There was a sense of solemnity in the temple hall, with the silence after the explosion of thunder. The king's words were like rolling thunder, reverberating in their ears and shocking their hearts.
Sky Orta was extremely frightened, and a layer of cold sweat broke out from the back of his neck. He fell down on the temple with a bang and kowtowed heavily.
"Your Majesty...Your Majesty!...I...I was wronged, I was deceived, and I had no objection! Your Majesty!..."
Shulot watched coldly, then looked at Huitu Puap.
"Bang! Bang! Bang!"
Huitu Puapu kowtowed three times until his forehead almost bled. His thoughts were spinning rapidly and he spoke with difficulty.
"Your Majesty! The leader of the Zicao tribe deceived us and gave us psychedelic drinks. These...these are all crazy words after drinking. I have long wanted to surrender to Your Majesty, but I am afraid...Witness the Lord God ! I have no second thoughts! If I have the slightest thought of betraying Your Majesty, my body and head will be separated, and my soul will fall into the abyss forever!..."
"That's right! This is what we were forced to write when we were in a drunken state of mind... Your Majesty! We went south at starry night to attack the Lithospermum family and suppress the nearby nobles. We have never been disloyal! The Lithospermum manor has been completely reduced to ashes, and the surrounding area has been completely reduced to ashes. The nobles have also been pacified... We are your loyal hounds, tearing down all rebels!"
"Witness the Lord God! Your Majesty, our hearts are full of loyalty! You are our only sun! ... Bang! Bang!"
The two kept kowtowing, and their defensive words became more and more frightened and hasty. The king listened expressionlessly for a moment and then asked coldly.
"Did you write these two secret letters?"
"Your Majesty, this is someone who was cheated and forced after drinking..."
"Yes or no?!"
"Ah! Yes...but at that time..."
"Say. Who is Prince Tarasco? Where is he?"
There was silence for a moment. Puap glanced at Horta and spoke bitterly.
"we do not know..."
"have no idea?"
"... Gulamo showed some royal tokens and said that he had a prince from the puppet dynasty in his hand. If the time is right, we can do whatever we want... We were drunk at the time, and we were in a hurry, and we never I really thought about how...so I didn't ask..."
"Exactly, exactly! Your Majesty, you are the supreme sun, oppressing the kingdom, how can we dare to disobey? In fact, after we sobered up the next day, we regretted it..."
"This time we attacked Zicao Manor, but we didn't find any trace of the puppet prince. It's probably just a lie..."
"Yes! Your Majesty, we, we...were framed..."
Shulot was silent in thought. He knew that if he were still here, the two people in front of him would never have the courage to rebel. And if he were not there, not many generals would be able to withstand the test... Among these two letters, the one that concerned him the most was the so-called "Prince Tarasco". Most of the princes of Tarasco were executed, and only a few escaped...
"Your Majesty! We were framed!..."
"Your Majesty! Spare us!..."
The king shook his head and stopped thinking. He looked at the two people with disheveled hair and miserable expressions in front of him and said calmly.
"You two wrote disloyal secret letters, colluded with the southern nobles, and committed a major crime! Personal guards, drag them both to the sacrifice stone and behead them as sacrifices!"
"Ah! Ah this!..."
"His Majesty!..."
Several armored guards immediately stepped forward, clamped them from left to right, and dragged the struggling two people to two sacrificial stones. Then, their arms were tied, and their heads were pressed on the dark red sacrifice stone, exposing their tanned necks.
The two guards raised their bronze axes high and aimed them at the necks of the two hereditary nobles, waiting for His Majesty's orders. As long as a command is given and the ax falls, the two people will be separated immediately!
The shining copper ax hung on his neck, and the dark red sacrifice stone was cushioned under his neck. He died there in despair despite countless sacrifices.
Smelling the blood that hit his nostrils, Huitu Puap's defenses finally broke. He had struggled for so long, betrayed his chief, old friends and relatives, and now he was about to die silently here when he saw that he had become a noble nobleman? Thinking of this, his face twisted and he howled in fear, his voice full of unwillingness.
"Ah! Your Majesty, please! Look at my contribution to the Western Expedition! I am willing to die for you, I am willing to fight as a vanguard for you! Ah!...Ah!..."
"Uuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuu! I don't want to die! Abba, father, family..."
Next to him, Horta had completely collapsed. His nose and tears welled up together, and he burst into tears. Before his father died, he passed on the family inheritance to him. He was only about 20 years old and was the only direct descendant of the family. All the people in the Chapala Lake area were executed with feathers... Could it be that the Sky Family, which has been passed down from generation to generation, will perish here? ? How can he see his dead father? ...
Shulot watched the two of them expressionlessly, never calling out the king's order to sacrifice.
The ax never fell. The two endured the agony of death. Sweat, snot, and tears mixed together and flowed down from their faces and necks, soaking the dark red sacrifice stone and scattering it. The scattered blood stained the sides of their faces red, making them look like dead fish, with only their bodies still flopping.
"Your Majesty, please..."
"Uuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuu"
After a while, the screams of the two people had become hoarse, and the fear of death flooded their hearts, turning into an indelible shadow in their lives. Shulot then said coldly.
"Cut their hair off!"
"Tear!"
The sharp ax fell accurately, touching the scalps of the two men, directly cutting off the hair. Puap's liver and gallbladder burst, and he closed his eyes in fear, waiting for the pain in his neck... He closed his eyes for a long time, tears rolling down silently, until he suddenly discovered that the head on his neck was still there.
"ah?"
"Ah! Woohoo..."
Horta screamed and screamed like a quail again.
Seeing the performance of the two of them, Shulot smiled lightly.
"Drag it over here."
The armored guards dragged the two of them over, and as soon as they let go, the two of them collapsed to the ground like mud. Puap was in an extremely embarrassed state, his face was gloomy, but his heart was full of joy.
"His Majesty..."
"Woooo..."
"You just said that you are willing to perform meritorious service and die for the kingdom?"
Shulot asked calmly, his eyes calm and sharp.
"Yes, yes! Your Majesty, I, Puap, am willing to serve you with meritorious deeds and serve you to the death!"
"Uuuu...I, Orta, am also..."
Shulot nodded. He was not prepared to execute the two men. Horta was from the Lake Chapala region and would be useful in subsequent conquests. Puap was an example of surrender during the Western Expedition, and it was better to keep him than to execute him.
"Then I will spare your lives and give you one last chance! But the death penalty can be avoided, but punishment is necessary!"
The king spoke calmly.
"Come here, under the watchful eye of the Lord God, each of you will be whipped twenty times!"
Several more guards came forward, took off their clothes and armor, and pushed them to the ground. Then, the two warriors swung their whips and beat them hard on their backs without mercy.
"Pah! Pah! Pah!..."
"Ah! Ah! Ah!..."
Miserable howls sounded, and the whipping without mercy was extremely painful. After twenty lashes, Huitu Puap was covered in blood, and Horta almost fainted.
After the whipping, Shulot looked at the two people who were unable to move, gave stern orders, and gave the final judgment.
"Horta handed over the Sky Warrior Battalion, transferred to the field army, and served as the commander of the thousand-man battalion! Puap handed over the Qin Congcan Warrior Battalion, and exiled Parmus..."
Shulot paused, a thought flashed across his mind, and when he spoke it again, his words changed.
"Exile to the end of the Talsas River and the southwest entrance to the sea, and guard the southernmost boundary of the kingdom!"
Hearing this, Huitu Puap's eyes darkened, as if he had fallen into a bottomless abyss.
With the popularity of kings, the vast lake with boundless east and west was given the concept of "sea", which is a dangerous journey to a distant continent. The southwest entrance of the Talsas River to the sea is quite far away, more than two hundred miles away from Cullamo City. There are only a few Tekos tribes that pay nominal tribute there. Only last year, with the exploration of Trapanic merchants, they were officially included in the kingdom's jurisdiction... This is a real exiled frontier.
"From today on, the Sky Warrior Camp will be renamed Chapala Warrior Camp, and the Qin Cong Chan Warrior Camp will be renamed Patzcuaro Warrior Camp, and they will be reorganized at the same time!..."
Shulot ordered in a deep voice and made a decision.
Among the five legions of the kingdom, the Guards Legion are senior warriors recruited from various ministries, the First and Second Pike Legions are elite militiamen who have been trained for a long time, and the Guakili Legion are newly conquered dog descendants. Only the Gyeonggi Legion has absorbed He killed many surrendering nobles and surrendering warriors from the Kingdom of Tarasco.
In the early days of the establishment of the kingdom, these surrendered troops were used to appease people's hearts and should not be touched lightly. By this time, the kingdom had been stabilized, so we took advantage of the rebellion of the southern nobles to completely purge this legion! Completely eliminate the influence of the Sky Family and other nobles in the old private army. The Prepecha warriors in each legion must be included directly under the kingdom.
In fact, the king once thought of completely breaking up the four thousand Prepecha warriors and integrating them into other troops. But in this era, local friendship is an important source of fighting power. Ordinary warriors are grouped together according to their place of origin and will be more tenacious and brave in combat, so it is better to keep them.
"Well, after the conquest of the south, the Second Lance Corps will also have to make some adjustments."
The king pondered for a moment and looked at the two hereditary nobles in the palace. Sky Orta's tears were still there, and his face showed both the joy of escaping from death and the sadness of losing military power. But Huitu Puap looked gloomy and lay motionless on the ground, seemingly resigned to his fate.
"Sky Orta, Gray Earth Puap, do you have any objections?"
"Woooo... follow your will..."
"...Praise Your Majesty! Puap is willing to obey and die for you in the south!..."
Xiulote nodded, looked at the two of them for a moment, and waved.
"Go down! Deliver the things in the camp as soon as possible, and then recover well."
Several personal guards immediately stepped forward and carried the two unable to walk down the temple pyramid. Then, five hundred imperial guardsmen went with them to the military camp outside the city for the handover of the army. There, the regiment leader Orosh had already chosen new successors for these two warrior battalions.
The cold wind of December blew by, and the Gyeonggi Army Corps carried out reorganization on the spot. All the officers mentioned in the letter from the Zicao family were strictly ordered to be dismissed and sent to garrison in Palms City thousands of miles away in the wasteland. These officers were able to contact Gulamo, and most of them were from Tarasco's nobles, who were replaced by civilian warriors with outstanding achievements.
The king was personally in charge and came well prepared, and the purge of the Gyeonggi Army Corps progressed very quickly. Ten days later, the purge was largely completed. Dozens of officers and more than a hundred warriors are about to be exiled thousands of miles away. The king then summoned the generals in the main temple, and under the witness of the main god, burned all these secret letters, promising to forget the past!
The long wind flew over the great temple and headed westward. Two hundred miles away in the west, outside the city of Apatchingan, after several days of entanglement, a crucial pursuit battle was coming to an end.
