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Chapter 531: Tax Farmer Lavoisier

As the farmer on the execution platform continued his tale, the more than ten thousand people in the square clenched their fists in anger, their teeth grinding loudly.

Especially when he recounted that after his sister's death, that shameless Tax Farmer had actually forced him to pay the fine from that year, even charging Interest, amounting to a staggering 80 livres, the crowd could no longer restrain themselves, erupting in a tsunami of roars:

"Execute this devil!"

"Kill him! I don't want to wait another moment!"

"Send him to hell!"

However, the nobles who had come to watch were not particularly moved—the pitiful life of a country bumpkin could at most elicit a regretful shrug from them, but hardly any empathy.

In fact, some morally corrupt individuals, who had themselves committed such acts of taking advantage of poor girls, were now whispering amongst themselves and letting out lewd chuckles.

Once the farmer finished speaking, the execution officer, seizing the moment as the atmosphere in the square reached its peak, loudly read out the High Court's verdict, then signaled for the execution to begin.

A drum roll sounded, and the enraged crowd immediately fell silent, their gazes uniformly fixed on the tall execution platform.

Afterward, the priest made the sign of the cross and retreated to the side. An executioner, wearing a black mask and with arms thicker than a normal person's legs, picked up the "long-handled execution blade" resting nearby and strode to the condemned man's side.

Only then did Joseph realize that the "blade" was actually an extremely broad Two-Handed Heavy Sword, its hilt reaching as high as an adult man, glinting with a blinding, cold light in the sunlight.

Tax Farmer Bernis, his neck caught in the wooden stocks and his body sprawled over a beam, suddenly erupted in terror, beginning to wail loudly. But the next instant, the executioner swung the heavy sword like a windmill; before anyone could quite grasp what was happening, the blade had swept past the stocks, and a jet of blood spurted out, Bernis's head rolling to the ground like a dropped coconut.

The execution officer stepped forward, picked up the head, and held it high for all to see, immediately drawing deafening cheers.

People waved their hands, shouting with all their might, their long-accumulated bitterness, indignation, and resentment all released with the gushing blood.

The Tax Farmer system had plagued the nation for far too long. Nearly everyone had suffered at their hands, had their last copper plucked from their pockets, hating them to the Bone yet powerless against them.

And from the moment that head was severed, people knew that the guild of Tax Farmers would cease to exist from then on!

Their future lives were increasingly filled with hope!

The farmer who had earlier denounced Bernis's crimes was now Choking with Sobs, murmuring his sister's name as he was helped down from the wooden platform by an execution officer's assistant.

Subsequently, another Tax Farmer was brought onto the execution platform.

Following the same procedure as before, the victim first ascended the platform to vehemently denounce his crimes.

This time, however, the one who stepped up was a middle-aged woman whose clothes, though old, were neat and proper, and whose every gesture exuded cultivation—clearly a noble.

She glared fiercely at the condemned man behind her, then began to recount tearfully how he had used the trap of "delayed tax payment" to gradually burden her husband with heavy debts, ultimately forcing him to sell off their family business.

Even her daughter, who had been engaged to a promising young lawyer, had her engagement broken off due to the family's ruin.

Ultimately, their small noble family, which had been passed down for over a hundred years, was forced to move into the slums of the Saint-Antoine district. Their house was surrounded by foul-smelling sewage. Her husband had to copy documents for others for over ten hours a day just to scrape by, and from overwork, he would groan from the torment of back pain every night until midnight.

This time, although the common folk still cried "Execute him," their voices were much quieter than before; after all, this lady's family could at least still eat their fill.

The nobles present, however, were plunged into immense fury—these filthy, shameless Tax Farmers had actually used despicable means to persecute a respectable and long-established noble family to such a tragic state, casting them into the abyss of suffering! They deserved to die!

They immediately began cursing in the crudest language, just like the commoners, frantically waving their arms, their faces flushed with agitation.

After that Tax Farmer's head was severed, the nobles likewise jumped and cheered, unconcerned with their image.

Next, another commoner victim took the stage...

In this manner, the victims publicly recounting the Tax Farmers' crimes alternated between commoners and nobles. Soon, the onlookers had forgotten their respective social statuses and began to unanimously denounce the Tax Farmers.

As one wicked head after another was severed, the crowd in the square grew increasingly united, even beginning to dance along with the rhythm of the execution drums.

This was Joseph's plan: to have the victims, long persecuted by the Tax Farmers, publicly accuse them, thereby igniting people's sympathy and anger, and thus fully legitimizing this purge of Tax Farmers.

At this point, neither commoners nor nobles harbored even a shred of sympathy for the Tax Farmer guild. The excited and frenzied crowd in the square was proof of that.

From then on, no matter how he dealt with the Tax Farmer Guild, there would certainly be no significant resistance. No, rather, the cleaner he purged the Tax Farmer Guild now, the more support and endorsement he would receive from everyone!

It wasn't until dusk approached that the execution proceedings finally concluded, with the two executioners departing, exhausted. Because recounting the Tax Farmers' misdeeds had taken up so much time, they had only severed nineteen heads all day, which lay in a bloody pile in the corner of the execution platform.

Joseph had also watched here for the entire day. Fortunately, he had witnessed even more gruesome scenes on the battlefield, so he managed to maintain his composure. Even so, he decided not to attend subsequent executions, as this primitive method of execution was still a bit too bloody. He was no pervert who found such things exciting—at the current pace, executions might continue here for over half a month.

...

Two days later.

Joseph was reviewing documents submitted by the Tax Bureau detailing the assets of convicted Tax Farmers and their verified illicit gains, when he suddenly frowned.

He abruptly saw a familiar name—Lavoisier.

The documents revealed that this great scholar, during his more than ten years of contracting the Parisian tobacco tax, had consistently watered down the tobacco he handled, thereby acquiring enormous illicit profits—approximately 80,000 to 100,000 livres annually.

Joseph couldn't help but rub his forehead, recalling historical records that claimed Lavoisier's decapitation by the Jacobins was a monumental error, stalling chemical research in France for decades, and so on.

Now, it seemed his decapitation, while perhaps an excessive sentence, was by no means entirely undeserved. The Tax Farmer system was such a corrupting vat that even individuals of high moral character found it difficult to remain untainted once involved.