"God, how do you know even a little castle in the mountains, who are the locals of us? William talked to me all afternoon with a map, and I still don't know where this castle is! Karl couldn't help but look at the sky, he was really convinced, to say that Hong Tao is not a god, he was the first to express doubt. Pen "Fun" Pavilion www.biquge.info

"This family business was introduced by William?" Since it was really the Habsburgs, Hong Tao naturally thought of Emperor Friedrich II. At present, the territory of Switzerland is still part of the Kingdom of Germany and the Holy Roman Empire. But Hong Tao did not think that this marriage was a good thing, and if it was really introduced by Friedrich II, then it was a big conspiracy. He wanted to use Jiang Zhuyi and Aya as bargaining chips to break into the interior of the German Kingdom. Although he has always said that he does not care about the large area of land to the north of the mountain, can he believe what the emperor says?

"No, no, no, it has nothing to do with William, but it has something to do with you. Baron Jiang has been lending money here all these years, and he is about to become the largest landlord. The mountainous region was very, very poor, and the Zehringen family, who ruled the region, had no children, and the future heirs were probably Habsburgs. The Habsburgs and the barons borrowed money to widen the Gotthard Pass, and the barons organized the passage of goods north, with the Habsburgs responsible for security along the way. I guess it was also an agreement between them that Aya married Count Rudolph, and the baron asked Aya to be the executor in the past. In the future, there will be another northern market for the goods of Rena, and the furs from the north will also go south from here. It's a great thing, and it's a very lucrative business, and compared to Jiang, the Venetians are just street vendors, and their vision is far behind. Carl was not stupid, he knew why Hong Tao asked this, and quickly clarified for his cousin.

"For now, it's often not a good thing for a woman to be too smart, she's playing with fire! Do you think that she and the Habsburgs, and the Zehringen family, could occupy the most important traffic crossroads on the European continent? It's not just a north-south artery, but when I knock down the Flanders and Hanseas, it will have to become an east-west artery. When the time comes, Louis in the west, the German nobles in the north, and the bohemians in the east will not look at her, a woman with no roots and bloodline, sitting on the ground and collecting taxes, and your cousin will also covet this place. Can she withstand the attack from all sides? Do you want me to fight a war on land with the whole of Europe! "Jiang Zhuyi knows how to do business, and he has a good eye, and Hong Tao knows and admires these advantages. But this woman's ambition is a little too big, and her courage is too big, and she actually wants to choke the throat of the European continent and become a big force that counts in Europe, which is a bit self-conscious. And she didn't choose the right time, and she couldn't help her enough.

"I think you're underestimating her, but there's more than one Habsburg in her hands. Since three or four years ago, she has asked Aya and Ariana to exchange many small plots of land belonging to her with the Zeringen family. At the time, I thought she was stupid and exchanged so much good land for mountains that produced nothing. Later, when she joined forces with the Habsburgs, I studied the map carefully and realized that she had a whole plan in place many years ago. ”

"Now that she has de facto control over a large area of land and population north of the Alps, south of Lake Zurich, east of the Duchy of Burgundy and Lake Zurich, there are few noble territories left, and even if there is, I guess she deliberately stayed behind to hide people's eyes. After this marriage with the Habsburgs, her influence would expand far north, because Aya had become her adopted daughter under the auspices of the archbishop. In other words, the child born to Aya and Adolf in the future is also her grandson, and he was born with the inheritance of the Habsburgs. ”

"From what I know of her, Count Adolph will certainly not live long, and sooner or later the Habsburgs will become her grandson's domain, so that there will be a formal bloodline inheritance, which the Pope cannot but recognize. You kill people with cannons, she kills people with honey and countless oriental witchcraft, and it is difficult to escape whoever wants to die, because the other party has no idea that there is an enemy. I still have to thank you, if it weren't for her listening to you, she would have done it to me a long time ago. ”

"Actually, she doesn't need much help from you anymore, the mercenaries in her territory were hired by Louis during the crusade to the west, and almost everywhere there has been a war over the years, you can almost see troops from her territory. Those guys from the mountains were only slightly better than William's leper legion, and they couldn't use their bodies as weapons. But I think if it were a normal army, they would be the first in Europe, and the only weakness would be that they were still a little small in number, but at the moment they would be enough to defend the mountain. "Carl found an opportunity today to educate Hong Tao well, which is a rare opportunity.

"Why didn't you tell me she was doing this?" Hong Tao really had to listen to Carl give him a lecture, he didn't know anything about these things he said, and Jiang Zhuyi did it behind his back. It can't be said that she is carrying it, because she didn't deliberately hide it, but she didn't take the initiative to mention it to herself.

"How did I know she didn't tell you? She never let me ask about the things you told her, I thought you made her do it. And I don't want to interfere too much in her affairs and annoy her, I'll be sad, of course you're not afraid. In the face of Hong Tao's questioning, Carl replied confidently, and the meaning of the words was: You are a pair of dogs and men who calculate people all day long, and I am an outsider and you are fooling around, in case that sentence is wrong, Jiang Zhuyi will be hated, and you will have to be unlucky if you don't blow the pillow wind.

"I'm really getting more and more pumping, what kind of person am I?" Hong Tao also understood Carl's complaints, and he was not convinced.

"I refuse to answer this question!" Carl's answer was even more hateful, obviously he admitted it, but he didn't say it directly.

"You have sinned against me! I'm a person who holds grudges, you just wait for Baron Jiang's revenge, let you always want to offend both sides, I won't let you succeed! Carl is no longer the same Carl, although he still trusts himself, but he has a lot of ideas in his heart. This is also normal, people in their thirties and fifties must think differently, and people with family wealth and poor people will certainly not always think the same way. All Hong Tao can do is scare him and make him sleep and have nightmares.

"Let's not talk about her business for now, since she has such a great ability, let her toss it by herself, only if she can't wear her pants, she will die!" At this time, Hong Tao was no longer worried about Jiang Zhuyi, just now after listening to Carl's detailed introduction, and looking carefully on the map, Hong Tao admired Jiang Zhuyi's vision and means. This woman is indeed not ordinary. Not only has a business mind, a long-term vision than ordinary people, but also has a lot of strategic thinking and execution ability.

The mountainous area that Jiang Zhuyi quietly managed was almost the south-central part of the Swiss Confederation in later generations. In the Middle Ages, this mountainous region was not yet a state, but a bunch of petty noble domains and direct domains of the emperor. The mountainous areas are poor, it is impossible to plant a large area, and animal husbandry is not developed. Everyone pondered, we don't produce anything, we can't exchange with outside countries, so we just use people to make money, so a very special mercenary custom has been born.

They build their own armies, train themselves, and sell themselves to anyone, and as long as you can afford it, they will help you fight, and they will never ask who you want to fight. And they will fight as much as they want, and every penny will be calculated very carefully, and if the employer has no money in the middle of the war, they will turn around and leave, and they will never talk about feelings.

One of the characteristics of wars in Europe is that they are very frequent but small in scale, especially between noble lords, which on average take place almost daily. If this kind of war is placed in the Song, Yuan, and Ming dynasties, it can be regarded as a fight between villages at best, and it is not even a war. However, there are few Europeans, and they are still professional soldiers, and if they can send out ten knights with a hundred and ten soldiers, they are relatively good lords. In the Middle Ages, there were only Crusades against tens of thousands of people, and countries could not afford to fight such a great war.

It is thanks to this environment that there is a market for mercenaries in the Swiss mountains. You can't beat the big village on the other side of the river, it doesn't matter, you pay for it, we will help you fight. Fifty gold coins to cross the river, one hundred gold coins to attack the other village, give money and work, and the last person who dies will not break the contract. If you pay an extra fifty gold coins, the Swiss mercenaries can help you garrison for half a year to prevent the other side from counterattacking.

Since the mid-to-late Middle Ages, Swiss mercenaries have become synonymous with fierceness, fighting power, and keeping promises. Although their employment is not cheap, it is really good, and rich people like to hire these troops who wear heavy armor and carry a few meters long halberds to fight in large phalanxes to help them take care of their homes.

These mountain people were not only fierce, but also very disciplined, and no matter how unfavorable the situation was, they did not desert. Most of them are fellow villagers, and whoever becomes a deserter will be known by the people of their hometown, and then no one will use the family, and it will be difficult to live in the local area if they lose their reputation.

They had three laws, to hang those who fled, to live in tents, and not to pursue fleeing enemies. These rules make it rare for formed Swiss mercenaries to be attacked by the enemy, and it is difficult to defeat the Swiss phalanx if they are several times larger than the Swiss mercenaries in frontal combat. Because this mercenary army is really desperate, every battle is a veritable battle to the death. These people did not take prisoners, the enemy killed them all, and the slaughter of villages and cities was done very easily.

In later Vatican City, only one army was allowed to be stationed, and that was the Swiss mercenaries, known as the Papal Guard. This is the Roman Church in order to thank this army of more than 100 people for desperately protecting Pope Clement VII from the escape, and in the end only a dozen people died, and since then, the Pope's guard only uses Swiss mercenaries.

By the way, the hunt for this pope was Charles V of the Habsburgs, who was called Charles V in the title of Holy Roman Emperor, and his real kingdom was in Spain, that is, Carlos I of Spain. It was he who built Spain's empire on which the sun never sets, and after conquering South America, famously said: "On my territory, the sun never sets."

In other words, this king and emperor are very accurate in calculating the time difference!

When Emperor Louis XVI and Empress were attacked by the troops of the French Revolution, the Emperor's Guard, composed of more than 700 Swiss mercenaries, fought to the death in the face of more than a dozen times the size of their own army, and finally all of them were killed. In order to commemorate these soldiers who defended the credibility of Switzerland with their lives, the Swiss specially built a statue in Lucerne, called the dying lion of Lucerne.

Jiang Zhuyi occupies such a place, if she can make good use of these mountain people, maybe she can really nail a solid nail in the hinterland of Europe, and become the best stick for herself to stir up this pot of in Europe in the future.

As for whether this woman will betray herself and stand on the same front with the Europeans, Hong Tao thinks there is no need to worry. No matter how good the Swiss mercenaries were, they couldn't beat the Indian women with shotguns. If she really wants to do this, it will be killing herself. If she keeps to herself, then she might as well teach her two more tricks, so that she can really build a country here, which is called Switzerland. Then move the bank vaults of the Baronial Castle and make all the people soldiers, and from the thirteenth century onwards in Europe they will be a stinking and hard little stone.

(To be continued.) )