Even the northernmost region of the main plane, the Northlands, still has a vast white fog hanging over the land on a summer morning, and no one likes such a cold, damp environment, but in order to be able to live tenaciously in this cruel world, they must pack their equipment on such a morning, leave their homes, and go to the deep mountains.

Even three years later, the richest and most powerful Baltic Empire in the Northland was still unable to equip every people with magical equipment, and hunters still needed to use ancient techniques and years of experience when they went deep into the mountains to hunt and gather precious materials.

In the Northlands, the most dangerous places are in the deep mountains and dense forests, even countries as powerful as the Scandinavian Empire, when they enter the Norwegian mountains to develop, they are still exhausted by the attack of the beast tide, not to mention the ordinary hunters, they walk in the deep mountains, as low-key as possible, do not dare to make a sound, and only dare to go on the path they are familiar with, because they are familiar, so safe.

Under normal circumstances, they don't have to worry about encountering dragons, flying dragons and other creatures after a corner, and they don't need to worry about hiding man-eating trolls and ogres behind the grass.

After three years of development and the treatment of some unstable elements within the empire, the price of goods in the empire has stabilized, and hunters can selectively sell their goods to higher-priced merchants, and there is no need to fear retaliation from the merchants if they do so, because the laws and force of the empire guarantee their rights.

In addition to selling the materials obtained from the mountains in their hands, the hunters also have other ways to obtain income, of course, to obtain this income, they need to take a little risk, enter the places they are not familiar with, to provide some information to the empire, such as in some uninhabited places, whether there are traces of dragons, whether there are trolls, Traces of the life of trolls and ogres, as well as other information about the presence of powerful beasts, precious beasts, mapping, and much more, can all earn a lot of money from the Empire.

During these three years, it was through the efforts of the hunters in the empire that the empire continued to collect information from the Ural Mountains and the Southern Black Forest, and this information collection work will be a long-term process, and this work will not stop until the map of these two places is completely obtained.

The reason why Alice and Semiramis decided to postpone the development of the Ural Mountains in the east and the Black Forest in the south is also due to the lack of information they have obtained, with their safe and risk-not adventurous personalities, they will only choose to explore a small area without basic information about these two areas, and will not invest resources in large-scale development.

However, such a small-scale exploration does not mean that the empire cannot benefit from the Ural Mountains and the Black Forest, in the past three years, through the connection between centaurs and jackals, the empire has accepted several centaur and jackal tribes living in the mountains and forests, after seeing the treatment enjoyed by the same race in the empire, and confirming that there is an irreparable gap in the combat effectiveness of the two sides, it has become a matter of course to join the empire, do not think that these tribes living in the deep mountains and dense forests are very stupid, they do not have knowledge, nor have they received any decent educationBut they will still be driven by profit to make what they think is beneficial to them.

Like a mountain of soil, the tribes that live in the deep mountains and dense forests are discovered, and then migrated to the empire in various ways, and after a period of assimilation, they become the inhabitants of the empire, become the population resources of the empire, and create wealth, even trolls and ogres are creatures that can be assimilated and transformed in the eyes of those officials of the empire, because the empire has never only carried out verbal education, and there are often big sticks along with dates.

Of course, the so-called big stick also has the principle that without violating the laws of the empire, within the scope of the rights of free people, they can be safe from anyone.

Citizens and freemen, as well as slaves, were protected by the laws of the Empire, because in a way, they were the regular population resources of the Empire, and should not be wasted in some mess.

The difference between the three is only in the welfare granted by the empire, the extent to which they can develop in the empire, and in other respects, especially before the law, they are equal.

These tribes who have just joined the empire can only obtain the status of free people, although it is a little better than slaves, but compared to the citizens of the empire, there is still a very terrible gap, because of this gap, they will spontaneously take the initiative to pursue to make up for this gap, and in order to be able to protect what they have paid, and the rights and interests that they are ready to get, these people will spontaneously defend the interests of the empire, because this is the nature of all people.

Even after three years of development, even if the empire adopted a series of policies to encourage fertility and reproduction, the population of the empire is still very insufficient, especially in the newly occupied Finland and Karelia regions, it is not possible to find a settlement after walking on the road for a day, more people still prefer to stay in Jutland, the prosperous area of the empire, so obtaining population from those deep mountains and dense forests has become another way to solve the population problem.

The reconstruction of Finland and Karelia is only the reconstruction of the cities and settlements there, and the problem of population will be a problem that can only be solved by long-term perseverance, and the population cannot be conjured out of thin air by magic, and it takes time to reproduce and grow after birth.

It was precisely because it was a long-term project that Alice and Semiramis did not talk about the north in their previous conversations, and until Finland and Karelia were dealt with, the more inhospitable lands further north were not considered by the Empire, not to mention that there were still a large number of giant tribes living in those lands, which could not be completely eliminated in the time zone of the Attila Empire.

Barren land without benefits, there are also giant tribes that are familiar with the environment and need a lot of effort to clean up, the empire is not endlessly greedy for the land, and the empire will not do it without good pay, not to mention that the existence of these giants is also a time bomb for the Attila Empire, because of the previous war, the giants who have hatred for the Attila will go to the east of Scandinavia in an organized way to continue plundering the remnants of the Attila Empire, which is the only way to weaken the Attila Empire when the Scandinavian Empire and the Scandinavian coalition are busy with infighting。

Having confirmed that there would be no large-scale operations in the south, east, and north, Alice and Semiramis intended to devote the resources of the empire to the development of the western route to the Celtic Isles, with the Celtic Isles as a transit point, and to trade with those territories in the south.

In the past three years, the trade of the Baltic Empire has developed rapidly, and a steady stream of high-quality timber has been transported from the various forest territories of the empire to the shipyards of Jutland, processed and manufactured into merchant ships and warships, sailing on the sea surface of the Northlands, because the areas below sea level have been controlled by the empire, and the sea tribes continue to provide various seafood for the empire, so the fishing boats have been gradually eliminated from the empire, and most of the previous ones have been transformed into merchant ships and sold out.

Because the ocean has basically completed the marine ranching, a large number of seafood is flooded on the market, which also leads to the price of seafood has become extremely low, no one wants to spend a high price to get a fishing boat, and in addition to the fishing boat, the hiring cost of the sailors on board is also the reason why they are discouraged.

The only thing that could constrain the development of the Baltic Empire's fleet was the size of the Jutland shipyards, and the large number of sailors who were familiar with operating the ships, the former could not be expanded because of the lack of too many skilled workers, which limited the possibility of building new shipyards, and the latter, in the final analysis, in terms of population, as if the Ouroboros problem had returned to square one.

With the development of maritime trade, a steady stream of wealth was pooled in the Baltic Empire, which was expressed in the exchange of processed goods for large quantities of unprocessed raw materials, which were of much higher value.

It is a flow of wealth, a flow of wealth that increases the value of wealth itself every time, and it is from this flow that empires are like shepherds who regularly cut off the wool of their sheep with scissors.

It can be said that now the wealth of the Northland is directly or indirectly in the hands of the Baltic Empire, and after this wealth flows into the hands of the Baltic Empire, it is transferred to the people of the Baltic Empire in various situations.

Later, as the people bought the vast array of services and goods that flooded the market, the wealth returned to the empire, and in the process, the suppliers of raw materials, the processors of raw materials, the sellers of goods, and the buyers of goods all got what they wanted.

Jutland, Lyce, Zealand, Finland, Karelia, Finland is like a pearl that has been worn, shining in the Northland with the light of wealth, and at the same time it is the light of prosperity.

"Semiramis, our first batch of merchandise has arrived in the Celtic Isles today. ”

At this time, Alice suddenly changed the subject.

This was the first time that the Baltic Empire had traded with the Celtic Islands in the name of the Empire, and until then it had been trading through goblin caravans, on the one hand, to see how the Baltic Empire's goods were sold in the Celtic Isles, and on the other hand, to test the situation of the forces on the Celtic Isles through such small-scale trade.

Contrary to Alice's expectations, the goods from the Baltic Empire did not gain a crazy demand in the first time in the Celtic Isles, on the one hand, because the people who lived there were full of evil feelings towards goblins, and they had been deceived by goblins too many times, so they did not trust the goods in the hands of goblins.

On the other hand, the goods produced by the Baltic Empire were different in style from those of the Celtic Isles, so that the inhabitants living here did not dare to accept these strange things at once, because there is a process of normal people's acceptance of strange things, which is normal.

However, in the next three years, the goods from the Baltic Empire ushered in a crazy process, and the people of the Celtic Isles found that these goblins were completely different, and the things they sold were very cheap and very easy to use, and had great advantages in performance and price compared to their local production.

However, this is only a small-scale trade, and it cannot completely impact the local market, and it has not completely crushed the local small workshops, because this is only a test for the Baltic Empire.

Now, after three years of this small-scale trade, I have gained the preferences of the people of this area, and have figured out the basic situation of this area, at least what kind of forces exist here, what kind of people there are, and what the terrain is.

The next thing is how to dump and completely occupy the market here, only monopoly is the biggest benefit, but because it is in a strange land, there is a certain distance from the Baltiha Empire, and the empire cannot directly control here.

So the empire decided to support one here, or to cooperate with one of the indigenous forces here, and indirectly control the market here through cooperation.

At first, Alice intended to find the Ulsters, as she had been in contact with the Red Branch Knights from the Ulster during the Second Expedition of the Attila Empire.

But she quickly dispelled such thoughts, because the country where the Knights of the Red Branch was located was now in turmoil, and was not Alice's best collaborator.

In addition to getting rid of Ulster, Alice set her sights on other forces, but either the forces were too small, or the leaders of those forces had different brain circuits than ordinary people, and there was no way to communicate at all.