"Sir, are you sure this is the priest sent to us? How I don't think he's an apostle of God at all. Ron turned his head again to look at the drunken parish priest Hamish Matthew, who was crawling on the back of a black mule.

Hamish had been following Art's party south for three days, and when he first met with Arte, this guy was still a clergyman's seriousness and purity, but as he got farther and farther away from Lucesen, his true nature began to be revealed, and at first he was just sneaking aside to drink some wine while resting, which was harmless. Slowly, this Hamish and Angus, a drunken fellow, got alike, both of them had a special penchant for wine, especially strong ale, but this guy named Hamish was really not good at drinking, and he began to get drunk before he had drunk a few large glasses of ale, ignoring the solemnity of a clergyman, and often fell asleep.

As a result, he drank all the way and got drunk all the way, and this guy used the time to rush to sleep, and then used the time to get drunk. Everyone in the company agreed that Art had been deceived by the abbot, and that a drunkard who had been pulled from the street had shaved his hair and stuffed it into their heads.

But there were two people who had a different view of the reckless priest. One is Angus, who has been a sergeant in the Holy Order, and has a lot of contact with the clergy of the church, and he hates those hypocritical clergy the most, and those "saints" who have a serious face all day long do not know how many rotten things they have done behind them, but it is this kind of reckless guy who is the real "pure cultivator". Another person who liked this priest was Art, and during the few days he came into contact with Hamish, he discovered that this unruly man was in fact a well-educated man, and he had a very deep understanding of the doctrine of the Bible.

However, the people in the valley need a clergy who looks like an apostle to bring the light of God to everyone, so Art still has to find a way to get this guy to change his dissolute character, at least to maintain the appearance of an apostle of God in front of the believers.

Art glanced back at Hamish, who was sleeping on the black mule, and said to Ron with a smile, "He is definitely an extremely devout messenger of God. ”

…………

In the county town of Tignets, the guards hurried into the hall of the lord's lord and reported to Viscount Pierre that the sentinels had spotted a cavalry of more than a dozen horsemen approaching the city three miles outside the city.

"Did that team fly the flag?" Viscount Pierre asked calmly.

"The sentry said that he didn't see it clearly, it seemed to be a black-bottomed heraldic flag, and the cavalry were all wearing black cloaks."

"Black-bottomed heraldic flag, black cape, could it be that guy is back?" Pierre muttered to himself.

"Okay, it shouldn't be an enemy, just let the defenders of the northern city be cautious, and there is no need to close the city gate." As he spoke, Pierre put on his bearskin coat, fastened his belt, hung up his sword, and went out of the office to call the guards to mount their horses and run towards the north gate......

Pierre climbed to the top of the city, raised his hand and raised his eyebrows to look at the approaching cavalry team, gradually saw the square flag and heraldic banner of the cavalry team, waved his hand to the captain of the city beside him, and said: "It's the patrol team, that guy from Art has been promoted to knight, bring him into my office in a while......"

…………

"Yat, you didn't disappoint me! I know you can make a difference on the battlefield. Pierre handed a glass of wine to Art, who was sitting across from the desk, then picked up his glass and touched it lightly, and drank it down.

"So, now should I officially call you Knight of Art?"

"Lord Viscount, I should thank you, if you hadn't given me a chance, I would still be clearing the border to clean up the bandits." Art said it sincerely.

Viscount Pierre smiled and shook his head.

"You said you have two fiefs? Is one of the pieces Wincheston Manor? ”

"No, no, Wincheston Manor has been given to Dean, and my fief is a tax card at the bridgehead of the southern border and a canyon wasteland on the east side of the Carmel Mountains in the south."

"I guessed that Wincheston Manor could not be sealed to you, and three months ago Dean's father had been active, and he had been here even with me. Wincheston Manor is surrounded by fertile land, and if it can be managed by a shrewd lord, it will surely become another rich manor. But even if you can't get Wincheston, shouldn't you just give you a few pieces of wasteland? Isn't your mining too too~~" Pierre didn't say the rest of the words, because it was useless to say anything about things that were already a foregone conclusion.

Pierre changed the subject and said, "You don't have to be too disappointed, after all, being promoted to knight and receiving a fiefdom is lucky enough for a commoner who has just been canonized as a trainee knight for a short time. I read your paperwork, you are still the palace southern border patrol officer, the court ordered the city of Tinies to support the five standing soldiers in your patrol team, I agreed to this matter, but if you take my money and food, you have to do things for me, you have to let your patrol team play its due role. Recently, the mountain bandits and bandits in the south have been rampant taking advantage of the war in the east and the lack of troops in various places. In late autumn last year, a caravan from the north was robbed by a group of robbers in a birch grove south of Lane Manor, killing eight of them on the spot and looting all the goods it carried. I took someone to check it afterwards, and the wounds of the deceased were almost always fatal, these guys were not ordinary people, I suspected that they were deserters or bandits. ”

"If we are talking about the same group of robbers, I have come into contact with them, and I was chased by the bandits for a whole whole afternoon in the birch forest, and finally I escaped from them while it was dark. Those guys were very powerful and disciplined, and I guessed at the time that they were from the army. Art recalls being chased and killed in the birch forest, and the feeling of being chased and bitten by a pack of hungry wolves is still fresh in his memory.

"Now there are six large bandits and more than a dozen small bands of bandits in the county, they are mainly entrenched around the two routes of the north-south trade road and the east-west horse road, and every hill and dense forest may be their lair, and now they have begun to plunder some small manor settlements in addition to plundering passing pedestrians and traders. After most of my troops were sent to fight in the east, my garrison in the county of Tignats was only a hundred men, and it was impossible for me to send all the garrison troops to clear out the bandits. Now that you are back, I will leave this matter to you to take care of, and in addition to the regular supply of food and grass for your five soldiers, I will also allocate you ten iron-headed winged spears, ten shields, five armed swords, two ox-horned bows, three sets of leather armor, and two thousand pfennigh salaries, and I will also order all the military forts and manors in the county to cooperate with you in eliminating the bandits, as long as you can collect the security tax from the lords' purses. I just need you to hand me thirty bandit heads before the wheat harvest, how about it? "Pierre had been annoyed by the bandits who were rampant in the county, who roamed through the mountains and valleys, and whose whereabouts were so unpredictable that Pierre had only slain a few minions in vain.

"Since I have taken over the position of Border Inspector, I will definitely be faithful to my duty, and besides, Lord Viscount is so generous, I will certainly live up to the high expectations of the court and your lordship. After returning from the battlefield this time, I plan to set up a special patrol team to clean up bandits in the county and smooth the north-south trade route. I will take all the weapons you have allocated to me, and I would like to make two small requests to you. "Art had already planned to continue training the army to clean up bandits, and it was a surprise to have the support of Viscount Pierre.

Viscount Pierre was also a straightforward person, and said: "I can only give you so much weapons and armor, I am more lacking than you in soldiers, and I also try to squeeze as much money and food as possible, and if I have more, I will have to go hungry." If you say anything else, I'll do my best to satisfy you. ”

"I won't talk about weapons, money, food and soldiers anymore, I want you to allow me to do two things, the first is to allow me to recruit homeless young people in the county, I now have my own knight territory, I need someone to go to the valley to open up land for me."

"No problem, I promise."

"The second request is that I would like to find a garrison camp for the patrol team, in a boulder pile twenty miles south of the Lane Manor, next to the north-south trade road, near the trade road, and at the fork of the north-south east-west road, so that the patrol party can patrol and maintain law and order.

"That place is in the Ownerless Wasteland, and the garrison assigned to your patrol team is fine, but there is no arable land or woods around it, and I am afraid that if you are stationed there, you will even need to transport firewood for cooking from afar."

"I'll take care of these things myself."

"That's okay, I also agreed to this condition."

"Thank you, sir!" Art stood up and bowed lightly to Viscount Pierre.

"You go to the clerk's place to hand over the paperwork in a while, I won't send you away, you can leave by yourself." Viscount Pierre said, putting down the cup.

…………

"Ron, take a few people to recruit young and strong homeless people outside the city, this time I only need young and strong, preferably a lone man, if there are half-old children of the homeless family can also recruit in. In addition, send someone to the city to buy some fine iron for forging weapons. ”

"Sergeant Major, you follow me to the arsenal to receive the weapons and equipment allocated to us by Viscount Pierre, we will expand the army in the future, and we can prepare some more now."

Art walked out of the hall and instructed Ron and Angus as he walked outside the gate.

A day later, thirteen cavalrymen, escorting a black-robed priest, led a dozen young and strong homeless people to rush south with a batch of weapons and equipment and a small amount of food and supplies.

The rest of the journey was not all smooth sailing, as Viscount Pierre had said, there were already several waves of shadows around the team, but because there were more than a dozen cavalry guards in the team, the fellows scattered and fled from a long distance.

"My lord, those robbers are certainly not ordinary people. I saw behind them that there were men on war horses directing and following them. Angus caught up with Art, who was at the head of the team.

"Of course they're no ordinary bandits, the man you see is the butler of Ryan Manor." A hint of murderous intent flashed in Art's eyes.

"Ryan Manor? My lord, are you saying that those robbers were dressed up by Joe, a man from Lane Manor? Angus couldn't believe it.

"Yes, I can't be mistaken about the fat butler's appearance."

"Sergeant Major, have you never seen the murderous appearance of the manor master, our whole family fled here with the homeless brigade in front of us, and the manor master directly led the troops to loot and slaughter the homeless, if we didn't run fast, we would have now become a pile of bones or a dying serf in the manor." Ron is still haunted by what happened outside of Lane Manor.

"My lord, since it's a bunch of mongrels, I'll take someone to arrest that guy and kill him!" Angus was tired of being followed all the way, and he wanted to rush over and slash those hungry dog-like tails.

"Sergeant Major, I'll let you kill enough, but not now." Art kicked the horse in the belly with a spur, and the horse under him neighed and accelerated southward.