What is the technique in "A vast silence reigned over the land."?

Personification, if you're talking about figurative language.

Explanation:

Personification is a literary device that gives human-like qualities to something like an inanimate object, idea, or substance that doesn't have one in real life. In this case, silence, the subject of the sentence, cannot physically rule over the land. It can only do so figuratively and with a different meaning. In this phrase, silence "reigned" over the land means that the environment being described was very quiet.

what did the protagonist say?

the anecdote makes readers feel sorry for the man’s lack of heritage, then reminds readers that the man has an equally valuable heritage.