Chapter 157 Interrogation
The three Dukes and Dukes walked silently in the corridor with solemn expressions.
"Your Majesty the Duke!"
It was Lester who spoke.
"I request to patrol outside the fortress in person so that I can check and verify what the scout said. From what he described, ordinary soldiers cannot deal with that kind of situation."
Duke Dodge thought for a while and said: "Let's listen to the reports of other scouts."
During the next day, the Duke collected the reports of several consecutive batches of scouts who went out for reconnaissance, but he did not find any What's unusual is that some of them have fought against rebel scouts, but they have never encountered the situation like last night.
It seems...that what the injured scout encountered was just an exception? Or is he lying?
After careful consideration, he agreed to Viscount Leicester's request and allowed him to lead his elite scout cavalry out to participate in patrols.
Before this, they had a "tacit understanding" with the rebels, and neither entered the other's warning range. But in last night's incident, the rebels clearly broke the "tacit understanding". This may mean that they have to make some changes to the status quo.
...
There is a small town not far south of Thorn Fortress, but its original appearance is no longer visible.
A high and thick stone wall was built outside the town, covered with various fortifications. A deep trench was dug outside the stone wall, and densely packed holes were inserted at the bottom of the trench. Wood thorn, if someone accidentally falls into the ditch, he will definitely not survive.
From time to time, heavily armed patrols can be seen walking back and forth on the stone wall. They look to the north vigilantly, not daring to relax at all.
This place has been transformed into a small fortress by the rebels.
Originally, the place where they were stationed was further north and closer to the Fortress of Thorns. This part of the rebels had no intention of attacking the Fortress of Thorns, because the task given to them by Archduke Giles was only to keep an eye on the Kingdom's army in the Fortress of Thorns. Don't let them run around.
However, one night a small group of troops suddenly emerged from the fortress. After successfully killing the open and hidden sentries in a corner of the camp, they sneaked in. Then they started setting fires everywhere, causing great chaos. .
Fortunately, there were not many people on the other side, and they were quickly forced back by the soldiers' spontaneous counterattack. However, the fire caused and the resulting panic caused the entire camp to suffer all night.
After such a shameful thing happened and it reached the ears of "Greedy Wolf", Grand Duke Lei was furious and immediately appointed a new general to take over the army.
The general who took over this rebel army - the "Southern Army" as they called it - was named Samar, one of Giles' strong men.
When Samar received the appointment, many of his colleagues felt sorry for him, because at that time the Southern Army was dealing with those lords who disobeyed Grand Duke Giles. Samar accepted such a "guardian" job, and he had made military exploits. There are fewer opportunities on their own.
But Samar is secretly happy. He has long seen that Archduke Giles will send his troops north sooner or later. Even if the Grand Duke does not go north, the royal army will also go south, so he will probably keep an eye on the Thorn Fortress. Eighty-nine was the vanguard. The enemies we had to deal with at that time were not the little shrimps in the south. Naturally, opportunities to make military exploits would continue to appear.
After Samar took office, considering that the original garrison was too close to the fortress and morale was low after just being attacked by a sneak attack, he ordered the entire army to move south to the current town and recruited a large number of troops. Local laborers built the town into a semi-permanent and crude fortress.
Anyway, the mission at this stage is not offensive, so we have to put more effort into defense.
At this moment, in a dungeon in this fortress, an inhumane interrogation is going on...
"Say?"
Accompanied by threatening roars, the sound of loud whips sounded in the dungeon again and again.
A prisoner was tied and hung in mid-air, and his body was whipped hard with a whip dipped in salt water.
If the seriously injured scout in Thorn Fortress was here, he would definitely be able to recognize that the beaten man was one of his companions. Several people were captured by the rebels that night.
Obviously, the Southern Army wanted to get some information from these "tongues" and tortured them constantly. Moreover, it seemed that the fabricated false information could not fool them...
After being captured, relying on willpower to survive the torture of the enemy, this kind of plot usually only exists in novels and dramas. It cannot be said that it does not exist in reality, but it rarely occurs.
Even those who are ready to sacrifice and have the consciousness to sacrifice their lives cannot withstand various interrogation methods. There are too many ways to make people unable to survive or die.
No matter whether a person has received anti-torture training or not, as long as he is flesh and blood, he will be afraid of pain.
In addition to the physical aspect, there are also various notorious methods of mental torture. This is the most willpower-destroying method. No matter how rigorously trained spies or soldiers are, they cannot withstand it. Therefore, once you become a prisoner, you will be recruited by many.
In order to cope with forced confessions after being captured, prisoners will provide false information or half-truths to make the enemy believe it is true. The true part of the information often does not affect the overall situation or is outdated. At this time, it does not matter whether it is leaked or not.
The captured scout opened his eyes as he was dying, and said in a hoarse voice: "Everything I know has been explained. I really don't know other things...ah!"
The loud sound of the whip sounded again, and the other party obviously did not believe his words.
As a scout with a high possibility of being captured, he was naturally always prepared with a lot of information to deal with the current situation, so after the interrogation began, he pretended to "rather die than surrender". After a few whips, the prepared information was told one after another.
Then you can only pray for the mercy of the interrogator. Generally speaking, after the interrogator feels that the value of the prisoner has been squeezed out, he will either give the prisoner a good time or send him to the rear to do hard labor. The probability of becoming a pervert who likes to torture people is still very low.
Of course, a qualified interrogator will definitely not believe that the information given by the prisoner is true. However, if you peel off the cocoons from a large amount of information that is both true and false, and carefully pick out the useful parts, that is another set of techniques. .
In this situation, the interrogator in front of him just didn't believe that he had finished speaking.
The interrogator, who was tall and very visually intimidating, grabbed the prisoner's chin and slightly raised the prisoner's head so that he was eye-to-eye with him.
"I'll tell you again! Tell me what you haven't explained yet!"
"My lord...I...really...really...don't know anything else Yeah..."
The prisoner groaned in his heart: This is already the fifth confirmation, is it almost over?
He would not dare to say anything about a situation like the fortress being empty of troops. Once the rebels knew about it, they might immediately organize an attack, not to mention the brothers in the army who usually eat in the same pot. His own wife, children, and children also live in Duke Dodge's territory.
In this era, bandits are like combs and soldiers are like grates, especially with the feud between the Dodge family and the Giles family. The fate of the common people led by Dodge can be imagined, and the army under Giles is even worse. They are notoriously bad. Although all crows in the world are generally black, there are always one or two crows that are darker than others.
The interrogator cast his questioning eyes to the other side, where a man sat. He wrapped himself in a cloak, and his face could not be seen in the hood.
“Hmph!”
The man in the cloak laughed sinisterly.
“He is lying!”
“He must have something else that he has not confessed yet!”
The words that sent chills down the prisoner’s body came from the mouth of the cloaked man. How could that guy tell that he was lying? He thought that the information he had given before was perfect, and as a low-level scout, it was natural that the information he knew was limited.
As if aware of the prisoner's doubts, the cloaked man stood up and slowly walked to the prisoner's side.
"You must be wondering, time and time again, why am I so sure you are lying?"
The cloaked man slowly raised his head, and the prisoner saw his face clearly, and there was nothing surprising about his appearance. But the key is those eyes...
His pupils are shining, they are really shining!
It is not the light reflected from the torch next to it, but the pupil itself is the light source!
"Because..."
As he spoke, the cloaked man's pupils seemed to become brighter and brighter.
"I can see the color of your soul..."
(End of this chapter)