On August 10th, the first day after the feast of St. Lawrence and six days before the Assumption of the Virgin, the assembled army was ready to march, in order to achieve the purpose of boosting morale, the routine blessing mass was indispensable, but it was a pity that Constance, as a clergy with a quarter of the population, could not find a priest willing to preside over the sacraments for the coalition army, and they gathered in front of the icon of Jesus in the church to go on hunger strike and pray, claiming to ask the Duke of Nijmegen to give an explanation why the Bishop of Constance has not seen anyone alive or dead, and the whereabouts of the body are unknown.

"Oh, hunger strike?" After listening to the attendant's report, I pressed the meat cutting knife on my trouser leg and rubbed it, pouting disdainfully, "Then it will be good for them, since we all want to be saints for centuries, how much is it that we are in the way of others?" Let them go, and leave them alone. ”

The eldest sons of the nobles who had been listening with their ears pricked up beside them were all stunned by the duke's decision, and in a moment the hall resounded with the embarrassment of countless daggers falling to the ground or cups and plates clashing against each other, and the stunned crowd looked at each other. The clergy of the Church in the Middle Ages, at least nominally above any earthly kings and nobles, were the forerunners who had devoted their lives to the cause of the Divine since childhood, and were committed to helping the poor people who had fallen into confusion and paganism like lambs, to help them escape from the sea of misery and convert to the right path of the faith in God.

Since the time of Pepin's consecration, the Holy See established in the Vatican has begun to embark on the road of secularization semi-coercively and semi-voluntarily, and successive popes have flatteringly attached themselves to powerful emperors, so as to ensure that the rights of the Holy See are not violated by insidious pretenders, and can more or less expand the influence of the Holy See through secular power, and then control more and more people and land to strengthen their own strength.

During the reign of Charlemagne. Because the empire was too large for the civilization structure that had been completely destroyed by centuries-long barbarian invasions to help him hold the country in his hands, Charlemagne chose to acquire more cultural knowledge. The Vatican also took the opportunity to expand its tentacles deeper and deeper into every corner of the empire, and diocesan bishops and bishops of the fiefs sprung up in Western Europe, consolidating the gains already made by the Holy See.

Bishops who are stationed in the localities are not subject to taxes or levy to their local lords, but have administrative and judicial immunity, as well as the tithes of the local church. Almost all of them are so rich. Many peasants who wanted to live a better life or who were religious fled their hometowns and came with their families to cultivate the land of the church and "one step closer to God." According to the customary law, as long as he enters the land of the church, whether it is a thug who has committed the most heinous crimes or a fugitive serf, his sins will be written off. No secular lord can be held accountable. Thus the Church became the umbrella of a considerable number of people, and together with the armed knights who defended the Holy See with the indoctrination of faith, the vast fertile land occupied by the churches and monasteries became an independent kingdom beyond the world, and thus became more and more entrenched.

"Lord Duke, I beg your pardon for offending, I'm afraid it's not appropriate for you to do this, right?" Auden rose from the crowd of aristocratic eldest sons with his "Basel mud legs" and became a hot figure on the table, and the dining place was relatively close to me. At the instigation of everyone's various eyes, he finally spoke.

"Inappropriate?" I slammed the knife down on the table, chewing on it with a deliberate slurp. While propping his chin and looking at his somewhat frightened face, "Tell me, what's wrong?" ”

Everyone present was so frightened by my movements that they didn't dare to come out, so quiet that they couldn't even hear their breathing, and Auden, who had a tangled and painful expression, probably hated his reckless decision in his heart, but at this point, he had already ridden a tiger, so he had to answer my question head-on: "My lord, you see...... Although the bishop participated in the rebellion, after all, he acted on the orders of the Vatican, and no matter how heinous he was, he had to wait for the will of the Holy See before he could deal with it...... In a sense...... Understandably, we can't find a reason to refuse, and I'm worried if their normal demands are forcibly suppressed...... It will make the misunderstanding and contradiction deeper and deeper, in case anyone investigates, I am afraid that it will be difficult for you to pick it up," Auden stared at my furrowed brow, and forced the second half ......of the sentence back into his stomach.

I squinted at him, my fingers involuntarily playing with the knife of flesh, Auden's face was pale and frozen, cold sweat running down his cheeks, his eyes empty and numb, nine times out of ten I thought I was going to die. "Oh, is it okay to send you to do this?" I asked with a smile as I put the knife back on my belt.

"No, no, Lord Duke, how dare I trespass...... We all listen to you. Oden shook his head busily, this hot potato fell into his own hands, and did he pay it back?

"Who among you wants to take this job, huh? Stand up and I'll see! The voice was raised a few degrees, and I looked around at the stunned crowd, the majesty of the superior nobles was very effective at this moment, and no one dared to take risks, "Since you can't do it, then do as I want." First of all, don't the priests want an explanation? Again, Bishop Constance had fled from the battlefield and had been killed by a mob somewhere, and Nijmegen had already sent men to search for a long time without success, and if anyone was still not satisfied with this answer, he could join the search under the escort of the knights; Secondly, they took such extreme measures to protest that it was completely autonomous, neither persecution nor inducement, and we could not stop the pious priests from being martyred and canonized, but the only thing they could do was to do their duty, and arrange for someone to provide meals from the castle on time and on time every day, and let the people along the way see that Nijmegen had done its duty, and no one could do anything if they didn't eat at the door, so that I, the dignified duke, could not kneel on the ground and beg them, right? Why don't you send more soldiers to forcibly break the noble mouths of the clergy and feed them spoonful by spoonful? ”

"What can make you condescend, my lord!" "That's all it takes, sir." "You're right, Lord Duke." The nobles echoed one after another, sniffing out that the wind was not in the right direction, and immediately turned the bow of the ship, carefully protecting their own interests.

The clergymen who thought they could frighten Nijmegen were dumbfounded when they learned of the Duke's handling measures, Rao had heard all kinds of exaggerated rumors about my "deviance" before, and they never thought that things would really be done so desperately, losing the backbone of the Bishop of Constance, the unity between the priests could not withstand scrutiny more and more, and the tandem and private operation of different factions within the church began, after all, they only wanted to scare and scare the Duke of Nijmegen with the old method, who knew that the opponent played more horizontally, and did not take hundreds of valuable human lives seriously at all, If you don't look for the bottom of the stairs, you will really starve to death - the kind of thing that everyone swears to worship, but it falls on the individual, and he can't give up the "dirty world" of attachment.

The hunger strike lasted for a symbolic day, and according to the report of the spies who were hiding in the shadows, while no one was looking, a few friars sneaked out of the back door to take a lot of food from the local people, and in short, the protests in the church ended at nightfall, and after arguments and consultations, they elected several representatives to come to the castle and demand dialogue and negotiation on an equal footing, and to solve each other's problems with dignity.

"To negotiate? Hehe. Blowing on the freshly covered fire paint stamp on the parchment, the red liquid gradually solidified, and finally the dragon pattern of Nijmegen and the words of the count's power were clearly revealed, and I threw the sealed letter into the pile of papers beside the table, and smiled coldly, "How devout I think their faith is, but it turns out to be disappointing, and the bringer goes to the hall of the castle to dry these fools who don't know how to lift up." ”

It wasn't until I was tired of the thick stacks of papers on the table that I remembered that the delegates from the church were still being thrown into the empty hall and stared at the moon rising in mid-air outside the window, and estimated that the time was almost up, so I beckoned the attendant to lead the way with torches, and walked out of the room with a cloak.

There was a rhythmic snoring in the corridor connecting the hall, and the attendant who was looking at me smiled helplessly, as if to say, "I can't do anything about it until I'm bored and fall asleep." The moment the door opened, the clergyman, who was dozing off in his chair, stood up reflexively, and funnily enough, one of them was still lying on the table and snoring comfortably, while his companion tugged at the corner of his coat, and the latter opened his eyes in a daze, unable to make out his current situation.

"God, I'm sorry, ladies and gentlemen, I have urgent military affairs to deal with immediately, so that everyone has been waiting for a long time, and they are lazy." Playing with the clergy who were saluting me, I sat on the throne with my ass, and changed my gloomy expression, "Your conditions are difficult to meet, please go back!" ”

This time it was the other party's turn to be surprised, they looked at each other with round eyes, like a group of Wang Ba who were about to be killed, "You haven't heard our statement yet, Lord Duke, why did you just refuse?" The priest at the head was a clear-faced, thin man, with a hooked nose so pointed that he seemed to be able to pierce the most parchment of parchment, and he stood relatively far forward, and looked like the head of the delegates.

"I can touch my chest and assure God that there is no lie." I leaned back in my chair and replied with a blazing gaze, "The forcible expropriation of the church's warehouses is indeed a last resort, but Nijmegen has made corresponding compensation, and it seems that there is no problem between us that needs to be negotiated, does it?" ”

"......" The eagle hooked nose representative bowed his head and was silent, and the priest who was lying on the table snoring was so red that he took over the conversation aggressively: "You are naked quibbles and shirking responsibility!" Perhaps Nijmegen instructed the ugly villain to murder the noble bishop, and your actions have brought shame on the sacred faith! As he spoke, he almost stabbed me in the face with the cross he was holding in his palm.

I made a "take a look" gesture to the hooked nose and said in a wry tone, "I don't think there's any need to talk about it, right?" Chamberlain! Send someone to escort a few adults back. ”

"Wait!" Another short, stocky middle-aged man, who had been silent, suddenly shouted, which really startled me, and he moved his fat body to the table, pinched his throat and said in a shrill voice, "We have something that interests you, yes, Lord Duke, we know how desperate you are to get it......"

(End of chapter)