Chapter 26: The Coming of the Magical Era (continued)
What's even worse is that even if the poisonous gas is released frantically to eliminate all living organisms in the contaminated epidemic area, it is still not enough.
Because Yersinia pestis is a very tenacious thing. According to the medical standards of the Middle Ages, it is almost immortal! It is highly resistant to low temperatures and can survive in freezing conditions for months to years; it can sleep in furniture and clothes left behind by the deceased for decades; it can survive in rooms, cellars, suitcases, handkerchiefs and waste paper piles. Waiting patiently until it reappears a few generations later!
Therefore, in the European countryside in the Middle Ages and modern times, there were often horrific legends like this - a running boy found a frozen corpse in the snowy wilderness, and pulled out a piece of expensive luxury jewelry from the corpse. , so he excitedly took the trophies home... Then, the disease that had disappeared long ago crawled out of the corpse, resurrected, and swallowed up this unfortunate village bit by bit...
During the spread of the Black Death in 1348, a similar situation occurred - most ordinary people naturally avoided the houses where the deceased lived and the items left behind. But there are also many bold desperadoes, such as thieves and mercenaries, who will sneak into these abandoned and unoccupied houses, steal various valuables inside, and then sell them through the black market that exists in any era. These shady things Then, these blankets, clothes, and utensils stained with Yersinia pestis were circulated in markets all over Europe. After passing through the hands of countless businessmen, they eventually spread the horrific Black Death to every place. Market towns and villages.
(Those who have watched the American TV series "The Borgias" should know that using plague-contaminated letterheads or gifts to assassinate political opponents was a common strategy used by European bigwigs in the Middle Ages to assassinate each other. Therefore, letters from enemies cannot be read casually. Yes, you might die just reading it)
Of course, Yersinia pestis is by no means an invincible killer. It has very weak resistance to dryness, heat or ultraviolet rays and can be killed by boiling for one minute. General disinfectants such as cresol, bleaching powder and ethanol can also kill Yersinia pestis. But the problem is that in the city of Marseille, where ten rooms and nine are empty, and there are no residents left in the city, the time travelers simply cannot organize so much manpower and material resources to carry out a comprehensive sterilization and cleanup of such a huge slum.
Moreover, for at least ten years, no one will be willing to move into these shabby huts... Those more decent and good houses are still empty!
"...Well, judging from the current situation, we may have to use the simplest and crudest method and burn this place down!"
Wang Qiu pointed to the slums at his feet, shrugged helplessly and sighed, "...This way we can end everything...it's just too violent!"
"...Violence and all that are minor problems! The problem is that it is easy to set a fire in an urban area, but it will be very disastrous if it gets out of control!"
Looking at these extremely flammable thatched houses, Ma Tong rolled his eyes and rubbed his forehead, "...What if it causes a fire that burns the city?!"
"...That's right, so before you set the house on fire, you have to put in place fire barriers... There just happens to be a good spell here."
Wang Qiu nodded, then turned the "magic book" in his hand to a certain page, and recited aloud: "... Dusk よりも faint きもの, blood flow れより红きもの, time flow れにbury もれし, great なる渝の名において, I'm a dark oath, I'm waiting for you, I'm waiting for you.とruが力もて,waitしく出びをwriteえんとを!スレイブ!”
(Things darker than dusk, things scarier than blood, emerge from the flow of time. In your great name, I swear in this darkness to remove all foolish things that stand in front of us. , gather your strength and give them equal destruction! )
——The heroine of "The Magician", "The Thief's Nemesis" Lina. Inbas's classic ultimate move "Dragon Break" is launched!
"...Rumble——"
In an instant, a dazzling light split the sky and the earth, and the houses, streets, and city walls along the way were all reduced to ashes. The huge sound like thunder shook people staggering, and the scalding heat wave surged in all directions... especially in this light of destruction. At the end, a huge mushroom cloud rose into the sky. Looking down from a high altitude, the scenery is really spectacular. Even Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August 1945 were probably nothing more than this!
All the citizens and villagers who saw this horrific scene were frightened out of their wits. They knelt down tremblingly one by one, closed their eyes and begged for mercy - they all couldn't help but think of the words in the Bible, The terrible chapter of God sending fire from heaven to destroy Sodom and Gomorrah...
Wang Qiu and Ma Tong, who were flying in the air, also opened their mouths in confusion - although they had watched the cartoon "Show Magician", they still underestimated the power of Long Po Zhan, and Not to mention the houses that were directly hit were all reduced to ashes. Even the shock wave and hurricane caused by the explosion swept across half of Marseille Port. Thousands of houses were simply like tofu, either overturned or collapsed or turned into dilapidated buildings.
But no matter what, an isolation belt like being run over by a giant was successfully created, completely cutting off the slums from the main city.
"...This demolition efficiency...is really amazing! I think you will have better prospects in the demolition team instead of being an urban management officer in the future."
After being stunned for a moment, Ma Tong finally calmed down and said jokingly, "...Okay, let me set the fire! Meow! My red partner, please let the world feel your majesty and dye the sky red. , give Meow a sea of fire! Meteor Fire Meow! (Japanese)"
Boom——Boom——Boom——
As the final "meow" sound fell, hundreds of fireballs instantly appeared in the air and fell like a torrential rain. Just like a strategic bombing in the World War II era, they quickly burned this abandoned neighborhood into a sea of fire. ……
Li Wei, who had just been revered as a "saint", stood in front of his office window, looking at this unscientific and magnificent scene of destruction, and couldn't help but sigh sadly, "... He used magic to cure diseases, used magic to demolish buildings, and used magic to set fires. Meow meow, is this world really going to enter the age of magic?”
However, after sighing, he sat down at the table again, stared at the map of Provence on the table, and frowned in thought.
At present, Levi has moved his base camp to Fort Saint-Jean, a fortress in the port of Marseille. This was the headquarters of the Knights Hospitaller of St. John of Jerusalem in the last century. However, this castle is not a glorious relic. , but a hiding place for cowards: the Knights Hospitaller at that time was The pagans were driven out of the Holy Land of Palestine, and their courage to continue fighting was wiped out by the defeats. They once wanted to go back to France to find a place to escape the war and live in seclusion... But in the end, the Knights Hospitaller returned to Rhodes Island in Asia Minor. , continuing to fulfill his mission as a knight, Castle Saint-Jean was naturally emptied again. Now that it has been reactivated by Li Wei, the "Knight from the East", it is probably barely returned to its original owner.
Opposite Fort Saint-Jean, across the fishy pier, is the rectangular Saint-Victoire Church, the busiest place in the city, and the official residence of the Bishop of Marseille is also nearby. Currently, Marikawa Shizuka and Professor Guo are stationed in this church, administering treatments and vaccines to citizens seeking medical treatment to save all sentient beings. Not far away is the Notre Dame de Lagarde Cathedral built in the eighth century, where the Knights Hospitallers distribute relief food every day.
In short, after the angel came, the situation in Marseille quickly stabilized. But all the oil and water in the city has been plundered.
"...The remaining wealth in the Port of Marseille has been plundered by Doraemon. Next, we need to get money from other places... I really don't know how that Doraemon owes so many debts - just It's an interest of 1.5 billion yen per month, which is equivalent to 150,000 ducats in this era!" Levi rubbed his head with a headache, "... Who should I go to for surgery next... No. , is it a fundraiser? ”
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Marseille, the southern port of the Kingdom of France, is located in the middle of a depression surrounded by hills. It is located at the westernmost end of the unique rocky coastline of the Northern Mediterranean and is a natural harbor. Further west, on the other side of the large tidal lake called Lake Bercher, the coastline gradually becomes flat, with the Camargue sand dunes of the Firth of Forth and the Rhone delta appearing. Medieval sailing ships could easily run aground in these areas. Intimidating to sailors.
At present, although Levi has initially taken over the city, he can only extend his influence to wherever he can see. The entire Provence region, centered on Marseille, still has many doubts about him - but it has been temporarily covered up under the haze of the plague.
The name Provence used to mean the entire southern France from the Alps in the north to the Pyrenees in the south. Although today's County of Provence has a much smaller territory, it still includes most of France's Mediterranean coastline in the future.
However, Provence has only become a part of France in name only. It is controlled by members of the French royal family, specifically, the Anjou family (this family has produced kings of many countries in the Middle Ages, such as the United Kingdom). A member of the nobility who ruled under the Ru dynasty, he served only as Count of Provence. What’s even more sad is that the title of this count is very low, probably similar to that of the Emperor of Japan during the shogunate era. He is nominally the head of a country, but in fact he cannot even control the capital city of Marseille, and most of the land under his name is Feudal princes, large and small, were entrenched. They paid little attention to the so-called Earl of Provence. Each had its own fiefs and soldiers. Castles, large and small, occupied every dangerous place. And the Count of Provence, who nominally rules them, would not even be able to step into Provence without the acquiescence of these small princes.
Li Wei's Bacon family was originally one of these unruly feudal princes, and it was also one of the more popular among them. It had to cling to the lap of the Knights Hospitaller to survive... However, it happened that It was such a guy who was neither above nor below, but he entered the capital city of Marseille in a grand manner and climbed to the head of all the princes! How can they be convinced by such a thing that confuses dignity?
——With the information dissemination ability in the Middle Ages, it is difficult to convince these powerful people that the miracles in Marseille are true.
In fact, after the miracle of the "angel's arrival" spread, almost as many powerful local factions came to protest as there were pilgrims coming to perform Hajj. What's more, even if a living "angel" stood in front of them, some guys with stubborn minds like granite still insisted that it was the devil and called on everyone to tie up these "birdmen" and burn them... Of course , the result can only be that they themselves were burned by panicked people.
But this situation only occurs near Marseille. If it is a little far away from the city, where the "angels" can't be seen flying, the appeal of Levi, the "saint", will not be very bright. For example, in recent days, some priests in the city who were grateful for being cured of the plague spontaneously went to nearby villages and towns to preach about the miracles of Marseille and called on people to go to the city to pay tribute and receive medical treatment. As a result, they were scorned by local princes and country priests, and even regarded as heretics. At least these priests were expelled, and at worst, they sent soldiers to arrest them and burn them at the stake for "spreading heresy"... Only those who Where the lords and priests had died of illness or fled, and the ruling order had completely collapsed, some villagers listened to the persuasion of the "propaganda team", carried their savings, and carried the sick to the city for pilgrimage and seeking help.
The situation was even worse for the medical team of nuns dispatched - after Li Wei took control of Marseille, Mother Teresa, who had just learned some modern medical techniques, volunteered to organize a medical team of nuns, bringing antibiotic pills, With syringes and plague vaccines, they went to the nearby port of Toulon to treat diseases and save people, so that more patients could feel the "favor of God" and collect donations at the same time (these guys didn't speak Japanese, so naturally they couldn't cast healing spells).
Unexpectedly, the warm-hearted Mother Teresa led the team to Toulon and settled down. After she started practicing medicine, she successfully cured some people. After receiving the news, the Bishop of Toulon came to the door with several monks and couldn't help but explain. He accused her of "piercing needles into the skin and pouring unclean liquid into the human body" as blasphemous witchcraft! The reason was "because the plague was created by the devil, so only the devil knows how to treat it"... So they incited a large number of citizens to destroy these precious modern medical supplies, and each one of them shouted "For the sake of pure faith, destroy these devils" evil thing”!
What makes Mother Teresa even more sad and devastated is that some patients who had just taken antibiotic pills and whose condition had improved significantly also listened to the deception of the bishop and others, shouting, "We have been helped by the devil, and now we can no longer Go to heaven! I can only fight to the death to apologize for my sins!" He got up and started fighting with the nun who was taking care of them a moment ago. He beat several people to death... In the end, Doraemon saw something was wrong from the surveillance screen of the reconnaissance satellite, so he quickly took the time to fly to Toulon, and personally used lightning to kill the bishop of Toulon, scaring him away. After defeating the gang of thugs who were repaying kindness with vengeance, they were able to rescue the remaining members of the medical team, but everyone was already in a state of extreme embarrassment and with severe head injuries.
From then on, Li Wei was determined not to care about the life and death of the citizens of Toulon and let them fend for themselves - he was not a submissive Virgin!
In short, it can be seen that even if he concocted the miracle of "the arrival of an angel", Livy could not make people all over Provence bow to him and offer their property and belongings respectfully. It would be too much trouble to take the "angels" around and "reason" from house to house, and you wouldn't be able to squeeze out much profit - except for a few decent cities, the remaining remote villages can't be squeezed out. Not much money could be raised.
Therefore, Knight Levi, who was looking at the map at the moment, moved his eyes to the other end of the Alps: Italy.
In the dark medieval Europe, Italy retained the most ancient Roman civilization heritage. By the dawn of the Renaissance era, the Italian peninsula had the most prosperous city clusters in Europe: Venice, Milan, Florence, Genoa, Naples, Pisa, Siena... and the great Eternal City. Rome. In the fourteenth century, they were not only famous art cities with a gathering of humanity, but also financial centers where wealth gathered! Before being replaced by the Dutch, they owned the Wall Street, Ginza and Lujiazui Financial City of this era! If you want to get a lot of money as soon as possible, the wealthy cities of the Italian peninsula, where money flows, are obviously a better choice than the pastoral countryside of France.
But the question is, under what banner should I enter Italy?
The mere title of French Baron is obviously not enough. The name of the Knights Hospitaller may not be very useful there. Under the banner of "saint", lead a group of "angels" to perform "miracles" in every city? This is not impossible, but it seems that some "organizational procedures" need to be carried out - after all, in this era when the church is powerful, self-proclaimed "saints" are always not as good as real saints!
So, he naturally set his sights on a place northwest of Marseille...
Then, when everyone worked together in Marseille and worked together for several days, Wang Qiu's "Book of Time Travel" finally showed the prompt "...end the Black Death epidemic in Marseille early and get 500 reward points." Levi Knight also took advantage of the situation to propose the next action plan.
"...What? Go to pilgrimage to the Pope first?" Wang Qiu blinked, "...Why?"
"...It's very simple, in order to go to Italy to raise money!" Levi replied calmly, "...Right now Doraemon needs a lot of money to repay the debt. The monthly interest alone is equivalent to 150,000 yuan. A gold ducat or florin (both have the same value, but are minted in different city-states). The principal amount is as high as 1.5 million gold coins! It is difficult for us to raise so much money in France - Marseille is already the most commercially developed place in France, but we have to dig deep and search the whole city to get it together. Out of 150,000 gold coins, Britain’s financial situation is not as good as France’s!
Nowadays, there is only one place in Europe that can produce so much wealth, and that is Italy! However, before entering Italy, we must obtain a title or position that is upright, reasonable and legal, as well as a guide who is prominent enough and knows the inside story of the Italian political situation, so that we can act there..." He said this Explained, “…and the Pope happens to be able to provide these two things…Only after the above conditions are met, our trip to Italy can be more confident. ”
"...But if you want to go to the Pope, don't you have to cross half of Italy and enter the city of Rome?" Ma Tong blinked in confusion, "...are you planning to go in a big circle? Going back? It feels like a waste of time! "...No way this year!" The pope is not in Rome, but has moved to France!" Levi waved his hand, "...To be precise, the current papal residence is in the city of Avignon in the north of Provence, which is very close to Marseille, only about 80 meters away. Kilometers, it takes about two days to get there..."