The time is long because of the wait.

Who said this. Chen Jian didn't remember it anymore, but now he deeply realized the incomparable correctness of this sentence.

After a few days of time crawling forward like a snail with a heavy shell on its back in the helpless waiting of Jian Chen, Earl Mrak, who had always been known for his marching speed on the mainland, finally appeared in Hammondale in his anticipation of seeing through the autumn water.

Chen Jian was really full of resentment about the speed of this earl's hurry.

The arrival of Count Mrak allowed Jian Chen to finally start recruiting militia under his name, and he visited the Earl, and he was familiar with it, and by the way, he took a form on the issue of recruitment, and hung up his name, and the three hundred human soldiers were recruited by the lord on the same day - the militiamen who were originally recruited during the war couldn't wait to join the lord's command, and the half-elf Pete chose left and right, From these qualified candidates, who had been trained for some time, three hundred of the best and strongest guys were selected to join this local army of Harmondale, which was nominally subordinate to Earl Mrak, but was actually under the command of Chen Jian and named the "Harmondale Guard" by the Empress.

And the half-elf Pete was honored to serve as the first commander of this army, becoming the captain of this defense team, and his original position as the head of the guard of the lord guard was taken over by Orison, a large-eared monster with excellent performance and superb martial skills.

Such an important position was given to a big-eared monster, and the unexpected appointment made the soldiers and lords once again see the lord's clear attitude towards his subordinates.

As long as you are loyal, as long as you are capable, no matter what race you are, you can be reused here by Lord Hammondal! This knowledge spread rapidly among the soldiers and the people.

Three hundred recruits, not counting recruits, were along with the guards soldiers. Under the leadership of the half-elf Pete and the big-eared monster Orison, the new equipment was quickly distributed, although it nominally belonged to the emperor's ** team, but the money for the equipment had to be paid by the lord himself, in this regard, Chen Jian was not heartbroken, a full set of imperial ordinary infantry equipment, leather armor, helmets, combat boots, gloves, and cloaks were a lot, but in terms of weapons, they only asked for heavy crossbows and round iron shields, and other things Chen Jianjue did not use and had no choice, but Rao was so, These equipment also went to the lord's thousands of gold coins, no way, those heavy crossbows are too expensive.

For these important forces to save his life in the troubled times, Chen Jian is quite important, so the powerful heavy crossbow was assigned to each soldier by him, the use of the bow and crossbow is also one of the important combat skills that the soldiers must master, Chen Jian, who was seriously affected by the heat weapon war, used these heavy crossbows as two consecutive old-fashioned muskets, in order to make them play the greatest role in the battle, the lord also took great care to recall the Spanish phalanx he had seen on the Internet before, as far as he knew, This kind of battle array using spearmen and arquebusiers used to be powerful in the Middle Ages, and although the current continent of Erathia is not medieval and has magic as a weapon of mass destruction, it is still in the era of cold weapons, and this kind of battle array should be able to exert some power.

As a result, the specially made elongated spears with a length of six meters became a regular weapon for each soldier, although the lord did not know the length of the spears used by the Spanish spearmen. But this is the limit length that soldiers can successfully use their spears to stab, and this length has greatly reduced the accuracy of the spurs.

However, it is a pity that the lord of the Spanish phalanx has only read some written materials, and does not know how to arrange the formation, and there are not many soldiers in his hands at present, so the lord has to grope for how to apply the theory of the Spanish phalanx to practical operation without knowing why it is true.

In terms of spare weapons, Jian Chen chose a popular steel scimitar in the Erathian Empire, and the reason why he chose the scimitar instead of the long sword most commonly used in the Emperor's ** team is because at present, Jian Chen's subordinates have two experts in using knives, one is a half-elf Pete who is good at elven knife skills, and the other is a big-eared monster Orisen who has inherited the sword technique of the Wolf Knight of Krurod, and Chen Jian himself believes that the knife is more suitable than the sword to exert its power on the battlefield with crowds of people.

Therefore, at this time, the standard equipment of Chen Jian's lord's guard and the Hammondale defense force is the main weapon extended version of the military spur spear, the secondary weapon of the secondary weapon of the heavy crossbow with two consecutive rounds, and equipped with forty crossbow arrows, the spare weapon steel scimitar and the round iron shield, and the alternative weapon ordinary length version of the military spur spear, which is made to meet the needs of different battlefields, in some battlefields with narrow terrain, the extended version of the spear cannot be used. You have to change into this ordinary spear. Soldiers were also required to wear full armor and carry a full set of weapons for long marches and battles, so physical training became a top priority.

As a result, this strange weapon configuration made all the emperor ** team who saw the cross-country training of the Lord Guard and the Hammondale Defense Team laugh their big teeth, and they found that although the lord of Hammondale had a good brain and good personal strength, he was a complete rookie in terms of marching formation.

In this world, they have never seen an army use such a long spear, let alone that class of troops to carry such a variety of weapons at one time, spearmen are spearmen, crossbowmen are crossbowmen, sword and shield soldiers are sword and shield soldiers, one person carries so many weapons? This is simply a waste of the soldiers' physical strength!

Even the experienced Earl Mlak was a little unimpressed by this, and he had no friendship with Jian Chen, and he felt that this lord with outstanding abilities in the mouth of the empress was nothing more than that, plus he was originally a little dissatisfied with the fact that there was still an armed force in his new defense area that was not under his control, and he even underestimated Chen Jian a little, thinking that this time it was Her Majesty the Empress who looked away and overestimated Jian Chen's ability.

As for Empress Catherine's statement that Viscount Chen Jian had a lot of experience in military training, he was already skeptical, and now he is even more disdainful.

Chen Jian didn't care about these ridicules and Count Mlak's lukewarm attitude, and still stubbornly implemented the training plan he had set, and let the two guard captains take the soldiers to practice and drill every day.

Soon after, under the vigorous management of Queen Catherine, the construction work of Hammondale began to be carried out in an orderly manner, and a specially formed construction corps marched into Hammondal, and a large number of materials followed, the first to start construction was Fort Werning and White Cliff Pass, after the completion of these two buildings of great military importance, the construction of the new Hammondale Castle and the city of Harmondale.

and presided over the construction work. It was Lord Felix, who had been to Hammondale, a close confidant of the Empress who had served as a special envoy, and now came to Hammondale again, to be in charge of the general command and dispatch of this work.

It is worth mentioning that the Queen's diplomatic work with the Hill Dwarves went quite smoothly, and a team of hundreds of Dwarven engineers then marched into Hammondale and joined the construction work under the arrangement of Lord Felix.

The addition of these master builders greatly accelerated the progress of the project, as the Empress had expected, and the dwarves were amazed by their superb craftsmanship.

Felix also brought the empress's official reward document to Chen Jian, just as Chen Jian thought, the empress did not forget about it, and the reward for him was still quite generous in the eyes of others.

The first reward was that the empress promoted Chen Jian from the Viscount of the Empire to the Earl of the Empire, for which the Grand Lord Chen Jian set a record for the fastest promotion of the nobles of the empire in history - in less than half a year, he rose from a commoner, first to a viscount, and now to an earl.

The second reward was that the Empress gave Count Chen Jian a Medal of Courage, which was the highest military award in the Erathia Empire, and was only awarded to those leading generals who had made great achievements in war. This shows how satisfied Empress Catherine was with his performance in this battle.

The third reward, in the eyes of Chen Jianna's philistine, was more affordable, and Empress Catherine gave the lord of Hammondale a rather ornate Elasia Empire royal leather armor.

This specially made top-grade leather armor has always only been allocated to members of the imperial family and some high-ranking generals who have made great contributions to the empire, and ordinary nobles have no chance to get it at all, and it is definitely a sign of status and grace.

According to Jian Chen's understanding, this thing is equivalent to the yellow jacket in the Qing court drama that he watched when he was on earth, but this thing is much more useful than the flashy things like the yellow jacket.

Painted in the colors of the Empire, this sky-blue leather armor is not only exaggerated and ornate, but also extremely lightweight, and has excellent defensive performance, even surpassing most chain mail, and also has shoulder guards. It can provide more comprehensive protection for the wearer, and can be adjusted according to the wearer's figure, which is one of the rare top leather armor on the mainland.

At present, in the empire, the people who are qualified to wear this kind of leather armor, in addition to the members of the royal family, are also among the nobles and military generals, and the empress attaches great importance to him in this way.

The fourth reward is very much in line with Chen Jian's heart.

Because of Jian Chen's outstanding performance during this period, and in order to enable Jian Chen to better develop his territory and make more contributions to the empire, the Empress gave Jian a special award of 10,000 gold coins.

10,000 gold coins! Jian Chen's eyes sparkled as he looked at the several large boxes that Felix had let him carry into his camp, and he couldn't stop smiling.

This time I finally got some real benefits, and the happy Chen Jian was a little emotional.

In addition, it should be noted that the payment for a large number of magic materials sold by Jian Chen to the empire was also sent by Lord Felix, which made Jian Chen's wallet, which had been shriveled for a while, plump up again, and his figure was very enchanting.

With the money, the first thing the lord did was to repay the loan of the lords first, of course, the ten percent of the remuneration was also distributed at the same time, which made the lords' trust in the lord rise again, and also made those lords who had recovered their loans before the elven invasion beat their chests with regret, because they missed a great opportunity to make money in vain.

Looking at the ten percent more gold coins in his hand, the tavern owner Old Kobe's folded face almost didn't smile a flower.

This is called some people rejoicing and some people are sad.

After some time, the alien prisoners of war that Her Majesty had told Jian Chen also arrived.

The first group of alien prisoners of war to arrive in Hammondale under military escort numbered only a hundred, including big-eared monsters, cavemen, and some Medusa.

These prisoners of war were captured by the empire in the last war, and the big-eared monsters among them were not from the big-eared monsters of Diya, but the big-eared monsters of the Krurod barbarian kingdom, and the barbarians of Krurod took advantage of the emptiness of the western border of the empire in the last war, and attacked the empire to seize territory, but were driven back by the empress, and a large number of troops were caught up by the emperor's ** team on the way back, and they were either killed or surrendered to the empire. became prisoners of war, and these big-eared monsters were also a part of it.

The cave people and Medusa are from the Negan Lords' country, these members of the expeditionary force of the Negan lords were defeated all the way after being driven out of Standwick City, and they were also cut off by the emperor's ** team, most of them died in the territory of the Erathian Empire, only a few escaped back to the undersea tunnel, and some of the guys who had no way to escape chose to surrender and became prisoners of war.

Before being sent to Hammondale, these alien prisoners of war were all working as coolies in the mines of the Empire, living a miserable life without a meal, and many of them died of exhaustion, sickness and starvation.

In this war-torn world, there is no preferential treatment for prisoners of war, and prisoners of war generally only have two ends, either executed or free coolies, and you blame yourself for your bad luck if you can't survive and die.

Although there is a custom of redeeming prisoners of war with money on the continent of Erathia, this practice is generally limited to some generals or special people, and it is not uncommon to ransom ordinary soldiers, but it is rare.

The reason why the elven king Parson proposed to Empress Catherine to ransom the prisoners of war during the previous peace talks between the two sides was also because he was worried that some elven warriors would fall into the hands of the other party, and it would be difficult to explain to the people of the clan - although the elves reject other races, they are still quite good to the people of their own race, which is a tradition.

If the elven king knew that the other party was only a few dwarves and centaurs who did not matter in his eyes, then it is difficult to say whether he would still propose the redemption of prisoners of war, you know, the cost of redeeming prisoners of war is quite a lot, and the side that holds prisoners of war will always take this opportunity to make a lion mouth and make a lot of money to subsidize the losses caused by the war, so often the money for ransom an ordinary soldier is enough to retrain five or six recruits.

Therefore, when Empress Catherine said that there were no prisoners of war at all, the Elven King would be convinced.

In fact, after some time, the Elven Kingdom discovered that Lord Hammondale had prisoners of war in his hands, but after the Elven King sent someone to investigate and found that it was only some dwarves and centaurs, he did not send anyone to try to rescue these prisoners of war or ask the Elasia Empire for their guilt.

First, I don't want to spend that unjust money, and secondly, if this incident causes the empire and the empress to be unhappy, and then affects my plan to recover Diya, it will be too unprofitable.

So in the end, the matter was over, and the dwarves and centaurs had to stay in Hammondal.

And Krurod's barbarian kingdom has always been a relatively poor country, plus it has always been at odds with Bracada in the Holy Alliance, so it has no good impression of the Erathia Empire in alliance with Bracada, and after losing the battle, these barbarians have fled back to their own country, advocating the supremacy of the jungle and force, so they will not bother to engage in diplomacy with the enemy, let alone spend money to ransom some ordinary soldiers.

And the great lords of Negan fled in embarrassment after the defeat, their strength was greatly damaged, and after they returned, they were worried that other lords would take advantage of the situation, and they were busy recruiting troops and grabbing territory again, how could they have time to care about the life or death of these ordinary soldiers who were captured by the enemy?

So these prisoners of war were ruthlessly abandoned by their former homeland, and after a day in the mines of the Empire, they were suddenly summoned, and many thought that the Empire had finally decided to gather them together and execute them.

To their surprise, they found themselves being taken to a small town that seemed to be on the border of the Empire, where they were reincarnated.

After receiving the news from the empress using the magic teleportation array, Jian Chen had already asked Felix to arrange for men to build a prisoner of war camp for these alien prisoners of war who might be his own soldiers in the future, and took the empress's order to Count Mlak to transfer an army of 500 people to be stationed near the prisoner of war camp, just in case.

The unknown POWs were a little puzzled by the fact that they had been locked up again, and they didn't understand why the Empire had gone to such lengths to send them here.

What's even more strange is that the treatment in this prisoner of war camp turned out to be very good, the newly built cells were not only clean, but everyone was given a new set of bedding and a change of clothes, and the food was good, at least the meals were full.

Before being put in a new cell, they were also arranged to take a bath, and some of the unclean ones were ordered to be washed again.

This was undoubtedly a great joy for the filthy prisoners of war who had not bathed for a long time, but it also added to their fears.

When things are abnormal, they are demons! Going from heaven to hell is scary, but suddenly going from hell to heaven is also very difficult to accept.

Naturally, the new POWs began to ask the former residents of the camp about the situation.