Chapter 231 – The Alliance 2
Chapter 231 The Alliance 2
“That old piker Maltz once robbed me of a bunch of horses for the surprising reason that I was badmouthing him behind his back, but of course, he made it all up, and I’ve never badmouthed him to his face.”
“One of the villages on my border was forcibly cut off by the Kents, whoops~~ that was my ancestral domain when my ancestor was a knight.”
“And that little brute of the Kent family, he even grabbed the people who had offended him in my territory in a dignified manner, without even saying hello, but they were my people, ah, you have to look at the master when you hit a dog, and this brat didn’t put me as a lord in his eyes at all.”
“When my territory was invaded by pirates, he even offered me assistance only on the condition that I pledge my allegiance to him, he really doesn’t know the sky and is wildly disobedient and insolent, doesn’t he know that I’m a loyal subject of His Majesty the King?”
“Three years ago Viscount Cole was framed by Maltz, and falsely accused of secretly opposing Count Ferdinand, with the result that the whole family was exiled, and his family’s possessions annexed by the Kent family. This incident is hitherto vivid in my mind, and I get chills in my back when I think of it.”
“He also built dams in his territory, and once the dry season came, he had to charge for water, and we and other lords located in the lower reaches of the river were subject to his extortion every year.”
“Maltz Kent, villain! Villain!”
……
The hall was noisy as the lords lambasted each other for the crimes of the Kents, expressing their displeasure with the domineering family.
The more the crowd talked, the more they became energized, and the Kent family had turned into ten evil bastards.
Earl Parker saw that the fire was almost ready, stood up and waved his hands.
“Gentlemen! Quiet! Quiet!”
With his words, the hall grew silent, and the crowd looked together at Price Parker.
The old earl said in a loud voice, “We are just talking here, it is painless to the Kent family, the only way to fight him down is to come up with actual actions.”
Immediately people shouted, “Lord Earl, just tell us what to do!”
With the leader, the others also chimed in, stating that they would fight the Kent family to the end.
The old earl immediately replied, “Cooperation! Only with our full cooperation can we fight against the Kent family! The people in this hall right now are only nearly half of the lords of the Northwest Bay, that means there are still half of the lords who are in favor of – or at least not against – Maltz Kent. He is now able to override the Duke again and manipulate the power of the Ferdinand family, we are still slightly inferior in terms of strength, all we must unite.”
“The old Count is right!”
“Let’s unite against the Kent family!”
Seeing that no one sang the opposite tune, Price Parker secretly breathed a sigh of relief, the lords attending this meeting were all invited by him after carefully selecting them, but he didn’t expect it to go so smoothly.
Hmph, O Maltz Kent, you are usually unassuming and arrogant and unbeatable, you didn’t expect to secretly set up so many enemies, right?
“Occupying the advantage of strength, Maltz definitely won’t obediently tie his hands, sooner or later we’ll have to fight him. Everyone has money to contribute and power to contribute, so let’s take stock of the power we have at hand now. I’ll just go ahead and say it, my Parker family can provide 50 knights and 1500 soldiers”
Hearing the old earl say so, the lords in the hall also reported the strength they could contribute, before coming here they all guessed that there would be such a thing this time, and had already calculated it carefully. “I, Clan Malcolm, can provide 50 knights and 1,200 soldiers.”
“My Heller family can provide 30 knights and 1,300 soldiers.”
“I, House Johnston, can provide 20 knights and 1,000 soldiers.”
……
It was Paul and Myron’s turn, and Paul reported the number of soldiers that the two families could provide, “The Greiman and Garnard families together can provide 1,000 soldiers.”
Earl Parker stroked his beard and nodded his head, knowing that Alda is not well populated and Bairdine suffered a rebellion last year, it is understandable that they can only take out 1,000 people together.
All the lords reported down, the total can organize a 500 knights, more than 12,000 soldiers “army”.
Paul thought to himself: “Half of the lords in the northwest can come up with more than 10,000 soldiers, if all the lords in the country spare no effort to support the royal family, I’m afraid that the rebellion in the south will only take half a year to be pacified.”
Paul subconsciously substituted the soldiers trained by Alda, he forgot that most of the soldiers these lords were talking about were peasants who were temporarily conscripted. If the lords really provided all these farmers and soldiers to the royal family, how to manage them would be a super huge trouble for the royal family, it’s a long way to the south to quell the rebellion, it’s not like dealing with the Kent family like fighting a war at their own doorstep, with the logistic capacity of this era to bear the burden of these people’s food and drink would be a disaster. And these soldiers can’t stay on the battlefield for a long time, otherwise who is going to farm.
Earl Parker was very satisfied with the power of the alliance, he twirled his beard with a joyful smile and said:
“Good! Our strength can completely compete with Maltz Kent’s extreme accomplices. In addition, we will also denounce the Kent family to His Majesty the King for holding the sovereign hostage and plotting to rebel, and denounce his suspicion of practicing witchcraft to the church, so that justice will be on our side and we will strive for the support of more forces.”
So the lords agreed on detailed steps.
Everyone went back and started recruiting and training troops, guarding their respective territories, and once the Kent family sent troops to attack after realizing that something was wrong, the other lords would have to go to the rescue immediately.
After the troops were almost ready, the lords wrote a letter to inform the whole country, exposing the misdeeds of the Kent family, focusing on the royal family and the church, in addition to the hostage taking of the king, the intention of plotting against the king, and witchcraft, of course, also includes all kinds of oppression to the people in their daily life.
At the same time to the Kent family ultimatum, so that Maltz Kent immediately confessed, if he can will be a title down one level, release Duke Ferdinand, return from the hands of the people to extort the benefits, and then pay a considerable amount of fines, the people will join together to protect him from the prosecution of the Crown and the Church, after all, he is also a Northwest Bay nobles and lords, the opportunity for reform is still to be given.
Paul at first a little dissent, according to his meaning, treatment of Maltz Kent this kind of person, after the defeat, should be held down to the death, beat the dog in the water.
Myron persuaded him quietly, “Everyone will be afraid if you propose that. I don’t know about other places, but in the Northwest Gulf, leaving each other a way out is an unwritten rule among the lords-if there’s no deep hatred between them.”
“Leave a man a way out, and we’ll see each other later?”
“Yes, yes, that’s what it means, and you’ve described it very aptly. There aren’t many things that can make the lords turn each other to death.”
“What are some of them?”
“Kinslaying feuds or …… unruly rebellions.”
(End of chapter)