Warlord: King of All Clans

The few captives Strong brought with him were all wearing merchant robes and the yellowish turbans characteristic of the Western Territory.

Isenpol is close to the West, and caravans from the West often came here to trade. Leo also has some understanding of the customs of the West.

The western border is full of deserts, Gobi and grasslands, with strong winds and sand everywhere. Everyone rides horses, so it is customary to wear a headscarf to block the wind and sand.

The textile and dyeing technology in the West was so backward that commoners could only wear such inferior yellowed headscarves, and only nobles could wear high-quality headscarves with bright colors.

If you can catch a captive with a colorful turban, that would be a real big fish, because that person must be a member of the Burke family in the West.

It was common for bandit groups in the North to rob houses, but compared with the horse thieves in the West, they were simply apprentices.

After all, the main occupations of the people in the North are still grazing and planting, and they only organize teams to go out and earn some extra money during the slack season.

However, among the nomadic peoples in the western border, often all the adult males in the tribe would live as horse thieves all year round, leaving only the family members, young and old, at home to herd the livestock.

In this case, the headscarf becomes a life-saving talisman, and the horse thieves can easily identify the target's identity through the target's headscarf.

Seeing that the target was wearing a colorful turban, the horse thieves were reluctant to shoot him and just waited to capture him alive and return the money.

They may even inquire more carefully about the target's origins, and consider whether they can eat the food or withstand the revenge.

So when Leo saw the people coming, he immediately lost interest. These people wearing yellow turbans were just workers and could not be exchanged for much ransom.

After Buck Fortress was breached by the Kobold army, a large number of residents and soldiers fled to the west.

Strong had too few troops and no energy to spare for pursuit.

However, some residents of the fortress still hid in the cellars, or organized people to guard the courtyards, waiting for the aliens to be repelled.

In their subconscious, as long as the Northern Earl's Legion did not launch a massive attack, the heavily guarded Buck Fortress would not be so easy to breach.

As long as the brief chaos is over and the defenders repel the foreigners, the city will return to peace.

So by the time Leo arrived, the ogre army had already detained hundreds of prisoners, and there were at least thousands of people in the city who were either hiding or resisting stubbornly.

The captives looked at the well-equipped alien army and were filled with despair.

The wild tribes didn't capture captives to sell for money or enslave them, they just wanted to store their meat while they were still alive for a longer period of time.

When they saw Leo appear, they seemed to see a ray of light in their eyes.

The other party’s leader turned out to be a human, so there was a basis for communication.

The middle-aged fat man in a white robe who was leading the group, fell to the ground at Leo's feet as soon as he reached the top of the city wall. He shouted in clear Imperial language, "Sir! I am the civil official of Buck Fortress! My family is very rich! I am willing to pay the ransom!"

Leo asked, "How much can you offer?"

The middle-aged fat man pointed with his fingers and shouted: "One thousand silver!"

"One thousand...silver coins?" Leo had been accustomed to spending lavishly in the imperial capital during this period of time, and was used to using gold soles, so he was a little unfamiliar with this term for a moment.

The Imperial Gold Sule is not a regular currency in circulation, just like the ancient gold ingots.

Most transactions among the people of the empire were settled in copper and silver coins, so the unit used by the prisoner to make his offer was more common.

But Leo didn't care about that. He thought this guy could offer a thousand gold coins.

He was happy for a fraction of a second, but when he heard it clearly, he immediately felt offended. "Ten gold coins? You want to redeem your life for a hundred thousand? Drag him out and behead him!"

The middle-aged fat man panicked and quickly raised the price, "One thousand two hundred silver coins!"

Strong, who was standing by, understood the market better than Rio and whispered, "Twelve thousand is not a small amount. One hundred and twenty thousand copper coins, that's a lot of food and lead ingots."

There would only be a hundred pounds of meat left after chopping him off, which would be despised even by the ogres if thrown to them.

If you convert it into 120,000 coppers and melt them into bronze, you can cast a thousand-man commander.

Leo didn't believe that a civil official of a fortress had so little property, so he said coldly: "Fifty gold coins, one less, and I'll keep your arm."

The ransom for an Isenbol corner flag knight is generally between twenty and thirty gold, and the ransom for a proletarian knight is even lower. Rio's asking price is only the ransom for two corner flags.

The middle-aged fat man was suddenly filled with despair. It was obvious that he himself did not quite believe that the family was willing to pay a ransom of fifty gold coins for him.

Although he was the civil officer of Buck Fortress, he was just a butler as Leo had guessed before.

He murmured and stammered, but did not really bargain. He just flattered, "Then please allow my servant to go back and report."

"OK."

So, under Strong's watchful gaze, the middle-aged fat man cautiously stuck his head out and picked out two people from the group of prisoners below.

"This is my loyal servant. I will definitely bring back good news for you, my Lord!"

Leo took a quick glance and saw that one of the boys had fair skin and evasive eyes, which he tried hard to cover with a dirty gray cloth headscarf. He immediately sensed something fishy.

So he shook his head and said, "Change people."

The middle-aged fat man turned pale immediately, and tremblingly pointed at two more people before he got permission.

After watching the two servants riding two fast horses from the Western Territory disappear into the World Tree Avenue in the Western Territory, Leo pointed at the two young men pointed out by the middle-aged fat man and ordered, "Strong, lock these two up and keep them under strict supervision."

As Strong ordered his men to execute him, he touched his head and asked in confusion, "My Lord, why is this happening?"

Leo said disdainfully: "Look at this group of slaves, all of them have thick skin and flesh, but this one has thin skin and tender flesh, is that acceptable?"

Strong acted as if he had suddenly realized something. "My Lord, you have a very sharp eye! You are so smart and powerful! Woof woof woof! In Strong's eyes, these people are all the same. I can't tell. I can't tell at all!"

Leo didn't care whether Strong intended to be the supporting actor or not, he just sneered at the middle-aged fat man's trick.

If a person from the imperial capital was captured during the war, the commoners and nobles could still mingle a little, but here in the western border, the lower-class commoners were all tanned to a very dark tan, with a red complexion. An eighteen-year-old had the skin of at least thirty-eight years old.

A pretty boy who had been exposed to the wind and sun for less than an hour and just put on a little dust on his face thought he could deceive him. Did he really think he was acting?

He didn't even need to use his mind to see that the other party was trying to escape.

Except for the middle-aged fat man, the other captives were all merchants from the Western Territory. They had large quantities of goods stored in Buck Fortress and did not dare to go to Isenpol.

After the defenders of Buck Fortress intercepted and killed a Northern caravan, Strong did not go easy on the Westerners and retaliated in kind.

As a result, for nearly a year, trade between the Territory of Talhanberk and the city of Isenbol was cut off, and the World Tree Avenue between the two places was almost deserted.

Most of the caravans from the western border chose to go south, entering the northern border from the Borok Pass in the south, and going to the Earl Gustav to trade.

But there are also some caravans that have neither the means nor the willingness to take the long way around, so they remain here.

The leaders of these cross-border trade caravans were all wealthy men, and they all expressed their willingness to pay a large sum of money to redeem the bodies.

Leo looked at them, hesitated for three seconds, and waved his hand, "Let them go!"

Strong and the businessmen all questioned, "Huh?"

Leo continued, "Not only will I release you, I will also host a banquet for you. In addition, I will never rob you of the goods you have stored in Fort Buck, and I am willing to buy them at the market price."

Several Western merchants who had just been tricked looked at each other, wondering whether Leo's words were true or not.