"Hah-" "Good morning. "Good morning. ”

As soon as it was dawn, people stepped out of their tents. The sound of greeting made the night quiet camp a little lively. The bonfire guarded by the third group of mercenaries on duty at night was only a charcoal bottom that was still simmering, constantly emitting heat, which was very suitable as a heat source for cooking meat for breakfast.

The food culture of the East Coast is much better than that of the West Coast in every way, so even in these travel conditions, the mercenaries will not treat themselves badly.

Meat and fish products are usually treated to remove water from meat and fish products in order to preserve them for a long time.

The ethnic minorities of the Palohian highlands often took advantage of the scorching sun and the natural wind in the vast expanse, while the northern part of the empire bordered the kingdom of Suomir used to smoke fish and meat. But these are difficult to achieve in the warm and humid climate of the south-central region, so the most common is naturally the oldest method of preservation, salted.

The best way to taste salted meat is to make stews, because the dry meat is soaked up and chewed less strenuously, and the large amount of salt contained in the meat can penetrate deep into the soup to provide seasoning for the vegetables and mushrooms that are stewed together.

But in addition to meat, nuts, and beans, they only brought some grains and grains with them on this trip, and it was really difficult for them to find wild vegetables that had not frozen to death in this environment.

Without fresh ingredients, the average chef would probably become sad, but for Captain Stephen and his mercenaries, this is a fairly common scenario.

High-level hunting mercenaries are what many people yearn for, and although war mercenaries with good swords are also quite terrifying, they are never alone. Mercenaries will be divided into two very different existences, precisely because of this need.

The parts of large creatures that can be found all over the continent are essential high-grade materials in many industries. In the case of the dragon bed crossbows brought by the Margaret family, for example, the bows and arms they use are far from ordinary wood. Ordinary materials are completely unable to withstand this level of energy emanation, and even the Purple Shirt Heartwood, which is cherished by the archers of the West Coast, can only shoot about ten arrows by providing pull on its own.

The laminated crossbow arms are made of fine wood, with the hamstrings of large creatures glued in the middle. After the multiple layers are fixed together, they are pressed together with heavy objects, then smoked to remove moisture to stabilize the body, and finally reinforced with iron hoops for the second time.

Strength aside, the absolute size of an individual is limited by the length of an animal's hamstrings, and fighting a creature of this caliber requires more than just equipment, brains, and physique, as well as a lot of patience.

Anyone who has ever caught a big fish knows that if you reel in the rod directly, it is likely to cause the line or the rod itself to break. Therefore, it is necessary to walk in a zigzag shape, if you want to capture the old and indulge, pull for a while, and consume the physical energy of the prey, until you feel that its resistance is not so strong, and then decisively close the rod.

The same goes for high-level hunting, where sometimes they need to stay dormant for two or three weeks in order to wait for the right opportunity. Wild animals are extremely sensitive to the smell of fire and smoke, and even if there is time to start a fire to cook, it must be solved as soon as possible. As a result, pre-prepared meat products such as bacon and bacon are a regular on the menu of hunting mercenaries.

However, the East Coaster's pursuit of food is destined to the extent that they will not be willing to gnaw on dry and salted meat, and in order to make this single ingredient have different tastes and flavors, the mercenaries can be said to have done their best, and in the long run, they have also summed up a set of menus that are only popular among the hunting mercenary cooks.

The bright firewood is perfect for boiling soups and vegetables, and when it is burned to charcoal and only the temperature is left to lick it, it is the best time to cook meat and beans.

The mercenaries directly pressed the cleaned iron pot on the charcoal fire, and then poured the salted meat into the pot, using the heat of the pot to force out the fat in the salted meat.

A moment later, the aroma filled the entire camp, and that was exactly when the second wave woke up. Henry, Mira, Filippo, and Horno were among them, and a little before them were the paladins of Adolphus, who had finished their morning prayers and were distributing the grass they had brought to the horses—it was not easy to take care of the seven hundred horses, including the pack horses, but the paladins had no complaints.

The selection of papal forces in the orthodox Jetina sect of the White Church is quite strict, and those who can bear the name of paladins are firm executors of the will of the gods. They are hard-working, self-disciplined, and strong in their faith.

The Imperial knights also did the same thing as taking care of their horses, but most of the time they relied on professional grooms and their own minions.

Paladins don't have that condition, at least not anymore. Although the Church is still a non-negligible organization, it was centuries ago that they had a well-developed military system and the human and material resources to carry it out on a par with the Empire.

Today's paladins are still nominally knights, but they have more in common with mercenaries than noble knights. They are accustomed to traveling, taking care of the logistics themselves, and taking care of their companions' horses as a natural move.

There is a lot of strength in numbers, and although there are many things to do, the entire camp has been cleaned up and set up in less than half an hour under the handling of a group of veterans. The mercenaries and knights put on their armor and hung up their weapons. Fresh water was replenished, the remaining supplies were double-checked, and all that was left in the camp was freshly cooked breakfast and plates ready for distribution.

A meal of four hundred requires at least thirty cauldrons to cook, and they are scattered around the camp so that the smoke from burning is not too concentrated. Witches aren't supposed to be as sensitive to this as their human enemies, but it's always right to be careful.

"I'm a little worried. Captain Stephen, who was in charge of the whole team in the real sense, said this, and walked towards Henry with a serious expression, he was about six or seven centimeters shorter than Henry, but his body was much thicker than that of a well-proportioned sage - this was trained by the use of heavy weapons for many years, and the reason why many of the hunting mercenaries were also part-time blacksmiths can also be seen from this. Apparently they are better at wielding heavy tools against stubborn creatures or metals than at fighting humans.

"Is there a problem with the consumption of materials? The sage took a sip of the cold stream water as a gargle. Although Stephen seems to be a big boss, he is not a person. As we said earlier, hunting large creatures requires a cool head, planning, and patience, and the responsibility of leading a hunting team is even heavier. Although he is occasionally short-tempered, he is not careless in the end.

"Yes, just one breakfast consumes the supplies carried by the two pack horses, and there is nothing left. Stephen said this, even though he was the nominal leader of the team due to the overwhelming majority of the manpower. But having seen what Henry did in the battle of the city defense, the mercenary captain would not put up any stand in front of him.

Most of the people who can grow the team to occupy a place in the industry are his type, and they don't care about those faces and identities in front of capable people. It's not completely passive to what others say and listen to, but it doesn't put on a high shelf and think that the other party doesn't understand anything.

Nepotism, arrogance, and arrogance may be able to climb into a certain position through dependencies and the like, but they will not last long.

"There's one more problem. Stephen continued: "The flow of water is different from where the witch is, and we may face a lack of water. ”

"......" Henry put down the cup in his hand and glanced around.

The creek, which had been frozen on the surface, had melted, and with the snow melting, the increased flow of water had turned it into a small river in a short period of time. It wasn't hard to find, and the fresh water they consumed was replenished here, but judging by Camilo and Horno's communication with the unicorn, the witch was probably a little further east.

The deeper the terrain, the more difficult it became, and the more difficult the terrain was, the more food and fresh water it consumed – but the problem was that the stream was running from north to south, which meant that it was going in a direction perpendicular to it.

They didn't follow the ancient path this time, because the witch didn't take the road when she retreated into the interior of the Bao Forest. So they set out yesterday and walked for a short distance into the forest, and in the evening they arrived at the glade to the northeast, where the loggers and hunters of the town and the surrounding villages camped.

But if you cross here, there will be no such thing as a road.

Four hundred men and seven hundred horses, countless situations can occur on a flat road, and if you have to enter the undeveloped forest, the problem will obviously only be greater.

Not to mention the remnants of the undead, it can cause a series of troubles in terms of supply alone. They don't have a lot of water storage containers for streamlined travel, and the temperature is not very high, otherwise if the consumption is a little bigger, I'm afraid they will have to start reducing their staff before they see the witch.

"Understood. The sage nodded, and said nothing more. The mercenary captain, who had had a lot of communication during the battle, understood that this was what Henry meant by having a solution, and he reported the risk, and the other party learned about it, so he would do something.

For him, that's enough.

Stephen turned his head and walked to the other side, the cooks among the mercenaries were very skilled, and after squeezing out the fat, they added some water to make the broth. The soup used to reduce the salt is not wasted, but is added to the cereal porridge to add flavor, and the salted meat that has absorbed the water is re-dipped in grease and poured onto the frying pan to make a simple and delicious fried meat.

Simple, but appetizing breakfast. After Orno and Mira finished freshening up, it was time to unveil the pot, and the last group of Imperial magicians did not wake up until this time.

The magic mentor Camilo took the lead and patted his back with a "ouch ouch" call, and immediately rushed to the point where his skeleton was about to fall apart after a whole day without stopping, and it was not at all comfortable to sleep on the ground with only a layer of linen cloth as a cushion. If he hadn't been really tired, he would have had to sleep all night like those apprentices.

"I'm glad you were able to adapt. As soon as they stepped out of the tent, the magicians noticed that the others had already packed up their belongings, and all but the dozen or so tents they were in had been put away and placed on the back of the pack horses. The listless magicians rubbed their shoulders and backs and walked towards the campfire.

"Give. Mira, who was scooping porridge, handed a horn cup to the wizard.

"Thank you. Camilo took it and looked left and right, and he recognized that it was made of ox horn, which was quite different from the silver and pewter tools he usually used, which made the magician feel a little fresh, so that he stared at it for a while.

"Hey, Venerable Magician, give way. "Ah, I'm sorry. Camilo made way for one of the mercenaries, then walked over to another pile of burning pots next to him, scooped a spoonful of warm water with a copper spoon and poured it into a cup.

He muttered, "It's good to have morning tea." He walked over to Henry's side, and the sage glanced down at the steaming horn cup in Camillo's hand, raised an eyebrow, and watched him take a few breaths before taking a sip.

“.......”

"How fishy. ”

"She meant to take this and rinse your mouth with cold water. ”

"You can't hold hot stuff in a horn cup. Henry shrugged.

“...... Remind me, how many days have we been on our way?"

"One day. ”

"Beginning to miss your life in the imperial capital and your comfortable carriage?"

“...... Yes. ”

Camilo frowned and took another sip of warm water.