The cold wind howled in the blizzard, and the streets of the port of New Dunker were covered with several feet of snow. The old snow has not yet melted, and new snowflakes have fallen. The layers of snow piled up, and the snow on the streets became thicker and denser, and gradually piled up into a thick layer of ice.

In the vast city of New Dunke, only on the main thoroughfare of the city, there is a small group of old men with shovels, struggling to remove the snow from the streets. As for the snow in the other streets of the city, it is up to the individual households to solve it themselves.

On weekdays, there are a large number of well-organized people who shovel snow and complete it with the fastest efficiency under the leadership of the city hall. But this year, because of Arthur's conscription order, all the able-bodied in New Dunker have been transferred to the army, and now there are definitely no more than a thousand young men in the city who are over fifteen years old and under forty years old.

And these people, basically the rich and aristocratic of New Dunker, don't expect them to work hard in the blizzard.

In the town hall of New Dunrk, the current mayor and a group of high-ranking councillors are sitting in the hall with sad faces, staring through the large floor-to-ceiling windows at the snow howling down.

"Firewood, this is a terrible problem!" the round mayor finally spoke: "Without enough firewood, it is impossible for New Dunrk to survive this winter." But as everyone knows, all the woodcutters in the five northern provinces were drafted into the army, so ...... There's no firewood for sale anymore!"

An equally round councillor knocked on the conference table in front of him in distress: "What's even more shameless is firewood from several neighboring provinces in the south. They were sold out on the way before they could be delivered. Occasionally, a cartload of firewood was brought by water, and the price was already on par with that of the finest wheat flour. The cost is too high for the citizens of New Dunker to afford!"

Everyone's faces were ugly.

Without firewood, there is no fireplace, and without a warm fire, the city of New Dunker is now full of old, weak, sick and disabled. It is bound to cause a lot of frostbite and freeze to death in this very cold winter. It is hard to imagine what hell it will be like in New Dunrk after the beginning of spring, and even the most lawless nobles dare not imagine the consequences of such a miserable situation.

Criticism of imperial public opinion. The Emperor's severe punishment, and the anger of the warriors who returned from the expedition?

Well, if the warriors who made it to the Fourth Abyss still have the life to come back alive. When they saw that their families were all frozen to death, they would simply use their weapons to chop the entire family of the nobles in the city into meat sauce, right?

"Wood, firewood!" the mayor shook his head bitterly, "we are lucky, the Sain River flows through New Dunker. So, we can get a supply of firewood from the imperial capital. Of course, to meet the supply of firewood throughout the winter in New Dunker, this is a huge number, and the cost of shipping is expensive, which costs a lot of money. But we have to provide enough firewood. ”

The parliamentarians had gloomy faces, and one by one they bowed their heads and were silent.

Provide enough firewood. This means that they have to pay for the expensive fuel out of their own pockets. It's a huge expense, and in previous years they wouldn't have had to pay a single copper. When the young adults of New Dunker were not transferred, they went to the mountains to cut down two trees by themselves, which was enough for the whole family to consume for a month.

Not to mention the large number of woodcutters who make a living from logging, and they are enough to ensure that there is an abundant and cheap supply of fuel in the market.

"Our Royal Highness. He made the most stupid decision this time!" finally spoke one of the most daring councillors.

"Maybe we should contact the nobles of other cities, we should petition His Majesty jointly, we don't need a lord who is so cruel and so unreasonable. Another councillor sneered with a gloomy face: "This winter, the five northern provinces are not having a good time, and after the beginning of spring, I don't know how many people will be left in these five provinces." But when you think about it, it's not a pleasing picture. ”

"Impeach Arthur, the nouveau riche!" a small noble councillor with a low rank but a very long family history stood up, and he waved his fist vigorously: "Impeach him, either drive him out, or we will move away with our people." If he continues to do whatever he wants, these five provinces will be finished. ”

The mayor sneered a few times, and he shook his head vigorously: "Now these five provinces are on the verge of death, dear councilmen, the five provinces in the north of the empire are on the verge of death. ”

With a heavy sigh, the mayor spread his hands helplessly: "The question of impeaching him, we will talk about it later, the main issue now is, what to do with firewood? We can only take out our own gold coins, go to the imperial capital to collect a large amount of firewood, and then send it to New Dunker through the Guò Seine River, and then distribute it equally among the people in the city." ”

"Gentlemen, this is the only way we can do!" the mayor looked bitterly at the green-eyed councillors, and sighed helplessly: "If we still want to leave a good name, if we don't want to see New Dunker become hell, if we still want to save our lives after those warriors return home, we can only take out enough gold coins!"

The councillors sighed at the same time, and then nodded helplessly in agreement with the mayor's suggestion.

The foundation of their family is in Cindonerke, they have interests in Cindonerke, life and death, if Cindonker is destroyed, then their family will become a tree without roots, and their family will soon die. So in this most difficult moment, they must keep New Dunker, and even if they are stingy, they must take out enough gold coins to keep the supply of firewood.

Just as the councillors were discussing how much cash they could come up with to buy firewood, a huge explosion suddenly shook the entire city hall building. The three-story hollow floor-to-ceiling glass windows made a terrible cracking sound, and dozens of huge pieces of glass 'snapped' and exploded into pieces, and countless broken pieces of glass splashed, smashing the heads of several unlucky parliamentarians in the conference hall.

"What's going on?" said the mayor, who quickly ran under the table and hid, howling hoarsely.

Two guards burst into the conference hall, cold sweat streaming down their foreheads, and they screamed in horror: "We have been attacked! A huge fireball fell from the town hall square, and the carriage of the councillors and the coachmen were killed!"

In the town square of New Dunker, a huge hole with a diameter of more than 30 meters is bubbling hot. The snow on the entire Municipal Square was smoked and evaporated into water vapor, and the rolling heat wave spread out in all directions, and the large trees covered in thick ice armor around the Municipal Square actually burned like torches spewing flames several meters high.

This is an extremely powerful magical fireball, and the mage who inspires this fireball is at least a saint-level power. To be able to burst out the most ordinary fireball technique with such a powerful power, ordinary mages at the peak of the Heavenly Rank could not do this kind of Cheng Dù.

Another fireball more than three meters in diameter fell from the sky with a bright flame tail, this time hitting a hotel opposite the city hall with precision. The fireball tore through the roof of the hotel, burrowed into the heart of the hotel, and exploded.

This luxurious hotel has more than 100 rooms, and now the windows of these rooms are spewing out a blinding pillar of fire at the same time. The scarlet flames quickly wrapped around the outer wall of the hotel like a poisonous snake, and in just a few breaths, the hotel building collapsed, and all the guests and waiters in the hotel were killed in the flames.

The mayor and legislators witnessed the horrific scene through shattered glass windows.

A tall, thin councillor howled hoarsely: "Enemy attack! Enemy attack! Someone has attacked New Dunker! Where is our city defense army? Where is our militia regiment? What about our sheriff? What about our city defense generals? Contact the sailors of the garrison fleet, this is an enemy attack!"

Everyone stared blankly at the frightened almost schizophrenic councillor.

The 5,000 city defense troops of New Dunker have been transferred.

The 30,000 militia of New Dunker had long since been drafted by Arthur.

He's now a colonel officer in Arthur's Legion.

And the general of the city defense army, whether he wants it or not, anyway, this guy is now with the rank of lieutenant general of Arthur's legion, and is trekking through the wilderness of the fourth abyss with a full army of recruits, looking for the frost gate that I don't know where I am.

"Garrison, go and ask General Neville for help! He has at least a few thousand people left!" The mayor is the mayor after all, and he reacted immediately. There were now less than a thousand young and strong men left in New Dunker, and most of them were the sons of nobles and wealthy people, and it was impossible to resist this sudden attack on their own.

In addition to these unreliable young men, there are now only a large number of old, weak, sick and disabled people left in Xintun Erke, and their best use is to be human shields, and it is impossible to count on them to fight.

On the side of the military port in New Dunker, the North Sea Garrison Fleet, which had just been reorganized for three days and had just set up a complete command frame, had already been mobilized at the fastest speed. Neville stood heavily armed on the flagship of the Imperial Light, giving orders aloud.

One after another powerful fireballs roared down from a great distance, indiscriminately falling in the sea water of the military port and on the nearby hills, the power of each fireball was extremely amazing, several medium-sized warships were unfortunately hit by the fireballs, and the battleships that were 100 meters away were lifted up by the terrible explosive force, and exploded into countless fragments in the dazzling firelight.

Raid, and such a powerful raid!

But where is the enemy? A small part of the city of Neudenker is already in flames, but they haven't seen where the enemy is!