After eliminating the pack of Forest Wolves that had suddenly appeared, Qin Feng immediately ordered the three Fire Foxes to return to the river and resume fishing.
Then, he stuffed the fish carcasses the Fire Foxes had killed into his Inventory, one by one. He just had to wait for this fresh catch to be transported back to his territory, where the villagers would process them into easily storable dried fish. Only then would they be converted into Food, the resource recognized by the system.
Of course.
Qin Feng also ordered the newly recruited Forest Wolf to go into the river and fish.
Unfortunately.
The creature's talent for fishing was truly terrible.
It thrashed about in the shallows for a good while, its fur matted and wet, its claws caked in mud, but it didn't manage to catch a single fish. The only thing it produced was a clumsy, comical spray of water that refracted the sunlight when it shook its head.
Left with no choice, Qin Feng had the Forest Wolf give up on fishing and wander around the nearby woods instead, to see if it could catch a few stray rats and rabbits.
Unexpectedly, the results were outstanding. It caught a whole bunch of small wild animals roaming the forest...
'Let me think.'
'To recruit the full ten villagers per week...'
'First, I need to have 100 units of Food ready.'
'But the villagers only produce a maximum of 1 unit of Food per day from gathering fruits and mushrooms, which is just enough to feed themselves.'
Qin Feng stroked his chin, his gaze sweeping over the sparkling river. His fingertips unconsciously tapped the Stone Axe at his waist.
'This means...'
'if I want to assign manpower to gather other types of territory resources...'
'I, the Lord, will have to lead my soldiers out Hunting every day. I'll have to rely on the extra Food provided by wild animals and fish to meet the needs of my entire territory's population.'
'Of course... I could also choose not to go out Hunting. After all, the Woodcutter's Hut and the Mine Cottage are already built, and I got two free lumberjacks and two free miners with them. I could just take my time and slowly gather the building materials to construct the other territory buildings and upgrade the Lord's Hall while I'm at it.'
'But that would slow the tempo down too much.'
He kicked a pebble at his feet, sending it skipping across the water and startling a few silver fish.
'The most logical path...'
'is to have all the villagers chop wood and quarry Stone.'
'Then, I should prioritize expanding the Woodcutter's Hut and Mine Cottage, pour all available labor into infrastructure, and crank the territory's development to maximum output.'
'Once Food acquisition starts to fall behind the territory's consumption... '
'I'll build a Farmhouse. With the farmers' extremely high Food acquisition efficiency, I can sustainably support the entire territory's population.'
'After that, I'll continue pushing infrastructure development at full throttle until the populace faces another food crisis, then I'll build the next Farmhouse, and repeat the cycle... '
To put it bluntly.
There was just one guiding principle.
As long as the people weren't starving to death, they had to be pushed into production and construction at full capacity. At the same time, the focus on Food acquisition efficiency would be minimized, sticking to a purely utilitarian operational logic to the very end.
This was the classic route almost every veteran strategy gamer chose during the development phase.
It was also the reason why, in PVP mode, they could amass an army several times larger than ordinary players within the same limited operational time.
It was just like those capitalists who deserve to be hung from lampposts, always managing to complete their primitive accumulation at a staggering speed.
Unfortunately.
The living beings of the Lord World could not, after all, escape the shackles of natural law.
The ancient, instinctual biological clock within them still dictated the bottom line for survival—they could not work more than ten hours a day and required sufficient rest and relaxation to maintain peak working condition the following day.
Therefore, even though Qin Feng harbored the ambitions of a wicked capitalist, he couldn't drive his people to become tireless construction machines in the dead of night, keeping the great wheel of his territory's development turning 24/7.
He could only call back the three Fire Foxes and the Forest Wolf as the sun slowly sank behind the distant mountains, ending the day's Hunting and actively beginning the journey back to his territory.
Back at the Lord's Hall.
Qin Feng emptied the day's catch from his "backpack"—various animal carcasses and the fish caught in the river—and handed them over to the villagers who were about to "clock out" for the day.
Then, as if by magic, the villagers pulled out Bone Blades hidden in their clothes and began skillfully Skinning and processing the haul, turning the small mountain of flesh and blood into Food resources needed for survival.
After processing, Qin Feng had a total of 53 units of disposable Food, enough to recruit five new villagers in one go.
"Recruit!"
[You have recruited five new villagers!]
[Warning, your territory's population has been exceeded. Some of your people do not have a place to rest and sleep. Please build a "Residential Building" as soon as possible to avoid affecting their future physical and mental health and work efficiency!]
Seeing this, Qin Feng swiped his finger across the territory resource panel, his eyes freezing on the "Wood Stock" entry.
The bad news.
There were only 20 units of wood remaining.
He was still 30 units short of the 50 required to build a Residential Building.
Based on the current logging efficiency, he estimated it would take at least until noon the day after tomorrow to gather enough materials. He couldn't start construction to solve this problem right away.
The good news.
The Forest Wolf and three Fire Foxes, recruited through the Riding and Cutting system, were not bound by the "sleep in a bed" rule like human subjects, nor did they take up population quota.
He didn't need to build a separate Residential Building for the four of them.
Other "Zoo" Soldier Types he recruited in the future would likely follow the same rule, which would save him a large amount of wood resources.
'Nice.'
'They can go out and fight, they can produce Food, they don't count towards the population cap, and they don't cost anything extra to recruit.'
'Could there be any better Black Slave Soldiers than these?'
'The only drawback is probably that they consume 3 units of Food per day and are a bit picky—it has to be the 'meat' type of Food.'
'But that's not a big problem.'
'They can satisfy their own appetites by Hunting and fishing in the forest every day. I don't need to assign any special subjects to produce meat-type Food for them at all.'
'This saves so much money.'
With that thought, Qin Feng temporarily kicked "Militia" out of his future development plans.
That was a problem for another day.
Recruiting Militia consumed a lot of resources, and keeping them for fights would also consume a lot of Food. They didn't produce any resources themselves and would take up slots that could be assigned to production-focused subjects.
Compared to these wild "Zoo" Soldier Types, which were basically free...
...the difference was just too great.
There was no reason for him to use them for the initial development phase.
He might as well replace them all with a Black Slave army from the Zoo and see this cost-effective and practical brand of capitalism through to the end.
'Alright.'
'I guess I'm on the road to a comfortable life now.'
'When tomorrow comes, I'll keep gathering Food resources in the forest and look for chances to fight a few waves of red-named beasts, then domesticate them into my own "Zoo" Soldier Types.'
'My territory's development efficiency will definitely increase a lot more.'
'Later on...'
'Relying on this unique advantage in wild Soldier Types...'
'I should be able to catch up quickly to those "King of Territory" players who specialize in resource production.'
'It might not even be impossible to surpass them.'
However, as he indulged in these pleasant thoughts, Qin Feng failed to notice that a group of dangerous, uninvited guests had arrived in the dense bushes at the edge of his territory...