Ragnar sat at his wide table inside his private stone room, counting the silver coins he had collected from the northern tribes after his army of foot soldiers successfully defeated their recent rebellion.
With the northern territories now firmly under his direct control, he decided to temporarily stop building new ships and stop forging weapons for his warriors. Instead, he planned to use his collected silver to improve the basic farming methods across his entire kingdom.
He wanted to build more water mills near the fast-moving rivers and forge heavy iron plows for the local farmers to use in the dirt fields.
After all, focusing entirely on growing more wheat and raising more livestock was a necessary step.
If he successfully increased the amount of food produced within his borders, he could feed a much larger population. A larger population meant that he would eventually have more young men available to defend the kingdom when the rival kings inevitably attacked his lands.
