Yuri met me in a nightgown, his eyes bloodshot.

He had only slept for a few hours when he met me, and for the previous few days he had spent the days outside the city directing soldiers and farmers to rebuild the walls outside the settlement and reprotect it. In the field, Yuri's more than a hundred cavalry pursued the thugs in all directions, and Yuri did not ask them to take the prisoners alive, they could execute the thugs at will, or take them alive and buy them out of town. Yuri directly inherited Kalinin's idea that before giving benefits to others, he must let others bleed once, and only blood can make people calm down and know how to be grateful again. Uprisings of all sizes were breaking out in many areas under the rule of the city of Little East Lake, and the old nobles were staring wide in the darkness and would give Kalinin some trouble at the first opportunity. Kalinin's power far outnumbered these nobles, but he was now fully focused on the siege of Varankov and had no spare strength to deal with the nobles in these places. Yuri only has more than 300 soldiers at his disposal at any time, and the area he is responsible for is a vast land between several cities.

Many fortresses and fortresses were nominally subordinate to Xiaodonghu City, but most of the men in the city were fighting, and most of the remaining dozens or hundreds of people were willing to stay in the fortress and defend it with peace of mind, and were unwilling to go out of the city to fight with Yuri. There were forts in some areas that were indifferent even to the burning of neighboring villages. The fear that the prince of Denia had brought to them had not yet dissipated: when the prince burned down a village, a fortress sent more than a dozen cavalrymen to negotiate, and the next day, more than a dozen soldiers were beheaded. The headless corpse sat on a mount and was returned home by the horse.

After that, these soldiers, whose morale was on the verge of collapse, could only be used to transport food. Then hide inside the thick stone walls and wait for Yuri to run around. Help them out.

"Victor." Yuri's eye sockets were black as if they were plastered, and he picked up a wine bottle, poured a small half glass into an expensive glass, and drank it down. That high-spirited Yuri is gone, and now Yuri has some vicissitudes of life and is exhausted.

"Yuri-sama." I saluted him.

Yuri's personal maid waited next door with Copernicus and the others, and when Copernicus found out that she could speak Swadia, the two began to talk, and the woman looked surprised. Even in the city of Little East Lake. It was not easy to speak Svadia so decently, and the maid gave me an incredulous look as the door closed.

With a tired expression, Yuri took out another of the same glasses and poured the same amount of wine, "Taste it?" ”

"No, sir." I answered him.

"Whatever you want." Yuri drank his wine again. The Vicchian love of booze has come to Yuri, perhaps as he did when he was younger, but his recent stressful life has caused his addiction to alcohol to relapse. "These damn mobs, like fleas. My soldiers had been on the road all day, and when they reached their destination, all the thugs had fled. The locals don't trust us. The path we are pointing out is wrong. I want to fight them with integrity, but they won't give me that chance. Not these people, we can also call up fifteen hundred people to go to Varynkov. Varankov's breakthrough is just around the corner. ”

"Didn't Lord Kalinin use something called gunpowder when he attacked Little East Lake City? You didn't use it to attack Varankov? ”

"Haha. You're well-informed. Yuri smiled wryly and shifted his body. Stuffed a cushion in the back to make it more comfortable for him to sit, "Giovanni is very smart. This guy built a sloping wall outside the city of Valankov, and every hundred feet, an additional earthen fence was built. The Creelian powder kegs could not directly damage the walls themselves, and could only explode clods of earth everywhere. Besides, this thing is mainly used to frighten people, and the Valans obviously know this kind of thing, so they are not afraid. They sent a large number of lightly armed infantrymen, armed with twin swords, and at the moment of the explosion, they slid down the soft ladder from the city and assassinated the Crelian craftsmen and our people. When our soldiers approached, they crawled back again. Afraid of the powder keg, our soldiers couldn't get closer. The Valans get it every time. ”

In a few words, Yuri, I could think of the well-trained, muscular Valan soldiers. These soldiers used to drink and brag with me at night in the woods, and asked me to borrow silver beans to find women, and asked me to write a letter to their families.

"So you're in a siege."

"Yes." "If the fighting had ended in the first two weeks, everything would have been different. Now, Valankov has consumed too much of the wealth and manpower of Little East Lake City. Now it is only possible to try to defeat Varykov. You know, Weiduo, if we don't win, everything in the Romanovs will come up in smoke. ”

"Why is that?" I don't know why Yuri said that, but all I heard all the way was how powerful the Romanovs were, "Now the Romanovs of Eastern Vykia are second to none. ”

"Second to none?" Yuri smiled maliciously, "It's not for nothing that the council has existed for so many years. We're just using it to integrate a lot of small families, but it has a lot of underestimated power. The truly powerful families are those who have been running an area for more than a hundred years. At the time of the Romanov Fort, there was no soldier left in the family, only the old and weak in the family, and the residents would not rise up to rebel, but would spontaneously go to the fortress to join the guard. This is not the case with the Romanovs now, the sudden expansion of the land brings not strength, but 'future' power, you are very smart, you should know the difference. In the present, the Romanovs are tormented by such a large land. Victorious, we still have a chance, we can go to exhaustion to maintain the rule; Once we fail, those guys in Dadonghu City and Ryazan Fort will immediately jump out against us. The Maharaja of Denia had been waiting for this time for a long time. Giovanni's allies would have been greatly encouraged. Little East Lake City? If we fail, the best thing to do is to become ordinary citizens here. ”

"You always make things so clear." I was silent for a moment, and though I had many strange feelings in my heart, I couldn't refute Yuri.

Yuri nodded. "Now is the most critical moment. The Valankov front could not afford to be lost. Food and weapons from the rear must be continuously delivered to Vlaankov in the past and in the coming month. We must squeeze out another five hundred young people and send them to Valankov. At the same time, we are to help the wounded soldiers of the council for free, and if we do not take care of them, the lords will immediately withdraw their soldiers. Wait, Victor, and we'll be able to breathe a sigh of relief. ”

Hearing this, I finally understood.

The family must have found a place for me to make a difference.

"It was easy for me to meet you this time, and everyone was friendly to me along the way." I said to Yuri, "As an illegitimate child, I feel a little surprised. ”

"Bastards also bleed the blood of the Romanovs." Yuri looked at me sincerely. His beard stubble was like a brush, and the inside of his beard was gray and gray, which made him five or six years older," Victor. I've been younger, too, just like you. I used to be extremely disgusted with the old men in my family, who set the fate of young people at will for their own selfish desires or for comfort, as if they were just their tools. I know this very well. When I was wandering around Rhodoc. One day, my father suddenly wrote to me to come home, saying that a marriage had been arranged for me, and if I didn't come home within half a year of receiving the letter. I will be removed from my family. Hah, so I hurried home, but I didn't talk to my father for several years. ”

"The mother of the woman Miccella?"

"That's right. Your sister's mother. Yuri's face lit up, "Time will turn hasty love into long-lasting affection." When Mycella was born. I was reconciled with my family. I also began to understand the arrangement of my fathers. If you don't take care of the family's affairs, you won't really identify with the family, and if you don't hate it first, you won't want to protect it later. Victor, I know what you're trying to say. ”

"The family arranged things for me?" I asked him bluntly.

Yuri was accustomed to convincing me when I was indecisive, and he was momentarily stunned by my straightforwardness.

"Victor, you've changed."

"I want to know what I'm going to do next."

Yuri stood up and pinched his nose. The liquor made his nose runny and his eyes redder. He walked over to a small round table in a mess, and began to untie the rope that had tied it to a thick letter, and he rattled the paper inside the letter, and finally found what he needed. That's a map.

"Donbass." Yuri put the map in front of me.

"What is this?"

"The counties of the Riverlands." He looked at me intently, "The territory of the Lepnin family. The Council of Vikia had just agreed with the Berke Council. ”

The meaning of this sentence is: Kalinin has just agreed on the border with Lech.

I took a closer look at the land, "No, the Lepnin family's land is bigger than this, and this county is less than two-thirds the size of the past. And I've been to the Riverlands, but I haven't heard of any Donbass counties. ”

"Their land is naturally very large, but this is the only thing they can get back." Yuri said decisively, "It's a new county, but near the checkpoints and mountain passes, some of them are indeed assigned to the Berks. But the richest plains and river flats, as well as an iron mine, and two small towns, were still in the county. It's not much of a loss. ”

If I hadn't been to the Valan barracks, I would have believed that. But I know that a county that has been given a geographical advantage by an unscrupulous enemy is nothing more than a piece of meat on a chopping board, to be slaughtered. No matter how rich you are, you can't just raise cattle and sheep in captivity that others can harvest at any time.

"The Burkes get out of here?"

"Left behind half of the Burk's lower nobles, and a group of Berkish puppet boyars. But nominally, the Burkes promised to return the place to the Parliament of Vekia. Lech also promised that after the reception was completed, the new earl would receive the taxes collected by the Burks in Riverland for several years as compensation for the nobles who had been in the war. ”

"Ha," I said sarcastically, "robbers always like to do something noble after the fact. ”

"Victor, Lech is a man worthy of respect."

"Yes, Yuri-sama." I already knew in my heart what was going to happen, "What awaits me is a marriage." ”

"Vidor," Yuri smiled with satisfaction, "Count of Donbass, Victor, how is that called?" I love it. That's right, your biggest task now is to stop doing anything else and spend more time with Miss Catherine. ”

"Wouldn't she be mad if she knew to marry me?"

"It is disgusting to speak viciously to a lady." Yuri spoke to me in a flat tone, but I could see that he was angry, and that the count's title did not make me behave uncomfortably and ecstatic, which of course disappointed him a little. "You have a grudge against the family, and I will no longer hide it from you. Your marriage is just the beginning, and the Council of Vikia has agreed with the Berks that the Council of Vikica will propose an earl, and that the councils of both sides will jointly recognize his legitimacy. Of course, there will be many people who nominate their relatives, but with the efforts of the family, Lech will pick you out of everyone. You have to marry Miss Catagalina, sell some strength to get her pregnant as soon as possible, and once she has not had her menstrual period for more than two months, you will take the soldiers to the city of Little East Lake and do your duty for the family. ”

"At that time, the siege of Vrankov is estimated to have already had a result, is there any point in me coming at that time?"

"If we fail, you will be the backbone of the salvation of your family. If we win, you'll need to give the other lords a good lead. "I can't think of anything more glad than this: to have a beautiful wife, to inherit her family's domain, and Miss Catherine is plump, and must be a rich and prolific woman, and you will have many children." ”

"It doesn't matter who the illegitimate child is?"

"I've written to Thomas'' 'Uh, what's it called now?'' Oh, Dean Innocent, let him fix this. You will have a noble and innocent mother, a Burke woman, and you will have several uncles and siblings who will be your help. Dean Innocent has prepared all the papers, and when the time comes, you can hug and cry with your relatives in front of several councillors, and make them think it's true. Then, the inferior bastard status will leave you forever. ”

"What am I going to do now?"

"Escort one of your aunts to Ryazan Fort, to represent our family, to her wedding to the Ryazan Prince." Yuri squeezed out a tired smile, "Then you go back to Little East Lake City and marry Lady Catherine." Her relative in the pass had already left the garrison and went to Ivangelod with two hundred soldiers to swear allegiance. He will be your loyal ally and will serve in the council in Varankov instead of you. He stretched, "Your story will be sung by the bard, Lord Earl." One day, you might even become the Duke of Riverlands. He made a promise full of temptation.

"This" Miss Catherine "" "

She has already expressed her obedience to the family's arrangement. If you want to see her, you can do it tonight. She is watching a famous play, "The Great Love," with your sister Mysella and many other relatives. Yuri said, "I didn't see it, you can go yourself." Ekaterina liked the show a lot. Oh, what did you come to me for this time, Victor? ”

"That's right, Lord Yuri," I said to the Romanov family, whose voice was as calm as a veteran's, for the first time in front of the Romanov family, "I have found my relatives. I came to say goodbye to the Romanovs. (To be continued.) )