"It's a pity that the 100,000 troops on the South Road." Lu Cha didn't know about the tragic situation of the sharp reduction in the combat strength of the troops on the southern route after the soldiers were checked, but he sighed with a sigh. "If they join us in the city, maybe we'll be able to last another month."

"Drag and drop, preferably until November. As long as it snows, the Elta will have to retreat, right? ”

"Is there enough food for three months?" Offe Mondridge didn't think Rucha would be open-minded, but he still had to ask. "If the spies burn down the granary, or if there is an accident with the grain, how can we continue to hold on?"

"Three months?" Rucha smiled. "Save some food, half a year's worth of food is available. At the beginning, most of the food share of the hundreds of thousands of people handled by Offy Mondrich was stored here, even if the front was lost and a part was missing, but the number of people was also reduced. ”

Offy Mondridge pinched his fingers, and indeed found that he was overly worried. In a few days, a group of merchant ships will arrive in Hilqi with the grain from the official warehouse of the country of departure. Although the potato nuggets and old flour did not look good, they could not stop the huge quantity, so huge that it was difficult for the Chamber of Commerce to use all the merchant ships that could transport it across the ocean and some of the bilunar transport ships in the country to carry them all at once.

And Offy Mondrich just paid for a shipload of all kinds of Chinese goods. With these dozen boats of grain as the base, as long as he is given a month, there will be no problem for the Western Expeditionary Army to stick to the food source in the future.

"What about storage?"

"The flour in the city is basically scattered and stored, and even the place where it is cooked every day is different."

"It seems that Lu Qiaqing is really ready to live and die with this capital." Orf-Mondridge sighed as he looked at the many flags fluttering on the outer wall of the castle.

"Hundreds of thousands of troops are dead, wounded, and fleeing, if even this well-defended imperial capital can't hold it," Lu Cha sighed with a chest folded, "We don't have to talk about returning to China and resigning, let's fight in this city until the last moment." ”、

The arrival of the commander of the Western Expeditionary Army, Eufay Mondridge, to the imperial capital has long been blown by the wind. The oath of the two main generals at the luncheon that they would live and die with the city stabilized the military spirit that had already moved closer to the Southern Route Army to a certain extent.

Orf Mondridge's Magic Spear Team became a firefighter to suppress order in the city at the behest of Rucha. They are not part of the forces within the Bilunar Church, and they don't need to think about faction siding in their troubles...... For a while, the atmosphere in Garcia City was almost new, and even the vendors who came and went felt a little different.

"Sell - smoked barbecue, grilled fish!" The little merchant in the carriage shouted in front of the stall with great anticipation—he was in time for the day, and those who were not clothed in armor and carried strange weapons on their backs must have been the new arrivals of yesterday as the soldiers defending the city said.

These soldiers have a lot of money in their hands, and their own things are also good-looking. The small merchant relied on the game obtained by the hunters of the village and the fragrant wood of the mountains and forests, and his own pickling skills to make roasted meat and fish far better than the others, which he had wanted to open before the Erta Rebellion. But now that he can eat with a mouthful of food and take the whole village to eat and clothe together, he is content.

"Hopefully it will sell well today." He took out the basket covered with movable planks and began to count the silver coins in it—as soon as he entered the city from the north gate, several of the soldiers who defended the city rushed to him to buy him a lot of small pieces of roasted meat. There are people in this market who have the Western Expeditionary Army to maintain the basic order of buying and selling, at least no one dares to openly rob these vendors of their small money. Otherwise, if anyone doesn't grab it today, no one will send sporadic grain and meat dishes to enjoy tomorrow.

"Come on, boss, bring me two." No sooner had the little merchant stacked the silver coins into a stack of gold coins than someone else approached.

"Listening to your accent, it doesn't look like you're from the church headquarters, is it?" The small merchant plucked the two pieces of roast meat that the soldier had fingered from the pylon, pulled out the rope and began to tie them together.

"Yes, we're Elta's number one army." The soldier looked at the color of the roasted meat, and his saliva was about to flow out.

The little merchant jerked his head up. "You're here to drive out the heretics led by the traitors of West El Tadoniva?"

"Exactly." The soldier looked up proudly, "Master Ofe Mondridge said that Elta still needs us to save ourselves. ”

The little merchant bowed his head again, and continued to tie up the meat with great speed, and then took it in his hand and handed it to the soldier.

"How much, boss?" The soldier had already pulled out his cloth wallet, "For the sake of the Eltas, it's cheaper." ”

"No money." The little merchant grinned, "You are the warriors who saved Elta, I can't ask for this money, just think of it as a labor army." In the past, the officials and soldiers didn't ask us for money, they pulled things and left, alas, that bitterness...... By the way, you can tell your brothers in your camp that I'm going to have lunch for you, but I'll have to bring my own staple food...... It would be nice to have a stove and pot with you. ”

Looking at the figure of the soldier trotting away in satisfaction, the little merchant smiled imperceptibly.

The Elta General Staff, which is a little weak externally, cannot penetrate into the local armies of the Western Expeditionary Army, but there is always a way to put some eyeliner in the metropolis of Hirzi, Garcia, etc. In particular, instead of taking their residents out of the city like the strongholds of the Western Expeditionary Army, these metropolises also put on a "pro-people" attitude and supported the exchange of traders......

How could a mountain village, which was almost starved to death by the policies of the old Elta, and who had no one to take care of the misdeeds of the magistrates, and who had saved many people by Doniva's "parachute gift" in winter, could open its mouth to be "the heresy of Sielta"? It's a pity that these soldiers of the magic spear team don't know the situation near the imperial capital at all, and they are even more dizzy when they are smoked by the aroma of barbecue, and they don't think that the "patriotic good businessman" in front of them is actually an all-pervasive spy.

What's even more stupid is that he confirmed in his first sentence that he was not an ordinary rebel army, but the heart and soul of Ofer Mondridge's direct subordinate.

The little merchant continued to sit down and collect silver coins—every time he entered the city, he would take silver coins and grilled fish and meat to the trading houses he knew in exchange for gold, salt, and all sorts of household goods. Needless to say, the comptoir itself is a front-line institution subordinate to the Second Department of the Elta General Staff.

All the merchants who have done business with Cierta are inevitably talked about during the trading process, during the small talk at the table. Any attempt to deceive the interlocutor will fail – false flattery will be exposed in body language, dropping them several notches on the credibility score.

Some of the merchants began by showing strong support for the Doniva regime and the Otherworldly. The two parties only need to carry out a few commercial cooperation, which is like dry firewood, from selling money to selling intelligence, and then volunteering to serve Sierta...... That is, "making a promise by example".

"Businessmen are the best way for us to expand our influence, on the one hand, they are the transmitters of information, with the intelligence we need; On the other hand, they don't know that there is a 'Chinese-style' content of life. As long as they feel from the bottom of their hearts that they have a future with Cierta, it is perfectly feasible to develop them into propaganda stations and intelligence stations. —Excerpt from "Uncertain Light and Darkness - Documentary of Elta's Intelligence Work", first edition in 2031.

The little merchant recalled the details of the brief training of the intelligence officer, and when he looked up, he saw a whole team of ten people carrying an iron stove, an iron pot, firewood, and old cloth to pad the floor, and some people carrying a large piece of white bread wrapped in paper -- the little merchant swallowed unconsciously, and sure enough, the white bread distributed by the soldiers was better than the black bread he carried.

After greeting each other, the laughing soldiers immediately threw the firewood into the tin stove at the behest of the small merchants. This kind of firewood stove, which is commonly used in the general troops of the Western Expeditionary Army, can cook a soup pot for ten people, and can also be used for outdoor heating. However, it is absolutely forbidden to be used indoors, and instead of it is a fireplace and stove with a long chimney.

Burning charcoal indoors can invoke the jealousy of the god of fire - a legend that has spread half the world for many years, but in different versions. Even if the tin stove is outside, there must be a soldier with a fan who keeps fanning the wind.

The pot with water was heated on the stove, and some soldiers had already spent a few small sums to buy fresh vegetables and put them in the pot to boil. Here, the merchant took out a few pieces of roasted meat, cut them into small pieces, and threw them into the soup.

"It's a pity that there is no wine." The little merchant sat down at the table and naturally smashed his mouth. "Warriors, please forgive me for the inconsiderate hospitality."

The soldiers' eyes had long been nailed to the roasted pieces of meat that were flying up and down in the pot, and they were even more dizzy with the respect for the small merchant like wine and chocolate, and naturally let down their guard against strangers.

Soldiers could not continue to eat with their spears on their backs, even though the regulations written by Euffel Mondrich himself stipulated that soldiers must keep their guns in their hands, so they made a compromise by sitting down around an old cloth with the gun unloaded on his lap.

The small wooden bowl is one for each person, and the large pot is placed directly in the middle. A group of people ate sliced bread over the broth, chatting about home cooking and interesting things in the camp. The small merchant was not in a hurry to test it, so he kept asking if the soup was too salty, how he roasted the meat, and whether it was delicious......

"I've got a craft that my father handed down." The small merchant brushed his goatee and looked proud, boasting about his products without shame. "In the future, I will rely on a few brothers to patronize more, and it is better to give a few kind words to the brothers of other battalions......

He wanted to create an image of making a fortune in a muffled voice, so that the soldiers in front of him understood that the banquet was just to let them go back and open up sales, not to win over relationships, let alone to manipulate them.

Most people think that the grilled dried meat that doesn't cost money is a hook, but how can you catch a big fish with only a string of meat? That's just the fodder for nesting.