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In many people's minds, the Crusades were the invasion of the barbaric, backward, and corrupt medieval church into the enlightened, diverse, and wealthy regions of Central Asia.

In fact, it's just a delusion on the part of these people.

In fact, the so-called Crusades were an outright war between religions.

I won't say much about what is right and which is wrong.

Li Cun also doesn't care who is right and who is wrong between them.

And, to be honest, Li Cun really can't tell who is right and who is wrong in the matter between religions.

Li Cun's attitude towards religion has always been the same, that is, all of them are respectful, and none of them want to get too involved.

Therefore, after Li Cun occupied Central Asia, he decreed that as long as the divine power did not disobey his imperial power, the royal power of his sons, and the worldly power, he would support freedom of belief.

In addition, Li Cun also issued a holy decree: that is, to seize all regions of Central Asia, except for Jerusalem.

So, under Li Cun's instructions, Li Cun's sons even beat Damascus, the capital of the Arab Empire, but none of them touched Jerusalem.

It is not difficult to see from Li Cun's consistent restrained attitude that Li Cun sincerely respects religion, fears all gods, and does not want to get involved in the affairs between the basic religion and the Mu religion.

However, the trees want to be quiet, and the wind does not stop.

Faced with centuries of brutal jihad, the Western nations embarked on crusades to support the Christians in the East and to recover the Holy Land of Jerusalem.

But the Byzantine Empire then fell, and Hagia Sophia was turned into a mosque.

Pope Urban II, at the Council of Claremont held decades earlier, called on the warriors of the Christian community to resist the invasion of the Muslims, and received an enthusiastic response, and thousands of European warriors took the oath of the cross and prepared to fight.

I won't say much about the process of the First Crusade, so I'll check it out for myself if I'm interested.

Suffice it to say that during the First Crusade, after the fall of the Edesa Kingdom established by the Europeans, in response to the request of the Kingdom of Jerusalem, the Europeans launched the Second Crusade under the leadership of King Louis VII of France and King Conrad III of the Holy Roman Empire.

Speaking of which, the cause of this incident was that Sanjar, a militant, sent troops to occupy Edessa before the Great Expeditionary Force came from the east.

After the First Crusade, the earlier German Crusaders were defeated by the Turks in Asia Minor, and the French Crusaders' attempts to capture Damascus failed, so the First Crusade did not achieve any strategic objectives.

Later, Sanjar sent someone to give the very important Edessa to the battle leader.

This led to a great defeat of the Christian religion in Central Asia.

According to the situation at that time, if there was no more crusade to the East, then the Christianity would be completely beaten out of the East.

The point is, everywhere else can be lost, and the holy land of Jerusalem must not be lost.

So the Crusaders began the Second Crusade.

Many Germans had missed the First Crusade, which had been led by the French, Normans, and Flanders aristocracy, and naturally wanted to add glory to themselves with new exploits.

Their leader, Conrad, had been to Jerusalem more than a decade earlier and had participated as a knight in the expedition of King Baldwin II of Jerusalem to the area near Damascus, and had some experience in fighting in the Middle East.

Conrad led the German Crusaders across the Rhine and Danube rivers from Regensburg along the overland route of the First Crusade.

After a bumpy journey, the Byzantines finally sent the German crusaders across the strait, and then Emperor Manuel sent his captain of the Varangian guard to guide the German crusaders.

In Nicaea, Conrad sent most of his non-combatants to Byzantine-controlled territory, leading his main force into the interior of Asia Minor.

Gradually, the Crusaders completed their convergence and began to attempt to encircle Asia Minor.

If it had not been for the expeditionary force to the west, the Turks would not have been afraid of the crusades.

Let's put it this way, during the years of the war with the Crusaders, the Turks repeatedly defeated the Crusaders.

Of course, the Crusaders also often defeated the Turks.

It should be said that the two sides are evenly matched, and their strength is not too close.

But the problem is that the Great Qian Expeditionary Force has already fought and defeated the Turks, occupied most of Central Asia, and then drove all the Turks who refused to surrender to Asia Minor, which greatly damaged the vitality of the Turks.

Such Turkic people obviously cannot protect the Mu religion anymore.

- Not only can they not protect the Mu religion, but in the eyes of the people of the Yi world, they can't even protect themselves.

At this moment, the crusaders struck.

The crusaders came to us, which meant that the Christian religion was going to encroach on the Muslim religion to preach the land.

How does this work?

The people of the Iraqi world must find another big brother to lead them to fight the crusaders, and it would be better if they could lead them to Europe and let the Mu religion defeat the Christian religion.

And who is more suitable to be the big brother of the people of the Yi world than the one who defeated the Great Qian Dynasty of the Turks?

Therefore, as soon as the people of the Yi world discussed, they gathered together and presented themselves to Li Cun, expressing their willingness to submit to the rule of Li Cun and Li Cun's sons, and only asking Li Cun to protect them and protect the Mu religion.

Li Cun was reluctant to get involved in the religious wars.

But Li Cun was still very interested in conquering Europe.

Besides, Li Cun has not had fewer sons in recent years, and the key is that many of his original young sons have grown up again, so Li Cun still needs a large number of fiefs to divide his sons.

The key is that Li Cun, who has always been obsessed with the entry of the Eight-Nation Alliance into Beijing and the Opium War, has always wanted to beat up those barbaric and arrogant bandits in the West.

The key point is that the people of Yi World also said that as long as Li Cun led them to defeat the crusaders, they would completely submit to the rule of Li Cun and Li Cun's sons.

The temptation to make the people of the Yi world obey the rule of himself and his sons is really a bit great for Li Cun, because it can save Li Cun and Li Cun's sons too many things.

In addition, there are countless beauties in Europe - blonde, red, brown, hot, amorous......

Therefore, Li Cun slapped his dragon chair fiercely: this is ...... I'm done!

After the First Crusade, the Crusaders crossed the sea from near Constantinople into Asia Minor, captured the capital of the Sultanate of Rûm, Nescaea, and then Edessa and Antioch, establishing the first Crusader states.

Soon after, the Crusaders conquered the Holy Land of Jerusalem and established the Kingdom of Jerusalem in Jerusalem.

The people of the Iraqi world have been bent on reclaiming their holy land.

But without waiting for the people of the Iraqi world to make a move, Li Cun led the Great Qian Expeditionary Force to the east and hit Central Asia.

This undoubtedly left the people of the world in Iraq without time to attack Jerusalem.

After Li Cun's sons defeated the Turks and occupied Central Asia, they all obeyed Li Cun's holy decree and did not provoke these Crusader states, let alone Jerusalem.

In other words, before this, the Daqian Dynasty and the Crusader states in Europe had actually been at peace, and the two sides had no reason to fight at all.

However, as the Second Crusades went smoothly, and as the Crusaders easily defeated the Turks who had been greatly defeated by the Great Qian Expeditionary Force after entering Asia Minor, some of the Crusaders began to swell.

The Crusaders, led by King Conrad II of Germany and King Louis VII of France, foolishly decided to attack Damascus and then continue to expand their territory to the east.

At this time, the Muslim religion in the city of Damascus was actually a strong ally of the basic religion, and the Crusader countries should not fight Damascus wherever they wanted.

What's more critical is that the current Damascus is already the fief of Li Cun's son Li Zhi.

Thus, the foolish claims of King Conrad II of Germany and King Louis VII of France were unanimously opposed by the Crusader states, who insisted that the Crusaders attack Aleppo, the greatest threat to the Crusader states, and recover Edessa, which was still under the control of the Turks.

King Conrad II and King Louis VII of France did not listen at all, and stubbornly went to attack Damascus.

The Crusaders suddenly attacked Damascus, and Li Zhi, who had never thought that the Crusaders would attack Damascus, was taken by surprise.

Unfortunately, Li Zhi died heroically in the process of resisting the Crusader invasion.

In addition, after the defeat of Damascus, the crusaders led by King Conrad II of Germany and King Louis VII of France also carried out a bloody baptism of Damascus.

Undoubtedly, this gave Li Cun, who was trying to fight Europe, an excellent excuse.

Li Cun immediately issued a holy decree: wage war against all the crusading countries and avenge my son Li Zhi!

In less than half a month, Li Cun's sons whose fiefdoms were close to Damascus wiped out more than 20,000 crusaders led by King Conrad II of Germany and King Louis VII of France in Damascus.

However, it is a pity that King Conrad II of Germany and King Louis VII of France, two rabbits, saw that the situation was not good, and decisively fled to Jerusalem with a small part of the crusaders.

Li Cun's sons Li Lin, Li Yi, and Li Feng led 3,000 light horsemen all the way to Jerusalem by King Conrad II of Germany and King Louis VII of France.

For Jerusalem, Li Cunke had a clear decree: not to touch.

Therefore, Li Lin, Li Yi, and Li Feng could not storm Jerusalem.

Therefore, after chasing Jerusalem, Li Lin, Li Yi, and Li Feng could only stop helplessly.

As soon as the brothers discussed, this Jerusalem must not be beaten, otherwise their father and emperor may take back their brothers' fiefdoms and drive them back to the territory of the Daqian Dynasty to eat and wait for death.

The most clever Li Yi rolled his eyes and said, "Why don't we write a letter to scare the king of Jerusalem?" ”

However, the brothers also knew that the three of them would not be able to frighten the king of Jerusalem with their prestige, so at the suggestion of Li Yi, the brothers wrote a letter of surrender to the king of Jerusalem in the name of their father.

The content of the letter is probably as follows: "I don't want to destroy this sacred place, so you'd better open the city and surrender immediately, and let you leave safely, otherwise the army will attack the city, and there will be no tiles left here, and no grass will grow!" ”

The king of the kingdom of Jerusalem at this time, no, it should be said, the queen of the kingdom of Jerusalem at this time was Melisander.

Melisander governs with her husband, Fulke.

Unlike the two idiots of King Conrad II of Germany and King Louis VII of France, Melisander and Furk, who had always been on the edge of Central Asia, knew very well how powerful Li Cun was to conquer the whole of Central Asia, and it is no exaggeration to say that this strength made it impossible to resist at all.

Therefore, Melisander and Fulke consulted with their ministers, and finally decided to open the city and surrender.

Seeing that things were not going well, King Conrad II of Germany and King Louis VII of France quietly fled out of Jerusalem with their men, and then fled all the way west......

Li Lin and Li Feng also wanted to continue to hunt down King Conrad II of Germany and King Louis VII of France, but they were stopped by Li Yi, because these two goods were their best excuse to attack Europe.

A month later, Li Cun personally came to Damascus and saw Li Zhi's body.

Although Li Cun didn't even have a single white hair, this was also a white-haired person sending a black-haired person, so Li Cun was very sad.

But if you dominate the world, you will inevitably die, not to mention that it is Li Zhi who dies, it is Li Cun himself, which is also a very normal thing.

In other words, since the day Li Zhi chose to be the prince and king, he should have the consciousness of falling into such a fate.

Moreover, Li Zhi died in battle this time for his own reasons.

Plus Li Cun has enough sons, so it's really not bad for Li Zhi.

So, after a while, Li Cun came out of his grief.

It was suggested that Li Zhi's eldest son should inherit Li Zhi's fief.

But it was vetoed by Li Cun.

After this incident, Li Cun realized that here in Damascus, it is extraordinary, and he cannot let people who are not capable serve as princes and kings, let alone the son of Li Zhi, who has just been able to walk.

Therefore, Li Cun appointed Li Yi, who performed the best in this battle and found an excuse for himself to attack Europe, to take over Damascus.

After dealing with these things, Li Cun came to Jerusalem.

At this time, the royal family, clans, and nobles of the Kingdom of Jerusalem all fled back to Europe with the queen of the Kingdom of Jerusalem, Melisander, and the cadres had officially taken over Jerusalem.

However, because Li Cun had issued a holy decree not to disturb Jerusalem in advance, after taking over Jerusalem, all the cadres and soldiers, one of them were counted as one, and all of them withdrew from Jerusalem without any damage to this sacred place.

However, although Lee was always cautious in dealing with matters concerning Jerusalem, it was still a matter of surprise when it came to the end.

As soon as Li Cun arrived in Jerusalem, Li Lin presented Li Cunjin with a face of invitation to Li Cunjin - a true cross.

In this regard, Li Lin was very proud, as if to say: "My two brothers are so stupid, they haven't even found this treasure, so they can only watch me make a great contribution!" ”

What Li Lin never expected was that when his father learned what he was offering, he almost slapped him to death, and scolded him unceremoniously: "Confused! You can ask for this troublesome thing?! ”

Li Cun didn't even hesitate, and personally sent this treasure to the Holy Sepulchre Church as soon as possible.

After this, Li Cun declared: Jerusalem will always be a land of freedom, and it will not belong to anyone, including himself.

After the announcement, Li Cun left 1,000 non-believing cadres and soldiers to maintain the law and order in Jerusalem, and set an iron law: the guards in Jerusalem were never allowed to join by people of faith, and there was absolutely no religious inclination. The Escort has two and only two duties: one is to protect Jerusalem from any person or force; The second is to serve the law and order of Jerusalem.

After the announcement, Li Cun relieved the 1,000 guards from their posts in the cadre army.

- In three years, there will be new guards from the mainland of the Daqian Dynasty to replace them, and they will return to China at that time to resume their duties, and they will be promoted to three ranks in a row.

In addition, Li Cun also stipulated that everyone who entered Jerusalem had to pay one yuan, and of course it was possible to pay more, depending on one's wishes.

This money was not collected by Li Cun, nor was anyone allowed to collect it, but it was only used for the daily expenses of the convoy and the maintenance of the city of Jerusalem.

Li Cun also had a stone slab built to make public every sum of money collected and where each money went.

By the way, this first yuan was paid by Li Cun.

One might wonder if penniless ascetics were not allowed to enter Jerusalem if they were to come here.

If this is the case, then ascetics can enter Jerusalem as long as they are willing to volunteer in Jerusalem, and even practice in it for a long time.

All in all, Li Cun, who has a heart of respect for all religions, sincerely hopes that Jerusalem will become a truly holy place, a holy place where there will never be war, and a holy place where all believers can enter and leave freely.

After carefully handling the affairs here in Jerusalem, Li Cun ordered: Continue the westward expedition and continue to avenge my son Li Zhi......

…… (End of chapter)