Mercenaries and Adventurers

After saying so much, Ranu basically told everything he and the two knew. At this time, a large number of people also entered the village hungry.

The village is not big. Although there are more than a dozen farmers' houses, not many people live in them. Many of the houses are very dilapidated and lack human maintenance. After a few months, many houses are leaking. Collapse of collapse, conditions were terrible.

But this also made the people who came in feel comfortable. After all, they were all refugees from various places. In the past, they basically lived in similar farmers' houses. Let alone staying overnight, just looking closely made many people feel uncomfortable. Very sad.

Under the loud command of Mr. Barfoot and Bloodfangster, groups of people were assigned to farmers' yards one by one. If the farmer's house is good, it is suitable for everyone to live in. If the house is not in good condition and there is a risk of living in it, everyone will build their tents in the yard of each farmer.

The young men in the logging team held torches, laughed loudly, and felled the fruit trees in the village, then chopped them into firewood on the spot. And they did not let go of some collapsed farmers' houses. A few young men used a row of flying kicks according to the half-collapsed earth walls, directly and completely kicked down those dilapidated houses, then picked them up, and worked together to remove the original building timbers. come out.

This kind of wood is the best burning material. It is thick and heavy, and a small piece can burn for most of the night.

The cooks who were waiting to cook even urged the firewood that the lumberjacks had processed back and forth. They directed them to set up iron pots, draw clean and cold water from the wells, and then prepare the bags of God-given food.

The flame ignited and burned rapidly with the vigorous blowing of the young and girl who helped the kitchen. After the water boiled, handfuls of plump wheat grains were thrown into the boiling water.

In addition, there are smashed salt bars. The large pieces of salt bought from the town of Dorne were crushed with a hammer, and then repeatedly ground into smaller particles with a small stone mortar and a wooden pounder. The cooks checked back and forth, and after seeing that the size was suitable, they took wooden spoons to scoop the finely crushed salt grains into the wheat porridge.

At this time, Keir came over and explained a few words, and the cooks put more salt into the wheat porridge, as well as some of their usual treasured dried meat.

These dried meats are carefully cut into small pieces, and then the cooks sprinkle them into pots of wheat porridge with their stingy hands.

Everyone walked faster and further today, so in order to supplement physical exertion and nutrition, we had to add more salt and meat.

Otherwise, traveling so fast will only make the entire team more tired. Although it is not visible or obvious in the past two days, the impact is there and real. This was what Kiel learned in the army when he went south with Kendall's army.

Ranu, on his side, has been stunned since he saw countless people pouring into the village. Only then did he realize how many people were waiting to come in outside the village when he was talking to the young knight.

He was at a loss with so many people. He watched these unknown people walking past him. Some looked at him curiously, while others went about their own business and ignored his presence.

Standing by the well in the village, he saw many people, men and women coming to the well to draw water. He wanted to go up and help, but these young people about his age were much stronger than him. Not only men, but women were also hungry than hiding. He will still have strength for a long time.

This made him embarrassed and didn't know what to do.

When the team's wounded camp was quickly established in the center of the village, Ranu saw his partner Joey being helped and placed on a blanket in the wounded camp.

Ranu then trotted over to check on his companion's injuries.

"How's it going? I told you to be cautious at that time, be cautious, hey."

Ranu complained about Joey's recklessness, while Joey, who was lying on the blanket, was weak and confused, looking at the numerous and busy people outside the camp: "What on earth is going on? Nuzi ?Am I hallucinating? Am I going to die?"

Ranu sat on the ground next to him and slapped Joey hard on the face: "Okay! How are you? This is not an illusion, but a passing team. There are also knights and church priests leading the team. The number seems to be Some are too much.”

Joey breathed a sigh of relief and lay down on the warm blanket with peace of mind, but soon his stomach made a loud growl, which made him ask Ranu, who didn't seem too hungry: "Good brother , do you have anything to eat there?"

It's okay not to mention it. Ranu's stomach growled as soon as he mentioned this. They only ate some berries growing scattered around the village during the day. They were quite sweet, but they were not very hungry. I originally planned to go to the nearby farmland full of weeds and wildflowers at dusk to find wild rhizome plants to dig up and eat, but unexpectedly, I was blocked in the village by Keir and his men.

I haven't eaten anything until now.

At this time, the pots of wheat porridge cooked by the cooks began to emit a rich aroma. Even in the smoke of firewood, this aroma was particularly clear and attractive. Especially for hungry people, it is an irresistible temptation.

"Gulu, I'm going to see what others have cooked for dinner. It would be great if I could get some to eat."

After saying that, Ranu walked out hesitantly. Behind him, his partner Joey quickly reminded: "Don't forget my share! Please!"

-

Kil was not hungry, and he didn't pay much attention to the affairs of the already experienced people who had camped for the night. At this moment, he was leading a group of people to patrol around the periphery of the village.

The hired long-haired lynx orcs had been sent to patrol the deserted farmland outside the village a moment ago. Keir found Maomao, the leader of the alien race, sitting on a carriage at the entrance of the village, combing his hair.

"A reminder to your people, be careful of the small groups of parasitic monsters wandering around at night. Their eyesight may be much better than humans at night. Some of the merchants and caravans that passed here before were attacked at night. Don't I underestimated those monsters.”

Courage Maomao flicked his tail and shouted confidently: "Don't worry, powerful human. Maomao, night, is the most powerful! Monster, night, hunts, Maomao, night, hunts. No, opponent, Maomao!"

Kil shrugged, but still reminded: "If you find any strange movement nearby, remember to come to me first, and don't try to face them alone. To be honest, those guys are not interested in either my subordinates or you. It’s too much, not to mention that at least a few of them are working together.”

Kil turned his head to look at the bustling center of the village, and exhaled: "It's so lively, and this is not a mountain, but a plain area. Not to mention the monsters wandering around are not blind. I guess it's not far away." Everyone in the town has also discovered what’s going on here.”

He finally gave the foreigner Maomao a reminder: "Please help with the night watch. After dawn, I will ask the girls in the team to make you some weapons-carrying equipment, so that the daggers and daggers in your hands will not need to be used." You can wrap it with your tail, or hold it with both hands. You can carry it behind your back, or put it on your waist like me."

After speaking, Kil patted the long sword on his belt and the blue ax hanging under the cloak on his back.

Courage Maomao touched its beard and asked doubtfully: "Carrying equipment? Contains metal?"

Kil sighed: "Most of them do not contain metal, but they are good partners with metal weapons. With or without them, it makes a big difference to a warrior."

Courage Maomao is not stupid, so after thinking for a while, he nodded cautiously: "Come first, take a look. If it works, keep it! If it doesn't work, Maomao, you need to change it to metal!"

"Okay, okay, you can do whatever you want."

-

The city wall of Yemei Town in the distance.

Although this is a town, its development in recent years has gradually and rapidly developed towards the scale of a city. The rock wall outside the town, which took a lot of effort to build, is an example of this.

Generally speaking, most towns of this size will only build a circle of earth and wood walls. Only towns or important castles will spend a lot of money to build stone walls.

Of course, the ruler of Yemei Town cleverly used the high grain taxes that the surrounding villages should have paid to work as coolies for the lords instead of grain taxes. Therefore, in addition to saving the food that could not be eaten and sold every year, most of them were thrown in the They did not pay anything for the large amount of food that rotted in the underground granary. They did not spend a single coin, and they solved many things that many lords had to spend many coins to do.

That's not bad. In the empire where the immigrants came, ordinary people even had to work for the noble lords for free for half a year. If they didn't work, they would even be imprisoned.

Anyway, at this time, on the rocky city wall that had only been built for a few years and was still very new, some sentries responsible for sentry inspections had already seen the gradually brightening campfires in the abandoned village next to the trade road in the northwest.

"Go and notify the captain! Let him come over and take a look!"

A sentry shouted loudly. After he finished shouting, he looked at the small iron clock placed on his sentry post with a somewhat hesitant look on his face. He hesitated to ring the thing because he didn't know whether it was a good thing or a bad thing.

The sound has sounded, and tonight everyone in the town, including thousands of farmers and villagers from inside and outside the town who have taken refuge here, will probably have to spend a sleepless night in fear.

Instead of ringing the bell, the sentry remembered that some time ago, bandits attacked the town at night. The sentry that night did not issue a warning in advance, and now a large number of houses on the south side of the town were set on fire in the chaos that night.

Later that night, many people were executed on the execution platform in the town.

Including the sentries and some patrol soldiers on duty that night, as well as the soldier captain responsible for guarding the south side of the town, were all beheaded.

Thinking of this, the sentry no longer hesitated. He knew that compared with his own life, the whole town's sleepless night was nothing.

Dang-dang-dang-dang-dang-dang-dang-

Two bells in succession rang continuously from the watchtower on the town wall, and then the other two watchtowers some distance away also sounded the alarm.

Soon, all the watchtowers surrounding the town sounded a continuous series of warning bells.

After a while, the alarm bells of other sentry towers stopped, but the sentry who first sounded the alarm was still holding a small hammer and beating the small alarm bell at hand.

This is to remind the whole town of the danger and then give everyone the exact direction of the danger.

The refugee villagers on the outside of the wall in the northwest of the town crawled out sleepily from their dilapidated shacks. They began to look at each other, but soon realized something, and they all became nervous.

The men turned around and took out the pointed wooden sticks used for fighting, or the pitchforks or hoes from the recently dug earth pit shacks. The children in the family shivered in the dark shacks, and the peasant woman in charge of the house shivered. He also bravely held a wooden spoon and a short stick, ready to fight to the death with the invading bandits.

Some farmers with few possessions or relatives elsewhere in the town urgently embarked on the road to escape, while more farmers had nowhere to go. They had little property and familiar relatives and could not enter the town or outside the town. Only this small piece of land in the northwest was granted to them by the lord family to live in.

Therefore, the vast majority of people can only stay here and face whatever is coming. Be it good or bad.

It's mostly bad. After all, no one has encountered anything good since the beginning of this year.

Fortunately, due to the above requirements, during this period the farmers built another three-meter-high earth wall outside the town's original rock wall. On the outside of the earth wall is a pit that is more than three meters wide and two meters deep. Adding the height of the earth wall, the height difference is about five meters.

With this defensive measure, most bandit gangs must not be able to break in, right?

The bandits' attacks on the south side of the town in the past few days were mostly to use the last opportunity to cause trouble before the earth wall was built.

This is what most farmers think, well, it can’t be wrong.

Although they don't know that the so-called bandits are actually some parasitic monsters that have taken over human bodies, they also don't know that simple walls can block wild beasts and most monsters, but they can't block parasitic monsters that can extend plant roots at all.

After all, how can earth or stone walls block plant roots?

As long as those monsters extend a short plant root from their hands and feet, they can firmly penetrate into the earth wall or climb on the hard rock wall. These things cannot stop this monster.

-

As the alarm bell on the town watch tower rang, the baron's mansion in the center of the town also quickly raised light torches. One of the highest towers in the baron's mansion even turned on a magic warning light. Under the reflection of the semicircular mirror, the bright light The beam of light quickly turned from the tower to the northwest of the town. After the observer in the tower confirmed that the guards in the northwest of the town were still normal, they immediately checked all the walls of the town clockwise.

Last time, it was because of carelessness that the night lighting command and defense method was not activated early, which caused the chaos to last for a long time from the south side of the town before it stopped.

A group of cavalry on horseback also rushed out from the gate of the baron's mansion and quickly walked along the stone road in the town to the northwest wall. After the cavalry rushed out, the thick wooden gate slammed shut, and each of the elite soldiers also came out. He rushed out of the room and went to various defensive points in the mansion to replenish his defensive strength.

The temporary administrator of the Baron family needed to know quickly why the warning bell was ringing, so he dispatched the family's elite forces.

Soon, on the streets dotted with tents and shacks in the town, this group of cavalry met the messenger sent from the other side of the wall. A cavalryman dragged the messenger running on two legs onto his horse, then turned around and galloped towards the baron's mansion. go.

The other cavalry continued to advance towards the northwest wall of the town under the leadership of the captain.

Along the way, the refugee villagers living on the streets and the townspeople who opened their windows and turned on their lights looked at the galloping cavalry. Some people asked what happened, some asked if they needed help, and some looked at them coldly. everything.

The cavalry didn't know the answer, so they didn't answer the farmers who took refuge and the folks in their hometown. They just hurried on.

At the baron's mansion, the cavalry carrying the messenger shouted for their lives before they reached the gate of the mansion and let the small wooden door next to the gate open. Soon, when he brought people closer to the dismounted horse, the small door was closed for a short time and opened from the inside again, allowing the messenger to come in.

The cavalryman turned around and continued his previous mission.

As soon as the messenger entered the baron's mansion, several tall soldiers in iron armor roughly removed the long sword from his waist and a short crossbow from his back.

The weapon was thrown aside casually, and the leather armor on his body was torn off and the belt buckle was taken off. Soon, he was stripped clean amidst the shouts of the messenger.

Then several priests carrying various styles of armed equipment came forward. They had different emblems of gods painted on their bodies, and the clothes of each church were also different.

When these priests came up, they stretched out their palms with divine power and touched the messenger's torso. After touching for a while, amidst the nervousness of the elite armored soldiers around them, these priests gave an answer that made everyone breathe a sigh of relief.

"There is nothing suspicious about it," said a priest from the Church of Saturn.

"There are no new wounds on the body, and the mind is clear." A priest from the Church of the Sun God whispered.

"Life is strong, single, and has no problems." The tall priest of the Church of the God of Blacksmithing and Craftsman also said.

"The soul is pure and safe." The priest of the Church of the God of the Dead finally said.

After several priests completed the inspection, they withdrew. The waiter in the mansion who had been waiting for a long time came forward with a set of simple but necessary clothes and helped the messenger put on the clothes.

After all, he was going to see the noble lord. Although he was not the person himself, but the temporary replacement appointed by the other party before leading the troops, he couldn't go there naked, right?

The messenger put on his clothes while cursing, and then followed the senior attendants and quickly arrived at the main hall of the mansion under the supervision of two elite soldiers.

The place was brightly lit at this time. Since there was a sudden need to use the hall, the waiters did not bother to light the candlesticks and chandeliers throughout the hall. After asking the housekeeper, they directly turned on the magic lighting that had been installed in the hall for many years but was not used much.

The crystals on the walls emit pure white light, making the already opulent room even more sparkling.

However, the relatives of several baron lords and the designated temporary manager of the family who had been waiting here did not bother to appreciate the gorgeous scenery around them. When they saw the messenger being led in, they all started asking what happened. matter.

The messenger retracted his eyes that were dazzled by the surrounding artworks and various shiny decorations, knelt on the ground and lowered his head and said: "Masters, just now, the sentries on our sentry tower discovered that there is a certain place ten kilometers away from the town in the northwest of the town. In a village, many lights that resembled campfires suddenly lit up. It was so sudden that the alarm bell was sounded and a warning was given."

An old man with white hair hammered his waist in dissatisfaction and looked at the messenger with squinted eyes: "So you don't know what happened? Just woke up the whole town like this? I'm so old and useless. I just fell asleep, I'm afraid I won't be able to sleep tonight."

The messenger lowered his head and did not refute or say anything more.

Another middle-aged woman was sitting on a cushioned square stool without a backrest. She breathed a sigh of relief and said, "Uncle, stop complaining. Although I don't know what the situation will be like, at least it's not as tragic as the past few days. Really, it really scared me the past few days, as long as nothing happens in the town. When my brother comes back, huh, those monsters will all be burned to death in the fire one by one."

After saying that, she even scratched her hair fiercely with her long nails to express her dissatisfaction.

The other three people sitting in the lower seat did not speak. After realizing that it was just a 'false alarm', they yawned and chatted quietly.

It had not been dark for long at this time, and to be honest, it was not the time for these noble family members to rest, but the situation was not good now. All the entertainment shops in the town, except for the pubs that never closed, basically closed early. Some entertainment venues that are exclusively open at night have been closed a few days ago because there are not many people coming to spend money, and it is not known when they will be reopened.

They discussed whether to play magic cards for a while and stop paying attention to things that had not yet affected the town.

The young man sitting at the main seat, a man in his twenties, coughed twice and asked the messenger: "Do you have any other details you can tell? And the village at that distance is probably a specific village. ?Bring up the map and let our messenger help identify it."

The messenger thought for a moment and then said.