At first, Villa thought it would be enough to organize fifty supporters of Otto. Unexpectedly, as many as five hundred people were preparing to go north that night.
Staying in your house during the long winter, the feeling of boredom becomes increasingly irritating.
Going out to welcome the leader back, there might be some surprises in the outdoors during this trip.
Some brave men are preparing, and some women are also taking action spontaneously, simply because their husbands have not returned home with the leader Otto.
When the news from the priest reached the ears of these women, they firmly believed that their husbands were walking hard in the snowy fields with a large harvest, because there were so many prey that even a strong man could not easily carry them.
The wife's anxiety was swept away, replaced by joy at the prospect of a good harvest.
Nearly two hundred women, some even with their children, each dressed like a bear, began to prepare sleighs for pulling goods overnight. The sleds were loaded with a large amount of dry food, as well as skin tents for camping outdoors, and axes for felling wood and killing wild animals.
In the end, nearly a thousand people were organized, including men, women, and many children.
Even Rurik himself was pulled into this mighty army by his mother Niya.
More people saw that even leader Otto's wife and Rurik, who had high hopes, took action. This search northward could no longer be called a search.
But it was the warmest expression that Rossburg made to the triumphant people.
When the first ray of sunshine in the morning shines hard on the pale earth, a sense of holiness penetrates people's hearts.
Everyone who had eaten started to take action in unison, and the vast team spontaneously formed a wide search line to make it easier to find the returning people.
Rurik was also sitting on the sled, dressed like a little bear.
Of course, he is completely different from the bear in that he always carries a knife in his waist for self-protection and for cutting meat.
Like other women, Niya is quite thickly dressed and will personally pull her sled towards the north.
Not to mention, even women, even people on skis carrying some heavy supplies, can still move faster on the snow.
For Rurik, today's action was actually the first time he left Fort Ross in the fjord!
Leaving their homes protected by hills, the huge team walked directly on the frozen ocean in order to go north, because the road was very smooth.
Next to Rurik, his cousin Arik was also dragging his sleigh, and with him was his wife Peravina.
The north wind was like a knife. Looking at his mother's back as she struggled to move forward, he couldn't help but feel more worried.
"Mom, how about I come down and walk?" he suggested.
"No! My child, at least now I can easily pull you."
Niya is really not young. She usually eats too much red meat and fish and does a lot of physical work, but her physical fitness is still very good.
Rurik didn't say anything else. He sat obediently throughout the short day until night fell and people began to set up camp one after another.
They had brought a batch of charcoal, so bonfires quickly appeared on the ice.
There is no need to worry that the charcoal fire is roasting the ice under the camp. Because of more than ten days of continuous freezing, the average thickness of the flat layer in the Bay of Bothnia has exceeded one meter, and the ice is thicker closer to the coast.
The people who went north to look for the leaders were very smart. This way forward on the ice was indeed the most convenient.
Of course Otto also knew about such a superior way back home, but this idea was finally changed due to the death of a large number of reindeer.
Naturally, there was no grass growing on the ice. Those deer that were forcibly expelled caused a large number of deaths after just two days of walking on the ice.
Otto originally had a hundred deer trophies, but when he led his men back to land operations again, they had only half the number.
Because the nutrition of grass under the snow is limited, reindeer do not hibernate. They will survive the entire winter, but at the cost of eating grass throughout the winter.
This is why reindeer people have to practice winter grazing.
If they could have a lot of grain, they could feed their deer this highly nutritious food, but that's never possible.
Feeding reindeer with wheat is a bizarre idea.
But without enough energy, a large number of reindeer would die from exhaustion if they had to drag the sled and the leisurely and comfortable Ross man sitting on the sled. Forcibly running for more than 200 kilometers.
Reindeer, of course, are a traditional species in the Arctic Circle, migrating hundreds of kilometers every year.
They naturally have extremely strong endurance, but this is no reason to abuse animal power.
Smart deer farmers will not go crazy and order their deer to starve and spend several days walking through the migration route that they completed in two months.
Otto and his men are not deer herders, and their attitude towards deer is also predatory. If the deer can return to Roseburg alive, it can be kept for a period of time to try to gain more value. Don't worry if it dies midway. The owner of the deer can immediately peel off the precious deer skin and antlers, and the remaining venison is Best dry food.
Whether they have meritorious service or not, they have at least two deer.
Now everyone has to face the terrible reality. Many people are left with the last surviving deer.
Some of Otto's men helped him drive the deer away, and he himself had to keep an eye on the last girl who was the deer herder.
A half-dead deer is not a catastrophic problem. Many of his subordinates go to deal with the deer carcass. The skin goes to the leader and the meat to the subordinates.
The opportunity to easily obtain a large amount of delicious red meat was right in front of him. The fifty venison belonging to Otto quickly turned into pieces of meat, and a considerable part had already entered the stomachs of the tribesmen.
Otto, what he cared about most was still the deer herder girl.
Along the way, the child neither cried nor fussed, but sat quietly on the sled wrapped in a thick leather coat. She ate meat, she drank water, and for days there was no intention of escaping.
"This kind of person is simply a born servant?"
Otto became more and more curious. Unexpectedly, the girl saw that her deer was being eaten by barbarians, and her heart was bleeding.
But what can a child who has lost his entire family and is controlled by barbarians do?
She couldn't understand the language of the savages, and now she was completely submissive, but she just didn't want to die. Because she is cowardly now, she does not have the courage to commit suicide like her mother. He was also very unlucky and did not freeze to death like his brothers and sisters.
But he was the only one alive, with his hands and feet still bound.
She doesn't know where she will be escorted yet, but looking at the current situation, she is afraid that the deer that were taken away from her home will die of exhaustion and starvation in the vast snowfield before she determines where to go. Her personal fate may be similar. tragedy.
The girl remained silent, longing that one day she would fall asleep and never see the sun again.
It just so happened that while I was still alive, the deer were getting fewer and fewer every day.
Otto and his party turned back to the old road. Based on the marks left earlier, everyone basically determined their geographical location.
Everyone is also very happy, and we can return to Roseburg in two or three days at most.
The only unhappy thing is probably that the deer pulling the sleigh are all dead. What was once a two-day journey may only take three days or more, because on their sleds are not only their own various snowfield camping equipment, but also a large number of animal skins and a large amount of frozen hard meat. More weight.
It is a good thing to return home with a full load, and everyone hopes to be able to bring them back without too much effort.
Otto hopes that his troops in Roseburg can send people to help everyone bring back the treasure, not to mention that the people in Roseburg have missed everyone for too long.
"Maybe I should send someone to take a shortcut immediately to inform them!"
