"Don't dare to go back? What's wrong? ”

Li Ang was shocked, how bold this girl was, she was able to make such a big gladiator rebel plan, and when she contacted the rebels alone, she was not afraid, and when she ran to the Lion Kingdom to ask for help, she didn't dare to see her.

And Leon could see that she had killed people, and more than one or two—she had always been calm in the face of all kinds of gore on the battlefield outside the city of Knowledge, like a battle-hardened veteran, and she was not even afraid when that Castro rushed at her.

Although Li Ang didn't know that Alina had led a team to kill countless nobles in Siyuan City, some temperaments could be distinguished at a glance.

Such a girl, there is something she doesn't dare?

"The family urged marriage...... Someone came to the door to ask for marriage, and my father has decided to agree, and it is said that the dowry is so large that my father has no reason to refuse......"

Alina pouted: "The point is, I'm not very easy to refuse this time...... It's troublesome. ”

"It's hard to refuse with your identity? Who is it? ”

Leon was a little curious.

"Sommelier of the Lion Kingdom, commander of the royal guards, adopted son of King Ulrik, heir to Duke Brenus, rightful ruler of Cragy Rock, lord of Sava Castle, Malbert."

Alina reluctantly said a long list of titles, apparently memorized from letters and other documents.

Huo ...... With so many people, you can't fit ...... in your home."

Li Ang blurted out a complaint.

But he also immediately understood why Alina would say that it was difficult to refuse—this kind of marriage was not a family matter.

This is a matter of state.

In the case of Malbert and Alina, this courtship is tantamount to an attempt to repair relations between the two countries.

Coupled with the fact that Malbert is now the lord of the Sava Castle, at a time when the Bacchus Empire needs to recuperate the most, Alina must consider the security of the country, and she is indeed not very easy to refuse.

"Don't talk nonsense...... You know him, right? What kind of person is that? ”

Alina asked very seriously.

"Hmm...... To tell the truth, that guy can be called handsome and chic, and he is smart and flexible, both civil and military, plus he is noble, rich and powerful, and he can be called a promising ......."

As soon as Leon opened his mouth, it was full of praise.

"No shortcomings at all? Is there such a perfect person? ”

Alina rolled her eyes and asked angrily.

"There are ...... shortcomings"

Li Ang twisted his chin and thought about it for a moment: "There is only one shortcoming that I know - he may be relatively short-lived. ”

"He has a grudge against you?"

Alina glanced at Leon in surprise.

"Not really...... But he will probably have a grudge against King Ulrik soon. ”

Leon looked like a prophet, looking like a magic stick: "But if nothing else, he must have robbed my convoy to pay tribute to the Lion City, knowing that this will offend King Ulrik, in order to protect himself, so he will immediately ask your family to kiss ......"

"Huh?"

Alina tilted her head and looked at Leon: "How do I feel like a framed ......"

"No, no, no...... I'm a decent person. ”

"You may not know that Malbert was originally the son-in-law of King Ulrique, but the little princess is only ten years old now, so they have not been married before...... If he hadn't offended the king, he wouldn't have been able to go to Bacchus to ask for his wife. ”

“…… I see...... Looks like I'm going to have to hide so I don't get in trouble......"

Alina bit her lip and thought for a while, then suddenly said, "Lord Leon, why don't you ...... You kidnapped me to Long River, right? ”

"Huh?"

Leon was dumbfounded: "What am I kidnapping you for?" ”

"If I'm not mistaken, it's probably not his own will that Malbert robbed your convoy to pay tribute to the king...... You're deliberately making excuses to give yourself, the king, and the princess a reason to attack him, right? ”

Alina reacted quite quickly to these strategies: "When he asked my father to ask for marriage at this time, he should have used the marriage contract to ensure his own safety while the Lion City had not yet reacted, so that the Lion King would not dare to touch him - the dowry that my father had no reason to refuse was probably from your convoy...... But I don't want to be a victim of this. ”

"Then all you have to do is tell Lord Justus about this...... As long as he knew the situation, he would probably give up this family business. ”

Li Ang was still a little puzzled: "Why do you want me to kidnap you?" ”

"Lord Leon, my father is the governor of the Bacchus Empire after all......"

Alina sighed: "For him, this engagement will give the empire a chance to recuperate, a fund to rebuild Siyuan City, and a chance for my father to get involved in the dispute over the throne of the Lion Kingdom, and even lay the foundation for the recovery of Sava Fort in the future...... This does have a lot of benefits for the Bacchus Empire. My father will never give up this engagement, and he will urge it even harder......"

Leon probably understood that Justes was indeed a selfless man, as evidenced by his willingness to leave the city of knowledge to give General Creon room to play.

A selfless person is of course a good quality for the country, but the biggest problem with such a person is precisely that he is too selfless - this good quality is often very bad if it is placed in the family, because he will think that his wife and children should do everything for the country like him.

"But with the character of Emperor Marius, he probably won't agree......"

Leon thought for a moment what Emperor Marius looked like: "He would probably rather personally lead his troops to attack the Sava Fort and snatch the money from Malbert. ”

"Yes, but Your Majesty has nothing to do with my father in such matters...... That's why I asked you to kidnap me - in this way, Your Majesty will definitely declare war on the Lion Kingdom, and this marriage contract will naturally not exist! ”

Alina smiled at Leon, "I think you also want the Bacchus Empire to declare war on the Lion Kingdom now, don't you?" ”

…………

At the same time, the Lion City.

"Your Majesty, I am Eric, a knight of oath allegiance to Count Leon. On behalf of Lord Leon, I bring you the loot from Dexia......"

In the throne room, a bruised Eric is meeting the king.

"I have received Leon's letter, and I have seen the loot, you have worked hard...... But what's the deal with your injuries? Was it wounded in the territory of Dexia? Li Ang actually let a wounded person like you travel thousands of miles, I really don't know how to sympathize with my subordinates......"

Ulrik saw a lot of jewels and brocades, and was obviously in a pretty good mood, and he knew that he was concerned about Eric's injury.

Eric's current appearance is indeed a bit miserable.

The equipment all over the body is damaged, and at a glance, you can tell that this is just after a hard battle;

The head was wrapped in bloody gauze, and faintly blood was seeping out;

The left side of his face was red and swollen, his lips were broken, and he was obviously punched hard in the face;

Only half of the gauntlet in the right hand remained, and the other half was sunken;

There was also gauze wrapped around his legs, and he walked with a limp......

Just by looking at it, you can see that he must have fought a tough enemy not long ago, and he certainly wasn't the victorious side......

"No, Your Majesty! Originally, I brought back five times as much loot here! Your Majesty, I will accuse Malbert, Lord of the Sava Castle! He robbed our convoy of loot to you! ”

Eric's emotions were quite excited: "I originally thought that the area of the Sava Fort was under the rule of the lord of the Lion Kingdom, and it should be safe for us to pass...... I didn't expect it to be the knights of the Lion Kingdom who robbed us! ”

"What?! Are you sure you read that right? How much was robbed? ”

Ulrik stood up from the Silver Throne, his face grim.

"I desperately escaped after a fight to the death...... But I could only take 20% of the loot, and the other 80% was robbed by Malbert! There was a group of lion knights patrolling us at the time, but they turned a blind eye as if they were all blind - for the robbers were all under the banner of Malbert! ”

The more Eric spoke, the more angry he became, and he was about to cry: "Your Majesty, it was originally given to you by Lord Leon, and it is your spoils!" ”

The marshal of the kingdom led his troops into enemy territory, and if the purpose was to capture towns, then the territory conquered was divided by the king, and the marshal would be able to receive the right to distribute the spoils of war;

But if the purpose was not to capture the city, then the spoils of war had to be given to the king.

This has been the practice for hundreds of years, and Duke Brenus did it before.

Leon sent a large amount of loot to the Lion City before returning to the army, which was originally quite pleasing to Ulrik.

But now, knowing that more of the loot that should have belonged to him had been robbed, and that it was actually Malbert who did it, Ulrique was indeed furious......

Because he knew that Eric would never tell such a lie in the throne hall - this kind of thing is easy to prove, and lying will not only kill, but also harm Leon.

And it's quite possible that Malbert did so......

After all, Brennus often does this - Brennus even often led the Lion Knights to rob other countries' merchants!

But the problem is that Brenus will always take half of the proceeds of Ulrik's robbery, and he will certainly not rob the king of the loot!

But Marbert, the bastard, actually robbed Leon of the money he gave him?

"Someone! Go and give Malbert a herald to get back to me! ”

King Ulrique was basically shouting in a roaring fashion.

…………

In April 356 of Pander's calendar, the Bacchus Empire declared war on the Lion Kingdom.

The reason for the declaration of war was that Miss Alina, the righteous daughter of the Emperor of the Bacchus Empire, was kidnapped by Count Leon, the marshal of the Lion Kingdom......

And Count Leon, who was returning to the Lion Realm, also quickly sent back a military report and gave an explanation for the matter - when Leon's army was marching towards Toba City, the Bacchus Empire sent General Agathon to lead a fleet to attack Eichkoman, which was originally occupied by Leon, so Leon 'captured' Miss Alina in an attempt to return to the city.

But General Agathon refused to change cities, so of course Leon could only take Alina away......

Moreover, in order to avoid the retreat being cut off by the Bacchus Empire, Leon could only withdraw his troops immediately and let the kingdom's army guard against the attack of the Bacchus Empire.

For King Ulrik, Leon's approach was no problem—since the Bacchus Empire had robbed Eichkoman, it was indeed right for Leon to take a hostage and ask the Bacchus for an explanation; After the Bacchus Empire declared war, Leon's retreat was easily cut off, and a quick withdrawal of troops was also due.

Emperor Marius was different, he didn't care about the specific reason, he was planning to regain the lost territory, for him, whatever excuse it was......

As a result, the Bacchus Empire and the Lion Kingdom are once again in a state of hostility.

But neither country has sent troops to the other for the time being, because neither side is ready for war......

King Ulrik had no money and could not afford to fight a big war for the time being;

Emperor Marius had no troops and could not fight for the time being......

It's just a war of words first.

At the same time, Leon's army also returned to the territory of the Lion Kingdom.

The army was officially disbanded north of the Sava Fort, leaving the minor lords to return to their homes, and Leon's own troops returning to the town of Long River.

It wasn't until all the merchants were safely returned to the territory that Leon began to calculate the benefits of this expedition.

The proceeds of the auction of Eichkoman can be divided in half, a total of one million dinars, and this money will be sent to Changhe Town in a month or two, because the Bacchus Empire is auctioned at the price of the land deed, and it will take a certain amount of time for the land deed to be realized;

It is precisely because of the lack of cash for the time being that Bahaman will not mess around in a short time - he will have to wait to get his share of the money first.

Four million dinars were obtained from Emir Xerxes.

These include 400,000 in cash;

an iron ore mine worth 600,000 yuan;

hard currency such as gold and silver worth 1.2 million;

dozens of cartloads of bloody jewelry and cloth worth about 800,000 yuan;

The final payment was a few hundred horses and gold and silver vessels worth 600,000 dinars.

The iron ore was subcontracted by Ramon to several slave owners, and he received some income from the subcontracting. However, Ramon will smelt on the spot and send the pig iron ingots after the initial smelting to Changhe Town once a month, which will allow Leon to reduce transportation costs, and it is indeed not cost-effective to transport ore over long distances.

Ramon estimates that there will be about 50,000 pounds of iron ingots produced each month — not iron ore, but iron ingots.

In this era, there is only such a small amount of production capacity, but fortunately, this is a long-term business, and Li Ang has not invested any time and manpower.

In fact, iron was also very valuable in this era, and 50,000 pounds of pig iron was worth about 10,000 dinars.

In other words, it was a long-term business with an annual income of about 120,000 dinars, but Emilexerxes only used it for 600,000 dinars, and it was clear that Ramon and Leon had taken advantage of it.

Under normal circumstances, industries such as mines that can bring stable income will be priced according to the estimated output in 10 or even 20 years.

Of course, the emir sold cheaply mainly because he couldn't mine it himself – the iron ore was in Yachen, close to Singar, but too far from the city of Toba.

After the emir got the city of Toba, this iron ore would definitely not be able to be taken care of, and maybe Bill Cardin would take it away, and it would be normal to transfer it at half price.

As for the blood-stained jewelry and cloth, a small part was sent to the king, probably worth hundreds of thousands of dinars.

Much of the other was looted by Malbert – the looted goods were worth at least more than 600,000 dinars.

Those hundreds of horses have been given to Alina, which was promised, and what Leon said can indeed be fulfilled, and he never breaks his word.

At present, what actually fell into the hands of Leon was cash and all kinds of gold, silver and bronze, that is, hard currency that could be used as money, and a total of about 2.2 million dinars.

In addition, there are also 'ownerless war horses' that are 'taken in' at the foot of Mount Ghazi......

There were more than two thousand three hundred horses in all—this was actually a share of the spoils with Agathon, and there were actually nearly five thousand horses on Mount Gazi, and Leon and Agathon didn't even want the old, weak, sick and disabled.

That's why Leon would be so generous to send hundreds of horses to Alina - he already had too many horses in his hands, and there was too little pasture to raise.

(End of chapter)