Chapter 305: The Queen's Proposal
Under normal circumstances, Phoenix is not opposed to marrying a royal member who is lower in the line of succession to the Rhine royal family.
In most cases, the royal family would not allow the crown prince with a high succession line to marry the daughter of a noble. After all, everyone knows the relationship between the royal family and the nobles, and the royal family would not tolerate a noble becoming the mother's family of the next crown prince. (When the Chinese feudal civilization continued to the Ming Dynasty, they would intentionally select concubines from small families, and it was not until the Qing Dynasty that they "retrograded". In Europe, people do not discriminate between meat and vegetables.)
If Phoenix could marry a royal family member with a low line of succession, it would be extremely beneficial for both parties - the royal family member could use the power of his wife's family to fight for the prince title, and Phoenix could also use the power of the royal family to weld herself into the first line of succession to the earldom, and her brother would no longer have the power to compete with her.
But all this can only be achieved on the premise that... there is no tiger from the Rose Kingdom blocking the way of Odysse's house.
Before Phoenix came of age, he studied at the Royal Academy in the capital and had close contacts with members of the royal family. At that time, the Rose Kingdom had not yet found an excuse to seize the property of the Odysseus family, and no prince had ever expressed any love for Phoenix.
It was not until it was certain that the Rose royal family had shown its fangs to the Odysseus family that a prince with a medium-high inheritance line suddenly appeared and expressed his intention to form a marriage alliance. Even a fool could see what his intention was!
This bastard just wants to take advantage of the situation!
"——I won't choose anyone." Phoenix said with a straight face, putting the two letters back in their original places.
The Count was not surprised by his daughter's choice. He just smiled bitterly and said, "I knew my daughter would not give in easily."
"The third prince, Kolov, is not proposing to me, but to the wealth and reputation accumulated by the Odysse family for four hundred years." Phoenix said expressionlessly, "He thinks he is the only way out for the Odysse family when facing the powerful Rose royal family. He thinks the Odysse family has no choice but to rely on him unconditionally and be used by him. Father, we need to prove with actions that this idiot is just daydreaming!"
"Phoenix..."
Phoenix pulled out a chair, stood up, and bowed solemnly to his father: "Please continue to believe in me, father. I will never let you down, and I will never let the ancestors of the Odysseus family down! I will find a way to get the Odysseus family out of trouble and defeat the invading enemy with dignity!"
Count Odysseus stared at his daughter for a long time, and said quietly, "Phoenix, are you going to cooperate with that younger generation of the Rex family..." After a pause, the old count said with difficulty, "Are you going to cooperate with him?"
"No, father." Phoenix straightened his back and said firmly, "I have decided to propose to the black magician Yang."
Count Odysseus: “?!”
"He has no interest in a 'little girl' like me." Phoenix said calmly, "As long as he receives my proposal, he will understand what I mean... The Odysseus family is willing to show the highest sincerity and request to sign a permanent alliance with Tarantan and Innadri!"
Women like Phoenix treat marriage the same way they treat a tool that may be useful.
The old earl would find it difficult to talk about marrying Charlie Rex, a bastard, while Phoenix would only calmly consider whether the marriage with Charlie Rex was valuable enough, and would not care whether Rex was the bastard of someone he knew...
In comparison, there is no doubt that marrying the Tarantan Lord and Black Mage Yang, who supports Rex, is more valuable.
Of course, Phoenix knew very well that Yang, who had shown her his age difference when they first met, would never marry her, but she had to show her desperate attitude...
Two days later.
Yang Qiu was squatting in the City Lord's Mansion, holding an enamel teacup, contentedly admiring the progress of the Mage Tower construction, when Rex hurried to the door with a letter in his hand.
When handing the heart over, Yang Qiu discovered that Rex seemed to be trying hard to hold his breath, as if he would immediately lose control of his emotions if he inhaled a little louder.
Yang Qiu, who was in a good mood, didn't care, put down the teacup and took the envelope.
After seeing the contents of the letter, Yang Qiu was stunned.
Rex, who was trying very hard to hold it in, turned his face away, held his stomach with one hand, and hammered the wall with the other.
This was the first time in his three hundred years of life that Yang Qiu experienced being proposed to by a lady... He couldn't help but laugh.
"This little girl is really capable."
After folding the letter with a sigh, Yang Qiu glanced at Rex with disdain: "You still have the nerve to laugh, look at how much I have become. At that time, I asked you to try to pursue Phoenix, but you were reluctant. Look, now I am using marriage as an excuse to seek an alliance and I don't even look down on you."
Rex: “???”
I can get shot ?!
Yang Qiu ignored Rex, a political novice, and packed up to go to the City Hall to meet Zhao Zhenzhen.
Zhao Zhenzhen made time to meet with Yang Qiu. After listening to the whole process, she joked, "The Queen of the Odysseus family proposed to you, and you are not moved?"
Yang Qiu had a blank expression on his face.
Zhao Zhenzhen said this casually. The unknown compatriot in front of her looked young, but if you really counted, she was a living antique from the Qing Dynasty... If an old monster from the Qing Dynasty lived to the 21st century, he would not have the mind to talk about love - people of her age have passed that stage.
"It's clear that the queen wants to seek an alliance not only with Innadri, but also with Tarantan. She must have encountered a life-or-death problem." Zhao Zhenzhen said seriously, "It's not a bad thing for us to have more all-weather strategic partners now, but there is a problem. The alliance strategy that the Odysseus family can accept may have a big cognitive gap with our alliance strategy."
History on Earth has proven that, throughout history, it has been difficult for countries with adjacent territories to establish a true alliance of common advancement and retreat - unless the two countries are facing a huge and highly aggressive common enemy, and the larger of the two cooperating parties must be non-aggressive, such as the delicate balance between India, Pakistan and China.
These two conditions are indispensable... The Chinese beast that has been entrenched in the East Asian monster room for thousands of years has been playing with itself for a long time. The two neighboring island countries are at least separated by the sea, and they have never been united.
The Tarantan system is now developing in a cautious manner. If it is not cautious enough and is a little reckless, it will not be an exaggeration to say that it will be the enemy of the whole world.
The Odysseus territory took the initiative to approach us, and Tarantan would definitely welcome it.
The only problem is that the number and size of the "enemies to be faced together after the alliance" understood by the Odysseus family are very different from the targets regarded as opponents by the Tarantan family...
You wanted to get me to form an alliance with you so that we could fight the monsters hand in hand, but it turned out that the enemies on my side include Godzilla, King Kong, Alien and Predator. Didn't expect that?
Surprising? Unexpected?
Yang Qiu smiled slightly: "A young lady is trying to establish an alliance at the cost of herself. How can we presume to judge this lady's awareness?"
Zhao Zhenzhen silently gave a thumbs up and said, "You are still darker."
Zhao Zhenzhen was only making suggestions. She would not go against Yang Qiu, who knew this alien world better than her, on the overall strategic route. She immediately cooperated with Yang Qiu to write a reply letter and sent it to the territory of Odysseus.
A day and a half later, Phoenix saw this euphemistic letter of rejection. The black magician Yang felt that he was too old and unworthy of Miss Phoenix's kindness, but he would always remember the pleasant cooperation experience with the Odysseus family and hoped to continue to maintain friendly contact with the Odysseus family.
At the end of the letter, the black magician Yang made a small request for assistance to Miss Phoenix - a railway was being built deep in the Tarantan Wasteland. Due to the harsh environment and rampant monsters, prisoners and workers were frequently injured or killed. If there were heavy prisoners with long sentences and serious crimes in the prisons in the Odysseus territory, it was hoped that they could be lent to Tarantan to build the road.
Seeing this part, Phoenix felt relieved.
The black magician Yang is sending out a signal to deepen the connection between the Odysseus family and the Tarantan family!
Phoenix sent her brother Parker without saying a word, and asked him to take all the serious criminals with sentences of more than ten years in Bugatti City Prison to Tarantan, and told him to stay there as long as he could and not to return early without receiving her personal letter.
Master Parker refused with tears in his eyes and even went to his father to complain... but to no avail.
A few days later, this young man who hated Innadri so much was put on a convoy to Tarantan...
After sending away his younger brother who might also be assassinated, and arranging the spellcaster who was originally protecting his younger brother - one of the two high-level spellcasters borrowed from Lionel Qiang - to be with his elder brother, Phoenix breathed a sigh of relief and continued to maintain a high-density correspondence with Innadri.
In fact, it is possible to make calls to Innadri from Bugatti City, and if that doesn't work, you can send a telegram. However, for exchanges between the two places of this level, letters written by senior officials from both sides are the best... Under the influence of the "laws of language", words can often have unexpected special effects, at least they can make people feel more at ease than verbal promises.
While maintaining contact with Innadri & Tarantan, Phoenix was more focused on storing food, expanding the army, and training soldiers - forming an alliance with the black magician Yang was only the first step. The Odysseus family could not rely solely on the undead to fight, and their own strength had to keep up.
While the two sides were trying hard to exchange glances and establish close ties, as time entered mid-April, the weather warmed up, and the sun dried and hardened the road surface. Inland caravans from all over the continent of Napalm left the cities where they had spent the winter and became active all over the continent.
With the recovery of inland caravans, various local anecdotes that had been stagnant since the beginning of winter before the New Year also spread rapidly across the mainland.
The Adler territory of the Rhine Kingdom is a must-pass place for caravans coming from the north and west to the Innadli territory in the south and the Odysseus territory in the east.
The Adler Territory has the most rampant underground human black market in the country, but on the surface, this territory is still prosperous and peaceful, especially along the magic steam train railway. The numerous small towns and villages are all full of vitality and popularity, creating a magnificent scene.
A caravan coming from the north stopped in a small town. They opened a carriage pulled by six-legged lizards on the town's busiest street to sell goods from the north, and also replenished the food and water needed by the caravan in the town.
"Are there really undead spirits in Innadri?" While having lunch in a tavern, the caravan heard the drinkers bragging about this and started to talk out of curiosity.
"That's right!" The proudest thing for local drinkers is to brag about their experiences to the caravans from other places. "I have a relative who is from Innadri and lives in Newin. He wrote to me last month and said that he saw a ghost near the Newin dock!"
...The area of Newin Town is still black on the players' maps. No quests have been opened and no monsters have been spawned for players to fight. Of course, this person is bragging.
This caravan from the north had also read reports about the Tarantan ghosts in newspapers while hibernating in a certain city, but it was still incredible to hear someone say with their own mouth that someone had seen the ghosts.
The young man who was the boss of the caravan and followed his father and uncles to do business asked curiously: "Can those ghosts really talk to people and help people do things?"
How could the boaster know if the undead could communicate with humans? But since the newspapers said that the undead could not only help the church exorcise demons but also help Count Odysseus fight wars, they must be able to speak human language. He boasted with his eyes closed: "That's for sure. My relatives said that the undead are very noisy! They often run around on the streets and will talk to people when they meet them. I heard that if you pay them, they can even help you repair the roof!"
"Are you talking about the undead or the temporary workers on the street?" the person next to him scolded with laughter.
"Aren't those undead spirits like that? They're just like those odd jobs on the street. You can call them to do work if you have money. Otherwise, why would they go to help Count Odysseus fight? Who has ever heard of the relationship between the Odysseus family and Tarantino? It's all about money!" The boastful man argued with saliva flying.
The caravan boss could tell that this person was just making wild guesses, so he sat back with amusement and said to his uncles, "It's really interesting. It seems that the people here are not afraid of the undead anymore. They're making ."
The young boss' uncle shook his head: "It's just that the undead didn't come to Adler County, otherwise the undead in these people's mouths would have changed."
Then, the people in the caravan began to discuss the next route in a low voice.
In previous years, the route of this caravan was fixed. They would bring the goods from the north to the city of Innadri to sell them, then purchase some goods from the south and west, then go east along the Barcelo River to the territory of Odysseus to collect some goods from the open sea, and then return north before August, arriving in the north during the autumn harvest and selling the goods they brought back to the northerners who had extra money after the autumn harvest.
Innadri is the land transportation hub of the eastern part of the Napalm continent. Caravans from all directions meet here. Caravans coming from the north can buy spices from the southernmost part of the country without having to go through the trouble of crossing the Sorenson Mountains. Caravans coming from the south can also buy goods from the north more easily.
Merchant ships sailing in the coastal waters could also carry goods north and south, but pirates were rampant, merchant ships were easily robbed, and accidents were frequent. The goods transported by merchant ships were not necessarily much cheaper than those transported by inland caravans.
If Innadeli just changed the lord, it would not have any impact on the caravan... Innadeli is a place that relies entirely on the land for food, and at least a quarter of its finances are supported by the income brought by the caravan. No lord will drive the caravan away.
But the new lord relied on the undead to conquer his fiefdom, and there are undead running around all over the territory, which makes these caravans a little worried - who knows whether the undead can understand human language and whether the new lord can control them!
The caravan owners discussed for a long time but still couldn't decide whether to go to Innadeli this year. They had no choice but to stay in the town for two days and see how the situation develops.
On the first day, this caravan was the only one staying in the town, but on the second day, two more caravans arrived.
Three large caravans and hundreds of caravan members occupied all the hotels and spacious squares in the small town with a total population of only two to three thousand. When the owners of the three caravans met, they exchanged glances and knew that the other party had the same idea as their own.
On the third day, another caravan of a hundred people arrived...
"Forget it, let's keep going down and try again. If it doesn't work, we can turn around again."
At noon, in the crowded town tavern, several family members of the first caravan that arrived in the town discussed for a long time but could not come up with a decision, and the oldest one made the final decision.
The price of spices and sugar from the southernmost region is the cheapest in Innadri. If you go around Innadri and buy them in the territory of Odysseus, it will be 20% more expensive... This caravan, which supports half of the town, values every penny of profit.
In the afternoon, when the caravan was packing up and loading their belongings onto the trucks, preparing to set out the next morning, they suddenly heard the townspeople shouting, saying something like someone from Inadeli had come, there were undead mixed in, etc.
The owners of the caravan looked at each other, dropped what they were doing, told their men to keep an eye on the caravan, and ran towards the town gate among the townspeople.
Residents of every town are not averse to such a popular activity as watching the fun. When the caravan owners rushed to the town gate in sweat, the gate was already blocked.
The tallest young boss stood on tiptoe to look outside, and saw... a few horse-drawn carriages parked at the town gate, negotiating with the town's militia.
The person negotiating with the militia was a very tough human, wearing the official uniform of the Rhine Kingdom and with a weapon on his waist.
There were both humans and orcs driving the carriages. The two orcs didn't seem very friendly to the locals. When they looked at the townspeople crowded at the town gate , the expressions on their faces were quite unfriendly.
The most eye-catching thing is the undead standing next to the human in the operator uniform.
The undead was wearing a dusty white short-sleeved pullover (actually a white T-shirt), a pair of strange pants with a tie at the waist and legs so short that his bony legs were exposed (actually just big shorts), and he was carrying a thick-looking backpack made of solid fabric (produced in a factory in the prison of Province G, the design was ugly but durable). He was turning his bald skull head curiously and looking around.
The undead wearing clothes and carrying backpacks stood together with the elite operators wearing the official uniforms of the Rhine Kingdom. This strange scene not only opened the eyes of the townspeople, but also confused the militia on duty at the town gate. When talking to the operators, they kept glancing at the undead.
After a stumbling negotiation between the two sides, the agent produced a document with the seal of the Innadri City Hall and a decree with the coat of arms of the Lord of Innadri. Only then did the militia accept the reality that this team of people were indeed official personnel. They wiped their sweat off their foreheads and let them pass, shouting at the townspeople to make way.
This team, consisting of official operators, orcs and undead, walked into the town openly, ignoring the crowds of onlookers lining the streets, and headed straight towards the town hall.
Next, the operator who came all the way from Innadri had to go through a difficult and time-consuming communication with the local mayor...
The local mayor was just a "re-employed" servant of a baron's family. After much hesitation, he did not dare to stop the people sent by the overlord of the neighboring territory. He simply sent the guests away, closed the door and hid away so that he would not be bothered by them.
Two hours after entering the town, the operators who had finally obtained local permission took the small convoy to the town's busiest street, set up stalls, and displayed the goods they brought to the locals.
"Cheap and affordable Tarantan spices, come and have a look, a bag of fine chili powder retails for only five coppers! Premium garlic is eight coppers a pound! And ginger! Soy sauce that can replace salt is two coppers a bag!"
"Tarantan exquisite dead cloth!"
"Tarantan's fine ready-made clothes are made of fine material that is stronger than canvas. They are warm, thick, and not afraid of the sun. They won't wear out and can be worn casually! The retail price is only half a silver coin a set!"
While the operator was standing behind the stall and shouting, the undead that came with him was not idle either. It stood behind the stall, holding up the goods with a pair of bone claws and enthusiastically showing them to the townspeople.
The townspeople who were just there to watch the fun, their eyes flickered back and forth between the goods on the stalls and the undead who were enthusiastically showing the details of the goods. Two eyes were simply not enough...
When the brave townspeople stepped forward and tried to buy the very cheap Tarantan clothes (old-fashioned jeans sold by the pound from Province S), the undead who knew how to display the goods in a friendly and enthusiastic manner came out from behind the stall holding a set of clothes.
Amid the exclamations of the onlookers, the undead walked to a place two meters in front of the brave townsman who dared to take the risk, shook out the clothes, gestured at the townsman's body shape from a distance, nodded, and seemed to think that the size of the clothes was suitable for the townsman, and enthusiastically handed the clothes to him.
When the undead walked towards them, the townspeople actually regretted why they had made such a fuss. They were stunned for a long time before they remembered to hand over the money.
With money exchanged in one hand and goods delivered in the other, and under the watchful eyes of countless people, the Undead made his first business deal with the townsman.
This undead ghost could also make change - after putting the silver coins into the cash box on the stall, it would take out five ten-dollar copper coins from it and hand them to the townspeople in front of countless people.
The transaction was completed, and the onlookers were more surprised than seeing a performance in a parade circus, and they burst into various exclamations.
The caravan owners who were mixed in the crowd and watching all stretched their necks and opened their mouths wide.
The young caravan owner was obviously very adventurous. He squeezed out of the crowd, took out some coins, pointed at a product at random, and stared at the undead with his bright eyes.
The hideous and terrifying skeleton actually understood his intention. It took the goods specified by the caravan boss and handed them to him, took the money, and gave him the change.
The caravan owner holding the merchandise excitedly squeezed back to his family and said excitedly: "Father, uncle, we can still go to Inadli. These undead can also do business!"
