Chapter 258
Chapter 255
There was silence in the hall, everyone lowered their heads and said nothing.
Everyone knew that the count - now a duke - had a volcano in his heart, and no one thought to get into the fire to find out.
Bad news, the Greiman family's army suddenly moved south and invaded Emden, the former territory of the Kent family, and drove away the officials and vassal lords stationed by the Kent family along the way.
The good news... It's not actually good news, but it's a little better than the previous one - the Arda people stopped not far from Bailan Fort.
Paul Greenman... is simply crazy. Doesn’t he know what he is facing?
The Kent family has always been the second most powerful family in the Northwest Gulf. Now it has become even more powerful after obtaining the title of Duke. That is to say, it is not convenient to fight now, so there is no time to pay attention to him.
And it is too despicable to cause trouble while everyone is busy with spring plowing. According to the news, there are more than a thousand people in Arda, which is not too many, but it is not a lot to say. Especially for Arda, which has a sparse population, it is a pity that so many young and strong laborers are not working in the fields. .
Ah, they can steal food. This is really... this is really... such an act of banditry.
Maltz Kent looked around the hall and asked: "Do you have any good way to drive the Arda people out?"
Everyone was a little surprised. The Duke's tone sounded very calm. How can you be so calm even when your hometown is being punished?
But now that the Duke has asked, the people below have made suggestions one after another.
"Your Majesty, Duke, we only suffered a small defeat before, but Grayman became so rampant. Please gather your troops again to fight them decisively."
"It is better to retake Fort Bido first. A shameful apology!”
"The Arda people have sharp firearms, so we have to find a way to restrain them."
"You cowards, no matter how powerful you are, how powerful can you be? If we gather the cavalry to charge, can they stop it?"
>
The hall was noisy.
......
Malts actually felt a little bitter in his heart. The Emden lords who were driven to Center City by the Alda army cried to him, and their words were all touched by the other party's fire crossbows and Thunder Hammer was frightened.
"After the smoke rose, people and horses fell down one after another, even if they were wearing armor."
"The roar is like thunder, and one shot can hit dozens of miles!"
Although some people say that It sounds like an exaggeration at first glance, but the power of the weapons of the Arda people seems to be correct.
Damn, this is clearly magic and witchcraft, okay, biased bastard church.
The noise in the hall made the Duke very upset. He inadvertently saw his intelligence chief sitting there silently, so he waved to him and went to the study together.
"Your Majesty the Duke, why did you come to me...?"
"How have you been searching for Alda's information recently?"
"Well...I have gained a little bit. In fact, I was I want to talk to you about this after the meeting. Since you came to me, I will present it to you first." The intelligence chief took out a roll of parchment from his arms and handed it to the Duke with both hands.
Since the outbreak of the war, the Duke's Palace has ordered an end to all trade with the territories of the Anti-Kent Alliance, which naturally includes Arda. As a result, the territories on Maltz Kent's side could no longer enjoy cheap paper, and everyone used expensive parchment again.
Anyway, this is what Malz Kent saw himself. Letters were exchanged, official documents were submitted, and all he received was parchment.
Malts glanced a few times, then waved to the supervisor.
"I want to analyze it carefully. You should wait outside first."
"Yes, sir."
The supervisor respectfully resigned, but in his heart It's a bit strange, the Duke's hands seem to be... shaking?
After the supervisor went out, Maltz put his arm on the table, put his right hand on his forehead, closed his eyes and frowned for a long time, and then unrolled the parchment again.
Too underestimate the enemy! Too careless! I really should have killed the Graiman boy last year.
……
The following is the content on the parchment.
Dear Duke:
After our many inquiries, we have a general understanding of the military strength of the Graiman family. The information is now summarized as follows.
Since being invaded by pirates last year, Arda has maintained a standing army, and over the past year, the size of the army has grown larger and larger, and now it is estimated to be about 2,000 to 3,000 people. In other words, Arda only committed less than half of its army in the Battle of Biddoburg.
This force of more than 2,000 people includes a water force of at least 600 people. It should have been established to eliminate pirates last year. As for why it was retained after the pirates were eliminated, according to our report in Fulan Port According to the investigation, Graiman seems to have plans to develop ocean trade and has already put it into action. Alda invented a new ship that is suitable for ocean voyages. People in Fulan Port are saying that this kind of ship has sailed to Cape Bay for a generation.
In terms of the army's equipment, although the armor coverage rate is not high, they have deadly fire crossbows and thunder hammers. When Graiman marched into Bailding to counter the rebellion, they still had a mixture of fire crossbows and spears. By this year's Battle of Fort Bido, all troops were equipped with fire crossbows, and the fire crossbows were further improved and equipped with bayonets, allowing the soldiers to attack from a distance as well as fight at close range.
As for the two new weapons, Firebolt and Thunder Hammer, intelligence shows that they were most likely invented by Paul Graiman himself.
In terms of the quality of the army, according to the information reported by the spies, the slogans of the soldiers inside can be heard near the military camp every day, from morning to night, and it seems that there is only one day on the weekend when there is no movement. Although I didn't find out what kind of training was going on inside, the rate of training six days a week was far higher than that of the general army. Even the knights rarely practiced martial arts for six days a week.
In addition, high-intensity training means a high level of food supply, otherwise the soldiers' bodies will not be able to sustain it.
With advanced and sophisticated weapons and sufficient material support, this army definitely spends a lot of money.
A year ago Arda was still a barren county, but its performance today has subverted our previous impression of it. We analyze the reasons for this change as follows:
First, Grai Man "unified" the neighboring Bailding. Although Alda was poor, Bailding was relatively good among the northwest territories. This move could double the tax revenue.
The second is the invention of various new things, such as porcelain, paper, and cans. These are things that people have never seen before, and they can also bring great convenience to people's lives. Before the technology for making them spreads, Lyman will continue to make huge profits from them. In addition, Alda has a method that can produce large amounts of salt, which greatly reduces the cost of salt. Now almost all salt merchants in the northwest bay are purchasing from Alda.
Porcelain, paper, cans, and salt, in the words of Arda merchants, these are their "fist products" for foreign trade.
In addition, Graiman is also selling an expensive agricultural equipment to the landowners in the territory. The role of this equipment in promoting agriculture has yet to be investigated, but it has already earned him a large amount of gold coins.
The third is the rise of industry and commerce in Alda and Bailding. After the emergence of "hit products", Gleiman adopted a supportive policy for industry and commerce in the two places and attracted a large number of private factory owners and businessmen to participate. In the production and sale of these products, although the tax rate has been reduced after the implementation of the policy, due to the expansion of scale, taxes in this area have still increased a lot.
A nightmare week!
(End of this chapter)