Iron Powder and Spellcasters

   Chapter 269 Preparations

  On the west side of the newly reclaimed land province, the Dajiao River-Guanghui River is the natural boundary.

  Crossing the Big Horn River and walking more than 100 kilometers to the west is the wintering pasture of the Telltown Department.

  In the past month, tens of thousands of Teltown people have continued to migrate here, making the number of tents in the wintering pastures unprecedented.

   But no matter how many tents there are, you can’t see the sight of thousands of horses galloping. At most, riders in twos and threes are galloping in the sky.

  The felt tent is far away from the felt tent, and the herd is far away from the herd, keeping a cold distance from each other, like an island in the yellow-green sea.

The reason why    appears like this is on the one hand because of the social form of the Hurd people, on the other hand, it is forced to survive.

  The Hurds can be roughly divided into three classes:

  Kota—that is, a full-time samurai, a military aristocrat;

  Halan-means Qianshou, the subjects of the nobles;

  Tiheer - slave.

  Because of the harsh and dangerous living environment, there is no difference in the living standards and political status of Qianshou and slaves.

  The slaves of the great nobles must be well fed, warmly dressed, and even higher in social status than ordinary Qianshou—even if the former is a slave and the latter is not.

   At the same time, the flattening of society has resulted in good class mobility.

   After all, a Hurd might be the leader of Guizhou today, and tomorrow he might be kidnapped as a slave and successfully achieve a class leap.

   Even if it is the "Three Ministries" of the Terden Division, its organizational model is still "a group of small military nobles allegiance to a large military noble".

  A small military noble plus his companions, guards, subjects and slaves is a miniature tribe.

   The fire roaster is not only the loyal object of the small military nobles, but also the most powerful military noble.

  The livestock that the pasture can carry is limited, and the Hurd family has to spread the distance for grazing; the expansion of the distance will increase the cost of domination. This loose social form will naturally evolve.

   For the Hurd society, it was necessary for survival; but for the rulers, it was the dispersion of power.

   Fireboilers want to make a difference. He has heard that the White Lion is "making up Qimin", and he also wants to reorganize the Teltown Department like the White Lion.

   But now his prestige is not as good as it used to be, especially the loss of the golden man who sacrificed to heaven has attracted a lot of criticism. Whenever the fire roaster saw the Kotas whispering, he felt that the Kotas were making fun of him.

  The accountant of the White Lion, Qimin, is in essence compressing the power space of the small military nobles - this is clearly seen by the fire roaster.

   But nomadic life has one characteristic: [The property of the herdsmen either has legs or can be carried on long legs and can run at any time].

  If the kotas are not happy with the fire roasters, they can bring all their net worth and leave at any time, and continue to be kotas in another tribe, or simply stand on their own.

   Of course, this kind of "moving", which is like defecting, must have problems with procedures, and it is also very troublesome to wipe the buttocks, and it may even lead to a melee.

   But when the interests are damaged, the Kotas will never hesitate.

   Therefore, the fire roaster did not dare to act rashly. He had to stabilize the Teltown Department first, and then squeeze the power out of the Kotas little by little.

  The quickest way to rebuild your prestige is to win the battle.

   For the Hurds, there is no problem that cannot be solved with loot. If not, it must be because there is not enough loot.

   And the Fireboiler has found a good target.

   "Telltown disciples!" The fire roaster entered the tent majestically: "Are you all here?"

  The kotas in the big tent stopped making noise, and saluted the fire roaster one after another.

  The fire roaster called the Kotas to discuss, nominally to "divide the winter pasture".

The    agreement with Prato is no longer binding, and the Tertown ministry no longer has to maintain a 100-kilometer buffer zone.

   As a result, it means that the Teltown Department has created a large area of ​​fertile winter pasture out of thin air, and the Kotas are all eagerly waiting for the fire roaster to divide the meat for everyone.

The fire roaster looked around the big tent, and said another thing first: "In the autumn battle, you and I were both present, and the wealth and women didn't loot much, but a lot of gelding horses were exhausted. It was my order that was wrong, You can blame me."

  The fire roaster revealed his own shortcomings, and the Kotas did not dare to answer at will.

   "The children still plundered a lot of things." A veteran Kota said cautiously: "This is all your favor, the fire roaster."

   The fire roaster sneered: "I haven't eaten the really tender and plump leg of lamb. A little bit of broken bones and corner meat, how can the children share it?"

   The real purpose of the fire roaster's tent, the Kotas are well aware of it, but no one is willing to express their position.

It was the uncle of the fire roaster who stood up first and asked bluntly: "Fire roaster, you can just say it. We are all willing to go to the grass valley, but you have to explain the context clearly. Just like the horses follow the lead horse, You explain where you're going, so we can keep up with you."

"It's very simple. Although the two-legged man has suffered a defeat, it is still a hard bone to chew." The fire roaster said gruffly: "Knife to knife, arrow to arrow, you and I may not be able to win, even if Winning will cost a lot of casualties.”

   Kota of Tertown Department nodded.

The decline of   30 years cannot be completely reversed by a single victory. If you really want to set up a battle and fight another battle, the people of Paratus will definitely win.

"So we have to go back to the way of our grandfathers and ancestors. We must be like wolves hunting yellow sheep, biting the small and weak first, and avoiding the big and strong." The fire roaster gritted his teeth: "Wait for the small ones. , The weak will be eaten up, the big and strong can be slaughtered..."

  The Kotas all felt that this was reasonable, but they also felt that the fire roaster couldn't say such a thing. You Keta secretly thought in his heart: It must be the rhetoric prepared for him by the "Echige" of the fire roaster.

  Echige is his father. The fire roaster's biological father has died. The only person who can be honored as Echige by the fire roaster is the "interpreter" who fled to the wasteland thirty years ago.

   "Just say what to do!" The fire roaster's uncle interrupted his nephew roughly: "Don't be reasonable!"

"Okay!" The fire roaster didn't hesitate, he said sternly: "This winter is warm, the pasture is not completely dry, the horses have not lost much fat, and there is still room to fight again. send troops.

  Zhu Keta went back and ordered their troops. This year, the winter pastures will be divided according to their output. If they contribute more, they will get the fatter ones, and if they contribute less, they will get the poor ones farther. There is nothing else to say, throw the beans and agree! "

   After finishing speaking, the fire roaster slapped the table, and two slaves brought in a golden vase and two bowls containing red beans and black beans respectively.

  The fire roaster took the lead in taking a bean from each of the two bowls and walked to the golden bottle. "Dang bang", a bean fell from his hand into the bottle.

   The other Kotas also picked up beans and threw the bottles according to their status and strength.

   Kotas who are not strong enough are not eligible to roll beans, and Kotas who are qualified to throw beans are not allowed to abstain from voting. Every Kota must choose a side. This is the bean-tossing decision, the simple and rude but efficient voting method of the Hurds.

   The fire roaster turned his back to the golden bottle and turned around after the bean toss was over.

   He shook the golden vase up and down three times and poured the beans into the pot at one go.

  Red beans and black beans are distinct in color, except for two black beans on the plate, everything else is red.

   "The gods witness!" The fire roaster roared and smashed the pottery plate, announcing the completion of the ceremony.

  …

  When the Teltown Department began to gather troops, Iron Peak County, a hundred kilometers away, was also mobilizing troops.

   The assembly order was sent to each military village as soon as possible. The carriage full of ordnance rumbled out of the arsenal and followed closely behind the messenger.

  The weapons and armor of the Tiefeng County Infantry Regiment were originally kept in a centralized manner, but now they have been delegated to individuals.

   In order to minimize the logistical pressure, Winters asked the soldiers to prepare their own dry food for two weeks.

   For a while, the smoke from the kitchen in Juntun Village was everywhere, and every household was busy grinding, mixing and baking noodles.

   It was at this time that the second company commander, Bart Xia Ling, discovered a serious problem - there were too many bachelors under him.

   Tiefeng County Infantry Regiment was reorganized from the surrendered Tiefeng County garrison army. As early as when Major Ronald was recruiting, the major deliberately chose refugees who had no family to join the army.

   Because refugees without family members are more at risk, and refugees without family members need less rations.

  The new infantry regiment inherited this structure, so most of the soldiers were fed by one person and the whole family was not hungry.

  On weekdays, everyone can make do with a bite. When it was time to prepare dry food for two weeks, everyone was in a hurry-including Bart Shalling himself.

   After walking around the village, Bart Xialing immediately stopped the family-by-household method of making military rations.

   All the men, women and children of the whole village were gathered by him. The second company commander had seen how the old sage Reid organized the soldiers to bake dry food. He decided to follow the practice at that time and prepare dry food for all the soldiers of the company.

   Men do manual work such as dough making and grinding, while delicate work such as baking and water transfer are handed over to the few women in the second village.

   A temporary oven was set up in the village square. Everyone worked together, sweating like rain, and the atmosphere was like a celebration.

   Seeing this lively scene, Bart Xialing suddenly felt a little desolate.

  When the second company commander was so busy, Winters was also busy.

   Dealing with the blacksmiths' guild, Winters gave the blacksmiths Boltin and Chaushaon all the power to do it.

  As the one who founded the blacksmith guild, the old blacksmith Boltain knew the guild thoroughly. Since he chose to be "slow", no one is more suitable for the knife than the old blacksmith Boltin.

   After communicating with the old blacksmith, Winters' vision is not limited to the blacksmith's guild - the core of all guilds' interests is monopoly. And there can only be one monopoly in Tiefeng County, and that is the new government.

   He arranged for Ciel and Shaosha to cooperate and conduct a secret survey of all the guilds in Tiefeng County.

   But these things have to make way for war. Winters arranged the assembly route for the infantry companies, and fell asleep in bed for less than two hours before being woken up by Charles again.

   The elders of the nearby villages and the peasants who were known to be good at farming had been summoned to Gervodin and were waiting for the tribunal to discuss the matter.

   It is helpless to say that the bread has to be eaten one bite at a time, and things have to be done the same way.

  Although the war is close at hand, the first thing Winters has to solve is the agricultural disaster caused by the warm winter.

   In a sense, this matter is even more important than guarding against Heard barbarians.

  Warm winters are rare, but not unheard of. Regarding the early jointing of the wheat, the farmers came up with all kinds of bizarre methods, such as holding a market in the wheat fields.

   A farmer from Shengke Village swears that as long as a market is held in the wheat fields, the problem of jointing of wheat seedlings can be easily solved.

  Winters seemed to be listening intently, nodding "hmmm" from time to time. In fact, his mind has already flown to the wasteland, and his mind is full of the terrain of Tiefeng County.

   Compared with running a county, marching and fighting is the job he is better at, more comfortable and more secure.

   But he's more than just a soldier—he's been aware of it since he was in Wolftown.

   At this meeting, Colonel Broad was also there.

   Colonel Broad was noncommittal about Winters' "rebellion", and the two got along as harmoniously as ever, as if Winters was still the centurion of the expedition.

   Winters didn't ask.

   In Winters' view, under Colonel Bode's deep pool-like calm appearance, he may be struggling and confused:

Fighting desperately, being captured as a slave, and dragging his body back to his motherland, only to find that the motherland is dead; which of the two new republics can represent Palato is still controversial; his old ministry has raised the flag of rebellion, but it is Because of this old rebellion, he was lucky enough to be returned from the wasteland.

   All the emotions and grievances are entangled together, and the cuts are constantly and the reason is chaotic.

   Winters has no ability to solve the colonel, and can only wait for the colonel to sort out his own thoughts.

   Winters asked the colonel to come to the meeting, and the colonel had no objection. So there was a one-armed middle-aged man listening silently in the corner of the conference room.

   Colonel Bode accompanied Winters in this way. First, he held a civil affairs meeting, listened to the petitions of the citizens of Gervoudan, and then inspected the storage situation of Gervoudan.

  The warehouse has not been inspected yet, and news came from outside the city—Samukin has just arrived in the suburbs with the wolf town labor camp.

   So Colonel Bode and Winters went out of the city non-stop to hand over the "big labor camp" to Samukin.

Before   , the prisoners of war in Vigne County were scrambled and assigned to each Juntun village to assist in autumn ploughing, and also used the strength of Juntun village to supervise the prisoners of war.

   Now that the soldiers in each village are regrouping, the prisoners of war cannot continue to stay in each village, and they must be regrouped again.

   After all the work was done, it was almost dark when Winters dragged his tired body and Colonel Bode back to Gervoudan.

   The Colonel seemed to be Winters' shadow all day long, barely speaking, just watching silently. Many people thought the one-armed middle-aged man was the tribune's entourage or bodyguard.

   But the day is not over, Andre and Mason are at the camp waiting for Winters to meet.

   Colonel Bode followed Winters to the meeting, but Don Juan and Moritz did not attend - Winters did not want the Colonel to know of the existence of the two Veneta officers for the time being.

Lieutenant Colonel    Moritz was too lazy to hold meetings, and Don Juan had already taken his light cavalry into the wasteland for reconnaissance. The two will abstain from voting in every vote, and their absence will not affect the decision-making.

   How to concentrate the horses sent down? Where to choose the pile of baggage? How to defend the nearly three-hundred-kilometer-long river bank? Whether to recruit militiamen... After discussing and making decisions one after another, there is only one issue left: whether to report the enemy's situation to the New Reclamation Corps.

   "Report!" Andre sneered: "Don't say whether the legion believes it or not. If they ask [how do you know the barbarian's movements], how should we answer?

  'Another group of barbarians told us. ’

  ‘The rebels colluded with the barbarians! Kill him! ’”

After    one person played two roles, Andri concluded: "Damn, in the end, the legion and the barbarians must fight us together."

   "You can't say that either." Senior Mason retorted weakly.

   "Can't say that?" Andre sneered: "We are rebels, and the Hurds are barbarians. If the rebels beat barbarians, the legion will not lose whoever dies. Look at it!"

Andre became more and more excited: "I want to say, not only should we not inform the New Reclamation Corps, but we should also find a way to lure the barbarians to Vigne County. In terms of wealth, Vigne County is not much richer than Tiefeng County. ? Let them go to the dog to bite the dog! Just to involve the Legion's energy, so as not to think about us."

"Don't deliberately lead to Vigne, the monkey's **** will go by himself." Winters pondered: "Last time, he punched his fist and beat him, and he suffered a loss. This time, he will definitely stretch his palm, more Offensive. Let's take care of one and the other. The borderline of the newly reclaimed land is more than 700 kilometers long... Not a single kilometer is safe."

   Hearing this, Colonel Bode, who had been silent for a while, suddenly sighed: "The attack and defense have changed."

   Winters, Andre and Mason all looked at the colonel.

  Colonel Bode asked the young men bitterly, "You haven't touched the Telltown Department once in all these years. Do you know why?"

   Winters shook his head. The decision-making process of the Palatine Army, how can they outsiders know.

"Because they are the most honest and obedient." Colonel Bode said bitterly: "In order to maintain the internal balance of power among the Hurds, we fought Hurd on the north bank and released Hurd on the south bank. At that time, the wider the border, the better. Attack from any point. Now, it's their turn to bite us."

  …

  Dark clouds were over the city, and the storm was about to come. While Winters, Bart Schalling, and many, many others were preparing for the battle, a trivial thing happened in Gervodan: a man returned to his home.

   Aksinia, who was putting the child to sleep, heard someone knocking on the door.

  It was already dark, and only the drunkards who wanted to take advantage of her would come knocking on her door.

   Aksinya was silent, pretending that no one was at home, but the knock on the door continued unhurriedly.

   Aksinya was a little scared. She first hid the two children in the closet, then took the poker and walked carefully to the door.

   "Who is it?" she asked.

   "It's me," answered a tired voice.

   Aksinya's heart was beating violently, she slammed open the door, and outside stood her husband, Ivan.

   The tongs fell to the ground, jumped, and stopped moving.

  No hugs, no tears, no smiles, Aksinya stood silently.

When    was seventeen, Aksinya married Ivan. In the fall of the previous year, her father was beaten to death by her brother and mother with a cart.

   So Aksinya silently married from Wangqiao Town to Gervodin. The day after the wedding, the new husband beats the new wife severely. After having a baby, the violence was less frequent, but never stopped.

When    was on a blind date, Aksinya might have some affection for the tall and straight Ivan. But now, she has no love at all, only the instinct of survival and the habit and numbness of life.

  The only light that shines into life is her lovely child. Without them, she might already be dead.

Aksinya couldn't recognize the person outside the door: the person outside the door was tall, but very thin, like a reed that could be blown down by the wind; his back was hunched over unconsciously, and his shoulders were slumped. down.

   The person outside the door seems to be Ivan, but it doesn't seem to be.

   "I..." The person outside the door licked his dry lips and said with difficulty: "...Did you petition the tribune for me?"

   Aksinya did not nod or shake her head, she just stood silently.

   The Adam's apple of the person outside the door struggled up and down: "Thank you."

   There were a few hot drops on the back of Aksinia's hand, which were tears.

  Hot tears ran down her cheeks, the strong Aksinya bit the back of her hand, knelt on the ground, and cried bitterly.

  The person outside the door hugged Aksinya, as if swearing: "I...I...I will never hit you again..."

   "You said this." Aksinya murmured painfully: "You have said this before."

  The people outside the door shuddered, and tears also welled up in their eyes. The person outside the door grabbed Aksinia's hand and placed it on the brand mark of the Holy Emblem on her chest.

   Aksinya heard the man swear: "This is the last time."

   [Thanks to book lovers for their collection, reading, subscription, recommendation tickets, monthly tickets, rewards and comments, thank you all]

   [Would you like to give a scum a chance for redemption... I'm really confused. If according to Winters' previous character, he would kill a scum like Ivan, he would not hesitate at all, nor would he miss it afterwards]

   [Ivan was captured just after "Winters realized that he had to kill canonically, not just as he wanted". If it was before, Ivan would have died a long time ago]

   [So Winters couldn't get enough to eat himself at that time, he still left a life for Ivan who wasted food]

   [The author remembers that it was Samukin who said at the time, "I think it's better to kill them all if they are locked up for wasting food." Winters replied, "The reason that there is no food is not enough for the death penalty, and it is not tenable."]

   [This probably triggers a plot branch: do you want to kill Ivan]

   [The author's original idea for this plot is that for Winters, he may not have thought about this decision for more than a second, and Ivan's life and death are in Winters' thoughts. But for Ivan, Aksinya and their children, it affects a lifetime. Although Winters can't feel it for the time being, the author hopes that through this incident, he can understand the weight of power]

[Also, seeing Aksinya, let Ivan be redeemed, not for Ivan, but for Aksinya, a tragic figure in another time and space, another universe, another book Rewrite your destiny]

[thank you all]

   (end of this chapter)