"Since the general has said so, if I refuse, it will be a little extraordinary, I want to see who is playing this trick with me in my territory, immediately gather people to get on the road, and we will talk about the rest of the things while walking." The crown princess showed strong self-confidence, both for her own strength and for the Cormier Kingdom.

If those rats are honestly nested in the rat hole, there is still a possibility of surviving in the Cormier Kingdom, and once they crawl out of the rat hole to make waves, it will be time for them to be uprooted.

There is zero tolerance for this kind of thing, whether it is the crown princess or the king of Assan.

As for the safety of King Ahsan and the archmage of the court, from beginning to end, it was not within the consideration of the crown princess, with their strength, if it was something that they couldn't solve, they would definitely not be able to solve it, and instead of thinking about those useless, it was better to focus on what was in front of them.

Both Gavin and Tynarasta led the elite of the elite, even if it was summoned late at night, and it took less than half an hour from giving the order to embarking on the road to the town of Dadluk.

They didn't go directly to the town of Luji, where the accident occurred, and Gavin and Tenalasta were very of the same opinion in this kind of disappearance investigation, and it was very important to be the source of the news, and they might be able to trace down important news clues with clues.

Just because Lord Theob didn't find it doesn't mean they can't.

Gavin and the others were going to turn around the Trail of the Thorntail in Hilp Town and go directly through the King's Forest to Susar City, but now they can only continue along the Calantaire Road for more than 80 kilometers, and before reaching the largest inland river in the Cormier Kingdom, the Star Wave River, they turn south into the Star Wave Road, and the town of Dadruk is located at the intersection of it and the Ranger Road, which is an out-and-out forest town.

The Kingdom of Komir is known as the Kingdom of the Forest, and the land on which it is located once belonged to the Great Forest of Komanso, which was once covered by dense ancient forests, which gradually began to give way as humans settled here.

But even so, the area of the ancient forest still occupies one-third of the entire country, and the largest piece of the area is the King's Forest, also known as the King's Forest, where the town of Dadruk is located, which is located in the heart of the entire Cormir Kingdom.

Centuries ago, the royal family of Obaiszir enacted a strict King's Forest Protection Act, which strictly forbade private felling of trees in the King's Forest and private hunting, and once found to be a private logger, the tree was fined, replanted and the worst was tortured by being bound in the tree to become a dryad, and the rest of their lives were forgiven for their selfish actions - this torture is said to have originated from the spirits to punish those natural creatures who desecrate the forest, hence the birth of the Dryads.

"The King's Forest is the greatest treasure of our Cormir Kingdom, here is our natural strategic depth and granary, the few food shortages and wars in the history of the Cormier Kingdom are all based on the output of the King's Forest, of which Luji Town is the most important center.

It also serves as a barrier to confine the monster tribes that spawn in the Cape of Storms Mountains, or force them to seek development on the other side of the mountain range instead of pouring into the interior of the kingdom. ”

Princess Crown has a more official explanation for the royal family's protection of the King's Forest, which is due to national strategic considerations, and some of the needs of the people at the bottom cannot be taken into account, even if there are quite public grievances, they have to be implemented.

"Taught." Gavin is quite unimpressed with this kind of one-size-fits-all, in this matter, the Cormier royal family's approach is somewhat simple and rude, as long as you are willing to work hard, there must be a more harmonious development method, and your own territory will definitely not simply adopt this method in the future.

When the group arrived at the town of Dadluk, the sun had already risen in the middle, and it didn't feel particularly obvious to be in this wooded town.

It's a picturesque place, with log farmhouses nestled among dense trees, miniature gardens and small vegetable patches dotted outside, bright sunlight shining through the woods, dappled shadows everywhere, and birds chirping from time to time passing overhead, not afraid of people at all, telling the vicissitudes of time The towering ancient trees are covered with moss, which perfectly blends the ethereal beauty of the elves with the smell of human fireworks.

The village was surrounded by small swamps, caused by the flooding of the Xingbo River, and Gavin's attention and interest were the giant storks roaming freely in the village, taller than adults, with a pointed beak that was a meter long, with a red top and a black beak, and was very powerful.

As if noticing Gavin's gaze, Lord Theob took the initiative to explain: "This giant stork is called the swamp giant stork, don't look at its huge size, in fact, its temperament is very tame, it will not attack any humanoid creatures, it is said that it was introduced from other places, but the place of origin is unknown, they prefer rodents such as snakes and water rats to fish.

Since having them, our village has never had a snake and rat infestation, and their eggs are also a great delicacy, they don't need to be cooked with effort at all, just cooked in clean water, so that those who have eaten them will never forget it, and they are sought after by countless nobles in the royal capital Sussar, and they can be sold for a gold coin, and their meat can also be made into several delicious dishes, which are not inferior to their eggs.

Unfortunately, their picky eating habits make it impossible for our farms to expand, and sometimes we have to buy snakes from snake catchers to feed them. ”

"My lord, I have a headache because there are no snakes, I have a headache because there are too many snakes, and all kinds of snakes on the other side of the Thun swamp are about to overflow." Gavin proposed, "Is the lord interested in setting up a joint venture?" I came out of the field, and the swamp stork came out of the lord, and we shared half of all the production. ”

Gavin wants to bring in swamp storks from Dadruk Town, and profit is secondary, mainly because he wants to deal with the snake plague in Thun Swamp, the war between the black-scaled lizardmen and the Thun snakemen is in full swing, and the Thun snakemen, who have been uprooted by Gavin, are crushed in the face of the powerful offensive of the black-scaled lizardmen.

But it is not so easy for the black-scaled lizardmen to uproot the Thun snake people from the Thun swamp, after all, the Thun swamp is so big, they drill into the depths of the swamp, and it is much more difficult to find them, especially the evil cursed snake people and the snake abomination have the ability to transform into snakes, which makes it more difficult to hunt them down.

Those cunning Thun snake people have now changed their war strategy, no longer easily appear in front of the black scale lizard people, but drive those snakes to attack the black scale lizard people tribe, this attack is not limited to the black scale lizard people themselves, but also includes the livestock fish they raise, if possible, those snakes will naturally attack the children or eggs of the black scale lizard people, that is, the black scale lizard people have black dragon blood flowing in their bodies, and the poison resistance is relatively high, if they were ordinary people, they would have been poisoned to death by those poisonous snakes a large area.

Gavin is urgently deploying an army of snake catchers from the Dragon's Oak Collar - the Kobolds' exclusive mount, the Ritted Weasel.

They are a top one snake catcher, rat catcher, rabbit catcher, they are close relatives of the flat-headed brother, immune to most snake venom, bitten by a poisonous snake, at most a few hours of sleep.

It's just that their home field is mountains and jungles, and their combat effectiveness in the water will be greatly reduced, and if they are not careful, they will become food in the mouths of those pythons, and they will be dragged into deep water to drown, at best, they will be assisted in those dry areas, and they will be placed in the black-scaled lizardman tribe to protect the safety of the tribe.

If you add this swamp stork, it is not just a defense, but also a proper counterattack, the size of the swamp stork determines that in most of the swamp waters, they have an absolute advantage, even if it is an adult arm thick python, it is just a matter of a mouthful, their size is born to hunt snakes.

Swamp storks have the advantage that ferocious ferrets do not have, they are birds, they can hatch in batches, as long as they have enough food, they can form a scale in less than two years, even if the snake plague is suppressed in the later stage, they still have good commercial value, they will not lose inside and out, and can also increase the diversified industry of the black-scaled lizard people.

"The general is really a cheerful person, and we have decided this matter." Lord Theob replied cheerfully.

When he was young, he had taken risks around the Thun swamp, and he knew the situation of Thun swamp very well, and he had this idea when he introduced the swamp stork in front of Gavin, but he didn't expect that this young general was even more bold than he expected, not only did he put it forward first, but the price was also impossible to refuse.

"The general really goes wherever he goes, and business can be done." Princess Crown couldn't help but look sideways, if it was said that the business in Hilp Town was prepared by Gavin, then in Dadruk Town, it was typical to be temporary, after all, they were rerouted here because of an emergency, even if he was a voter of the Lady of Strategy, it was impossible to budget to this point.

"It's just a coincidence." That's how Gavin can explain.

Gavin had read about the presence of swamp storks in the town of Dadruk, but that alone was not worth a trip to the place himself, and he was going to leave it to the Conqueror's caravan to advance.

I didn't expect that there would be an extraneous complication, and I had the opportunity to come to Dadruk Town in person, so I naturally finalized this matter by the way.

Neither Gavin nor Tynarasta dwelled too much on this issue, after all, for them, this relatively single breeding industry, even if the scale is large, the value is relatively limited, as long as the intention is finalized, the details will naturally be promoted by the following people, and their main energy is still in Luji Town.

As Theob had said, no one could tell how they knew that Lumarket had disappeared, as if they had woken up one night and all the people knew about it, as if someone had told them the news in their sleep.

Even if he used a spell of charm to deeply hypnotize them, the answer he received was the same, and he was unable to find the source or gather more useful information.

"We are walking along the Ranger Road, I have been walking on this road for nearly 30 years, I am very familiar with every grass and tree here, because this road is more round, from our town to Luji Town is eighteen kilometers, even if it is walking, it will not take two hours, usually we can arrive in less than an hour, as a result, we ran on this road for three hours, and did not see the shadow of Luji Town, Luji Town is so big, we can't miss it, and then we discussed it, After walking for another two hours, there was still no trace of Luji Town, and then he turned back. ”

"How long did it take you to walk back?"

"We didn't remember this accurately, we set out in the morning, turned back at noon, and when we returned to the town, it was already dark."

"Did you find anything unusual along the way? Feel like something is missing somewhere? Or maybe something is something that doesn't feel right? ”

"I didn't feel anything wrong before, but in retrospect, there was something wrong with everything, it was like we were spinning in the jungle all the time."

"That's right, that's what it feels like, a lot of places are like they're printed out of a mold."

"This is the case with the forest road itself, only those spirits can distinguish each tree and name them, and when the road market town disappears, we will subconsciously magnify the uneasiness caused by this situation."

"Okay, thank you for your cooperation, you can leave and let the aerial reconnaissance team in."

"Yes, Your Highness."

"Tell me about what you've seen."

"Back to Your Highness, we are going along the Lumberjack Trail, which is a trail from the town of Dadeluk to the town of Luji, only five kilometers away, but through the densest area of the King's Forest, the air sign itself is not very clear, can only be used as an auxiliary reference, to help identify the direction, in addition, we will also use some tall trees as flight landmarks, every time we fly over a flight landmark three kilometers away from the town of Dadruk, the Lumberjack Trail disappears, Even if we landed to search, let alone head to Lugu, by the time we found the Lumberjack's Trail, we were back in Dadluk. ”

"So, you've been lost since the Lumberjack Trail disappeared?"

"Yes, at that time, it was full of woods, all the same, and we were indeed lost."

"What about the sun? Why don't you rely on the sun to discern your direction? ”

"We did rely on the sun to discern our direction, but when we got back to the town of Dadruk, we found that we had strayed far from the Lumberjack's Trail, we had gone southwest before, but when we came back, we were in the northeast of the town, and we didn't know when, we had made a big circle."

"How many times have you flown in total?"

"Eight times, we tried a total of eight times before and after, until it was dark and there was no way to fly again."

"Is this the case every time?"

"Yes, it's the case every time, the only thing that's different is probably that the direction of coming back is not fixed."

"Okay, I know, thank you for the information."

"It's what we should do, and unfortunately it didn't help in any way."

"Lord Theob, the way you disappeared wouldn't be the Lumberjack's Trail, right?"

"Yes, after the successive failures of the aerial reconnaissance, I organized the purple dragon knights and battle mages in the town, with the help of a ranger and a druid, let them go along the logger's trail, with their speed, they can go back and forth in an hour, but I didn't expect them to be gone forever, I was afraid of any danger in the middle, so I didn't rush to send a second wave, and went to the palace for help as soon as possible, and His Highness knew the rest of the things."

"Okay, you know almost everything you need to know, summarize all the information in your hand, everyone see if you have any good ideas, say them all and listen to them, there is no right or wrong, just provide a direction of thinking."

In order to get first-hand information, Princess Crown met with all the relevant personnel and asked them about the search process in detail, and the answers they got were all in the clouds, and they also had a stomach full of questions in their stomachs, let alone give answers.

The forest road itself is different from the ordinary road, where the line of sight is very limited, the scenery is the same, it is easy to lose the sense of direction and distance, the only thing to do is to go along the road, if there is no road, a little careless will be completely lost in the primeval forest, become a meal in the stomach of various forest monsters.

If the forest is big enough, even if you are flying in the air, you will lose your direction, even if you think you are flying straight ahead, if you really mark it, the flight path is not necessarily straight, and many times, people's feelings are inaccurate.

Lord Theob was the first to speak: "I tend to say that this is an illusion, a large illusion enchantment, which wraps the road market town and the surrounding roads and forests, it is not really gone, but our senses are misled, even if we walk past him, we don't know it, the people in the road market town are also trapped by this illusion, and there is no way to get out of it." ”

"I'm afraid it's not that simple." Tainarasta shook her head and said, "There are resident transcendent mages in Luji Town, if it is really a simple illusion, even if they don't have the ability to break it, they can use their real eyes to penetrate the illusion and come out of it to ask for help, and most importantly, illusions usually don't have the ability to prohibit teleportation." ”

"There's another possibility." Gavin threw out his own speculation, "That is, there is an overlap in the plane, and Luji Town is engulfed by the transparency realm of the etheric plane or the phantom plane, when it is no longer in this plane, it will naturally not be able to find it anyway, and the engulfed position will be avoided and blurred, producing an effect similar to illusion, until it is completely digested here, fused into a part of itself, and the two worlds are separated again." ”

(End of chapter)