The plan was decided, and William, Hubert, Rodrigo and others agreed that he and Duke Hubert would personally lead more than 25,000 people from the First Guards Legion, the Standing First Army and the Nordic Guards to land directly in the Norwegian capital Trondheim, while Duke Rodrigo would lead the Second Army and 3,000 Viking mercenaries, a total of 15,000 troops, to cross the sea to capture Oslo.

In order to show his trust in Duke Hubert, William specially appointed Duke Hubert as commander-in-chief of the battlefield, with full responsibility for commanding the battle.

As a king, and at the same time a knight, this war against the Kingdom of Norway William was ready to personally take the Guards into battle. In the Middle Ages, warfare was the most important thing for kings, and it was very common for kings to personally lead their troops into battle.

However, when William said this plan, Duke Hubert immediately persuaded him:

"Your Majesty, now that the country is strong and prosperous, it is not the time of the early years, why do you want to risk the stone and personally lead the troops to the battle? Moreover, the Norman kingdom is inseparable from your presiding, and many government affairs need to be controlled by you personally. ”

In the face of Hubert's persuasion, William was unwavering and said firmly: "No need to persuade me, I am a knight king, and where my army is, I will be there!" ”

Then he changed his tone and said: "Hubert, I also know your concerns, I promise you that I will never appear on a dangerous battlefield, and besides, I will hand over the command of the battlefield to you, including my Guards Legion, so that if you are careful, nothing will go wrong." ”

"Your Majesty, then it is a word, and you and your Guards Corps must also obey my command, and remember not to take the enemy lightly." Hubert relented and promised William to lead his troops to the Norwegian battlefield.

In this battle, the Norman Kingdom only dispatched three legions, the rest such as the Third Legion of Duke Andrew of Belgium was responsible for garrisoning the Kingdom of Lorraine to defend against the threat from the Holy Roman Empire, the Fourth Legion of the Duke of Richard was responsible for and the Second Legion of the Guards was stationed in Paris, as a mobile force, Roger . Morality. The Earl of Montgomery's Fifth Legion was responsible for garrisoning England, so that even if other enemies attacked the Norman kingdom in the war, it would be good to hold the territory.

This war was not only a matter of William's standing army, but the other noble lords of the Norman kingdom also contributed money and efforts, leading their respective armies to follow the brigade to the Kingdom of Norway.

After all, William's benefits were not in vain, and countless Normans, Frenchmen, Bretons, Flemishers, and Englanders were all lucky enough to win territories and titles in the last war.

This time their opponent is the Kingdom of Norway, as long as they occupy a vast territory and get Norway, they will be able to share more benefits than they gained in the last Mecklenburg War, and after seizing the Kingdom of Norway, the Norman Kingdom may give birth to three or four dukes, as well as ten counts.

For the future arrangement of the Kingdom of Norway, William cares about the plan, the eastern and western kingdoms where Oslo in the south of the Kingdom of Norway is located will become William's direct territories, and the Duchy of Nidarus, where the capital of the Kingdom of Norway Trondheim is located, will be canonized to William's relatives as a screen to protect the royal territory, and then the northernmost territories will be canonized by William to the nobles who have made meritorious contributions in this war.

Although William did not have many territories for the Norman nobles, he also provided sufficient compensation for the nobles, and the monetary rewards were never less, in addition to the fact that he would give them some of the Scottish territories.

When William has the Kingdom of Norway, plus the England he already owns, maybe he will be able to reproduce the North Sea Empire of Cnut the Great in the future.

The preparations for war were very rapid, and in order to take advantage of the civil strife in the Holy Roman Empire, William personally intervened to supervise the collection and recruitment of supplies and check the replenishment of soldiers. You must know that several standing legions are not full, and if you want to form a stronger combat capability, you must replenish the soldiers of the two legions.

Through the Norman Royal Chamber of Commerce, William dispatched and recruited more than 4,000 large and small transport ships from various port cities, which were to be responsible for transporting soldiers to the war.

Landing across the sea was common in the Middle Ages, such as the Third Crusade, when Richard the Lionheart and Philip II's Cointreau sailed from far away Western Europe into the Mediterranean and seized the island of Cyprus.

Moreover, the fleet leading to Oslo and Trondheim had long since been wiped out, and there were basically few enemy fleets capable of navigating the Norman convoy.

In the port of Le Havre in Normandy, countless Kirk ships with open sails were nervously loading and unloading war materials and soldiers, in addition to Kirk ships, there were some other types of ships in the harbor, but Xu Liang was extremely rare.

The Kirk ship was a kind of round ship that was different from the Viking galleys and long ships in the Viking fleet, with the sail as the main power, and its ship type was characterized by short, wide, solid structure, and most importantly, large cargo capacity, especially loved by merchant ship owners, many of the ships recruited this time were from merchant ship owners in various ports, so the proportion of Kirk ships was extremely high.

Compared with the popularity of Kirk ships, another type of ship that also originated from the Vikings was in a very embarrassing situation, on the one hand, William's army had already eliminated a large number of Viking longships in favor of the more powerful and sturdy Galen ships, on the other hand, the Norman merchants were not willing to use the Viking longships, the cargo capacity was too small, in comparison, they were definitely willing to use the Kirk ships this larger ship type.

"All the troops are leaving!"

With William's order, countless Kirk ships began to leave the harbor with their sails.

Although the port of Le Havre in Rouen was only a short distance from the Norwegian capital, William was not willing to joke with the lives of his soldiers, because these Kirk ships were inland waterways and could not penetrate the North Sea.

Once the transports were assembled in Rouen, they continued along the long coastline of Flanders, until they passed the Dutch principality, when the convoy turned north towards Trondheim.

This time it was thanks to William's generosity during the last Mecklenburg War, otherwise it would not have been possible to gather a fleet of three or four thousand ships, even if the Royal Chamber of Commerce had contacted him.

The sheer size of the fleet means that there is a greater chance of being discovered by the enemy. In order to prevent the Danes and Norwegians from prying eyes, William ordered the whole army to lead the army north immediately before reaching the Duchy of the Netherlands.