On the sentry tower on the outskirts of the villa, Owen and Ray, who had taken their place after knocking out the two mercenaries standing guard, had been waiting for Julian's signal. However, Julian and Ipeia have been in for more than half an hour, and there is still no signal, and when it is about to be time for the sentry to take over, Ray's impatience begins to attack again: "What the hell is Julian doing? ”

"This is Julian's place and we still have to respect his wishes. Wait. Owen reassured.

But Ray still couldn't calm down, he paced back and forth on the watchtower for two steps, stopped, and said, "Owen, do you think Julian's appearance in the Rocard Empire this time will be another ghost of the Central Church?"

"I don't know, but it's very likely. ”

Julian is still under the patronage's charges. Even if that bullshit pope is dead, he will disgust people. ”

"Don't say it. ”

Owen shook his hand and motioned for Ray not to continue the discussion on the issue.

But Lei didn't understand: "Isn't it? That bastard Pope is annoyed to think about it! ”

"Alas......," Owen sighed, "although the Pope was once our worst enemy and did a lot of things to hurt Sophia, he was always Uncle Mercone's father, and I saw with my own eyes the Pope's sincere expression of remorse on his deathbed, and it is also true that he sacrificed his life to save Sophia." ”

Hearing Owen say this, Ray couldn't help but squeeze out a somewhat embarrassed smile: "I understand." Owen, you and Uncle Mercone are like father and son, no matter what happens to the Pope, you can be regarded as half a relative. You don't want to hear someone say bad things about your loved ones. ”

"Hmm. Owen smiled and nodded with a "thank you for understanding" expression, ending the conversation between the two.

However, the silence did not last long.

Ray took the initiative to open the conversation again: "Owen, tell me honestly, what is the purpose of your coming to the Rokar Empire?"

"Didn't you say that?" Owen looked at Ray with strange eyes, "I'll help you find the Golden Dragon Clan together, and take care of each other on the way." ”

"Not true. You must have other purposes. ”

"For what purpose?"

"I don't know. Probably you have divined something, or have some strange thoughts or plans, but you don't want to tell me. Anyway, you must have something to hide from me. ”

"Why do you think this way?"

"I don't know, I just feel that way. ”

"You're thinking too much. ”

"I hope so. ”

Once again, the conversation between the two friends broke up. Ray, though impulsive and loving, is not stupid. He knew Owen's character, and he also knew that Owen didn't want to tell him about it, and it was useless to ask, so he simply shut up to avoid hurting the friendship between the two.

At this moment, on the third floor of the villa, in the room where the Duchess Victoria lived, a faint light lit up, and then quickly went out, and then the light came on and out three times in a row, and finally fell silent, as if nothing had ever happened.

"Owen, look! Julian signaled. ”

"Good. Act as planned. ”

The two of them raised the alarm bell on the watchtower.

"Bang", "Bang", "Bang", "Bang", ......

The loud, hurried bells rang through the wilderness.

At the same time, about ten kilometers from the lakeside villa, on the riverside of a tributary of the Tefner River.

More than 20 soldiers, more than 20 hunting dogs, and several war horses stayed on the embankment.

General Bazak Menavino and his own reconnaissance team found the place with their nimble noses.

"Porphyry", "Porphyry".

Two shirtless soldiers poked their heads out of the water. ......One of the soldiers took a deep breath, straightened his breath, and briefly stated his findings, "There is a large metal object under the water, and it should be our ironclad chariot. ”

"Hmph!" the general sneered, "these gangsters are more cunning than expected, and it seems that they have long thought that I will do something on the chariot, so they deliberately drove the chariot so far away, so that the hound would attract us, and they may have fled in the opposite direction." ”

"General, what should we do now?" asked the officer who served as the deputy.

General Menavino rubbed the sparse fibrous roots of his chin thoughtfully.

It was here that a rapid bell rang in the distance.

"General, listening to the sound seems to be the warning bell in the army to alert the enemy to an attack. Could it be that the nearby emperor's stronghold was attacked by gangsters?"

"No, there is no stronghold of the emperor nearby, which is where Madame Rousseau rests. There are mercenary guards there. ”

"Madame Rousseau......?

"That's right. It seems that there is trouble there, so I told everyone to pack up and rush over immediately. ”

General Menavino decisively gave the order for reinforcements. As a member of the military, Bazak naturally has no good impression of Grand Duke Rousseau, who has always been at odds with the military, although he also knows very well that Grand Duke Rousseau is an important minister with a high status in the power of Prince Yure, but if he sits idly by and watch Grand Duke Rousseau's wife fall into a crisis, then he will not be able to eat and walk around.

Located on the northern coast of the western side of the Brilliant Continent, there is a rich country founded by merchants, called the Republic of Monis, which has gone through several twists and turns since its inception, and has been jointly blocked by the Central Church and the surrounding powers many times, but finally survived to the present, on an equal footing with the great powers. Its unique political system is the cause of these blockades, and it is also the spiritual weapon that survives these tribulations.

As can be seen from the name of the country, among a large number of hereditary monarchies, the republican state of Monis is obviously a strange flower. It is nominally a retro republic, but it is very different from the ancient republican state with the consul as the head. The supreme leader of the state, Monis, is not a king or emperor, nor an obsolete consul, but a president. Below the president is the cabinet and parliament.

The Republic of Monis is a federal state composed of 27 city-states with each other's ** and a central special district of Monis, each of which has its own parliament, and the members of the parliament are democratically elected by the citizens of the city-state. These councillors are called city-state councillors. The number of councillors in each city-state ranged from 15 to 29 and constituted the council of the city-state.

In addition, the council of each city-state elected a member of parliament who came to the central district to form a more powerful council, which was called the parliament. The choice of who is the lord of each city-state is also decided by the vote of the citizens of the city-state. As for the election of the country's supreme leader, the president, it is more complicated. The president is not directly elected by the whole city-state, but is elected separately in each city-state, but not by the citizens with one vote, but by the members of the city-state's parliament, as long as a presidential candidate wins the most votes in the city-state's parliament, then all the votes of the city-state belong to that candidate, and finally, the candidate who wins the most parliamentary votes among all the city-states becomes the president, and then the president forms a cabinet, appoints officials, and governs the country.

On the surface, the system of the Republic of Monis appears to be fair and superior to the surrounding monarchies, but in reality it is not, because their so-called "democratic elections" are extremely deceptive.

There are two reasons for this: first, the distinct household registration system between nobles and commoners is the social foundation of the Holy Light Cult state, and Monis is no exception, and the citizens of this country are also divided into two classes, nobles and commoners, and there is no difference in the difference between other monarchies. Moreover, for more than 300 years after the founding of the country, the commoners did not have the right to vote, and whether it was to elect a member of parliament or the president, it was the entertainment of the nobles, and it was not until about 40 years ago that the rulers of Monis gave the right to vote to the commoners after the uprising of the commoners against the aristocracy that swept through the three continents. However, the right of the commoner to vote was greatly restricted, firstly, only a commoner family was allowed to have one vote, while the nobility was one vote per person, even if it was a newborn baby; secondly, the families of those who did not have a job or served in the army, criminals, beggars, and their families would be stripped of their votes; and the parliament could deprive the plebeian families of the nobility of the right to vote under various pretexts. Such an election result is not representative of the majority at all.

As for the second root cause, it is the old question of "who has the final say" in the country. In fact, the people who really rule this country are not the president, nor the parliament or the parliamentarians, nor the entire people, but the three major chaebols: Marcus, Longfort, and Morgen. In the absence of the Monis Republic, the predecessors of these three chaebols were hereditary dukes and nobles, and later, for some reason, the three nobles lost their fiefs and were forced to do business. In order to restore the glory of the past, they gradually established their own country, and the three major chaebols funded the establishment of the Monis Republic, and they have been controlling the country behind the scenes.

According to Monis's law, the president, the lord of the city, and the councillors cannot be hereditary, but the president and vice president of the Chamber of Commerce can, in fact, the president of the Monis Chamber of Commerce is hereditary by the Marcus family, and the Longford family and the Morgen family have long occupied the position of two vice presidents. The so-called "democratic elections" in this country are subject to strict interference by the Chamber of Commerce. The vast majority of the elected parliamentarians are from the side branches of the three chaebols or those who are closely related to the three chaebols. The presidents who have been elected to power in Tongguò may not be the people of the three chaebols, but they must serve the three chaebols. In other words, both the president and the legislators are actually the big stewards hired by the three major chaebols with power to help them run the country.

The influence of the three chaebols is everywhere. The speech of the Monis Republic is relatively free, people can walk loudly and shout at the president, the city lord or the parliamentarian will not be arrested, but there is absolutely no criticism of the three chaebols, if someone harms the interests of the three chaebols, then the only thing they can do is to prepare a coffin for themselves. Even presidents are no exception, and in the short 400-year history of the founding of the country, there are not a few presidents who have been assassinated for offending the three major chaebols.

The reason why the three major chaebols have so much energy is that in addition to controlling the country's economic lifeline, they also control the army. For example, the Morgen family controls maritime trade and the country's navy, the Langfu family controls the landing trade and the army, and the most powerful Marcus family is the big boss of all the money houses in Monis, in other words, any flow of money in this country is carried out in the palm of the Marcus family's hands, and militarily, the Marcus family controls the internal security forces and the secret intelligence agencies.

When it comes to the secret intelligence agency of the Monis Republic, I have to mention the "Night Owl Assassination Squad" that makes everyone in the three continents talk about it. This mysterious organization is responsible for eliminating dissidents and maintaining the status of the three chaebols internally, and is skilled in infiltration, poisoning, kidnapping, assassination, and chaos externally, and has made great contributions in the foreign wars of the Republic of Monis. However, because of these elusive, murderous, and notorious methods, they were disgraced by the knightly class, who had always regarded themselves as upright, so much so that the Central Church also questioned them for raising teachers, for which the Republic of Monis has always denied the existence of the Night Stalker Assassination Team. Although everyone knew that these businessmen were playing scoundrels and telling nonsense with their eyes open, since the Night Stalker Assassination Squad had been coming and going without a trace, and no matter whether the mission was successful or not, they would not leave any traces or evidence sufficient to prove their identity, so the unfounded Central Church and other countries had no choice but to acquiesce in this open secret.

However, there are no airtight walls in the world.

At this time, the bounty hunter Joyka is walking alone through the streets of the capital of this pseudo-democratic country. Four days had passed since the battle to sweep the snakes and cocks in the mountains of Kuka, but Joika had not boarded the airship and left the merchant country, not only Joika, but also Sophia and Cassius. Because in the past few days, there have been some inexplicable events that have hindered their departure, and all these signs point to the legendary and mysterious secret service - the Night Stalker Assassination Squad.

Joyka was standing in the doorway of a casino. He didn't come here to bumper his luck and relieve his stress, as usual, but to solve some mystery