They were still a long way from the gates of the Stone Fort, but the speed of the convoy had slowed down significantly, and there were even cases where they had only made three turns for nearly an hour.

In front of the Dunlun Merchant Regiment, what appeared to be a long line of carriages from the same merchant group moved slowly, and at the end of the line of sight, the soldiers of the Raymond family were carefully searching each carriage for suspicious objects at the checkpoint.

Among the five realms of the empire, the territory of the northern territory is the most vast, but due to the harsh climate all year round, there are not many nobles who are willing to use the northern region as a fief, and in this frosty land, in addition to the duke of the northern realm, there are only three marquises, compared to the remaining four realms of more than a dozen marquises, the number of marquis in the north is very small, but because of this, the strength of these three marquis is far from being comparable to the marquis of the other four realms.

They are nominally vassals of the Duke of the North, but in fact they are divided into factions, secretly wrestling with each other, among which Francis Raymond is the strongest, with a standing army of 9,000 well-armed soldiers almost equivalent to the strength of two or three ordinary marquises, and Stone Fort, as the most important city of the Raymond family, needs to go through quite strict inspections to enter and exit the city gate.

The convoy of the Tun Lo Merchant Regiment was quite far behind, and according to the speed of the checkpoints ahead, it might be their turn to be tested at dusk, and the long road in front of the Stone Fort Gate was filled with all sorts of convoys and travelers, but no one tried to crowd forward to gain a position to enter the city faster.

The reason is simple, just on both sides of the road, from time to time there will be several groups of cavalry running and patrolling, unlike the regular regiments of the Raymond family, in that these patrolling cavalry are more sturdy, and do not wear standard swords or standard cavalry guns, each of them holds a stout and sturdy long wooden rod in their hands, which looks like an enlarged version of the rolling pin, but this stick is not as smooth as the rolling gang, but has many iron nails slanted and inlaid with it.

Merchants who often walk this trade route are not too unfamiliar with this cavalry team, they are the discipline team of the Raymond family, and they have always been responsible for maintaining order in the convoy to be inspected.

The reason why these caravans are so orderly is because of the unique style of the Commandment Team.

Although the name of the team has the word precept in it, the precepts that this team thinks are obviously different from what ordinary people know, in previous years, when the prestige of the precept team was not yet resounding, there were many merchants who tried to occupy the front position, and when facing these people, the cavalry of the precept team would not come forward to warn even a word, they did it more directly.

As long as the merchants who violate the established order, they will be carried out of the ranks directly by these strong men, and before you can react to what is happening, the thick wooden sticks will directly greet you in the face with the wind, if you die under a blow, very good, if not, then even better, they will directly tie your shoulders to the horse with two thick ropes, step on the horse's back and pull the reins, drag the person far away for a lap and then circle back, at this time the horse is only dragging a cloud of flesh and blood that cannot distinguish the form, they will still leave these things on both sides of the road, and it will take a week to send someone to clean them up。

Blood forged the prestige of the Discipline Corps.

After that, pedestrians to and from Stone Fort would rather wait a few days than compete in the queue again.

Tunlo had been lined up since sunrise in the morning, and it was not until the sun was about to set that their previous merchant group had just finished inspecting it, and no fires were allowed on this stretch of road, so at noon they had to swallow water to make paste-like rations.

Morgan and Marcus walked to the checkpoint and handed over the paperwork and the records of previous years' trade to the soldiers in charge of the inspection, along with a bag of heavy coins, and they knew that proper checks would make it easier to clear customs and not have to worry about being deliberately troubled.

Sure enough, the soldiers were obviously very useful for the money bags, and because the convoy of the Dunlun merchant group did not have a few carriages, the routine inspection was quickly completed, and just as they were about to let the merchant group enter the city, one of the soldiers suddenly saw Daphne in the crowd, and his eyes brightened instantly.

"You, stand up. He pointed at Daphne and hooked his hand.

Devany walked out a little confused, and it wasn't until she saw that the soldier's gaze was always fixed on the fine lines of her breasts.

"I suspect you have something dangerous hidden on your chest, come and get checked. So saying, the soldier and two other comrades walked to the stone house at the checkpoint, which had only doors and no windows, and three men and a woman went in, and knew with their toes what the so-called inspection was all about.

Hodge stepped forward and whispered at the soldier's back, "She's a doctor in the merchant group, so I don't think it's necessary." ”

Herbalists are a respected profession everywhere, and the reason he threw out the title was to keep the examining soldiers from acting so unscrupulously.

The soldier paused, turned around, looked at Daphne, and then at Hodge standing beside her, "Doctor, do you have any qualifications from the Herbal Medicine Association?"

"Nope. ”

Devany replied naturally, in fact, a considerable number of herbalists do not have the qualifications issued by the Herbalist Association, but their identities are recognized, which is not difficult to make sense in common sense, but in the eyes of the soldiers who deliberately make things difficult for them, it has become a loophole that can be exploited.

"No, that's even more suspicious!"

The soldier said in a cold voice, "Come here, you have to check if you are suspicious." ”

Hodge frowned slightly, it seemed that these soldiers were determined to trouble them.

"We have reason to refuse unjustified inspection requests. ”

The soldier at the head bared his teeth and looked at him with malicious intent: "Boy, it is our duty to investigate suspicious characters, there is nothing legitimate or improper, you protect her so much, you won't be in league with her." ”

He took a closer look at Hodge, and although he was a man, he was even more beautiful than the woman he had his eye on, and immediately decided: "It seems that you have to be examined well." ”

Hodge took Daphne's hand and took a step back.

Seeing this, the soldier decisively pulled out his saber and looked at the two gloomily: "What, you want to run?

Seeing that this was not good, Morgan hurriedly ran over and took out another bag of coins from his bosom and handed it to the soldier to make a round.

The moneybag soldier accepted it unceremoniously, but instead of letting go of Daphne and Hodge's thoughts, he pushed Morgan and scolded, "Get out! ”

Hodge stiffened his grip on Daphne's hand, he had no idea that this would happen when he entered the city, and he couldn't find a suitable solution after calculating in his mind many times.

Can you only forcibly break through at the expense of revealing your identity?

Just as the soldiers approached them with their swords raised, and were about to start arresting, a thunderous sound of horses' hooves galloped in, forcibly breaking the stalemate.