A war in the north of the Count of Burgundy did not seem to have much effect on the people in the valleys of the southern frontier, but the aftershocks of the war eventually reached the valley of Zheng, south of Linets

While the lord of the valley was mediating a battle in the Swazi territory, the valley was also busy.

In the workshop area under the hills where the river bends in the southern part of the valley in the middle of the jungle valley, the smoke from the fire fills the five or six wooden houses in the workshop area, and the sound of clanging iron, clattering wood, and grinding swords has resounded in this busy workshop area for several days and nights.

The artisans of the weaving and brewing workshops all stopped their work and were all sent to help in the weapons and carpentry workshops, the young and strong helped the blacksmiths to carry iron and hammer embryos, the weaker helped to cut wood to make spear handles and shields, the peasant women were responsible for sharpening swords and assembling weapons, and even the old and young families in the workshop area were mobilized to go to the mountains and forests to collect firewood and grass, add fires to the stoves, and make fires for cooking......

In less than a week, the Lieutenant Carpenter, Bard, led two Swabian craftsmen (and a pseudo-carpenter who was learning armor-making in Lombardy) and twenty craftsmen and thirty apprentice craftsmen, with the assistance of a large group of domestic servants, to make enough weapons and armor to fit a hundred raels.

"Old steward, this is the last batch of weapons and armor, a total of ten short swords, twenty-one winged iron spears, a set of half-body plate armor, five sets of iron-inlaid cotton armor, fifteen saucer helmets, eighteen shields, in addition to thirteen pieces of broadaxes, round-headed hammers, chain flails, etc., these weapons are enough to assemble twenty peasant soldiers."

"However, the materials for making the crossbow have been used up yesterday, and the most important bow bone of the crossbow has been used up, so we can't make the crossbow for the time being."

In the weapons workshop, Bard, the lieutenant of the craftsman, led the valley civil councilor Cooper to inspect the weapons production in the workshop, and this was the third time that Cooper had come to the workshop area to speed up the production of weapons and armor, because there were still some troops rushing north to help waiting to assemble weapons and armor and pull them out.

Cooper was not familiar with military affairs, but after five or six years with Art, the army fought one after another, and even the gray-bearded old man was forced to learn some military affairs.

Old Cooper casually drew a short sword from the wicker basket, and due to the time constraint and heavy task, these short swords did not have time to make a well-made and beautiful scabbard, and most of the short swords could only be coarsely sewn into a leather scabbard, and some were even directly wrapped in linen coarse cloth. However, although the fancy scabbard was omitted, the texture of the dagger itself was quite good, and these were all relied on to kill the enemy on the battlefield to save his life, and Cooper would rather save the time of making the scabbard than dare to save trouble in the production process of the sword body.

"The blades of these weapons are still very good, you have done an excellent job, and after the last batch of weapons is made today, the workshop will be closed for a day, and I will have a sheep slaughtered to celebrate your achievement. Also, remember to have enough whetstones, at least three let's have a whetstone. This battlefield is not as good as usual, the weapon battle damage is very bad, and the blade of the sword will become jagged after a fierce battle, and there is not enough grinding stone to let the soldiers sharpen the sword with the palm of their hands. ”

Cooper handed the dagger to Dem Zheng, a Swabian weaponsmith and workshop steward who was accompanying Bard

Diem stretched out his hands and took the short sword in Cooper's hand and put it back in the wicker basket, and said to Cooper in a very stiff Burgundian language: "We, remember ~ the civil magistrate's words, weapons and armor are the best!" ”

Cooper nodded approvingly at the weapon master Diem, "Dim, Bard often mentions to me your exquisite craftsmanship skills, and the army has also reported that the weapons and armor made by the Valley Weapons Workshop are very good, and even those palace guards like our weapons and armor, which is due to you, and I will definitely ask for credit for you when they return from their northern expedition." ”

"By the way, according to the information received, our caravan will bring you and Luka (carpenter) and your family back to the valley by the end of this month, and the civil administration has built two wooden houses for your family, so you can live with your family at that time."

The Swabian weaponsmith was overjoyed to hear that his relatives were about to be reunited in the valley after a two-year absence, and he kept drawing a cross on his chest with his right hand and whispering a prayer in Swabian language.

"Thank God, thank you~Lord Civil Officer, God bless Lord Art~" Dim kept expressing his gratitude, and then ran out of the weapons workshop towards the nearby carpentry workshop where spears, arrows, arrows, and shields were made, apparently to share his joy with Luca......

From the workshop area, along the smooth and wide carriageway along the river bank to the north, four villages have appeared on both sides of the road, and at this time, there are young men wrapped in winter clothes and carrying bags in several villages, under the leadership of the village chief (who is also the captain of the peasant soldiers of each village) to assemble towards the Beiguan Military Fort.

These were not the militant peasants who went north to the province of Yonah. In fact, after receiving the order of the Yate army more than ten years ago, in just three days, the barons of the valley had gathered more than seventy young and strong peasant soldiers and rushed to the Beiguan military fort to participate in the emergency training, and two years ago, these people had already arrived at the garrison camp of Boulder Town, waiting for the valley to be equipped with weapons and armor, and immediately went north to Jonah Province by means of Fort Andermatt.

Earlier, the commander of the Valley Garrison Corps, Bass, had dispatched Obote, the leader of the patrol team, to lead forty patrol soldiers, including the bandit officer Redoan, to the battlefield in advance to report to Art.

Now walking on this road to the Beiguan military fort one after another is the second batch of conscription peasant soldiers of the Barony of the Valley, a total of eighty people, will be arranged to the southwest farm, Wincheston Manor, Lane Manor, Boulder Town garrison camp and Beiguan military fort to make up for the lack of garrisons due to the northward reinforcements.

Most of these conscripted peasants were sturdy and strong-looking, their winter coats were not bright but thick enough, and the bags on their backs were bulging, and the young peasants had smiles on their faces and occasionally gave the peasants a laugh.

In the barony of the valley, the conscription was not a heavy conscription, but rather a symbol of status and power.

In short, not everyone here has the right to be drafted. First of all, only those young and strong lords who had lived in the valley for more than a year and had not committed evil deeds were registered as peasant soldiers by the garrison legion; Secondly, the registered peasant soldiers do not necessarily have the opportunity to become peasant soldiers, and the valley civil administration and garrison corps must determine the number and scope of conscription according to military intelligence and military orders; Finally, it is a right because the conscripts here are paid and fed (the daily salary of the internal guard conscripts is one pfennig, and the salary of the foreign war is doubled, and the military reward is calculated separately), and the subjects who have been conscripted as peasant soldiers will be given priority to enter the army and become soldiers......

Therefore, when the civil magistrate Cooper and the commander of the garrison corps, Bass, jointly issued a conscription order, the seven or eight hundred male leaders of the valley were looking forward to becoming the second batch of conscripted peasant soldiers (the first batch needed to fight north, and most of them were still a little afraid, and the second group only needed to defend the territory, and the risk was not high and the treatment was not low).

While talking, laughing, and playing, dozens of peasant soldiers from several villages had already arrived at the valley wooden fort. The Wooden Fort of the Valley is now a market town castle in the true sense of the word, and the hunter's house six years ago has become the Lord's Mansion and the Lord's Hall, which now lives in the center of the Wooden Castle, and the Wooden Fort has been clearly divided into five areas: the Lord's Mansion Hall, the Church School District, the Merchant Trade Area, the Mansions of the Rich Officials, and the Garrison Barracks.

The hall of the lord's mansion is still the scale of the knightly period, but in order to ensure the peace of the lord, the houses of the original lords around the mansion were partially demolished, and a stone façade was built, and a garden was opened up by Baroness Lottie inside the stone outer wall, and the courtyard was all re-paved with cobblestones, and there were two wounded veterans from the army guarding the gate with spears in armor; At the base of the outer wall of the lord's hall is the valley civil affairs office, which is still the row of low wooden houses, where the civil affairs departments and the commanders of the valley garrison corps handle the affairs of the valley, which is the core of the entire valley barony.

The chapel was across the street from the hall of the lord's mansion and the civil office, and the original wooden house church was enlarged into a stone building, and the main hall was enlarged in height and three rooms were added as prayer rooms, clerk storerooms, and clergy living rooms; The parish school, which is adjacent to the church, has also been transformed into a spacious wooden house.

The commercial trade area is surrounded by the lord's mansion and the church school, and is expanded from the wooden castle inn and the original workshop area, and the inns, grain and cloth, iron and farm tools, clothing tailors and grocery stores have been set up, all of which are under the control of the civil administration, and the shops are taken care of by the families and wounded veterans of the military and civil affairs, which can be regarded as a measure of military and civilian resettlement, and the profits earned are collected by the civil administration in addition to the daily branches, and with the increase of the number of people and villages in the valley, the commercial goods trade area has become more and more prosperous.

Three places have been artificially carved out outside the original wooden fort fence wall, one of which has built eight or nine mansions, most of the mansions are several single-story red tile wooden houses, and one mansion in the middle has two floors, which is the new mansion of the Scott family, after the low wooden houses that were originally leaning on the outside of the lord's mansion were demolished, Scott accumulated a huge amount of money and civil subsidies to build this valley plank except for the lord's mansion The most "heroic" mansion.

Scott's family should be the absolute "magnates" of the Barony of the Valley, Scott's position as a cantonment officer in civil affairs is second only to Cooper Sr., Scott's wife Emma is now promoted from civil affairs officer to deputy civil affairs administrator, receiving a lot of monthly salary, Scott's son Ron is promoted to a trainee knight, military deputy company guard, Scott's daughter is now the baroness's personal maid, food and clothing are provided by the lord's mansion, the entire Scott family is supported by the valley, naturally there is no shortage of money and status.

The other large mansions were also built by high-ranking officers and officials of the army and civil affairs, and although the people who entered and exited them were not necessarily nobles, there was no problem in having enough food and clothing.

The other two vacant lots are not built for the time being, and they are the homesteads prepared in advance by the civil government for the army, the civil government, and the valley lords, and if anyone wants to build a house, they can buy it after paying the homestead tax to the civil government......

The roads inside the wooden fort are paved with stones, because the paving of these stones has completely changed the original state of the wooden fort, and the wooden fort has built a large pit around the wooden fort to pile up manure, and the feces excreted by the fort people are forced to pour into the big pit for manure, so the wooden fort is rare and does not have too many peculiar smells.

At first, the burghers were not very accustomed to this kind of clean and tidy castle, but over time everyone got used to it.

Beyond the three clearings was a real fort wall, which was built by more than 100 war slaves led by Lawrence and Aide-de-camp Gehr for more than two months, costing thousands of pfennigs, and almost all of the rocks (natural strips) near the wooden fort in the valley and the pebbles in the stream were turned into the outer walls of the wooden fort, which was enough to cope with most of the low-intensity war

Walk along the rock-paved road of the wooden fort in the valley across the wooden bridge over the stream to the opposite bank, where there is a large flat open space, and there is a large row of wooden houses on the edge of the clearing, which is the barracks of the wooden fort garrison, which is permanently stationed by the security team under the jurisdiction of the valley garrison corps on weekdays, and the registered peasant soldiers from several villages in the south will also participate in the training here during the slack season every year.

At this time, there were several men who looked like officials standing at the entrance of the garrison barracks, led by Ruben, who was the newly promoted civil affairs manager of the village head of the valley.

Reuben wore a thick linen robe with a sheepskin coat over it, a short sword at his waist, and a new prosthetic leg on his left foot.

"Steward Reuben, I have brought the second batch of peasant soldiers from the four villages as ordered, and I ask you to receive them." The head of a newly built village leading a group ran forward to greet the lame Steward Reuben.

Reuben nodded, straightened the short sword around his waist, and motioned to the official holding a birch bark beside him to start counting according to the book, and after the roll call was made, these dozens of peasant soldiers would start to eat public grain and receive salaries.

"It's not early today, you guys are stationed in the barracks to rest, and Deputy Steward Emma has already brought someone to prepare food for you. Tomorrow morning, I will personally take you to the Beiguan Military Fort to take over the defense, the last batch of reinforcements to the north has set off, and the Beiguan Military Fort needs to be stationed and guarded as soon as possible. In addition, at noon tomorrow, we will send twenty strong soldiers from your dozens of people to escort them to the garrison camp in Boulder Town......"

The chiefs of several villages began to beckon their peasant soldiers into the camps......

The gaze continued to move north, crossed the Beiguan Military Fort, crossed the uninhabited wasteland, and came to the garrison camp of Boulder Town located in the depths of the wasteland, seventy or eighty peasant soldiers had just arrived here, they were the first batch of conscripted peasant soldiers of the Barony of the Valley, these people will assemble in Boulder Town, and after the valley's grain and grass are prepared, weapons and armor will be distributed, and then according to the selection and dispatch of the commander of the valley garrison corps, Bass, a part of the most elite young men will detour through Fort Andermatt under the leadership of eight instructors (or garrison corps officers) and enter the province of Jonah, Then he went north to help the battle.

The remaining Farmers will be assigned to the Southwest Farm, Wincheston Manor, Ryan Manor, and the Boulder garrison barracks to fill the garrison gaps......

Except for the border outposts, almost the entire rear area was mobilized to support the Northland battlefield......