Chapter 239: The Role Model of the Nobles
Two days later, in the village of Fidenne.
The lord only rested for three hours after killing those python knights in Thrindir, and basically reached Fidena at the fastest speed.
Governor Justus and Alina are no longer in the team, and neither are the Freedom Corps.
Justus went to Diling Port, where he planned to meet the serf general Ivaylo.
The infantry of the Free Corps could not march as fast as the cavalry with two horses each. In order to set up an ambush before the Snake Cult army, Leon asked Jocelyn and Sigismund to follow up with the Free Corps, while he himself led all the cavalry to Fiedena in a hurry.
The village of Fiedne is located at the bottom of an unnamed mountain range. It was originally a waystation built at the pass of the mountains, and then gradually developed into a village over the next few hundred years.
This is the main traffic route connecting Dilingang and Boshi City, and it is also the only way to go - if you don't plan to cross mountains and take a detour.
Generally speaking, villages that form important transportation routes are relatively prosperous, and this was also the case with the Village of Fidena in the past few years.
But that was a few years ago...
Today, the village of Fidner looks very desolate.
The fields are barren, bones are strewn across the road, everything is in disarray, and nine out of ten houses are empty.
There are not many mosquitoes and flies in winter, but the vultures in the sky and the rats on the ground seem to be quite fat.
Here, "nine out of ten houses are empty" is not an adjective, but a literal meaning - the vast majority of the houses are empty, and many of them have been set on fire, and the entire village is burned black.
Obviously, it is not certain whether the Red Death has visited here, but it is certain that looters have visited here.
"Sir, there are still people in the village. The Snake Cult army should not have arrived yet. But... the village seems to be full of old people. There is not a single young man in sight."
When they reached the village entrance, Lisadilan, who was exploring the way ahead, came back to report the situation.
"This village must have been hit by some looters...but we only saw old people? The group with the least ability to protect themselves survived? This is a bit strange..."
The lord looked around and walked towards the village.
There are several high-walled courtyards in the center of the village. They look like noble residences, and there seems to be someone peeking out from inside the houses and watching.
However, after seeing the lord's army, these people hurriedly closed their doors and windows, and the sound of doors being blocked by wooden bolts could be heard from far away.
No Snake Worshipers were seen in the village of Fidne, but there were residents - or rather, there were survivors here, which obviously meant that the Snake Worshipers' army had not yet arrived here.
Obviously, although Leon led his troops to Serindir first and fought a battle and then turned to Fiddene, making a circle, they still arrived earlier than the Snake Cult's army.
Those huge numbers of Snake Cult followers probably seriously slowed down the advance of the Snake Cult army.
But the reactions of these people in the village were a bit strange. Normally, if they encountered the Red Death or robbers, the villagers would usually run away.
What's the point of shutting yourself up in your house when you encounter the army?
Li Ang ordered the troops to stop at the entrance of the valley outside the village and asked Lisa Dilan to take people to find out the truth.
After all, we are not sure whether the Red Death is raging in this place, so let the Noldor go and investigate first to prevent other troops from being infected with the Red Death.
Not long after, Lisadilan returned on horseback and brought an old man with him.
In other words, they kidnapped an old man, because Lisa Dilan brought the old man back with him lying on the back of a horse.
The old man was well dressed, with the typical Bacchus ribbons, and looked like a tribune.
But he was in a very bad mood, and was already out of breath after being laid horizontally on the horse's back by Lisadiran for a while.
"Sir, this is the family that just closed the door. He attacked me with a javelin as soon as I approached, so I had to force the door open and capture him... But there are no servants or slaves in his house, nor any young men."
After Lisadilan brought the man back, he threw him directly to the ground, causing the old man to scream in pain.
The tribune of the Bacchus Empire has no servants and young men at home?
This is quite rare.
Judging from the style of the house, this old man should be quite wealthy. He shouldn't be living so miserably.
"Hero, please spare me... Hero, please spare me..." After being thrown to the ground by Lisadilan, the old man collapsed on the ground and could only beg for mercy.
hero?
The meaning of this title at this time is roughly similar to the word "good man", right?
Does this old man think that Lisa Dilan is a gangster?
But Lisa Dilan's behavior of forcibly arresting people is probably indeed very much like that of a bandit...
Understanding the reason for people's fear, Li Ang took off his homemade mask, squatted down and asked the old man lying on the ground in a soft voice: "We are not bandits... What happened here? Why didn't you leave here?"
Seeing that the lord was gentle and kind, the old man stuttered twice and asked tremblingly: "...Aren't you bandits?"
"...When have you ever seen a bandit under the banner of nobility?"
Li Ang felt that most of the grassroots officials in the Bacchus Empire might have some problems - either bad or stupid...
Well, probably the same for other countries.
"But these Noldor elves..."
"They are all my subordinates. Don't worry, they won't bite."
The old man seemed to have recovered. He slowly got up and looked at Lisadiran with fear.
Lisa Dilan spread his hands and said, "I'm sorry, I was just ordered to find out the situation. I had to break your door. The master will compensate you..."
Leon glared at Lisadiran, took out a few dinars and handed them over: "You can see that the Noldor elves are all very sensible and good people... What's going on in this village now? Has it encountered the Red Death? Who is the lord here?"
The old man did not take the money. Instead, he looked at the dinar and sighed, "Forget about the money. It's useless now... This village has not encountered the Red Death, but it is worse than encountering the Red Death..."
This old man is indeed the local tribune.
Perhaps it was fate that the lord of the village of Fiedene turned out to be Leon's acquaintance - Fabius.
That is, the son of Governor Livius.
In fact, most of the village of Fiedene is the family property of Levius. The reason why Fabius can become the lord here is actually because no other lord dares to take office in the territory of the Levius family.
After Levius and his son were captured by Leon last year, Leon packaged them and sold them wholesale to his good brother Ramon, letting Ramon, a professional ransom broker, handle the business.
In fact, they were lucky. Since it was a second-hand business, they had to go to Singal. The long journey took a lot of time. Therefore, Levius and his son got a great benefit. After they returned home, the Bacchus Empire was caught in internal and external troubles, and no one cared to trouble the defeated general.
They were defeated and captured by superior forces at Bailu Fort, and lost the Shieldwind Fortress. Not only did they lose many soldiers and generals, but Li Ang also took away several thousand civilians...
Under normal circumstances, Emperor Marius would have taken the opportunity to remove Livius from office and replace him with one of his own confidants as governor.
Like Creon or Agathon...
But in the current situation, I naturally can't take care of these things.
In fact, due to too many major events recently, Levius and his son were basically forgotten... Even if they were not forgotten, no one in the entire Bacchus Empire had the heart to consider them for the time being.
So, when Livius and his son returned to Fiedena, they found that no one cared about them...
Then, they discovered that there seemed to be war everywhere in the Bacchus Empire.
The father and son took advantage of the domestic unrest to come up with some ulterior motives.
Livius actually knew very well why he was appointed governor. People who hold high positions usually understand the simplest truth - only when you have soldiers in your hands can you stand firm.
However, the father and son together now only have three hundred slaves and two hundred soldiers, which they feel is not enough.
These are actually the private property of the Levius family.
Most of his original subordinates, that is, the captured shadow infantrymen, were redeemed by the infantrymen's own families after being transferred to Ramon by Leon.
Since Livius did not redeem the captured soldiers, they naturally did not return to Livius's service.
So, when the country was in danger, Levius planned to "start from scratch" and build a large army. He wanted to "save the Bacchus Empire from the water and fire"...
That's what he said anyway.
And it seems that this is what they really did - the so-called starting from scratch to build a large army is to forcibly abduct young and strong men to serve as soldiers, in short, conscripting men...
He does this job often and has a lot of experience...
As for saving the Bacchus Empire from danger - if Emperor Marius killed Hirayuzas in Siyuan City, then it would be Emperor Marius's Bacchus Empire that was saved.
But if the rebels of Hira Yozas win, then Lord Levius will naturally save Hira Yozas's new Bacchus...
Anyway, Levius is also a member of the Shadow Legion, and he has some friendship with General Shira.
This is not because Levius is born rebellious or likes to be a fence-sitter. In fact, this is the consistent behavioral habit of any wealthy family for thousands of years, and it has been the same in all dynasties.
This is also true even when a foreign race overthrows the regime.
There is a term in the East called "family, country and the world". Obviously, family comes first and the world comes last.
Therefore, what the wealthy nobles in any country have done over the past thousand years has basically revolved around the same logic: investing based on family businesses.
Or called betting.
When the country is in a state of great unification, powerful and prominent families will use family power as capital to invest in court power, and ultimately control the country by controlling the aristocratic bureaucracy.
Therefore, in a unified country, the place with the most disputes is around the prince... The nobles will bet on the prince they support, which is to invest their own resources in the future king.
Instead of a unified country, when faced with a divided continent in a state of war, the wealthy aristocrats would shift their investment methods to local areas - from controlling resources such as knowledge and official promotions, to controlling land, population, and private soldiers.
Of course, the essence remains unchanged, and it is ultimately all about controlling more combat power.
No one is stupid. In fact, everyone knows that political power comes from the barrel of a gun.
It’s just that when the central authority was more powerful, people were afraid to become warlords for fear of being targeted and killed by the king, so they all had a tacit understanding.
Once the world is in chaos, any smart noble would hold on to their troops and make investments.
In fact, for the nobles, so-called loyalty is actually investing in shares.
Join a stronger force that is good at fighting, and work together to achieve a monopoly - that is, control the country.
Only the lower-class civilians care about loyalty, while the upper-class nobles only care about the return on investment.
Moreover, the logic of most aristocrats is the same as the mentality of many venture capital institutions.
Simply put, it means that one is optimistic about a certain project and believes that it has the potential to achieve a monopoly, so one invests resources and becomes a shareholder in the project in the hope of obtaining greater benefits after the project is successful.
During this period, many venture capital firms will simultaneously invest in two competitors in the same industry - either one of them will become a unicorn if it defeats the other, so venture capital firms will bet on both sides.
Because if any company successfully monopolizes the market, investors can reap ten or a hundred times the profits.
Governor Levius, on the other hand, planned to hedge his bets.
But betting always requires capital, and the more capital you invest, the higher the status and benefits you will get in the future.
The Levius father and son had no intention of helping anyone fight the war; they were only interested in investing in the victor.
In other words, they would wait until Emperor Marius and Hira Yuzas finished fighting in Siyuan City before they would bring their troops to attach themselves to the victor.
Therefore, in order to make their own troops appear more numerous - that is, to obtain a higher status when they stick close to the victor, the father and son once again went around abducting strong men from the people to serve as soldiers.
Anyway, the purpose is to attach to the victor, to lead troops to gain status rather than to fight, so the degree of combat effectiveness and training does not matter, as long as there are more people.
But if we use violent conscription, the young and strong people will definitely not obey, and they may mutiny at any time. What should we do?
Levius certainly has his means...
To be precise, this method came from his son Fabius.
He probably learned from Li Ang's way of seducing the civilians in Bailu Fort, so he did not just recruit young and strong men this time.
He migrated with his entire family, taking his young and strong family members with him. His family members were placed in designated settlements, separated from the young and strong.
In this way, with hostages, these young and strong people have no choice but to obey.
Moreover, Fabius was very thorough - the entire village of Fiedene and the surrounding areas, with a total population of about 8,000 people, were all violently conscripted except for the elderly!
Yes, regardless of whether those people were civilians or slaves, and they were forcibly conscripted along with women and children.
This is indeed a very thorough approach.
After all, whether civilians or slaves, they all belonged to various noble lords. In this era, the people could be regarded as the property of the local lords. Forcibly conscripting all the population was undoubtedly robbery, and the robbed was of the people under their own rule.
This will of course offend everyone in the local area.
However, Fabius, who had lost the support of the people, encountered a massive rebellion by the Snake Cult right after completing the forced conscription...
Because he was competing with the Snake Worship Cult for population resources...
This is really a problem. The news from Siyuan City has not yet arrived. Levius and his son don’t know who will win or lose, so they can’t stick to them and lick their wounds...
But they forcibly conscripted nearly 8,000 people from under their rule, offending everyone in the territory!
At the same time, among these 8,000 people, many have already joined or are planning to join the Snake Cult, and these people are colluding with each other to cause trouble.
So Levius and his son felt extremely uneasy and couldn't sleep at night - they had to resolve the danger, otherwise they might be killed at any time.
So, they killed nearly three thousand people in batches over half a month - in fact, they were not sure whether those people were Snake Worshipers, but as long as they thought they were, they would kill them.
It is true that it is better to kill three thousand people by mistake than to let one person go.
Of course, there are also very rare cases where Levius falls in love with someone else's wife...
But this practice did prevent the Red Death from appearing in this village - the snake worshippers here were indeed killed in batches.
However, after resolving the chaos of the Snake Cult, the father and son still felt very uneasy because they had not been able to see the battle situation become clear.
And the remaining 5,000 men in their hands have no real combat capability...
Forcibly conscripting these people would mean that no one would be able to engage in production, and the daily food consumption would be terrifying. Their stored food would obviously not be enough.
However, neither Livius nor Fabius dared to release these conscripted "troops".
On the one hand, they need these manpower, which can give them a sense of security.
On the other hand, since they had already made enemies with all the nobles and commoners when they were forcibly conscripted, if they were released, these people might form an army and work together to kill them!
So the father and son decided to just go for broke. Not only did they not release the conscripted people, but they forced all the young and strong among them to be slaves, and sent his trusted soldiers out to conscript food from the surrounding areas again!
Everyone knows that food is life in troubled times, and no one is willing to pay grain!
So there were little conflicts here and there.
One can imagine the quality of the subordinates sent to collect grain, as they were able to do such a thing as forced collection.
That person definitely can't be a kind person who serves the public with a smile...
When the grain collection encountered conflicts, the first reaction of Levius's subordinates was to suppress them!
This suppression turned into looting and massacre.
The corpses all over the ground were not caused by the looters, but by the local lord Fabius himself.
Every family was robbed and every household was slaughtered, like a swarm of locusts passing through a border, worse than bandits .
Only some local nobles or officials managed to escape - such as this elderly tribune.
But there is no doubt that the food in everyone's house has been robbed...
That is why the tribune said that money is of no use...
There are only a few elderly people left in the entire village. They are neither able to work nor have enough food to make a living, nor can they travel thousands of miles to migrate to other places. What's the use of giving money?
There is no food to buy around...
"Where are those forcibly conscripted people now? Five thousand people... this is not a small number!"
The lord felt that Levius and his son had once again refreshed his worldview and were definitely representatives of unscrupulous nobles, but he did not want to get involved in this matter now. After all, the Snake Cult army was about to arrive, and Leon only hoped that the father and son would not ruin his plans.
"In the mountains... That bastard father and son took them and hid in the mountains in the east. No one knows where they are."
