Chapter 415 A Difficult Decision
It's difficult for anyone to make a decision that completely overturns their life plans.
But if the benefits of this decision are confirmed to outweigh the harm, and the problem will be more serious if the decision is not made, then most people will not resist too much.
Phoenix, who had made up his mind, showed amazing action. He rushed back to the city during the night and convened his think tank overnight to discuss the formal declaration of war on the Rose Kingdom.
Most of the think tanks were passed down by the old earl to his daughter, and a few were recruited by Phoenix himself during his reign. They were all stunned to hear such news when they were dug out of their quilts in the middle of the night.
After the shock, this group of indigenous elites, who almost gathered the cream of the civilian talent in the territory of Odysseus, fell into ecstasy, and excitedly analyzed and discussed the pros and cons of moving to the Rose Kingdom - Miss Phoenix is expected to become the Queen of Rose, which is obviously a great news for the non-aristocratic elites who follow her!
Listening to his subordinates' discussion, Phoenix's anxious mood gradually calmed down.
This group of civilian elites who are attached to the Odysseus family do not want to be neighbors with the undead regime. Miss Phoenix, the owner of the think tank, knows this very well.
She knew very well that half of the think tank was worried that after the Odysseus Territory was swallowed up by the Undead regime, they would lose the privileges that came from being affiliated with the great nobles and would be reduced to the dilemma of having to compete for jobs with more elites selected from the common people (after all, Innadri even recruited former prostitutes to work as clerks); the other half was out of consideration for the interests of the Odysseus family.
Phoenix doesn't care about this. Loyalty mixed with selfish motives is still loyalty. Those who truly pursue absolute selfless dedication will not hang around the nobles.
Whether the subordinates' private interests will conflict with the interests of their masters, and whether they can effectively control the balance between the two, are what traditional aristocratic elites like Phoenix need to care about.
From the perspective of the Odysseus family, Phoenix is no less wary of its neighbor, the Undead Regime, than the Rhine Royal Family...
Over the past year or so, the exchanges between Odysseus and Innadri have become increasingly close. There are cargo ships traveling back and forth between the two places on the Barcelo River almost every day, and the frequency of passenger ferries has increased from once or twice a week to three or four times a week. There is even a phenomenon that people from Odysseus go to Innadri to look for job opportunities - this would have been unimaginable in the past.
As the frequency of exchanges between the two places increased, the Odysseus family's understanding of Innadri's undead regime also increased day by day.
The gradually exposed edge of the undead regime became increasingly glaring to Phoenix, an elite among the traditional aristocracy, and even... made him feel palpitating.
In the first half of last year, the undead regime only sent a small number of undead scholars (actually retired experts in agriculture, water conservancy, geology, electricity, etc. hired by the national team) and a large number of employees (contract workers and grassroots trainees brought up by the national team) to the countryside to organize and lead the Innadeli farmers to build water conservancy projects and reclaim wasteland.
By the second half of last year, after the undead regime had thoroughly penetrated the villages of Innadri and established a spider-web-like village organization (in fact, it was a readjustment of the organizational structure of village cadres to prepare for the merger of villages and the transformation of villages into groups), it unscrupulously bared its fangs, struck a thundering blow, and completely liquidated all the nobles in the fiefdom of Innadri.
As far as Phoenix knew, except for the Darcy family and a few other families who had completely surrendered to the undead regime, the rest of the families were almost all caught in one fell swoop.
As the Archon of Odysseus, Phoenix would admire the iron-fisted methods of Innadri, the Archon of the Undead, but he would also feel a little wary.
Indeed, the relationship between the territorial nobles and the local fiefdom nobles was not always so close and harmonious.
Phoenix, who ruled on behalf of her father, had thought about letting the nobles of Odysseus see her methods when she first took office, but it was not easy to implement such a thing...
When she first became the supreme archon of the Lord of Odysseus, she had the idea of investigating two fiefdoms that had been in arrears and concealing large amounts of taxes year after year - the population had grown by more than 100,000 over the past 30 years, and the land in the tributaries of the Barcelo River was fertile, but large tracts of land were reported as barren every year and excluded from the autumn tax collection. Even a fool could see that there was a problem.
The result was... before Phoenix could organize people to check the land and population, many senior civil servants in Bugatti City Hall either jumped out to oppose it or proposed repairing river channels and lanes and renovating city roads, trying to divert the direction of City Hall's policy.
Not to mention the rumors of distorted government orders that spread throughout the region and the absurd criticisms that appeared in newspapers.
But although Phoenix was annoyed by the selfish desires of the fiefdom nobles and the trouble they were causing against her, she did not think of completely eliminating those who governed the local area for the Odysseus family - after all, the power of the great nobles also came from governing the fiefdoms that were equal to the title for the king; acting rashly would break the rules of the game of power, and would not only give the royal family a handle on the Odysseus family, but would also cause the Odysseus family to become the public enemy of the kingdom's nobles.
Apparently, the Undead Archon had no such concerns.
Phoenix picked up the unsweetened black tea brought by the secretary and took a sip slowly.
Yang and his undead regime ignore the rules of the game of power.
When the Odysseus family was caught in a predicament of being attacked from all sides, Yang and his undead regime disdain to take the opportunity to tear a piece of fat from the Odysseus family, but instead readily provided assistance to the Odysseus family - from the perspective of an ally, this is indeed quite reliable.
But if you look at it from the neighbor's perspective...it's too scary.
Phoenix put down his teacup and tapped his fingers unconsciously on the table.
Giving up the business they had run for hundreds of years and moving to the Rose Kingdom was undoubtedly a crazy risk for the Odysse family...but considering the long-term future of the family, it was still worth the bet.
The next morning, Yang Qiu received a reply telegram from Phoenix.
The next head of the Odysseus family promised that, as an ally and in accordance with the request of Lord Yang of Tarantan, he would create some kind of disturbance in the near future to divert the attention of the Rhine royal family. He even asked whether the Odysseus family needed to send troops to cooperate with the undead army.
Although there was no need for the Odysseus family to send troops, Yang Qiu was indeed very satisfied with this attitude of making a decisive decision after judging the situation and without any pretense. He immediately went to the City Hall happily and asked the City Hall to arrange someone to send Phoenix's brother, Master Parker, back, and gave him 1 semi-permanent undead summoning array and 10 temporary summoning arrays.
After finishing the affairs with Innadeli, Yang Qiu turned around and headed straight for Lord Adler.
The twenty or so players who had gone out to have fun had already reached the border of Adler Territory in a day and a night (in the other world's time) and were about to enter Tachia Territory. He had to quickly pull out the team that would cover these players and clean up the mess!
At the Duta City Hall, Miss Phoebe, who had a rare chance to enjoy a cup of black tea quietly in the morning after recruiting new colleagues, suddenly shuddered.
Phoebe got goose bumps for no apparent reason: "......?"
At the same time, in the border mountain town about 200 kilometers northwest of Dutata City.
The northern part of Adler Territory is mountainous. During the reign of Ezekiel's family, the northern part was sparsely populated before the Protectorate War. After the Protectorate War, Ezekiel's family moved the population of the territory to the central and eastern parts, and the northern part became more and more desolate.
The town of Kata, located among the mountains, is the only small town within a hundred miles of the northwest region of the northern border of Adler Territory.
This small town is less than 20 kilometers away from the territory of Tachia, and most of the townspeople rely on the business opportunities brought by passing caravans to make a living.
As soon as the sun rose in the early morning, Huggins Bernie, a resident of the town of Katta, called his son, took a sickle, a shovel and an axe, pulled a cart out of the town, left the town, and went to the mountains outside the town to cut down a shrub called "Katta grass" by the Rhine locals.
This shrub is a kind of feed that only grows in eastern countries with hot and dry climates. It can be fed to six-legged lizards, ground lizards, wildebeests used for carrying goods, ordinary horses without hybrids of monsters, pigs, cattle, sheep and other large livestock can also be eaten.
In the Rhine Kingdom, Kata grass can only be seen in the northern part of Adler Territory and the northern part of Odysseus. It is particularly lush in the mountainous area in the northern part of Adler Territory. The town of Kata is also named after this natural feed.
Hawkins Bernie works as a "feed farmer" which can only be seen in Kata Town. He pays a relatively low price to the town hall to rent the mountains near the town. He makes a living by sowing and cutting down the naturally grown Kata grass in the mountains and selling it to passing caravans.
When khat grass grows to maturity, it is more than one meter tall, with dense branches and leaves and thick stems. Cutting down and processing this shrub is a physically demanding job. Huggins, who is in his early fifties, was so tired after he and his son cut down two clumps of khat grass that he could not straighten his back. He had to ask his son to continue while he found a stone to sit down and rest.
“By next year, I may not be able to enter the mountains.”
Looking at his son working hard and sweating, Huggins, who was panting, began to feel worried.
The harvesting period of Khata grass is the same as the cycle of caravan activities. Khata grass can only be harvested from March to November each year and sold to caravans to earn a whole year's living expenses.
There are hundreds of households engaged in "feed production" in Kata Town. The selling price of Kata grass is not that high. It is considered good if one can sell a hundred kilograms of processed feed for more than ten or twenty copper coins.
A strong adult laborer, working from morning till night, can only cut and process about 200 kilograms of Khata grass at most; the father and son are busy all year round, and it is considered a good year if they can ensure that the whole family does not go hungry throughout the year.
If he couldn't do the work and had to rely on his son... what would happen at home? Huggins didn't even dare to think about it.
Looking south, Huggins, a native of Kata Town who had worked as a feed farmer all his life, couldn't help but have an idea in his mind:
It would be better to save some money and take my whole family to the south while I can still work this year.
After the lord of Adler Territory was replaced, the new lord sent people to Kata Town and installed loudspeakers on several streets in the town. Although the people of Kata Town are far away from the central part, they can rely on these loudspeakers that sound every day to learn about what is happening outside.
Higgins had heard the job-hunting advertisements broadcast over the loudspeaker several times - just by sweeping the streets, one could earn more than ten gold coins a year, and two meals were provided!
But for most ordinary people, it is not easy to make up their minds to leave their hometown and live in a strange place.
Last year, when the people sent by the new lord were recruiting people in the town, Huggins hesitated again and again, but ultimately did not dare to sign up.
He has lived in Kata Town all his life, and Hawkins has an unreasonable fear of the outside world.
If it weren't for the pressure of life, Huggins would never have thought of this.
Now, although Huggins had this idea, he was still hesitant.
"Forget it, let's talk about it at the end of the year."
With a sigh, the old feed farmer patted his butt, stood up and prepared to continue working.
When turning around, Huggins seemed to see something white flash by in the corner of his eye.
Huggins took two steps toward the bushes, then was startled and turned his head in confusion.
On the hillside about a few dozen meters away, several bald skulls emerged from the dense khat grass bushes.
Harkins opened his mouth, staggered back two steps, pointed in the direction where the undead appeared, and wanted to shout to warn his son, but he was so frightened that he couldn't make a sound.
"There are NPCs! Civilian NPCs!"
The players, pushing aside the overly dense bushes (after all, they were artificially planted and much denser than wild ones) and moving forward with difficulty, pointed to the old Huggins father and son with surprise.
"Fuck! I finally saw an NPC! I'm back on the right track!"
"Who on earth suggested taking a shortcut? The place on the map that doesn't have a route marked is full of mountains. This is such a bummer!"
"Alright, alright, if there are civilian NPCs, then we must be close to the right path. Let's check if there are any roads around!"
The players who had been in the deep mountains and forests for several hours ignored (harassed) the Huggins father and son, who were obviously civilian NPCs. They cursed and jumped out of the khata grass bushes planted by old Huggins, and went down the mountain along the path that Huggins father and son had trampled for many years...
The son who realized belatedly that the ghost had appeared, and old Huggins who had fallen to the ground in fear, watched the ghost go down the mountain in a daze, following the dirt road trampled by the feed farmers at the foot of the mountain, running towards the town...
