"Your Majesty, there is a local village and town in front, there are no Taiping soldiers, let's go there and buy some food first."

Several Swedish guards dressed in the cotton robes of local villagers said to Karl X, who was also wearing them.

"Okay."

The downcast Karl X replied in a bitter tone.

Three days and three nights had passed since the breakout fiasco, and after the failure of the breakout, Karl X's troops withdrew to reorganize and found that there were less than a thousand people left, and many of the noble generals who led the team had disappeared without a trace, and I don't know whether they were killed in battle or fled early.

The most fatal thing is that the 5th Grenadier Division of the Taiping Army, which was also greatly damaged, entangled all the remaining reserve troops, and launched a crazy pursuit of Karl X and his party.

The remnants of the army led by Karl X were completely dispersed in less than a day under the frantic pursuit of the 5th Grenadier Division, and Karl X escaped with his personal guards, not even daring to ride a war horse, because the elite grenadiers of the Taiping Army chose to chase and kill the horsemen.

It was precisely because Karl X did not ride a war horse and changed into the clothes of an ordinary soldier that he escaped from the elite grenadiers of the Taiping Army under the cover of his own soldiers.

After escaping from the pursuit, Karl X and his entourage were located in the territory of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom, after the defeat of the Swedish Legion, the Fifth Grenadier Division had restored the authority of the local Heavenly Kingdom, and the new local security regiment was re-established.

The Swedish rout may be able to break through the white security regiment, but it will reveal its escape direction and be annihilated by the elite grenadier detachment of the Taiping Army who arrive later.

With the arrival of the main force led by Hong Tiancheng, the strength of the Taiping army increased significantly, and the area of control gradually spread to the lost territory originally occupied by the Swedish legion, capturing the Swedish rout.

In fact, the Taiping army made such a great effort, mainly to arrest the big fish of Karl X, and the Taiping army had learned from the Swedish captives that their king was not killed in battle, so they made great efforts to temporarily organize and establish a security regiment, and sent Taiping army detachments everywhere to intercept the Swedish rout.

With the arrival of other elite grenadier divisions of the Taiping Army, this blockade will become tighter and tighter.

Karl X and his party naturally knew about it, so after fleeing, they hurried towards the border without stopping, and attacked a group of local villagers, ripping off their clothes and changing them.

Even then, Karl X's personal guard was reduced to less than 10 people.

Fortunately, they were not far from the border, and it was the first time that Karl X and others went to local villages and towns to buy food.

Karl X and his guards were already hungry, and they had little time to gather food, let alone hunt, as they fled.

After checking that there was no trace of Han Chinese in the village, Karl X's guards finally made up their minds to go inside and replenish some necessities.

After Karl X and his party entered the village without danger, ate a full meal, and bought a lot of food, there were no accidents.

However, in the hidden corners that Karl X and others were not aware of, there were already several pairs of greedy eyes staring at their group, and there was no other, just because Karl X and others were too 'generous' when they paid!

In a poor and backward village and town, Karl X and others paid directly with gold, if they were not targeted, it would really be unreasonable!

Karl X and others also had to do this, they did not have the currency of Poland and Lithuania at all (the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom has always relied on robbery and direct collection of material taxes, so no currency was issued, and the civilians in the areas controlled by the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom also used the metal currency printed during the Polish-Lithuanian Kingdom, but it was only used in intra-civilian transactions, and the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom officially did not recognize it. ）

In this era, there was no concept of paper money, and metal money was used, which is commonly known as gold and silver coins.

However, at this time, the Taiping army was offering a reward everywhere for the capture of the Swedish router, and if the currency of the Swedish kingdom was taken out at this time, wouldn't there be no three hundred taels of silver here?

Therefore, Karl X simply settled with the gold he carried with him.

As the hard currency of European countries, gold is naturally good, but its value is too ......

So, when Karl X and others were out of the village, they were stopped by the security team of the village and town!

A flag of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom fluttering in the wind, a cheap red turban twisted around his head, and a variety of cold weapons in his hands, only the leader held an old-fashioned arquebus in his hand.

The village security team composed of more than 20 people surrounded Carl X and his party of 6 people.

"The Great Heavenly King, I suspect that your actions have violated the supreme laws of the Heavenly Kingdom, so go back with us and explain slowly."

The captain of the security team, who wanted the local gangster leader to become a regular no matter how he looked at it, shouted to Carl X and his party in the villagers' uniform while digging his nostrils.

At the same time, more than 20 members of the security team, armed with various cold weapons, cooperated and raised their weapons upward, signaling them to be honest.

What Karl X didn't know was that this was a common method used by the small security forces in remote villages and towns of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom to blackmail outsiders, find a reason or simply move out of the banner of the Heavenly Kingdom, say that the strangers were guilty, and then bring them back and squeeze the last copper coin before letting them go.

These security teams are only trying to make money, and they don't mean to hurt people, unless the extorted party dares to resist, but the security team will also send people to secretly observe the strangers before the action, and once the other party has more people and stronger weapons, they will naturally not do it.

Karl X and his party tried their best to hide their identities, and their weapons were hidden deep in their clothes, and they used delicate flintlock handcuffs and close-fitting short blades, so they looked like ordinary merchants without weapons.

Karl X squinted his eyes slightly at the captain of the security team, smiled and threw the money bag on his waist: "This money is enough for you and your people to buy a good piece of land to live, how about letting us go?" ”

The captain of the security team stretched out his hand to check the money bag, weighed the weight in his hand, and couldn't wait to open the money bag, and the bright gold nuggets inside suddenly blinded his titanium alloy dog eyes......

", boss, this group of outsiders is really fat, and a casual throw is enough for the brothers to eat for a lifetime!"

Karl X looked at the undisguised fierce light in the eyes of the security team and the others, his brows furrowed, he seemed to underestimate the greed of this group of people.