Claude had no idea how much of a commotion the victory report passed by Major Leedfunk had caused, and was even reprimanded by the staff office of the frontline headquarters for falsely reporting military exploits. He is tired and busy now, and the only thing that can comfort him is that spending half a day with the young mage Sheila every few days will give him a moment of peace and calm.
Tiredness does not refer to physical fatigue, but mental fatigue. Except for Claude and the big man Germi who only knew how to fill his stomach, all the soldiers and officers who participated in the battle had more or less psychological and mental abnormalities. Just like Sergeant Markey, he suffered from insomnia for several days in a row and said that whenever he closed his eyes, he would always hear screams and wails coming from Squirrel Village.
Even Mark Qi, who is a veteran, is like this, let alone those soldiers. The same was true for Muriel and Diaverde. They told Claude privately that for some reason, dying from artillery fire or bayonet melee on the battlefield, whether it was the enemy or their comrades, felt that it was very special. Normal things, nothing surprising or sad. As a soldier, dying on the battlefield is a destination.
But like Claude, who burned so many enemies to death with one fire, he always felt that those enemies died unjustly. They did not die face to face on the battlefield, but were trapped by conspiracy and conspiracy. Especially when they were finally trapped in the fire and had no way to escape, their miserable cries for help and wailing had a profound impact on every soldier outside who heard it. a certain mental impact
Fortunately, Claude ordered the soldiers to pour water on the ground and buildings of the camp and prepared to attack the enemy's camp, which reduced everyone's attention. However, after the incident was over and delayed until now, everything calmed down, and the soldiers were still mentally slow. Changes slowly occurred, and they would always be reminded of the tragic cry for help in the fire scene that night.
The cases of insomnia like that of Markchi, Muriel and Diavid are still mild. The cases like that of McJack who immediately have nightmares as soon as they fall asleep and find themselves trapped in a fire and then wake up screaming from their dreams are serious. More serious. Many soldiers were like Mike. Not only were they unable to have a good rest, but other soldiers were also woken up by them. By the end of the second day, everyone had dark circles under their eyes and was depressed.
Murield said that everyone suspected that the souls of the enemies who were burned to death in Squirrel Village could not return to the kingdom of the God of War for eternal rest, so they could only wander around Squirrel Village, always pestering the people who killed them. This is the main reason why everyone cannot relax and let themselves have a good rest.
It's just nonsense. Claude doesn't believe this nonsense. If there are any ghosts, they should come to haunt him. After all, he is the real mastermind of the Burning Plan. If he is to be judged guilty, he should be held responsible. What’s the point of pestering the soldiers who obeyed his orders? It can be seen that ghosts are also afraid of evil people.
All are psychological factors. Claude knew very well that at the last moment when the fire burned the enemy, listening to the cries for help and wailing coming from the fire, the soldiers had forgotten that the people trapped in the fire were actually their own enemies. At that time, everyone regained their humanity and sanity, and they only had a simple desire to save others, just like when the neighbor's house next door was on fire and everyone went to help put out the fire.
It's just that the fire was too fierce and too big, and they couldn't get close. They could only watch the people trapped inside being burned and suffocated to death. This made those soldiers feel very guilty. On the one hand, they were unable to help. On the other hand, I thought that I was an accomplice in setting up the fire scene and causing the tragic situation before me, so I deepened my guilt and let my conscience prevail, causing my own psychological and mental problems.
Since everyone believes in gods and ghosts, this matter is actually easy to solve. It is nothing more than losing money and eliminating disasters. Claude took out his money bag and threw it to Murield, asking him to take a few people to the town to invite some priests from the Temple of War to come back and hold a large-scale sacrifice in Squirrel Village so that the ghosts of the burned enemies could return to the kingdom of the God of War. That's it. At the same time, we must do a good job in the ideological work of the soldiers, emphasizing that those who were burned to death were our enemies, not our neighbors. They came to Squirrel Village to kill us and take our lives, not to party with us.
After struggling for more than ten days, the matter was finally dealt with. Claude paid more than twenty gold crowns out of his own pocket. This money could not even be reimbursed to the battalion headquarters, because this soldier mentality was not included in military expenses. The cost of treatment is a problem. For example, Mark Qi became an alcoholic even though he was not a big drinker. He was under too much psychological pressure after going to the battlefield and had to resort to drinking to get drunk to relax himself. Women and wine are actually the best relaxing medicine for soldiers in this era.
But when Claude stayed with the young mage Sheila, Sheila asked Claude very strangely, why didn't you have this mental problem? You didn't feel guilty at all when you burned so many people to death. It seems that you are worthy of being a magician. , magicians treat these ordinary people in a condescending and cold-blooded manner. No magician cares about the lives of these ordinary people.
Sheila asked and answered herself, but Claude knew very well that as the mastermind of burning so many enemies to death, he really didn't feel anything in his heart, except that he felt sick several times that night and the next day because of the smell of barbecued human flesh. Besides, I feel really peaceful inside, and there is no guilt or anxiety at all. I can eat well, sleep soundly, and have no psychological burden at all.
This is not a matter of being a magician or not, but as a time traveler, even though Claude has tried his best to integrate into this strange world, he still has nothing but his family and a few friends. No feeling for the Kingdom or for other people. Even the battle he participated in felt like he was playing a more real game in his heart. Whether they were his own soldiers or enemies, Claude would always unconsciously regard them as NPCs. Except for a few people who were relatively close to him, including Murray Ed and Michael Jack, everyone else was treated equally in his eyes and there was no difference between them.
Under such circumstances, no matter how many people die, they are nothing more than a statistic in Claude's eyes. The only thing he has to guarantee is whether he can survive this war, because he doesn't know if he still has a chance to be resurrected and cannot sacrifice himself easily. Therefore, no matter what means or strategies are used to deal with the enemy, it is appropriate. There is no need to regret it. Anyway, whoever wants my life, I will kill him first. It is that simple.
The villagers of Squirrel Village have also returned. Next, they need to sow seeds in the mountain fields to avoid missing the farming season, otherwise they will be hungry this winter. Now that the war is over, they can't stay in Blackstone Village and run back. However, Squirrel Village has been burned to the ground, and their shabby shack home has been completely destroyed.
Claude is willing to be responsible for helping them build a new squirrel village, and Claude is still responsible for this. Anyway, he would not be the one working. The more than 130 prisoners left in the camp became the main labor force in building the new Squirrel Village. All Claude has to do is to plan Squirrel Village in a unified manner and build relatively regular village houses. This does not cost much money. There are many kinds of building materials in the mountains, but there is a shortage of young and strong labor. Now that the prisoners have filled the labor vacancy, Claude can allocate part of the rough grains captured from the nobles' camps in the territory as food consumption, and everything will be fine.
Claude encouraged the villagers to expand their breeding industry. He believed that given the geographical environment of Squirrel Village, it was likely to become an important border garrison location in the future. Even if they leave, troops from above will be stationed to control this mountain road. So if the villagers of Squirrel Village vigorously raise livestock and poultry, they don't have to worry about selling them at all. The garrison will purchase goods locally, which also eliminates transportation costs from the rear, and the villagers will also have more income. This is a win-win result.
However, Markchi listened to Claude's words and secretly encouraged the village elder to take advantage of the prisoners to help build the village and build a tavern first, so that the soldiers stationed here would have a place to relax in the future, and the village elder could also The village elder was moved by the prospect of making a fortune. He actually came to Claude and asked to build a tavern for the village first. Claude made Claude dumbfounded and finally agreed to the village elder's request.
Design and planning is Claude's specialty, but Claude has no plans to build tall and stylish houses for the villagers of Squirrel Village. He just re-planned the architectural layout of the entire village to give the villagers a better place to live than the shabby shacks. In addition, he arranged a yard of similar size for the villagers' new houses, which was enough for all the villagers to be satisfied. Thank you so much.
This time, Claude planned to build mud houses for the villagers. He would first dry the logs, then build the frame of the house, dig out the wall foundation, and use stones to build a one-foot height. Then we dug yellow mud, clay and lime from the mountains. After crushing, they are stirred and filled into wooden frames to become mud bricks. After drying, they are mixed with clay and lime for bonding to build walls. It only takes more than half a month and ten people to build a villager's house. As for how to arrange it inside There is no need for Claude to take care of it and let the villagers do what they want.
According to the wishes of the village elder, the first thing to be completed was the village tavern. Then the village elder took several villagers across the mountains and visited several villages in the mountainous area. He found four relatively young widows to come as maids, and purchased a lot of fruit wine, mixed wine and game meat brewed by the mountain people. , it was opened after a simple decoration.
Claude didn't join in the fun on the opening day. Instead, he went to the witch forest to have a tryst with the young mage. When I came back at noon the next day, I found that the tavern was closed. I was puzzled. When I returned to the camp and asked, I found out that the tavern had a prosperous business last night, and almost all the soldiers who were not on duty went to the tavern. The soldiers stationed here all have money and nowhere to spend it. How could they be unhappy after finally building a tavern here, and then consume all the wine, game and other things in the tavern
The village elder, his old woman, and several villagers who helped in the tavern didn't even have dinner. In the end, they had to go to other villagers to get some cereals to fill their stomachs. As for the best and most profitable business, it was the four young widows who worked as maids. From the time it opened at four in the afternoon until it closed at two in the evening, they never got out of bed. Soldiers were waiting in line one by one. It is said that almost every maid received more than twenty soldiers. They would not be able to recover after three or four days of rest.
Said Claude, he wanted to yell, are you so hungry? There are only about 130 people in the camp excluding the wounded soldiers, and two-thirds of the soldiers have gone to patronize the four widows. So shameful.
Diavid knocked on the door and came in, followed by the signal soldier. As they walked, the two of them talked about the wonderful things about the four maids in the tavern. As the sergeant chief, Diavid, Muriel, Markchi and others were the first guests received by the four maids in the tavern. The signal soldier behind him was on duty last night and did not go to the tavern. He was drooling now. Listen to Diavid bragging about how he had a fight with the maid
Claude ordered Diaverde to shut up with a dark face, and then took the carrier pigeon message from the signal soldier. This is an order from the battalion headquarters. Major Leedfunk wants to dispatch the Diavid Squadron back to suppress local riots. Seeing that a month has passed, there is no movement on Claude's side, and there is no news that the nobles of the two principalities have re-recruited troops to come for revenge. The battalion headquarters believes that there is no need to place three squadrons in Squirrel Village, so they will The Diavid squadron that provided follow-up support was recruited back.
After signing the order and letting the signal soldiers go out, Claude scolded Diavide and told him not to show off the affairs between men and women. This was not an honor, but shallow and obscene. In addition, you have to go back to suppress the local riots. Be more careful and don’t go into the tavern to find women for nothing, lest anyone discovers this lustful habit and sets a trap for you.
After Claude talked a lot, he realized that Diaverde looked at him with an unconvinced look and complained: "The boss himself found a beautiful woman as his girlfriend, how could he know that we younger brothers are hungry? I'm hungry. By the way, last time I heard that there was a baroness, she was a great beauty, and you detained her here for two nights. We don't have the skills like you, boss, so we can only vent to the maid in the tavern."
Claude was speechless and could only wave his hand to Diyavid and his squadron to get out.
For Claude, the two months after defeating the coalition of nobles from the two principalities were a rare leisure time. Although there are various matters that require him to make decisions, here in Squirrel Village, he is the only chief official. He does not need to discuss with others. He only needs to make a decision and the people below will naturally be responsible for executing it. Whether it was the rebuilding of Squirrel Village or the soldiers' daily training, patrolling, patrolling, reconnaissance and other tasks, Markchi, Murray Ed, McJack and others were supervised and responsible for it, so he had a lot of free time to run to the Witch Wood and talk to himself A tryst with his little lover Sheila.
Except for Diavid being summoned by the battalion to suppress local riots, Claude didn't care at all about the outside world. On the contrary, the battalion commander, Major Leedfunk, sent many pigeon messages to Claude and conveyed a lot of information. At the very least, Claude knew that traffic had been restored through the temporary passage in the Picklet Mountains, and that reinforcements from two second-line legions had entered the three southern counties. They would support the two precarious frontline defense positions.
About ten days later, Major Leedfunk arrived at Squirrel Village with a large group of people. He told Claude that these people were from the staff and military discipline department of the frontline headquarters. They were here to verify Claude and the soldiers. of military exploits.