burton a little puzzled, because the place Feng Chou chose was not any of the places marked on the map by the development committee that were suitable for development into a territory.
The Benedict River flowed to the western edge of the Benedict Plains. As it approached the area of the Broken Mountains in the west, the plains on both sides of the river were no longer so flat. On the originally open plains, there began to appear some lonely peaks and small broken mountain ranges.
The development site that Feng Chou had chosen was a lonely peak like this.
This thick and lonely stone peak was just in the direction of the Benedict River. Its appearance forced the Benedict River to slightly change the direction of its flow, forming a semicircular bend around the peak.
In Baron Burton's view, the vicinity of this peak did not have the value of developing into a territory.
He frowned and said, "Sir, with all due respect, I don't see the value of developing this place into a territory."
Feng Chou smiled and said, "But in my eyes, it is a very good territory. On the way to the town of Broken Tower, I have carefully observed this place. On the west side of the peak, which is downstream, is a very good natural port. The south side of the peak is inland, the terrain is flat and the vegetation is particularly dense, which shows that the land there is fertile."
"On the east side of the bend, which is upstream, a natural dam more than ten kilometers long has been erected on the mountain to protect the territory from the threat of floods."
Baron Burton asked the key question, "What about irrigation?"
Feng Chou said, "As I said just now, in the upstream direction of the territory, the mountain's vein along the river bank has formed a natural dam. I can build a stone ditch on the outside of the dam, install a few sets of water wheels, and use the power of the wheels to drive the water pump to pump the river to the top of the dam, and then build a ditch along the inside of the dam to bring the water to the gentle southern slope of the mountain."
Baron Burton was puzzled. "Pump?
"A water wheel can't raise the water to such a high place."
Feng Chou shook his head and said, "No, no, no, of course not an ordinary water wheel. You can use a spiral water pump. Use the power of the wheels to rotate the spiral water pump to continuously pump the water to the ditch at the top of the mountain ridge, and then use the height difference to send the water to the foot of the mountain."
The spiral water pump was the famous Archimedes pump. It was the oldest pump on earth, but its effect was not low at all.
Feng Chou continued, "I can build a reservoir at the foot of the gentle southern slope of the mountain. When there is no need to water, water can be pumped and stored, and when there is a need to water, water can be released. In this way, only ten water pumps will be enough to meet the basic needs of the territory."
Baron Burton shrugged and said, "Sounds good, but I can't promise you right away. You know, this place is not the designated development site for the territory. I need to apply to the committee to add this place to the designated development site before I can sell it to you."
Feng Chou knew that this shrewd businessman was suspecting that he had found something valuable in that place, such as a mineral deposit. He probably said this because he wanted to send someone to secretly explore that place.
Feng Chou pretended to be disappointed and asked, "How long will it take?"
Baron Burton said, "About a week."
Feng Chou thought for a moment and pointed to another location on the map. It was the intersection of a small river and the Benedict River. It was also located downstream of the Benedict River, more than ten kilometers upstream of the river bend that he had just pointed out.
This location was designated by the development committee to develop the territory.
On the map that Baron Burton showed Feng Chou, there were many such locations marked. Most of these locations were located on the periphery of the plains, surrounding the core territory of the Benedict family and providing a peripheral barrier for the family.
This was also the core meaning of the "merit coin" development method.
The significance of the merit coin system was not that it could save a little development cost. In fact, this cost was not much for a wealthy merchant family like the Benedict family.
The significance of this development method was that it could build a buffer zone on the periphery of the territory for free and absorb a group of thugs and cannon fodder called "vassals" for free.
Feng Chou pointed to the development site and said, "Well, to be on the safe side, I hope you can keep this territory for me. If the application for that land is not approved, I hope to get this territory."
Baron Burton said, "No problem, my friend."
For the next period of time, Feng Chou became idle and could only stay in the camp and wait for news.
After training the second-string members for a few days, Owen found Feng Chou. He felt that it was better to let the second-string members idle and take on some simple tasks for the time being.
Feng Chou agreed to his suggestion.
In the past few days, Natasha, who had nothing to do, took the initiative to enter the state of a teacher. She used teaching as an excuse to torture Feng Chou all day long, causing Feng Chou to almost reveal his strength to surprise her several times.
After getting familiar with her, Feng Chou found that Natasha was actually a very cheerful and enthusiastic girl. Even if the reality was cruel, it did not make her completely depressed.
Natasha did not hide her strong interest in the handsome Baron at all, and Feng Chou could not refuse this enthusiastic and cheerful girl who sometimes liked to play pranks.
Of course, the more important reason was that this girl had a beautiful face and a devilish body.
… …
A week later, Baron Burton's servant found Feng Chou and brought him an invitation from Baron Burton.
As soon as they met, Baron Burton asked Feng Chou for credit, telling him how much effort he had put in and how much he had paid to make the land designated by Feng Chou as one of the territories that could be developed.
However, Feng Chou knew that this guy was talking nonsense. In the past week, an exploration team had almost turned the hill and the nearby land upside down. Of course, they did not find anything.
As for the land being listed as one of the territories that could be developed, it was not a problem at all. To be able to use a piece of land that originally had no development value to exchange for tens of thousands of silver coins, which fool would object to such a good thing?
At this time, Feng Chou made a new request. He hoped to use ten crowns per mu to buy the development rights of another fifty thousand mu of land from the Benedict family.
Feng Chou's explanation was that he intended to open up another fifty thousand mu of pasture in the periphery of the territory to raise fine-wool sheep.
This was not a lie, because according to Feng Chou's memory of the history of Earth, he felt that perhaps the woolen industry would have a bright future in Kasaranca.
Feng Chou's request made Baron Burton suspicious again, but he thought about it again. That piece of land had almost been overturned by the exploration team, so there shouldn't be any precious mineral deposits there. Even if this person really did find a precious mineral deposit in that piece of land, as the real owner of that piece of land, the Benedict Family could easily take it away.
If there weren't any mines, exchanging fifty thousand acres of undeveloped land for five hundred thousand crowns seemed like a good deal.
Feng Chou had originally prepared a small bag of magic gems as a bribe when he made the request for fifty thousand mu of land.
He did not expect that the other party would agree to his request after a little hesitation, which surprised him.
After confirming his intentions, Baron Burton called for his secretary to draft a land transaction document.
In the end, Feng Chou used more than 20,000 silver coins and 500,000 crowns in exchange for a land contract that included the development rights of seventy thousand mu of land.
The contract stipulated that the land on the south bank of the Benedict River within fifteen kilometers of the mountain would belong to him. Within this range, he had the right to open up seventy-one thousand three hundred mu of land for agriculture.
Seventy thousand mu of land was about the size of a medium-sized Baron's territory.
The reason why Feng Chou wanted such a large piece of land was not to make money. There was no money to be made from developing a territory, and it was also not to pursue a higher title. It was meaningless to him.
He did everything he could to get such a piece of land in order to accumulate talents.