Of course, as the leader of a national salvation government that occupies and rules more than ten provinces in the south, Jiang Tian cannot stay out for too long.
After dealing with these noises and episodes, he would soon have to face the various official duties that quickly piled up again.
From this point of view, he quite misses the relaxation and comfort when his adjutant Paulina was still by his side; although the first to fifth attendant rooms led by Andrew now have more than twenty professional teams; three hundred A large number of consultants, secretaries and record-keepers are busy working on it.
But none of them could compare to Paulina's photographic long-term memory and her profound document retrieval and analysis skills when she served as an adjutant.
It works like an efficient humanoid AI, which can maintain working conditions for several days and nights with the most basic meals and short breaks.
On the other hand, what surprised him was the slow and procrastinating reaction of the Burgundian dynasty in the capital city of Seine to the events in the south.
You know, the whole winter when the roads in the mountains were blocked by heavy snow has long passed. The Free Army also split up and attacked the surrounding provinces.
However, it seems that the Free Army has completed the suppression and suppression of bandits in most areas of the Rhône province where Lyon is located.
The two corps led by Madurand had already penetrated the provinces of Anson and Jura northward, and began to besiege Besançon, the capital of Franche, the territory of the Prince of Conté/the territory of the Grand Crown; while the other group set off from Toulouse. , the Tiago and Porthos regiments that attacked the Central Plateau have also captured the Conzel and Haute-Loire provinces adjacent to the existing control areas.
It is about to connect the southern part of the Central Plateau with the two major regions of Provence and Toulouse. However, the momentum of the Northern Dynasty's large-scale crusade, which made Jiang Tian prepare for the attack, has never been seen.
On the contrary, some nobles and old dynasty forces in the places they passed formed many self-defense forces and armed militia groups to spontaneously resist the infiltration and invasion of the Free Army.
In fact, in order to quickly cut through the mess and sort out the area as soon as possible, in order to welcome the counterattack and continuous offensive from the Burgundian Dynasty, the Free Army also relaxed the review and authorization of the local old forces in disguise; it allowed the company captain, deacon and priest to Procurators formed temporary courts on the battlefield; in order to conduct quick and batch trials and verdicts, local potential saboteurs and sympathizers of the old aristocracy were recruited.
Of course, unless there was an armed confrontation, direct execution was not allowed; but during this period, the number of people who had left their homes and been sentenced to exile in Binhai numbered tens of thousands.
It wasn't until senior Rafaro, who was active on the social stage in the capital, sent news one after another and the information of the fleeing people that Jiang Tian got to know some of the inside story.
It turned out that serious differences continued to occur within the Burgundian dynasty on national policies and military strategies.
Although among the ministers of the dynasty, there were always radicals advocating and clamoring for the rebuilt three major legions to be called one hundred thousand strong, and to quickly send troops to severely punish the mob army that was ravaging the south and trampling on the sacred.
But the three armies that had just recovered/pacified the Norman region were unwilling to continue fighting. Most of the officers and soldiers just want to have a good rest and have fun in the routine winter camp traditions; there are even some former mercenary groups who were recruited by the dynasty, because of the deduction and arrears of wages, as well as the promise of sharing the spoils. Various degrees of rioting occurred.
Although it was quickly suppressed by the cavalry and retinue troops composed of noble children, they also took advantage of the situation and robbed the surrounding areas in disguise on the pretext of hunting down deserters.
Then, in order to make up for the shortage of soldiers, company captains and below were allowed to go to cities, towns and villages in batches to catch strong men.
Then, with the cooperation/collusion of some local officials and gentry, this round of recruitment operations turned into a farce of money-making in the form of disguised kidnapping and extortion; after catching a far excess number of strong men, they Some of them were redeemed by relatives through intermediaries.
Therefore, for most of the winter, the capital region and the surrounding provinces were in turmoil; young and middle-aged people were constantly being kidnapped, and then used to extort the last bit of food and money from their families; some people could not bear it and started to fight. Fleeing from his hometown, he died of starvation and freezing on the road.
On the other hand, with the arrival of severe winter, the prices of cotton, grain, firewood, oil, etc., and various livelihood necessities inside and outside the capital are also increasing day by day as big businessmen and powerful agents hoard them; so that every person At night, families are without food or lights.
Therefore, in this case, groups of people fleeing the city of Seine, and even leaving the capital region, appeared on the road in an almost endless stream; but the superiors of the Burgundian dynasty turned a blind eye to this or even ignored it. They say they are happy to see the results; some people even set up cards to charge them.
At the same time, riots and conflicts broke out again in the newly pacified Upper and Lower Norman provinces. But it was the generals from the National Salvation Alliance who led their troops to surrender to the new dynasty. Although they were granted official positions such as territorial earls and senior officials after the incident, their conflicts with each other triggered the war.
As a result, the former generalissimo's old troops, who were already besieged in a corner of Cherbourg County on the peninsula in the northwest corner of the Lower Normandy province, took advantage of the opportunity to fight their way out; easily breaking through the blockade formed by these traitors, and They went all the way north and captured Rouen, the capital of which was poorly defended.
Then, after gaining support and help from a large number of local sympathizers, he continued northward and entered the Flanders Territory/vassal territory.
Therefore, under the imminent threat of a comeback by the National Salvation Alliance forces of former Grand Marshal Mortiler, the Royal Council once again fell into disputes.
At the same time, relying on sufficient activity funds and the main hall, Senior Rafaro, who is far away in the capital, not only stays out of the matter, but has even been promoted to the assistant/senior aide to the Lord Privy Seal, and has the opportunity to attend the Minister of War and the Minister of Justice. meeting with the Finance Minister.
Therefore, throughout the winter, through the secret channels he secretly organized and arranged, teachers, students, technicians, scholars and other technical and intellectual classes fled to the south; there were as many as a dozen groups and thousands of people.
Later, there even appeared among them the persecuted and wanted sworn priests. After the Free Army accepted them, except for a few who directly hired scarce professional talents; most of them had to go through a period of testing and observation period in newly established special schools and training classes, and only after mutual supervision and reporting, they could be awarded Initial office and salary.
In this way, even if there are some people with ulterior motives or ulterior motives hidden inside, they can be slowly filtered and screened out.
Are they just speculators who pursue fame and fortune, careerists who want to gain social protection, or saboteurs who are completely filled with hatred?
In this way, even if a few fish slip through the net occasionally, their harm can be minimized.
Jiang Tian was reviewing and thinking slowly, planning to fall asleep at night and have a good chat with Paulina who was far away in North Africa to pay attention to the local progress.
At this time, Father Lacha's announcement sounded again outside: "Sir, the No. 7 secret camp of the Pious Company has been completed and put into use. I ask for your presence and instructions."
The next day, Jiang Tian came to a large luxury manor near Lyon. This is also the predecessor of the Burgundian dynasty in the north today. It came from one of the fourteen original nobles and founding kings, a branch of the Arles-Ode family, and the earliest real estate built locally.
Therefore, the history of this large manor can even be traced back to the end of the Rose Dynasty. As a remnant of the Franks, the Arles-Ode family was the only branch that survived through matrilineal inheritance. In order to protect itself from the wars between vassals and princes at the end of the dynasty, the Burgundy family transferred the core of the original manor to Part of it was built into a military fortress.
Finally, after many years of continuation, there are many towers and small fortresses here; it is like a small fortress.
It is somewhat incompatible with the bright and flashy architectural style of the local popular hedonism. Therefore, it is also called by the locals
"Iron Cavalry Manor". After the invasion of the Northern Italy/Ciro coalition led by the Principality of Verona, this place became an important node on the front line facing foreign enemies.
Although no large-scale battle broke out in the end; surrounding this
"Iron Cavalry Manor" experienced fierce offensive and defensive battles and changed hands several times. Therefore, when the Free Army captured the city of Lyon in one go, this city
There are actually people in the "Iron Cavalry Manor" who have been resisting in the ruins for nearly a week. Only then was the Free Army special attack company that found the underground entrance used smoke and explosions to expel and eliminate them.
But nowadays
The "Cavalry Manor" is just like the Rose Palace outside Toulouse; after simple cleaning on the surface and continuous underground renovation and widening.
It became one of the many special companies set up by the Free Army to use secret training camps. Then in this secret camp, Jiang Tian met the newly recruited members of the Pious Company: a group of men, women, and children who looked like crooked melons and cracked dates, and exuded an unreliable atmosphere; there was even a big-headed dwarf and a Disabled people with broken arms were among them.
They are also strange people with special skills that the Pious Company searched for in the local market.
Therefore, although these people look a bit shabby and poor on the outside, after demonstrating their weird abilities, they are still somewhat interesting.
For example, the nickname of the big-headed dwarf
"Rat Walker" has the ability to sense and influence various rodents/rats within a radius of several hundred meters; therefore, he once used this ability to deceive and extort some taverns and hotels, and was finally captured by the Pious Company. live.
But in Jiang Tian's view, his ability was tailor-made to meet the needs of the Free Army's promotion of urban sanitation and epidemic prevention.
At least in cities and villages in this era, mountains of garbage and rampant rodents were the source of infectious diseases and major plagues.
If he can obtain enough sources of rats, he can even use them to temporarily disrupt and oppose the enemy's cavalry sequence.
Another example is the man with a broken arm. He was originally a falconer for a local noble; but he was trampled and injured during a hunting trip and was abandoned in the wilderness to die.
As a result, during the death struggle about to be disemboweled by vultures, he unexpectedly gained the ability to simply communicate with vultures, falcons, swans and other large birds. Only then was he able to survive and became involved in the mobile circus.
In a sense his abilities are more useful. There are also people who can control ropes that are tens of meters long and perform various flexible movements of winding and binding. There are also people who can use crystal stones to emit blinding flashes... Although most of them are not particularly useful, But there is nothing wrong with gathering together to give a job first.
Because, through the increasingly frequent encounters and witnessing of strange events, Jiang Tian suspected that there is some kind of mystery in this time and space, and it has been gradually recovering in recent years; therefore, when he encounters similar weird people and strangers in the future, he will only More or less...so you need to start planning and planning ahead.
