Realm of Power

The night is like water. Different from the bustling atmosphere of the Kugit camp outside the city, the night in the inner city of Samoer Fortress is very lively. The noisy noise can even be heard by the Kugit people stationed outside the city. Inside the castle The red light that reflected the red sky made the Kugit people even more confused.

The business area outside the military camp on the inner wall of the fortress is covered with tents of various sizes. The vendors selling goods are like an army of thousands of people. The business tents set up are like huge white umbrellas. , the three large military camps in the castle were surrounded by water.

The vendors in the trade tents were waving all kinds of goods in their hands and promoting their goods with slobbery words. From weapons and equipment to all kinds of fruits, the tents behind them were almost filled to the brim with competing goods.

On the left, there is a food street lined up for hundreds of meters consisting of dozens of tents. Piles of farmers and soldiers are happily clashing glasses of ale with each other. A dozen gorgeous and charming Saxon dancers are dancing on the large round stage in the center of the tents. The passionate Saxon lap dance, the long white legs exposed under the gorgeous silk cloth, caused the soldiers and farmers drinking nearby to let out bursts of excited shouts and applause.

Behind the military camp is the blacksmith area. There are hundreds of blacksmith shops divided into three rows. The fires are bright inside, and the tapping sound is like playing music. The crisp metal collision sound is stirring in the night and can be heard even from a distance.

Nearly a thousand blacksmiths summoned from the three territories are working day and night to build the latest weapons and equipment. Flatbed carriages transporting ore continuously bring in dark iron ore from outside the castle gate, and then pass through the flat road behind the military camp. The stone road leads into the blacksmith district,

The wide stone road can accommodate three carriages traveling side by side at the same time. Piles of iron ore are unloaded from the flatbed carriages and piled into small black iron mountains.

These are high-quality iron ore transported from the Sagoning Iron Mine ten miles away. Fatty arranged for 1,000 refugees to work there, and granted the villagers near Sagoning that they could use one hundred horse-drawn carriages to transport the ore as a deduction this year. tax,

The happy villagers of Sagoning used their leisurely evenings to transport iron ore. If they were lucky, they could make two trips a night, and the entire year's taxes could be paid in 50 days. Such a good thing certainly made Sagoning happy. The villagers ran extremely diligently, and in just ten days, they had already piled up a mountain of iron in the warehouse at the back of the blacksmith district.

There were no traces of the tense atmosphere before the war in the Samoer Fortress, among the bustling and noisy night market, and the nervous and busy blacksmiths. The crowd inside gave no hint that the Kugits would break through this solid fortress. Worry

The Kugit envoy Sceris, who followed the guards to the bedroom to rest, stopped. Standing on the corridor high in the castle, she could clearly see the lively scene below. The continuous firelight below reflected the red light of the sky. piece,

"Who are these people? What are they doing down there?"

Looking at the lively and noisy scene inside the outer wall of the castle, Scelis did not expect to see this scene in this tightly defended fortress. This did not look like a heavily guarded fortress at all, but more like a prosperous medium-sized town.

Scellis, who served as the special envoy this time, was not only the envoy for negotiation, but also responsible for the task of reconnaissance of the fortress defense.

“The sky is big and the earth is big, eating is the biggest thing!”

The Kugit spies have already found out that several large grain-producing areas in the south of the kingdom are transporting large quantities of grain to the Samoer Fortress. According to conservative estimates, the food accumulated in the fortress may exceed one million dan, enough for all Kugits. The special forces will last for two years

For Sceris, who is in urgent need of food, this fat man who has monopolized so much food is a big customer. As long as he can get one-third of the food from his hands, all the Kugit people will not go hungry. Return to the prairie.

Scellis discovered that the formerly dilapidated Samor Fortress had been refortified by the Vecians. The number of defenders of about 10,000 mentioned in the spy report was still a conservative estimate.

Just looking at the large military camp covering nearly two miles below and the numerous soldiers walking back and forth, Scelis thought there were at least about 15,000 people.

If the farmers and merchants stranded in the fortress are included, the fortress's strength will definitely exceed the 20,000 mark.

20,000! Sceris's heart trembled, and she held the five delicate fingers of the sapphire knife handle.

It was almost two-thirds of the total number of Kujit troops invading the south, and all the soldiers were wearing fine mail armor. Even when drinking, they did not forget to put their weapons within reach at any time. The weapons were shining under the light of nearby torches. red light

Although there was a lot of noise and bustle below, there were still dozens of groups of soldiers patrolling the area in an orderly manner. From this, Scellis knew that these were not ordinary peasant soldiers, but well-trained professional soldiers.

Sceris secretly considered that without more than 15,000 elite Kugit warriors, the thought of capturing this well-defended and heavily guarded fortress was simply a fantasy, and they must be the most elite steel-armored warriors.

The main force of the Kugits has been trapped in the quagmire of the siege of Kyoto Klesto, and it is impossible to mobilize excess troops to storm a heavily guarded fortress.

Even a cavalry regiment stationed in the town of Hitteru was just brought by Sceris from the royal court as a pretense. King Kugit had strict orders, even if all of his own people were killed by the fortress, that regiment You must not attack the fortress without authorization, because it is the last cavalry unit guarding the Kugit Court.

This is also the helpless background for Sceris to come to negotiate. If there were tens of thousands of elite soldiers in hand, the Kugits would have already begun to attack Samoer, and they still need to negotiate with the Samoer Fortress.

Sceris, who was full of confidence, did not expect that the fat man Samoer, who had a large amount of food in his hands, had no intention of redeeming people. Instead, he acted like a rogue who only cares about money. This gave Scelis, who was shouldering the heavy responsibility, a headache. ,

The Kugits robbed a lot of money when they went south this time, but most of it was in the hands of the left guard king who was responsible for outflanking, and some of it was in the hands of Prince Stanisas, the deputy commander of the Royal Guards. Finally, they were left behind. The Royal Guards have at most 600,000 yuan in hand.

The Royal Court pays more attention to the number of captives in its hands. Those are the golden lumps that can be exchanged for large sums of gold coins. Instead of marching with heavy belongings, it is better to take the golden lumps with them who can walk on their own.

However, Scellis now discovered that the royal court was wrong. The Vekian capital of Cresdo was surrounded by her like an iron barrel. The 200,000 Vekian defenders inside were even worse than the Kugits. It was said that they were all eaten. It is impossible for people to come up with food at their current state.

However, the Satsuma Fortress, which controls food, is not interested in these prisoners at all, which makes the more than one hundred noble prisoners become useless waste besides consuming the little food they have.

The fat man didn't know the pride of the Kugit people. The news that the famous Son of the Eagle had fallen in the Sodale Mountains in the south of the kingdom three months ago had caused quite a shock to the senior officials of the Kugit.

The central radicals headed by King Zuowei believed that the southern mountains and hills were not conducive to large-scale cavalry operations and could easily be ambushed by the cunning Vecians. Attacking the south itself was a wrong plan.

Prince Kutan Ni Ersas, who now advocates going south, has confirmed with his own life that this speculation is correct.

At the suggestion of King Zuowei, who advocated capturing the central part, the royal court had to give up the plan to divide its troops and go south, and concentrated all its forces to attack the central part. Only then did the bloody siege of the royal capital Cresdo break out.

I don’t know what the fat man from Samour would think if he knew that it was his unintentional actions that caused the Kugits to give up on their plan to conquer all of Wikia.

Sceris knew from the Wikipedia report intercepted two months ago that her mortal enemy, Prince Kutan Niersas, died at the hands of this wretched fat man Samour.

And judging from the current construction situation inside the Samoer Fortress, it is estimated that the large amount of property plundered by Kutan Niersas has not escaped the clutches of this fat man. He could not help frowning and cursed secretly with a livid face,

"Kutan Niersas is a big fool. He has been working hard for half a year, and yet he has taken advantage of a weak fat man. What a shame to the Kugit people!"

He wants money and food, and he has tens of thousands of elite troops in his hands. If it were him, he would not care about the lives of the captured nobles.

Sceris sighed secretly, this mission was really difficult to handle.

"Those are the refugees my family has resettled and the merchants who came with the army. They are always so enthusiastic. Such trading activities usually last until dawn. I hope these people will not disturb the envoy's rest?"

The guard leading the way saw the sadness on Sceris's face and thought he had offended the special envoy, so he quickly and respectfully replied,

"Merchant? Why do these merchants appear in the fortress?"

After hearing the guard's explanation, Sceris's face became even more confused.

"We adults say that the army needs food, weapons, and supplies. These merchants can provide us with the things we need. We can also hand over the things we don't need or the spoils of war to these merchants. This is one step at a time. It’s a win-win situation and can save us a lot of unnecessary expenses! We adults call this a one-stop service!”

"One-stop service? Food? Supplies for defending the city? Merchants? Handling trophies? Supplies whenever needed! Transport by yourself? What do you mean?"

Sceris tried to connect the information in her mind, and her mind became a mess.

The modern "one-stop" service is the product of business development to a certain stage. It is a complex and troublesome thing for the Kugit people who have no business sense, even for the smart Sceris. A complicated and nerve-wracking relationship

That night, in her dream, Scellis saw arrowheads, stones, and rolling logs falling like raindrops on the heads of her army from the towering walls of Samour.

Teams of merchants braved dangerous arrows to continuously transport various materials to the city tower. The number of defense materials facing them increased even more than before. The corpses of the Kugit warriors under their command were higher than the city wall.

A river of bright red human blood flowed under his feet. An extremely obscene fat man was picking up the meat scraps in his teeth with a small wooden stick in his hand. He stood on the city wall with a contemptuous look and smiled slyly at himself.

"ah"

This incredible scene made Scellis let out a clear scream. She sat up and realized that she had a nightmare.

"The dream just now should be the one-stop service that the soldiers said! A city defense force can get supplies from suppliers at any time. Is this battle still going to be fought?"

Sceris muttered to herself, got up and went to the window of the castle, pushed open the wooden window frame, and heard the sound of noisy entertainment outside the window. Suddenly a gust of night wind blew, and Sceris felt the coolness behind her, with her white skin. As soon as I touched it, cold sweat wet the clothes on my back.

The next day, negotiations on food still kicked off in the hall of Samour.

"Except for the prisoners, we can negotiate other conditions! I am a kind person. I believe there is nothing in this world that cannot be exchanged. It just depends on whether you are worthy of it."

Sceris saw the fat man who had just finished breakfast walk in with a satisfied look on his face, picking his teeth with a toothpick in his hand, and smiling with the weird smile in his dream last night.