The Girls Are All Coveting Me-Chapter 501 - 437: Serfs and the Sun

Location: A small world somewhere in the Multiverse

Chris looked up at the sky.

About a year ago, anomalies began occurring in his country.

The once painfully slow Peasant Breathing Technique saw a massive increase in cultivation speed.

All of this happened after the sun in the sky turned red-gold.

The original name of the Peasant Breathing Technique is long forgotten.

But now among the people, this breathing technique is solely referred to as the Peasant Breathing Technique.

This is because that’s what everyone believes.

Including Chris, who believes that the knights only spread this breathing technique to give the peasants more strength to farm.

Chris was born into a peasant family, one of the families governed by the three housekeepers of the Andes Knightly Domain.

About 20 years ago, it was said that a knight from an unknown origin forced the Andes Knight to pass down the Peasant Breathing Technique.

The Andes Knight had no choice but to comply with the powerful knight’s demand and spread the technique.

However, Chris heard from the powerful Knight’s Squires that the version being spread now is just the castrated version of the true Peasant Breathing Technique.

When the Knight’s Squires talked about it, they didn’t even care about Chris’s presence.

Chris knew what they were thinking.

A breathing technique is indeed a valuable thing.

Being able to pass it down to the peasants is already a stroke of luck.

Does it matter if it’s castrated? Could these peasants possibly overthrow them?

When these Knight’s Squires mocked Chris, he could only bow his head, nod, and move past them in deference.

The Knight’s Squires laughed even louder.

However, regardless, the Peasant Breathing Technique indeed enhanced the peasants’ physique; their backs weren’t as sore, their legs didn’t hurt as easily, and even their wives’ moans were louder under them.

Of course, Chris understood clearly that even with the breathing technique, they couldn’t compare to the noble lords.

Not to mention the noble lords; even under the noble lords, the Knight’s Squires could easily crush them.

Chris didn’t quite understand why such a situation exists.

Nor did he know that after they handed over their hard-grown crops to the knights, those knights had enough food to train Knight’s Squires with physiques far superior to peasants.

Peasant food fed the Knight’s Squires, who then turned back to continue oppressing the peasants, constantly demanding more crops, developing more wasteland.

Round and round, never-ending.

—That’s how it was supposed to be.

But one day, the situation suddenly changed.

When that red-gold sun overshadowed the original sun, Chris suddenly realized his life was changing.

The sunlight from that sun was incredibly warm; even when adjusting his breathing using the Peasant Breathing Technique while working in the fields, he could feel the warm sunlight flowing into his body like a babbling stream.

The Peasant Breathing Technique, which ordinarily couldn’t progress with long-term practice, suddenly saw a surge in power.

Don’t ask Chris how he knew?

His wife, reluctant to let Chris into bed, had already given the answer.

Then one day, those arrogant knights suddenly arrived at the fields, loudly declaring that the Peasant Breathing Technique was a forbidden technique from the Evil God and no longer allowed for peasants to practice.

The knights confidently said:

"The Peasant Breathing Technique is harmful, don’t believe this."

"The knight who spread the Peasant Breathing Technique just wanted to use you as fodder to advance his own technique. We knights, with good intentions, forbid it to protect you."

"Don’t practice it, don’t practice it, don’t practice it."

"Trust us knights, why would we lie to you?"

"Once the red-gold sun of the Evil God disappears, good days will come quickly for the peasants."

Chris was unmoved by their words.

He didn’t know about the original Peasant Breathing Technique.

But saying that the knight who spread the technique wanted to use them as fodder was somewhat laughable.

Wasn’t it that the knight considered them fodder, while the knights before them didn’t?

No one is a fool.

Maybe one person could be mindless, but not everyone in a group.

Chris knew that some people in the village could vaguely guess that the knight spreading the Peasant Breathing Technique wasn’t a good person.

After all, the Peasant Breathing Technique required more grain, and forceful practice meant more effort was needed to till more land just to support their physique.

Previously, peasants only needed to exert seven or eight-tenths effort to feed their families.

Now peasants had to use twelve-tenths effort to clear more land, submit more grain, and then feed their families.

Moreover, Chris heard that some peasants particularly adept at the Peasant Breathing Technique were taken away by the knights.

He knew of a fellow villager who, due to his remarkable practice in the Knight’s Breathing Technique, was taken away.

The next time he was seen, he had abandoned his wife and child and became the husband of a nobleman’s illegitimate daughter; it was rumored the knights intended to make him a Knight’s Squire.

It was said that when that peasant returned home, his former wife and children could only bow their heads and call him "master."

But the question is, is the Knight spreading the Peasant Breathing Technique really any good? Are the current Knights really any good?

With Chris’s limited understanding, it’s hard to grasp concepts like class solidification and the exploitation of surplus value.

But his subconscious tells him that something has been taken from him by the Knights.

Now that the Knights are addressing them this way, Chris’s first reaction isn’t compliance, but a realization that the Knights have lost control of the situation.

So Chris begins to ponder what has so terrified the Knights, and eventually his gaze lands on the Peasant Breathing Technique.

Indeed, the initial spread of the Peasant Breathing Technique may not have been for improving the peasants’ capabilities.

It was likely just to make peasants exert more power and be better exploited for their value.

But all this was before that red sun appeared in the sky.

The previous sun was scorching hot for Chris.

Sunlight on his body turned into every drop of sweat falling into the soil.

At the hottest times, his skin would be painfully seared by the sunlight.

Scratching it would just break the skin.

When sweat trickled over his wounds, a burning pain would spread.

But now the sun is somehow different.

The Peasant Breathing Technique, which once required Chris to consume more food to sustain, suddenly lost its conditions under that sun’s rays.

No need to consume more food, no additional burden on the family.

Just basking in the sun every day was enough, the power lingering in the sunlight accumulating in his body.

So what was once a burden due to food scarcity suddenly became a means to enhance Chris’s strength.

Chris does not know what kind of attitude that sun above holds towards him.

Will it exploit them when the time is ripe?

But...

Being exploited by someone is still exploitation.

At least in the presence of the sun, the Knights on the ground seem insignificant.

Before the sun, all are equal.

And the Red Gold Sun indeed made Chris feel he was becoming more affluent.

Unknowingly, Chris noticed new voices emerging in the village.

These voices were weak at first, but after one peasant severely injured a Knight’s Squire who tried to seize his wife and daughter, the previously timid peasants in the fields began to change their outlook.

So it turns out... the Knights can be injured too.

Although Chris doesn’t yet know the power difference between a Knight and a Knight’s Squire.

For many, the two seemed indistinguishable, both were once insurmountable mountains to them.

Rebellion seemed impossible anyway, so what did the power difference matter?

But now the situation seemed to be changing.

Six months later, a genius among the peasants emerged to slay a Knight’s Squire.

Of course, this genius reaped no benefits, as Knights quickly killed him after he slew the Squire.

But it didn’t matter.

For the various factions, the crucial thing was not whether they could kill the Knights, but that the Knights could no longer suppress the peasants.

Some smart Knights, in turn, started mingling with peasants ahead of time, for fear of future problems.

While others, who refused to bow down, began large-scale conflicts with the peasants.

Soon, battles erupted fiercely between the two sides.

Year after year, more lower-class Knights couldn’t withstand the peasants’ power.

Knights started to fall at the hands of peasants.

Soon fires of war spread throughout the kingdom.

When Chris regained his senses, he found himself grouped with the kingdom’s rebels.

Yes.

The once self-proclaimed smart Chris had become one of the rebel forces.

While communicating more with the increasing number of peasants, Chris suddenly realized something.

Had the peasants truly changed from before?

No.

Their mindset remained the same as before.

Had the Peasant Breathing Technique changed from before?

No.

The technique was still the same Peasant Breathing Technique.

What had actually changed?