The elderly tribune was clearly unkind to the Livius father and son, and had already called them bastards.

"Hiding in the mountains? Don't Levius even want his own manor? ”

Wendy didn't understand, and she and Risardillan looked at each other, and they both shook their heads together.

"There are a lot of minerals in the mountains, all of which are the property of the Levius family...... That bastard father and son probably think that the minerals are more important than the manor......"

The tribune didn't seem to be foolish, but that's all he knew, after all, he was too old to go out and investigate.

But the lord could understand that the father and son of Livius had offended all the people around them, and they obviously felt that they were not very safe in their own estate.

Since Livius had abandoned his estate, the lord would move in directly with his team, so as not to waste time setting up camp.

The governor's family estate was large, with dozens of mansions dotted together on the mountainside.

This is a typical high-walled compound of the old Bacchus, in the nature of a courtyard, with many high arches and huge stone columns, but it does not have a towering castle like the high nobility of Pande.

In fact, if a castle had been built here, the village would probably have been called Fidnéfort – a place that is much larger than a village in its size.

The location and view of the manor are very good, the mountain is the valley road leading to the entrance of the village, and the whole village can be seen directly through the valley of more than 100 meters in the manor.

Probably the only thing that is not so good is that this manor is isolated on the mountain, and once the foot of the mountain is surrounded, there is nowhere to run.

"Is this already the narrowest place in the neighborhood?"

The lord stood on the terrace at the top of the manor, looked around, and pointed to the location at the entrance of the village and asked.

"Yes, it was originally a road to transport ore in the canyon, and then it was widened by more people, and now it is so wide."

Seeing that Leon had occupied the estate of the Livius family and began to survey the terrain, the old tribune's eyes lit up: "This ...... My lord, are you going to deal with that bastard father and son? ”

"To be honest, I'm here mainly to deal with the Serpent Cult, and I'm going to have to fight an ambush around here...... But I don't have enough manpower, and this valley hundreds of meters wide is not easy to seal the enemy......"

The lord did not deceive the tribune, and when he fought outside, he must have to find the help of locals who are familiar with the terrain.

"Snake worship? I really want the Serpent Cult to kill the bastards of Livius and Fibius right now! They killed a lot of people a few days ago on the pretext of dealing with the Snake Cult...... In fact, we all know that more than half of them are innocent! ”

The tribune gritted his teeth, his face sagging with wrinkles, and his flesh trembled, "If you need manpower, maybe you should get the people from the village back." ”

"How many people are left in the village at the moment? Does anyone know the location of the Levius family's properties in the mountains? ”

The lord glanced into the village a few times, and could see some people who were hiding and looking this way, and probably a few old people survived.

"Of course, the people in the village know that there are many old people in the village who have worked in those mines...... Every year, there are always people who can't afford to pay taxes to do mine labor......"

The tribune sighed: "But I don't know where the father and son are hiding, there are a lot of minerals in the mountains." ”

The so-called miners are actually looking for some excuses to forcibly recruit people to mine—which is actually the same thing as the prayer tax and the urinal tax made by some noble territories in the Lion Realm.

This tribune was obviously a minor nobleman, and the mine servants were naturally not arranged for him, so he may not be very familiar with the mines.

But it was clear that he must have been familiar with the people of the village.

"It looks like we really have to get the villagers back...... Go and gather all the people in the village who are still alive, and I'll get you some food......"

After sending the tribune back to gather the villagers, the lord began to wait in peace.

Hearing that the lord was willing to give them food, within an hour, all the survivors of the village had gathered outside the manor.

When there is no food to eat, the elderly who are inconvenient in their legs and feet have become quite efficient.

In fact, there are only about 200 people left in the surviving old people, and they can't consume much food.

The distribution of food to these people was not to invite people to buy hearts, and the hearts of the people in this place had long been ruined by Febius, and there was no need to deliberately invite people to buy them.

The main thing is to use these people.

It would take at least a day or more for the infantry walking behind to reach here, and it was unknown whether they would be able to arrive in time for the Serpent Cult army to arrive.

With only a cavalry force of 800 people, even a successful ambush could not completely annihilate the Snake Cult army.

When confronted with the Serpent Cult, the lord didn't think about how to defeat the enemy.

It's about how to annihilate the enemy.

In order to annihilate the enemy, any resources and manpower available should be used.

Therefore, even the two hundred ragged old men in front of him, Lord Lord felt that they could come in handy.

Originally, Leon considered taking advantage of the locust-like habits of the Snake Cult army to set up an ambush and block it, and then try to encircle it on both sides after the infantry arrived, blocking the Snake Cult army in the valley.

But the valley is as wide as 100 meters, and Li Ang has too few people in his hands to arrange it.

And snake worshippers are not like the average rabble - they are not afraid of death.

This means that even if the ambush is successful, the losses will definitely be considerable in order to block the enemy in the valley.

Those Noldor elves and Amy's female warriors are baby bumps, and it would be too bad to lose too much.

Now that he knows that Livius and his son have done all the, then Leon will of course consider getting those forcibly conscripted villagers back to solve his current problem of insufficient manpower.

Looking at the old people who were queuing up at the gate of the manor to receive food, the lord got up and came to a room outside the manor and knocked on the door: "Alyssa, are you ready to be a priestess again?" ”

"Hiss...... I really didn't expect that after leaving the Divine Cult, I would still have to do these jobs...... Hiss ......"

Alyssa in the room opened the door.

She had changed back into her priestess attire, low-cut serpentine armor revealing her fair neck and shoulders, and the deep furrows looked quite seductive.

……

In the afternoon, a 'serpent priestess' led two hundred ragged 'followers' to a large mining area in the mountains.

It's actually an open-pit mine, and the whole mountain looks like it's been cut out of the section, and the mountain is divided into several layers, each with a lot of people busy.

The soil layer in the mountain section is very new, and it is clear that the mine has just been excavated on a large scale.

Most of the people in the mine were chained to their bodies and looked like slaves.

There are a lot of people, and there will be no less than two thousand people who can be reached directly from the mine.

No matter how powerful the Viyus family is, it is impossible to have so many slaves - it is clear that most of them are forcibly recruited civilians who are only forced to be treated as slaves.

"What's that...... Serpent worshippers? The Serpent worshippers are coming! ”

There were apparently guards around the mine, and as soon as Alyssa appeared nearby with the old people, someone shouted.

Then the bell rang out, apparently the sentry in the mine had sounded the alarm.

"Hiss...... Is the reaction so big? ”

Alyssa pursed her lips.

The people in the mine were already in a commotion, and soon after, a force of about two hundred men appeared on the top of the mine.

At this time, Alyssa had already retreated down the mountain with this group of 'followers', and directly retreated to the estate of the Livius family.

It only took a few hours for the Lord to find the whereabouts of the Livius father and son—or rather, not to find them, but to expose them themselves.

In fact, the method used by Leon is very simple.

As long as Elisa, the true serpent priestess, appears in the largest mines with her 'followers', then the Livius father and son will surely panic, and they will definitely organize their real forces - either transfer or fight.

They had killed 3,000 people in the name of dealing with the Serpent Cult, and now that they saw the Snake Cult priestess here, they would of course think that the Serpent Cult had come to them for revenge.

Even if they didn't come to take revenge, they definitely came to rob people, and the father and son of Livius naturally had to find a way to solve it.

If they hadn't come forward, Alyssa might have actually recruited the villagers as a serpent priestess......

And the number of 'followers' brought by Alyssa, that is, the old people who are familiar with the geographical environment and are responsible for leading the way, is just about two hundred......

This is a very embarrassing number for the father and son of Levius, they can kill 3,000 people in batches in a month without resistance, it must be ruthless enough, and the courage is not insignificant.

But they didn't dare to directly attack the Serpent worshippers, who numbered more than 200 people......

After all, the Serpent Cult has a reputation for not being afraid of death, and no one wants to fight with a comparable number of outlaws unless it is necessary......

If the losses are too great for them to suppress the villagers who have been forcibly recruited, maybe the revolt will kill them.

Because there are only 200 soldiers in their hands who are really capable of fighting, and in addition, only more than 300 slaves raised by the family are still obedient.

But those house slaves can only stare at the villagers in the mine - these house slaves who used to dig every day have now turned over and become foremen, and they are quite motivated to wield whips, but it is no problem for them to beat people, but it is definitely unreliable to fight.

In other words, the only people who can use this to fight the war are those 200 private soldiers.

So Febius carefully tracked the location of the 'serpent priestess', neither near nor far.

But after seeing this 'Serpent Worship Force' enter his family's manor, Febius was a little uneasy.

Although the father and son did not live on the estate and took refuge in the mining area in the mountains, this does not mean that they intend to give up their property......

Moreover, these two hundred soldiers are also family private soldiers, and they have always been in the manor to take care of the family's home, so it can be said that they know the environment of the entire manor well.

Naturally, a person's confidence in a familiar environment will be enhanced, and with a somewhat 'protect the family business' mentality, Febius decided to take a little risk.

He led a team to infiltrate the manor through an unknown secret passage.

To tell you the truth, the lord really didn't notice that there was such a secret passage in this manor - the exit was under the bed in the inner room, and the lord didn't have time to check the bed.

This secret passage is probably hollowed out of the mountain, leading directly to the other side of the mountain.

This was also a common risk protection measure for the estates of the great nobles of this era - they could flee for their lives in case of emergency.

However, although Leon did not know that there was such a secret passage in the manor, Fibius obviously did not know that there were so many people in the manor......

After leading his soldiers out of the secret passage, he gathered twenty or thirty soldiers in that bedroom, ready to launch a surprise attack on the 'serpent priestess'. As soon as he went out, he found himself surrounded by a large crowd of men with bows and crossbows......

This kind of scene seems familiar to him - half a year ago in White Deer Castle, he was also faced with such a scene, and then he was surrounded by a large group of bows and crossbows.

Luckily, this time he had plenty of experience, so he reacted quickly - he threw himself to his knees, raised the sword in his hand above his head, and surrendered incredibly quickly.

"Yo, there's a road here?"

The lord hurried to the manor's house, and was a little surprised to see Febius on the ground and the soldiers kneeling in a row beside him.

"Febius, quickly lead the way and release the villagers you have captured......"

……

"My lord, there's news. The scouts found some Serpent worshippers in the valley thirty miles to the southeast, presumably the forerunners of the Serpent Cult army. ”

In the evening, Wendelph came to report back.

"It seems that by noon tomorrow at the latest, the army of the Serpent Cult will pass through here. I don't know if the Silver Hand will be able to arrive at that time. ”

Leon looked at the map in front of him and stood up: "Is the arrangement in the valley ready?" ”

"The guards are all ready...... But my lord, this manor can't hold on for long, and although the villagers have rescued us, they can only help us build fortifications. They have no training and can't fight...... We still don't have enough men, and we don't have enough arrows. ”

Wendy reminded with some hesitation.

The Noldor fought during this time, from the village of Buyulin to Serindil, and the arrows fired in each place were basically not recovered, and at the moment there were only about seven or eight arrows per Noldor on average.

The territory of the Bacchus Empire is not comparable to that of the Lion or the Raven Realm, and it is difficult to replenish the arrows of the bow and arrow, and even if you want to use human arrows, you can't find a place to get them.

"It's okay, at least for now, even if it's surrounded...... We also have a way out. ”

Leon shook his head: "Wendy, although those villagers are not trained, in fact, most of the snake worshippers are not trained either, so it is the best choice for them to block the entrance to the village...... If the resistance of this village seems too strong, the main force of the Snake Worship Cult may not be fooled......"

In fact, the safety of the villagers is quite guaranteed, because the wooden stakes have already begun to be driven at the entrance of the village.

The entrance to the village of Fidenne is actually the most dangerous part of the whole valley, and because it is constantly widened, both sides of the village entrance have been dug into steep vertical cliffs.

Although the width of this place is now about 100 meters, it is still the most suitable terrain for ambushes.

The wooden stakes more than three meters high are being driven to the entrance of the village in dense turns, nailed several layers, and the wooden stakes are basically unable to accommodate people or horses to pass through.

With the help of thousands of villagers who are familiar with the environment, it is not so difficult to control the hundred-meter-wide valley.