prince of europe in quintiles

Chapter 150 The Sixth Master!

"My God, this place is really hard to get around."

Jeffrey on horseback led more than 200 rogue archers, and four to five hundred refugees, drilling around the southern part of the Harz Mountains.

How many gangs of refugees, gangs of robbers, green-skin tribes, or beastmen and other strange things have been hidden here in the Harz Mountains, it is difficult to count now.Jeffrey only knew that in the depths of this mountain no smaller than the country of Göttingen, there were at least thirty or forty bandit groups hidden, each with hundreds of people.

However, most of the robbers and refugees here live a half-cultivating and half-plundering lifestyle. The valleys and basins of the Harz Mountains and the rich mineral resources make them seem to have returned to a natural land after escaping the heavy oppression of the feudal lords. In a small world of freedom.

It's just that happiness is always a minority.After breaking away from the feudal order, the world returned to the original tribal state.These mountain people in hiding directly left the security provided by the feudal order, and returned to a primitive and barbaric order for themselves and their families.

In the most popular explanation, the feudal lords used to ask your family for food, but now the bandit lords will kill you.

So the oppression in the mountains is not necessarily easier than outside the mountains.

"The bandit leaders here will be replaced every few years, and the longest one has only lived for seven years. Tsk tsk, don't expect them to work for us. Is the position under their own butts warm? I know!"

One of Jeffrey's deputy, a guy who is good at drinking and inquiring about news, complained.

Their team entered the Harz Mountains from the southwest, and soon established a base on some of the hills to which Millhouseburg belonged, and excavated the land on the outward side of the mountain where no one dared to do it. We plan to plant some beans first to fertilize the field, and next year we will plant wheat and add more tillage.

Because this place is in the north of the Millhouse sub-country, it was named the Northhausen Settlement.

And with Huo Teng's financial and material support, the shooting group of more than 200 people organized by Jeffrey was quite popular in the vicinity for a while.

It's just that the strong dragon doesn't overwhelm the local snake, and the bandits hiding in the ravine don't welcome Jeffrey's arrival.This chivalrous knight who was quite famous in the Tao in the past, it is not convenient to reveal his true identity now, he adopts the alias Flijie, and expands around by using both soft and hard methods.His purpose is also very clear, which is to mobilize all forces in the mountains to harass Wernigerode, Goslar and Halberstadt in Saxony during the autumn and winter. The counties and sub-states of the country made it impossible to cope with Saxony's southward offensive.

On this day, when he wanted to meet a bandit boss who owned a copper mine, he was rejected.

"But going on like this is not an option. If I can't complete the Earl's task, can I still be Viscount Millhouse? That's a serious title."

Although the right to inherit the title is still unclear, according to the tradition of succession from father to son, once Jeffrey inherits it, he can be regarded as a middle- and lower-class nobleman who owns a fief, which is significantly different from those rogue knights in society.

This is the master of the people!

For the goal of being a master, Jeffrey was worried during the day and thought about it at night, and he couldn't eat well every day.

After four days of continuous thinking, Jeffrey suddenly learned something from Huo Teng's past experience.

Take advantage of strength.

How on earth are the bandits from the Harz Mountains supposed to mess with the Saxons?

He didn't need to come forward to organize the bandits to join him, that would run counter to Huo Teng's goal.When the bandits see that someone wants to be the boss, they will naturally be more willing to beat you.

So Jeffrey did a very shameless thing.

He led the refugees out of the inner hills of the Harz Mountains and returned to the hilly refugee camp in Northhausen.This temporarily alleviated many intense human-ground conflicts.

But Geoffrey sent cavalry to intercept the farmers and the mountain people from trading grain, iron and copper.He opened a blacksmith shop in the refugee camp at the foot of the mountain. While collecting ore from the mountain for forging, he purchased food for the local people.

As a result, it has monopolized a major channel for supplementing food in the Harz Mountains.

In the past, the bandits who could barely survive the winter by exchanging copper, iron and other daily necessities for farmers began to feel uncomfortable.Take an inventory of the government inventory, this winter is not easy!

They wanted to ask Jeffrey for an explanation, but they heard that this kid was very good at fighting, so they hesitated to move forward.

At this point, Jeffrey's plan finally began to play out.He sent someone out to say, "The Saxon army is going to fight Göttingen, brothers Wernigerode has food!"

At that time, although Geoffrey did not become the leader of the harassment plan, he still stirred up the wind and rain, causing many blind bandit leaders to flock to the north.

"Now I can finally become a master." Jeffrey thought very emotionally.

……

Wearing a long coat made of otter skin, the old Bernard lamented in the tent: "The banditry in the Harz Mountains has never been a serious problem for us. Why has this year repeatedly made us feel extremely uncomfortable?"

When his subordinates heard this emotion, they immediately became very nervous.

This means that the old Bernard is going to lay off people.

For example, Viscount Wernigerode, who carried out the plan to exterminate bandits.And the latter has fainted in a hurry.

After all, although the fiefdom has a tradition of succession from father to son, if you were raped before you were alive, don't even think about keeping the fiefdom.

"It's really a pity. I thought that someone would bravely ask for a battle and go to the Harz Mountains to suppress the bandits. Alas, I think back then, after the defeat on the banks of the Elbe River, countless Slavic tribes ran rampant in Istphalia. I don't know what happened to my subordinates. How many heroes and talents have helped me to sweep away the banditry and stabilize the country. Who knows that it has only been 15 years since I left, and the state of vitality and the beauty that is still in front of me have all disappeared."

When old Bernard sighed, he used rough Latin.

The subordinates could barely understand some words, but it was difficult to guess what the old duke was thinking.

This is where old Bernard is scary. Even a failed deterrence can create an unfathomable impression on his subordinates, making them afraid to take any action.

But this trick, for the exhausted Saxon nobles who really don't want to fight anymore, seems to have the opposite effect.

Many nobles simply slipped away quietly.

Some people saw others running, and I ran too, so when I turned around suddenly, the tent was half empty.There are still many nobles who are ready to run away.

Does Old Bernard dare to punish him?

He dared, but knew he couldn't.

Earl Val's eye-gouging incident created a deep communication gap between the old Duke and his subordinates.The old Bernard had to continue to maintain his unfathomable majestic image, which made this rift wider and wider.

These nobles cheated and played tricks, nothing more than they didn't want to fight.

After a year or two, his reputation is still there, and the Duchy of Saxony will be stable.

"But I can't afford to wait."

The old prince looked south.

That young man who rose up by accident, Huo Teng who turned the tide of the battle with strange means again and again, can he let him wait for another two years with peace of mind?

Huo Teng dared to declare at home that he wanted to establish the Principality of Westphalia, wasn't it just a confrontation with the Eastphalian Plain of the Billund family?

He can't wait, time is not on me.

"Has the food from Goslar arrived?" Old Bernard gave up punishing the fleeing nobles, but asked about purchasing snacks.

Since the nobles of the fiefs do not need to provide financial support to the monarch, the travel of the army requires old Bernard's manor estates all over the country, as well as logistics officers who temporarily raise food to go to the countryside to purchase.

The former, who was hollowed out by Bernard Jr. last year, has not yet recovered; the latter has been repeatedly obstructed, and the purchase of food is very limited.

How to do?

Old Bernard's cold eyes aimed at the upper left of Göttingen County on the map.

Since it cannot be raised in Goslar, it is up to Paderborn to bear the pressure.

"Go and take Val out of the monastery. Tell Selina in Paderborn to redeem Earl Val with two months of food from an army of three thousand." Old Bernard was determined to squeeze out the last value of this useless man. .

Chapter 150 Seven

"This son of a bitch, Huo Teng, is too bad!"

Little Bernard's attendants dragged their tired bodies and hung their wet clothes back to the camp.

The brothers were going to help little Bernard hold the stage, but they came up with the idea of ​​crossing the river upstream.They thought that this idea was ingenious, brought their servants and the boat they had finally stolen, but they were shocked to find a huge desolate lake above the Rumer River.The vast lake made them unable to distinguish between east, west, north and south, so they could only continue to go further upstream.

As a result, they walked like this and found that there was a river called the Lena River flowing north-south. Together with other nearby rivers, they chased and blocked their way.After crossing the Leine River with their boats in their arms, they found out from the neighbors that if they wanted to attack Huo Teng's side and rear, they had to go back again.

The waterways around here are so complicated that these attendants fell into the water twice and almost drowned themselves.

Huo Teng is really bad!

This bastard guy actually chose such an exquisite combat environment, so he trapped the small elite troops (their self-proclaimed ones) who were trying to intersperse in the net of nature.

But after this group of people returned to the camp, they found that it was no longer necessary for them to test the waterway and it was inconvenient to intersperse.

Just now, a particularly sensational incident broke out.

Four of the food search officers who were sent out to search for food in nearby villages, who are usually Saxon knights, have not returned yet.

This is the northern half of Northeim, on the north side of the Rumer River. It is impossible to be intercepted by the Horten faction when the bridge is destroyed.So they must be riding their own horses... deserting and running home!

Is it okay to leave the team at will on the battlefield?

When Little Bernard heard the news, he stood on the porch and was furious: "If we follow our old rules, these guys will be beheaded after they are caught, their property will be confiscated, and their children and wives will be donated as slaves to meritorious officials." My dear! Ah, I’m so pissed off!”

This is a nearby village, which was ruthlessly occupied by the Southern Expedition Army, and all the local residents were expelled or captured as servants to serve the army master.

Around the porch stood Saxon knights.What everyone is most uncomfortable with is that Bernard Jr. pretends to be tough, but it is actually a tone that is almost humiliating to the people present.

In the tribal principality period in the past, everyone did fulfill the law of the strong preying on the brave and the weak getting out.But that was two or three hundred years ago.Do you still have the nerve to mention the old things?

Now it is the Principality of Saxony that has established a stable feudal order, and even the duke cannot deprive his subjects of fiefs too casually.Among the four knights who fled, three of them suffered from the time-limited recruitment by the Duke of Saxony for years and hardly saw their family members.The remaining one is said to have not seen his wife for three years, and the child is one year old.

Seriously exceeding the time limit for knights to serve in the military, and now you dare to speak nonsense at everyone on the porch, then according to the tribal law, we can still overthrow your whole family and drive out the Biron family.

Since the most fundamental core contradiction could not be resolved, facing the perfunctory actions of the knights and the increasingly demoralizing morale, little Bernard could only make a fuss on the surface.

He first gathered all the nobles together in one place, and comforted them with kind words.

Then, he showed the knights the rich armaments and materials he possessed, and hinted that they would be able to continue to divide the money soon, so that most of the knights could at least stabilize the mentality of victory.

Finally, a group of priests was summoned to read scriptures to the knights.

Yes, purely chanting, repeating passages in the Bible about the victory and blessing of the brave.

This scene is very similar to the trend of some useless leaders in modern times who can't work and hold meetings.

But to be honest, mental pressure is still useful, at least after running the first batch, it will be difficult to start the second batch.The most basic face of the Saxon Cavaliers is still needed. After losing two consecutive battles here at Huo Teng, no one can face it.

It was in such an atmosphere of mutual reluctance and lifelessness that the Saxon army finally stopped hesitating and decided to go south to cross the river.

……

It is October 10th.

Huo Teng squatted on the tree stump, frowning at the mass of protruding tree branches nearby.

As the inheritor of military science on paper, Huo Teng is the only one who is quite ingenious in the setting of fixed battlefields.

He knew that the lake upstream was his natural barrier, and there were mountains on the right, so the main battlefield must be the open river bank in front of him.So all Huo Teng's ingenuity was used here.

What the peasants are trying to beat with their mallets is a blocking device made up of several tree branches called "beast-repelling piles", which are placed on the beach like a horse-repelling horse to prevent the ships of the Saxon army and the giant war beasts from running rampant.

In the cold October, Huo Teng also paid a lot of money to hire farmers to go down the river and install anti-ship repellent horses that pierced the bottom of the boat in the muddy river.When the ship is pierced by it, or it is simply erected and unable to move on the river, then the ship can basically be declared a death sentence.

Just burying piles in the river was not enough. Huo Teng asked the farmers to break the round pebbles and bury the sharp blade-like stones in the hidden corners of the river and the beach, as black as they wanted.

Western Europeans have never seen this kind of thing. After all, similar special technology can only be found in Constantinople, the Queen of Ten Thousand Cities.

"You are really bad, you are too bad." Caron, the mercenary captain who watched Huo Teng as the whole process, praised sincerely.

With Huo Teng's insidious craftsmanship, he would be too talented to be an earl.

He should be the devil.

"This is also for victory. Winners are eligible to eat honey. Challengers like us who haven't won, let's work hard first. At least we don't need to eat shit." Huo Teng patted Caron on the shoulder and continued to improve the beachhead .

In addition to the previous measures, Huo Teng also placed the Torsion Ballista on the shore. Although he didn't use asphalt as a big killer, it was quite powerful. It was mainly used to fight against the enemy's giant war beasts.

Just when it was still in full swing here, and the beach was about to be set up as the home of the devil, the sudden restlessness proved that the Saxon army couldn't help but attack.

Huo Teng immediately jumped off the stake and hurriedly asked the guards to ring the alarm.

The bell rang loudly on the beach, and the peasants who came to work and earn money were at a loss, and they left the battlefield in a disorderly manner after being driven by the officers.

"Fortunately, we have prepared a few sergeant captains for this visit, otherwise the army would be out of control." Huo Teng looked at it and praised.

Huo Teng commanded several times the army this time, so he recruited five elite affairs officers and sergeant captains before setting off.The leader is Adlaib, who has played before.These five sergeant captains were in charge of military training on weekdays, and they served as commanders of two centurions in combat, leading two centurions to command the battle.

Judging from the current effect, it is very good.

After the army let the peasants evacuate, the soldiers took advantage of the gap to put on heavy airtight armor, holding guns, shields, or bows and arrows and sneaked into the sentry post.

The archers also strictly carried out their orders, preparing to snipe the first wave of incoming enemies on the beach covered with stone thorns and stone knives.

"Very good, remember Adlaib's credit, and get a big reward when you go back." Huo Teng clapped his hands in approval.

But today was a terrible day for the Saxon army.

Riding on a boat snatched from a nearby villager's house, under the leadership of more than [-] Saxon knights, more than a hundred Saxon elite embarked on an adventurous journey across the river.

The river current in autumn and winter is gentle, and these boats approached the opposite bank eight meters away without any surprise.However, before it arrived, the creaking sound of cracking wood began to sound.

"Oops, the bottom of my boat is broken!"

"There are stakes, damn it."