The sound of rumbling horseshoes shattered the stillness of the dark night.
Nearly a hundred Qingqi galloped towards them and did not stop until they reached Liangshan Pass. A big man in the lead waved his hand, and a small group of ten or so riders rode out and spread around to guard. The rest of the knights dismounted and began to feed and drink their mounts, and began to rest for a short time. An hour later, the hundred or so light cavalry remounted and galloped towards the Wangcheng Plain... .
No one expected that there were two people missing when the hundred or so light cavalry started back on the road. Lorist and Tagle got out of the bushes, listened carefully to the sound of horses' hoofs going away, shook their heads slightly, and the two started on the road.
If you follow the road from Nubit Port to Hamidas King City, the carriage can arrive in the morning and evening, and it only takes fourteen to five hours. If it is a messenger, it can be reached in ten hours by horse. But if you rely on two legs, it will take at least one and a half days, usually two days.
Lorist and Tagle can't follow the avenue to Hamidas King City. After all, the avenue leading to the King City is now in the hands of the Norton family armed forces. If they arrive at Hamidas King City swaggeringly on horseback or in a carriage, fools will get up. suspicion. Lorist and Tagle were about to take a slanted line on the hill, pretending to be the escaped nobles from Nubit Port who had escaped from the enemy's hunt and hid in the hill, and crossed the hill to find the way back to the royal city.
Walked for more than two hours and took two breaks. The sky is getting brighter.
Lorist, who was walking in front, stopped, pointed to the front, and then sat with Tagle on the right and outflanked him.
Here is a sparse grove, not far away is a small rock hill, just beyond the small rock hill, there are sounds of running water and noise...
Below the small rocky hill is a fast-flowing creek. On the rocky beach of the creek, there are a few people resting. It seems that they are nobles who escaped from Nubit Harbor.
In the middle of the creek stood a tall, tanned man with old welts on his naked back. At this moment, he was bending over to catch fish from the thigh-deep stream, but he didn't seem to have much experience in catching fish. Although his hands were like palm-leaf fans, he was always a step behind, and his whole body was soaked without catching a single fish.
Sitting on a big rock on the shore was a richly dressed nobleman, about thirty, with a pale face and dull eyes. He was paralyzed on the big rock, and his bare feet were being held by an old man in gray clothes. He was having a massage, and he was still cursing obscenities like useless dog shit on the big man in the stream.
Next to the nobleman, squatted a middle-aged man in his forties, wearing a brown leather armor, holding a long sword in his hand, staring straight at the stream, and from time to time echoed the nobleman and shouted a curse. Twice.
On a large stone slab three to four meters behind the middle-aged man, lay a big man in bright silver mail, with his hands behind his head, watching the farce in front of him indifferently, as if he had nothing to do with it.
Tagle made a few gestures towards Lorist, and seeing Lorist nodded, he walked out from behind the hidden tree and walked towards the creek beach.
"Who?" The burly man in chain mail lying on the big stone slab was the most vigilant. He jumped up and drew his sword as a warning sign. There was a flash of golden light on the long sword. It turned out to be a golden-ranked sword. scholar. It's just that although this big man in chain armor is a golden swordsman, the guard posture he puts on is a bit ridiculous, with his front feet stepping on the ground and his center of gravity facing backwards.
The squatting middle-aged man and the nobleman leaning on the boulder also shut their mouths. The middle-aged man drew out his sword and held it up tremblingly as a guard. The nobleman kicked the old man who was holding his foot. , said angrily: "Hurry up and put on my shoes..."
The big man in the stream also straightened up, looking warily at the forest that made the noise.
"Relax, Carrick, it's me." Tagle appeared by the stream.
The middle-aged man with the long sword saw that Tager was stunned: "It's you, Tager?"
"Your grandma, I was miserably hurt by you bastards. You must force me to enter the inner city, saying that the inner city can be defended. Damn it, you gave up the inner city before others attacked and broke through. Throwing Lao Tzu at the back of the team and almost being caught. If it weren’t for Lao Tzu’s life, this life would have been ruined in your hands..." Tager stepped on a few big rocks across the stream cursingly, towards the middle-aged man go.
Seeing that it was Tagle who came, the middle-aged man also breathed a sigh of relief: "It's you, Tager, I thought Creamer and the others were with you..."
"Crimer? He's dead. He was with us when we left the city, but an iron crossbow arrow flew not far from the city gate and nailed him directly to the city wall, scaring us half to death. Then We continued to run, but Bailuopu, Flinder, and I were all lost at dawn, and the enemy cavalry came after us..." Tager walked up to the middle-aged man while talking nonsense.
"Did you come here alone?" It wasn't the middle-aged man named Carrick who asked, but the golden swordsman who was still vigilant.
"Pull it down, I don't have that ability." Tager sat down with a tired face, stretched out his hand to take a few sips of water from the stream, and drank half full before answering: "If it weren't for our chamber of commerce secretly sending Three guards followed us, and I was captured or killed by those cavalry long ago."
"Lock, come out, it's all our own people, it's okay." Tager called out to the woods twice. Lorist flashed out of the woods and slowly walked over while maintaining his vigilance.
"He's the guard of your chamber of commerce? Why haven't I seen him before?" the middle-aged man named Carrick asked curiously.
"They are following me in secret. One is to protect the safety of El and I, and the other is to report what we have done on this trip to the chamber of commerce. If the situation is not urgent, they will not appear in front of me." Tower Geer explained.
Oh, everyone understands, this is a traditional behavior of many aristocratic families in Galintia, which is to secretly send people to monitor and protect the children of the family when they travel, and to report back the journey and performance of the children of the family in detail. In order to understand the character of the family's children, evaluate whether he has the talent to inherit the family or whether it is worth spending a lot of money to cultivate. I just didn't expect Tagle to have such treatment.
"Didn't you say there were three of them?" Carrick looked at Lorist and asked.
Tager yelled: "I don't know what kind of bad luck labor and management have come to travel to your broken archipelago, just in time for this damn war! Didn't you say that you have never had any enemies? You have been beaten to your old den! If labor and management If you stay in the outer city well, you will show your identity as soon as possible. In the name of our Peterson Chamber of Commerce, you will not only be treated like a guest, but at least your life will be safe.
I was brought into the inner city by you guys and followed you to break out of the siege. After running around in the middle of the night, I ran into cavalrymen. They would not listen to my explanation and cut them down with their swords. Well now, three of the cavalry were killed, two of us died, and those cavalry were still chasing after us. If it wasn't for Locke who was familiar with the mountains and forests and led me to escape, would labor and management still have to suffer so much over the mountains? "
Carrick touched his nose resentfully: "Tager, we took you to the inner city because we wanted to protect your safety. This is out of kindness as a friend. It's just that we didn't expect the enemy to be so powerful..."
Tager shook his hands and dried the drops of water on his hands: "How on earth did you provoke such a powerful enemy? I seem to have heard people in the chamber of commerce talk about this family with a bear pattern painted on its flag. Can't remember what it's called?"
Carrick squatted down again: "I don't know too well, I heard that two or three months ago, the nobles and slave trading houses in the kingdom united and dispatched tens of thousands of people to Hirovas Island in the Kingdom of Antinak A big hunt was carried out, and tens of thousands of migrant slaves were captured. However, they suffered a lot in that operation, and many people died. That Hilovas Island seems to be a territory called the Norton family... "
"The Norton family?" Tagle jumped up as if frightened: "Your grandma, how dare you mess with the Norton family, no wonder you were beaten..."
"Huh? You know the Norton family?" Carrick asked.
"I've heard people say that they are the Roaring Bears of the Northland, military nobles of the former Krissen Empire, who guarded the frontiers of the Northland for the Empire. The 100,000 troops that defeated the Kingdom of Iberia in the First World War. Are you out of your minds to provoke such a powerful enemy? If such a military nobleman has a grudge with him, he will never die. You are in trouble this time. It’s just that I can’t figure it out , isn't the Norton family's territory in the Northland? How come Hilovas Island has also become their territory?"
"To be honest, I don't know. I heard people say that Hilovas Island is also the new territory of the Norton family. The Norton family recruited 50,000 to 60,000 young and strong refugees to develop and build on the island, so the people above started to fight these things. The idea of the refugees. We said at the last meeting that our Kingdom of Haneyabada has been short of slaves in recent years, so I heard that there are so many young and strong refugees who are not jealous..." Carrick said.
"Are all the nobles of the Kingdom of Haneyabada idiots? You have to find out the details of the other party before you want to do it. Why don't you think about it, you have the ability to recruit 50,000 to 60,000 young and strong refugees to develop on the family territory Will the aristocratic family you build be easy to provoke? Ordinary nobles can’t even support 50,000 to 60,000 people! Besides, the lack of slaves in your kingdom is not self-inflicted? Who told you not to treat slaves as human beings? Use it in the dead. If you die a lot, it will not be enough. Why don’t you understand that slaves are not consumables. They will create wealth for their masters. Can’t you treat them better? How come you don’t understand such a shallow truth about the slave owner’s own loss?” Tager scolded.
"Carrick, where did this friend come from? It sounds like he has a lot of opinions on the nobles of our Haneyabada Kingdom. Why don't you ask him to talk about how to train those slaves to work hard? ?” At this time, the white-faced nobleman who was leaning on the boulder spoke again.
"Uh, Lord Viscount, I forgot to introduce first, I'm really sorry. This is the young master Tagle, the vice president of the Peterson Chamber of Commerce, one of the seven giants of the business alliance, and he and another young master Eric Burke He traveled to our kingdom to gain experience, um, that is his guard, called... called...." Carrick forgot what Lorist's name was.
"His name is Locke, and he is the guard of our Petersen Chamber of Commerce. It is a pleasure to meet you. Dear Viscount, Tager from the Peterson Chamber of Commerce salutes you." Tagle respectfully greeted the white-faced nobleman half lying on the rock regards. However, the white-faced noble put on airs and snorted twice, indicating that this was the answer.
"Who is he?" Tagle didn't care, dragging Carrick to walk two steps and asked in a low voice by the creek.
"That is Viscount Timba, one of the seventeenth dukes of the founding of the country, but it has been three generations since it was passed down to him, and the title has also been reduced from duke to viscount. But his sister is the great concubine of the current king Luther III, who just gave us The king gave birth to the first prince, so his title is very likely to be re-elevated to earl..." Carrick also replied in a very low voice.
The 17th Duke of the founding of the country is actually the leader of the 17 relatively large pirate gangs that established the Kingdom of Haneyabada. He was named Duke. Of course, the pirate king who established the kingdom was not a vegetarian. If the duke's heir to the title refuses to pay a relatively large amount of title inheritance, then the title will be lowered to a lower level of succession. Of course, the territory will not change, but the lower title in name is not pleasant. From this point of view, the viscount's ancestors were all miserly and refused to pay the inheritance money, so the title was lowered to the viscount.
"What about that?" Tagle glanced at the golden swordsman lying on the big stone slab behind him.
"That's Duke Guffman's golden knight. I don't know his name, but we met him yesterday afternoon. Viscount Timba paid a large sum of money to hire him to escort us to Hamidas King City. said Carrick.
This Carrick is one of Tagle's best friends in Nubit City. He works as a small steward in the City Lord's Mansion, responsible for checking and supervising the management of the treasury. After being invited by Tager several times and given two gifts, the two became good friends, and almost told how much material reserves there were in the treasury of Nubit Port.
Tagle promised him that if the Peterson Chamber of Commerce opened a trading point in Nubit Port, he would give him one-tenth of the shares. Therefore, for the sake of the life and safety of the big benefactor, after the Norton family landed armed and defeated the more than 3,000 miscellaneous soldiers composed of slave catchers who went there, he dragged Tagle into the inner city...
As a frequent visitor to the City Lord's Mansion, the Viscount Timba naturally knew Carrick, the little steward. After breaking out from Nubit Port yesterday, the Viscount Timba escaped quickly in a carriage, but he was unlucky. He was the first to run to this hilly area, and he became the focus of the scout battalion led by Josk and Yuri. The subject, the Viscount Timba commanded his guards and servants to launch the first charge to the defensive position of the scout battalion. As a result, his guards and servants were all dead, and there were only two slaves left beside him, one in gray The personal old slave, the other is the big man who is catching fish in the stream.
When he was in a hurry, he happened to see Carrick, so Carrick was arrested by Viscount Timba and became his guard. Later, Duke Guffman and others came, and Viscount Timba, who had lost all his guards and servants, became a neglected target. Carrick was afraid that he and others would be designated as the targets of death, so he went to the front to charge, so he suggested that Viscount Timba take a small road, avoid the main road, and climb over the hills before returning to the royal city.
The golden knight Carrick named Oss suspected that he was running away, so he walked in the same direction as himself and others. But since Viscount Timba knew him, he hired him to escort him all the way, and Carrick couldn't help it. Who calls others a golden knight, but he is just black iron, and his words don't work.
Carrick secretly whispered to Tagle: This golden knight named Oss is not trustworthy, he can even betray the orders of Duke Guffman, who is the head of the family, and run away, so in his eyes, these people are like a group of people Ants. If Viscount Timba hadn't lost all his salutes and belongings, and promised to give him a large sum of money when he returned to the king's city, Carrick doubted whether this Oss would come here to make money and kill him.
So Carrick is the happiest one to see Tagle, at least Tagle is a silver swordsman, in case something happens, he can resist a few more times to give himself a chance to escape...
"Then what are you doing now?" Tagle asked curiously.
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