The old village chief Bright was sitting in the living room, he was resisted by the rebels in the north in the summer, he was injured a little, and now his leg injury is healed, but once he is old, it is difficult to leave him when he picks up a cane.

He rubbed the yew wood cane in his hand, and was chatting with old Sheila with or without a ride, nothing more than some trivial matters in the village.

This winter, the village chief of Bright no longer has to worry about the villagers not having enough to eat, and the house where they live has been blown off the roof by the snowstorm, but there are still a lot of trivial matters, and after the autumn harvest festival, the village of Wall broke out like a blowout of the wave of marriage, probably because he has some spare money in his hand, the house can withstand the wind and snow, the granary of the family is full of wheat, and the young people in the village have begun to marry back a group of girls from other villages, causing the population of Wall Village to surge.

Many villagers were not well fed and clothed, and at that time they had to worry about filling up every day, and everyone would be polite to each other, and no matter who was in trouble at that time, they could stretch out a hand to help.

But now everyone is idle all of a sudden, all by the fireplace in the house to hide from the cold winter, except for two meals a day, only the little thing in bed after nightfall, life becomes boring and inevitably there will be some grievances and contradictions, every day noisy, not family disputes, or conflicts between neighbors, so that the old village chief Bright is a little tired to cope.

At this time of year, the men of the village did not know which forest farm to haul the wood in!

'A bunch of bored idlers, you have to find something to do for them.' That's what the old village chief Bright thought.

It's just that with the arrival of winter, the land is blocked by ice and snow, and there is not much that can be done in winter.

That's why Chief Bright can't wait to find Surdak.

Seeing Surdak coming down from the second floor wearing a clean set of leather armor, old Sheila raised her head, looked at Surdak with her somewhat cloudy eyes, and looked at Surdak with a calm face: "Oh, you're back!" ”

"I just saw you sleeping, and I didn't wake you up!" Surdak walked down the stairs, stood beside Sheila Sr., and hugged her.

"I'll go see little Peter, you guys can talk here!" Seeing Surdak coming, old Sheila stood up tremblingly and walked slowly to her room.

Surdak sat across from the village chief of Bright and asked the old chief, "Uncle Bright, everything is okay in the village lately!" ”

"Fortunately, once everyone is idle, there will always be people who seem restless." After the old village chief said this, the quarrels between those idle and boring villagers appeared in his mind, and he smiled indifferently, those boring quarrels had been resolved under his own suppression.

Village Chief Bright casually asked, "You went out this time and everything went well?" ”

Surdak glanced at Andrew and Samira, who were waiting on the side, and said casually: "There is a great gain from going out this time, that is, the formation of the militia battalion and the cavalry battalion needs to be completed as soon as possible, the news from the upper nobles, there may be some actions on the side of Bena Province tomorrow spring, and there must be some frequent movements in the barracks around the country, the security on this side of the barren land is already very bad, if another barracks are withdrawn at that time, I am afraid that the defense line on this side will be even more fragile, I want to arm the militia in the barren land as soon as possible, This part of the ordnance has to come out of the city of Hailanza, and the warriors may have very strict requirements for the physical strength and skills and tactics of the villagers, so I am ready to develop a group of archers in the militia camp, as long as they can pick up bows and crossbows, they can build an effective defense system in each village. ”

He paused for a moment, and then said: "According to the order of the upper echelons of Bena Province, I have to prepare a cavalry battalion in this short period of time, as for the cavalry, I want to go to the villages to recruit it, the biggest difference between the cavalry battalion and the militia battalion is that I need some veterans with rich combat experience, whether they can ride horses is secondary, but they must be experienced in combat, Uncle Bright, do you think I can recruit enough people in the barren land?" ”

"Ah, is there going to be a war?" Hearing Surdak say this, the old village chief asked in surprise.

Surdak shook his head slightly, and said: "That's not it, it's just that the plane war has never stopped, and I will go to the plane with the army next year to garrison, I'm afraid I will have to stay there for a while." ”

"You want to recruit some cavalry, there should be some people in our village who can do it, but there will definitely not be too many."

Only then did the old village chief know that after becoming a nobleman, he still had the responsibility of defending the territory for the empire, in fact, everything has two sides, and being able to participate in the war of the plane is also an excellent opportunity to earn military merits, and it seems that this task is not difficult, it is just a plane garrison.

Surdak continued: "So...... Uncle Brett still needs you to manage this side of the village, I can't take care of this side, not only that, but we also need to leave the barren land and build a militia battalion that is enough to protect the barren land, at least to resist the bandit groups flowing from the desert side, and the province of Bena may not be too calm recently, I just hope that the chaos will not spread here. ”

When the old village chief Bright heard Surdak say this, he asked, "What are your plans for next spring?" Now that the reservoir has been built, there is no need to worry about not being able to grow crops in the dry season in spring and summer. ”

At this time, Rita came out of the kitchen with a pot of lemon tea, made everyone steaming tea, and brought some pastries before sitting down, she also wanted to hear about the plans for the next year in the village of Wall.

"Of course, but when we open up the tidal flats, we are actually reducing the size of the swampy depressions, so that when the rainy season comes, the tidal flats will be washed away by floods without developed drainage channels, so the drainage channels need to be dug wide enough," Surdak said. ”

"With this year's experience, it is not a problem to develop some tidal flats." The old village chief Bright said. "There's something I've always wanted to discuss with you!"

“…… You say. Surdak knew that this was the purpose of the old village chief's visit.

The old village chief rubbed his wrinkled forehead with his hand, and after a deep sigh, he said: "Recently, everyone in the village may have lost the pressure of life, and they can't find any place to vent their excess energy, so I thought I should find something to do for them......

"You're going to form a road repair team of villagers?" Surdak asked in surprise.

In fact, even if the old village chief doesn't say anything about this, he plans to do it.

"That's what it is." The old village chief nodded and admitted, "I'm going to let them rest the mountain road from Vol Village to Hailanza. ”

In the opinion of the old village chief Bright, the city of Highlanza is separated from the barren land by Oak Ridge, and the road is winding and turning, even if it is a whole day on horseback, it is not that it must be repaired, but instead of letting them nest in the village, it is better to find something for the villagers to do.

But in this way, the village has to bear the cost of building the road, and also provide the villagers with three meals a day and a salary for free, which is not so much borne by the village of Wall, but by Surdak out of his own pocket, and the sulfur mines in the treasury of the village of Wall, which can be exchanged for gold coins, are strictly speaking, Surdak's private property.

"On such a cold day, wouldn't it be too hard to build roads, and go to Oak Ridge to dig stones...... Surdak didn't go on.

In fact, what he wanted to say was: 'Kobold slaves didn't do that hard work......

"It's okay, at this time in previous years, I didn't take everyone to the icy ravine to cut wood, and then transport those huge trees out to get a little salary, and it was easier to build roads than to transport wood." The old village chief, Bright, smiled freely.

He has lived in a barren land for so many years, and what kind of hardship has he not suffered......

Speaking of which, I can only complain that Surdak treated the group of kobold slaves too well.

The old village chief said with emotion: "I am considering that the barren land is located in the remote northwest area of Hailanza City, because the road leading to Hailanza City here is not smooth, every year there will be school-age children who miss the annual awakening ceremony, for so many years, no one in the barren land has awakened the magic pool and become a magician noble, if this road can be repaired, there are still so many four-wheeled carriages in the village, maybe there will not be any children who miss the awakening ceremony." ”

Now that it had snowed three times, the conditions on the other side of Oak Ridge had become extremely harsh, and Surdak thought that if something happened while building the road, it would be more than worth the cost.

He thought for a moment before saying to the old village chief, Bright: "Otherwise, we will change our goal and let the village road construction team build roads on the barren land, and I want to connect all the natural villages in the barren land with cement roads, so that once any village is attacked by desert bandits, it will be convenient for us to rush over to rescue." ”

The old village chief was a little unable to turn his mind, and he glared at Surdak and said, "Build a road in the barren land...... The land here is all wasteland, where is the need to build a road? ”

In fact, as the old village chief said, the Badlands is bordered by Oak Ridge to the south and the Paglos Mountains to the north, and large sand dunes are gradually spreading from the northwestern corner to the Badlands, while there are no mountains in the Badlands, not even the hills are very gentle slopes, except for a great rift valley running through the east and west in the center of the Badlands.

The old village chief couldn't understand why Surdak wanted to build a road on the wasteland of Yima Pingchuan, couldn't he walk without a road?

Surdak leaned over and pushed away the tea tray on the tea table in front of him, then dipped his finger in the teacup a little water, drew a simple outline of the barren land on the table, then drew a few simple lines with water, and placed a few small biscuits and teacups on the waterline, pointed to the teacup and said: "This cup represents the sentry post, this biscuit represents the bridge ......"

The old village chief, Bright, looked at the table with a confused expression.

Surdak went on to explain: "The road network I am talking about is not a simple concrete road, it also includes a series of additional facilities such as lookout posts, checkpoints and bridges, at least so that the cavalry has the ability to cross the Great Rift Valley, the camels of the desert bandits are more adapted to the Gobi Desert in the barren land, and if we want the militia battalion to have enough mobility, we need to have enough four-wheeled carriages to pull them, and I hope that no matter which natural village in the barren land is attacked by desert bandits, the militia battalion can be on the scene in less than half a day......"

The old village chief did not expect Surdak to have such a huge road construction plan.

"In fact, it is not as difficult to build a road in the barren land as you think, as long as you pave it with volcanic ash, sprinkle it with water, and compact it with stones, it can become a smooth cement road...... Surdak continued to tell the old village chief about his initial idea.

"So you've got these plans!" Andrew, who had been sitting quietly listening to the conversation between the two, couldn't help but interject: "Recently, the desert bandits have been harassing the villages on the edge of the desert again, although Gulitham and I went there to block the desert bandits a few times, but as long as they saw us, they fled far away, and they didn't dare to contact us at all, and our equestrian skills are not as good as them, as long as they let them enter the desert, it will be more difficult to catch up......

Andrew glanced at the half-elf archer beside him: "Recently, we have been worrying about these desert bandits, so you have already thought of a series of methods against them!" ”

"Expand the militia battalion, train the archer regiment, recruit veterans to form a cavalry battalion, build roads throughout the barren land, use the convenience of four-wheeled carriages to transport the combat strength of the militia battalion, and set up checkpoints in the barren land, these are all aimed at those desert bandits!" Andrew said with some excitement.

The head of the village of Bright heard Andrew, the indigenous warrior of the Nanai tribe, say this, and also found that there would be many benefits to building roads in the barren land, so he said no more.

He just wanted some energetic villagers to have something to do, and it would be relatively easier to build roads in the barren land.

"What? Those desert robbers are making trouble again? Surdak asked, raising an eyebrow.

Andrew looked a little depressed and said: "Yes, at the beginning, Gulit and I were able to block one or two unlucky desert bandits, but then they became alert and couldn't catch them, this time in addition to bringing back a batch of camels, we could only hang a few fresh heads on the cross of the mountain pass, and let the group of desert robbers escape into the depths of the desert." ”

Tomorrow spring, Surdak will leave the barren land with the cavalry battalion, and if these desert bandits cannot be properly dealt with, I am afraid that it will be a real trouble, even if a militia battalion with archers is formed, I am afraid that it may not be able to withstand these bandits.

Surdak rubbed his temples with some distress and said, "So it seems...... We have to find a way to deal with these desert bandits, let me think about it, the best scouts in the desert area should be the Hawkeye archers, I'll go around the city of Hylanza and see if I can hire a mercenary group with Eagle Eyes, if not, then I'll have to hire a magician, no matter what, we'll have to sweep these oases at the edge of the desert! ”

"It's long overdue! I've been able to endure this breath for a long time......" Andrew said excitedly, waving his fists and speaking to Samira beside him.