Under the cold and calm surface, the whole world is freezing, and some clues have already emerged.
The Neva River is still frozen, and the heaviest reindeer can still walk around on the ice.
There is also endless ice in the Gulf of Finland, and it seems that spring has nothing to do with it.
The vernal equinox was coming, and Rurik planned to leave just after the vernal equinox ceremony, and the day was set for the twenty-ninth day of March.
Although there was ice everywhere, people began to find that it became quite warm in the afternoon, and the snow began to melt on the eaves of the wooden houses. Then it began to condense again in the evening, causing a large amount of ice to appear on the eaves the next day, so much so that some children used the ice as a sword and laughed. Fight each other.
Svetlana is already personally preparing dry food for the journey back home. She planned to cook some fish herself and bake some oatcakes.
The stove was in the corner of the palace's backyard. She had no one to help her and didn't want anyone else to interfere. She just worked hard here, feeling very satisfied.
Suddenly, Rurik wearing a velvet hat came over looking for the scent.
"It can be arranged for a servant to do it. You don't have to do it yourself." He said.
Lanna smiled brightly: "You haven't recruited many servants. Besides, according to our traditions, women must do these things."
"But you are my queen."
"I am your woman."
Rurik heard this with satisfaction, and when he took a closer look, he saw that she was indeed holding on to a dogfish steak that had been cut into several pieces.
Compared to bass and herring, the largest fish you can catch in the water near New Roseburg is pike. This fish tends to grow very large and has a long lifespan. It is as ferocious as a vicious dog and is a perfect carnivorous fish. Therefore, the bait for fishing is freshly slaughtered reindeer meat. The fishhook is tied with a thick hemp rope and thrown into the dug hole in the ice. The line is lowered to about 30 meters away and waits.
Lanna said while cooking the meat: "The fishermen said that the water under the ice has become turbulent, and the ice must be melting. Fortunately, the deep water is very stable. The big fish took the bait, and it took 20 people to work together to pull this big guy up." "
Rurik took a closer look, and as expected, this was a tough dish.
"Did you send someone to buy it? How much did it cost?"
"Two silver coins, the best fish is here. Rurik, this fish is enough for us to eat for a week."
"Really? You got a big deal. No, they sold it cheaply on purpose."
"Yes." She smiled in a low voice: "Because I am your woman, they will pay such a price as soon as they hear that the fish will enter your stomach."
"That's fine. It's just that I still have to spend a lot of money on the trip back."
"So how was your inspection? Their preparations went smoothly?" she asked.
"Of course it is. There are fishing holes all over the ice, and pike and bass are coming out of the water. I also saw the sleds they made in a big way, and they are all very strong. The snow covered a lot of withered yellow reeds, and they cut some of them."
"Reeds? Feed the deer?"
"Exactly. But you don't believe that just eating grass, more than a thousand deer in a larger sled team can successfully reach Novgorod."
"That's impossible," she said.
This matter made Rurik worried. Rurik sighed: "I can wait until the ice and snow melt before taking action. But that will delay the farming season. Look at the ice on the palace, the ground is thawing, and the ice can still move Time was running out for the sled, but I didn’t dare to take the chance, as the large amount of ice that broke the ice could destroy the ship.”
"Yeah..." She continued to flip the fish with the iron fork.
"The spring sacrifice is coming soon. We will leave after the ceremony. I will whip the deer as hard as I can. We must go back within ten days."
New Roseburg is indeed making intense preparations for an "ice and snow migration operation."
A total of nearly 1,300 people will immigrate to Novgorod. They will not only leave themselves, but also take away all the valuables they can take away.
The soldiers of the First Flag Team are strong and strong, and their families are all in their hometown of Roseburg Fjord. Their families will immigrate on large ships in the summer. The prince has not only made a promise to this, but has also positioned this as a current national policy, even higher than foreign wars.
Their winter hunting success turned into heavy silver coins. They made another batch of dried meat or cooked meat, and also bought a large batch of wheat cakes or simply fried oatmeal from Yaslaqi's shop. Several people teamed up to hire locals to build the sled. As for the reindeer pulling the sleigh, there was no need to worry about it.
The First Flag Team didn't have anything heavy or valuable, and they had all the property and dry food they had with them, so they could run away without any worries.
The Ostara people are another huge immigrant team. Although there are only more than 600 men, women, and children, they have a lot of soft goods in their hands.
Those Neo-Ostara people who were actually Hijmalen people had traveled thousands of miles to the mouth of the Neva River and had basically completed their wintering. They did not expect that new immigration was about to begin again.
Legend has it that Lake Ilmen is very similar to Lake Yelmalen in my hometown, and the climate is warmer. If wheat is planted here, wouldn't it be a bumper harvest every year?
Regarding where the tribe settled, Duchess Carlotta had already figured out the location, even though she had not personally arrived to inspect it.
Tomorrow is the Spring Sacrifice, and on the eve of the festival, all the Ostara people have completed their preparations.
Their camp outside the city walls is about to be abandoned, and what will happen to the old shacks depends entirely on the wishes of the governor of New Roseburg.
The shed turned into a simple shed. The people of Ostara carefully took away all the cloth and pottery pots. The breath of life was quickly dissipating.
In contrast, there were a large number of oak sleds, loaded with all kinds of supplies, especially sacks full of grain.
After Aslaki signed the contract, she transferred the large sum of wheat that Rurik paid to Carlotta the next day, and she paid an extra portion for this.
Wheat worth twenty pounds of silver coins greatly increased the weight of the Ostara people's supplies. They did not think that the goods were too much, because the tribe's existing food could already guarantee more than 600 mouths to eat until next year's harvest season, and even more. There will be surplus grain for planting next spring.
There are only about 600 of them, more than 300 adults, and the rest are children.
Although the sled slides on ice and snow, if the weight is too heavy, the sliding effect will be poor. The total weight of the tribe is not large, and their cargo weighs far more than human beings.
"We will build the best farms and pastures on the southern shore of the very warm Lake Ilmen. We will grow wheat, flax, raise cattle, and fish. We will have unprecedented abundance."
Carlotta described a wonderful scene, even describing it in terms of the legendary Asgard. People believed in this so much that they took the sleds very seriously.
The men in the tribe are all farmers from the Yermalen tribe. They are also good at carpentry and can make a number of commonly used agricultural tools and vehicles. Many people can actually live a decent life in their hometown, and they don't need to take the risk of large-scale immigration.
But their wives who were once in trouble have been clamoring to return to Ostara. There are also legends about the Russians discovering a wonderful world, and the Russians do sell all kinds of things in the Birka market, and even include the Duke of Rus who killed him personally. This statement was made by the King of Denmark. Many reasons intertwined together led them to take risks.
However, life on the Neva River has not changed much compared to my hometown.
Now that they are on the verge of death, they can only believe in the new legend and immigrate to Lake Ilmen.
Each small family has its own sleigh, and each sleigh is stacked with various goods and secured with hemp ropes.
They have as many as 140 large and small sleds, and now the "army" of sleds has assembled in the camp.
All the tribesmen gathered around the female leader, and the setting sun shone on Carlotta's clean face, eager to hear her give an exciting speech before setting off.
No, Carlotta has already torn her throat.
"The snow is about to melt! People of Ostara, we are going to march to Lake Ilmen, to the watery land south of the lake. There is a river there, the locals call it the Lovaj River, and we are going to Our new Ostara was built at the mouth of the Vaj River.
There were other tribes in the area, and they despicably betrayed our ally, the Principality of Rus. I led our warriors in the crusade, the rebels were killed, and their lands became ours as spoils of war.
I know that many of you men are actually Hjärmalen. It doesn't matter, you are all my people, and you are also very good farmers and herdsmen. We will be given a large area of cultivated farmland that can be cultivated as soon as we land. The land there is fertile and the climate is warmer, so we can harvest a lot of wheat this year.
We also have a fortune now, we want to buy some cattle and deer, we breed livestock, skin them to make fur clothes, milk them to make butter, and make cheese. We will do whatever we want under the military protection of the Rus.
There is also a new heir in my belly. He is the blood successor of the leader of Ostara and the nephew of the prince of Rus.
So no one can hurt us and everything will be fine..."
Although many words have been repeated too much. In the past, it was just passed down by word of mouth. Now it is very important for Carlotta to preach it personally.
The people of Ostara were shouting, which attracted nearby residents to watch and comment.
Some people are reluctant to leave, some are attracted by their abandoned wooden shacks, and many people are itching to immigrate with them.
Immigration is not random immigration. The people of Ostara have no worries about immigration. Rurik has guaranteed it. Rurik even spent a lot of money on this year's "big immigration project". This immigrant sled team has approached 250 vehicles. This time, he is not only transporting people, but also a large amount of materials.
In particular, a large amount of growing grain has to be transported, which takes up a lot of the load quota of sleds. There are also sleighs that simply transport oats and baled hay, which are used as feed for the reindeer.
Rurik gathered a thousand deer, and a small number of horses. He now has such capital, but the deer does not choose randomly.
Locally owned and newly captured deer have resulted in a large herd of nearly 4,000 deer in New Roseburg. They are almost all the property of the prince of Rus, and Governor Knusson has the obligation to breed them and is also eligible to receive some benefits from them.
The herds of captured deer are believed to be selected by the Karelians, so the number of female deer far exceeds that of male deer. Many doe are already pregnant and are about to give birth, and the herd will swell to nearly 5,000 this year.
There is still a group of does that did not complete their gestation during the mating season last fall for various reasons, and they are perfect for use now. These deer are different from their wild counterparts, and even have slight genetic changes, making them more willing to be raised and used by humans, and humans will try their best to multiply the number of deer.
Each sleigh is equipped with four deer, a female and a stag. Reindeer are inferior to horses, but they surpass Mongolian horses in terms of endurance and are extremely cold-resistant.
These deer are excellent winter livestock, and Rurik has figured out how to make good use of them, which is to spend some money to feed oats vigorously. Simply feeding oats won't work, just put salt on your hands so the deer will lick them with their tongues. When the team begins to rest, untie the reins and watch the deer. They will dig through the snow and eat hay and moss.
Land transportation is far worse than water transportation, especially since the settlements controlled by the Rus Principality rely on lakes and rivers. However, the farming season cannot be delayed. Rurik needs a large number of strong men with a strong desire for farmland and good harvests. He needs the brothers of the First Flag Team to sweat. What's more important is wheat cultivation, even though now only a little more than one hectare can be planted.
He hoped that after the sea in his hometown froze, the tribesmen in his hometown would strictly implement the order, and the new ship would carry a huge amount of wheat all the way to Novgorod in the shortest time, so that the land could be planted at the end of spring plowing. If this is going to be a failure, then it doesn't matter. You can immediately use the empty land to plant vegetables or hemp stalks.
The "Immigration Oath Meeting" of the Ostara people was very lively, and the people sent by Rurik came back and gave a truthful report.
He was very satisfied. The people of Ostara who were most worrying were already ready, and they just needed tomorrow's sacrifice to convince people!
Since this is the great migration of the Vikings, the people and gods of the Vikings must be worshiped.
The priests who were stationed in New Roseburg in the early years escaped the "Burial for Vilia" incident in their hometown. They are the remnants of the old priesthood. They know that coveting the highest power is seeking death, so they deliberately live in poverty and simply serve as priests.
However, the residents of New Roseburg did not have much respect for the priests. These new priestesses did not believe in Rurik himself. The heroic young man was clearly a tangible and visible god.
Rurik did bring benefits to his tribe and those who joined later, and his status as "son of god" was further consolidated.
In a sense he did become the Son of Heaven, the medium of communication between mortals and the gods of Asgard.
No, the whole New Roseburg people came out for the spring sacrifice.
Rus has changed its customs. There will be a stone ship altar to slaughter deer and cattle, and a fire tower will be lit. This will make the Vikings and Slavs, and even the Finns happy.
He killed a stag himself, and the priestess cut open the liver and cheered auspiciously. In this sacrifice, Frey and Freya are the main sacrifices, and finally Odin is sacrificed. When the fire tower ignites, it is equivalent to sacrificing Peron, the Slavic god of fire.
Everyone was cheering, enjoying the warmth spread by the flames, as if bathing in the early summer sunshine.
The sacrifice was a great success, and after the priests' spring was here, the ice and snow would soon melt away.
Those who were very worried about the immigration journey itself were reassured that the priests and princes would not lie, and the gods had promised everyone a safe arrival in Novgorod.
The appointed day has arrived!
People rested beautifully all night, and at dawn the next day, golden light spread over the ice and snow.
"What a beautiful sight!" Rurik looked into the distance, looking east and west.
Svetlana wrapped herself tightly, took off her scarf, and couldn't help but look at the sun.
"Rurik, we are about to leave, I see people have gathered."
"Indeed. Oh, my brother is here."
Arik came with a confident step. He ate wheat cakes and grilled fish, and his stomach was filled with energy.
"The first flag team is ready, you have to lead everyone into action. Thanks to my second wife's ability, brothers will not be short of food now."
Rurik nodded: "Sister-in-law and Askard are also leaving."
"That's natural. It looks like my third son will be born in Novgorod. I'm going to call him Kil."
"It's indeed a son, what if it's a daughter?" Rurik was surprised and asked again.
"It must be a son. Freya gave me a dream. My son will make great achievements."
"Yes. It is indeed a great achievement."
"Oh? So you can still see your nephew's fate?" Arik asked with a smile.
"Right, after all, he is a child of our family. Go and tell the brothers to show all the flags. I'm not sure if Loki will play a prank on the way. Be careful of sudden wind and snow. All sleds should hang flags to ensure that no one is left behind. .”
"Good decision, I'll make arrangements right away."
Rurik chatted with Arik and Carlotta for a few words, and then said goodbye to Governor Konuson.
The huge team was hunting with flags. Although they were immigrants, they were actually a powerful military force from Northern Europe. They were armed immigrants through and through, under the direct command of the Rus' princes.
Horns were blown one after another, and leather drums were beaten violently.
The migration began, with reindeer pulling sleds on the frozen and flat Neva River ice. Behind Rurik were more than 200 large and small sleds, and people were marching enthusiastically on the ice and snow road leading to happiness.
They successfully crossed the Neva River and entered Lake Ladoga, continuing to advance in front of the frozen lake. People with a discerning eye could see that the lake ice was thinning, so in order to avoid danger, when the sled team entered the Volkhov River, they all advanced on the left bank of the river, just to reach Novgorod directly.
Svetlana keenly noticed the changes in the river: "Look, Rurik, there are cracks in the ice."
"It looks like the Volkhov River is about to freeze over."
"Yes, the thaw is a little later than usual. It seems that spring plowing may have to be postponed this year."
Lana said it was normal, but Rurik felt a little scared. The climate was indeed gradually cooling during this era, and we were in the process of a mini-ice age in Europe.
Northern Europe as a whole is not suitable for farming, and it is basically impossible to operate without the support of modern agricultural technology. In Novgorod and more difficult areas, warm winds from the Black Sea can penetrate the entire area.
Agriculture in Eastern Europe will develop greatly, and the large immigrants from Russia need to seize the land here.
The journey was so uneventful that it was almost boring, and God Loki did not cause any trouble. The ground was indeed thawing, and each afternoon the emigrant teams discovered melting ice. Some even saw grass sprouts breaking through the snow and dead branches beginning to sprout.
Once the team left, it lasted the whole day. The reindeer herd consumed a lot of oats, and Rurik could afford it, ensuring that he could reach Novgorod by sleigh in eight days.
The forest suddenly disappeared, and the front suddenly became clear!
Under the snow are the fields of Novgorod, and a city appears on the riverside!
It's a tower, it's a wall!
Finally arrived at the destination!
Rurik took the whip and whipped it at the deer. The deer, which had been walking slowly, began to speed up, causing the entire team to run wildly.
The Ross flag and the Ostara flag trembled violently, people cheered that the deer were roaring, and the mighty team finally arrived at this happy place and returned to this field of hope.
