To Four Thousand Years Later

v3 Chapter 22: Forty years of unknown king

Count Nils-Michel is having another nightmare.

He supported Wei Bian to straighten up, feeling that he was very thirsty. He drank half a sip of water first, then vomited directly on the ground in disgust, and asked the housekeeper to bring a bottle of wine. After drinking half of the bottle, he felt his body warm up again.

...S... Solomon Niels muttered in a low voice: "Will you kill me?"

Although I apologized to the new king. But he still harbored a strong uneasiness in his heart.

His family is very young, and up to his generation, it can barely be regarded as the inheritance of three generations. His grandfather was the son-in-law of the Lazy King, but in the political war between Buping III and his father Iron Hammer Zhili for the throne, their family stood decisively on Lao Zhili's side and provided a lot of funds.

Because of this, their family can continue as a hereditary earl. Today, their family's territory is the Champagne region not far southwest of Yashen.

Today, Nils has become the main supplier of wine to the Frankish royal family. At the same time, he is an outstanding businessman. The Chamber of Commerce under his name has already opened up three trade routes to Saint-Denis, Burgundy, and Bavaria Minor. . It can be said that the most affluent area in the whole of Frank has been delineated. After all, if you go further east, it is already the territory of Du Juanhou. Du Peng Hou Juyi Varipovatu is not easy to deal with. What's more, the land itself was laid down by his father, Kestrel Marquis Henry Povato.

Seventy years ago, Frank's eastern frontier even reached only north of Croatia. But when the Lazy King was in power, a major event happened in the Frankish East.

When the Goths fought against the Persians for the 18th year, in the north of the Gothic Kingdom, the Duke who managed the Wallachia region suddenly declared independence and refused to continue fighting with the Persians.

It was still the time when the grandfather of King Benito I of Stone was in power. The war on the Eastern Front had already exhausted him. In the sixteenth year of fighting the Persians, the Egyptians also launched an offensive from the south. At the same time, the Carthaginians in the southwest were also eager to try, planning to take a bite out of Goth.

What made the situation worse was that the grandfather of the stone king Benito I was stoned to death by a catapult on the battlefield with the Persians. At that time, as the second son of a certain minor nobleman, he served as the leader of mercenaries. At this time, the Gothic court struggle was basically over.

Shi Wang's father took over as Da Ren. He was not the best choice, but he was born as a general. It is suitable for the current situation of Gothic.

He first relaxed the battlefield on the Eastern Front, defeated the Egyptian siege through three consecutive surprise attacks, caused heavy casualties to the northern Egyptian army, and signed a peace treaty with Egypt. . But before the end of the first month of fighting, Frank sent someone to negotiate a peace with him. Promise that Frank will form an alliance with his in-laws, and will not invade each other and promise war assistance to each other.

At that time, the one who negotiated with him instead of the lazy king was the grandfather of Charles Hammer, who was the official minister. So the Gothic king suddenly freed his hand, and led two cavalry regiments to go around from the south, surprise the rear of the Persians, cut off the Persians' supplies, and cut off the Persians who had penetrated deep into the hinterland. Except for the southwest corner, the leader basically encloses the Mediterranean Sea. Although the Persians have reached Crete, they are obviously not good at naval warfare. The Goths, who were proficient in this way, easily dispersed the Persian army, burned their ships, and forced them to stop on different islands.

After that, he reached an agreement with the Franks and borrowed two armies to encircle the Persians in the territory. The Goths were in charge of sea warfare, the Franks were in charge of guerrilla warfare in the jungle. One of the conditions put forward by Hammer Naith is that the Goths promise not to recover the Wallachia region.

After that, it passed two encirclement campaigns. Gothic also paid a big price to destroy the first Persian army and severely damage the second to fourth army. It was Hong Shihou who commanded the last siege. He also made great military exploits one after another, and was named a Marquis. The leader is the piece of land he laid down.

Although that piece of land is really too big...but the then Palace Chancellor Charlie made such a decision also made sense.

The rapid population and economic development of Frank these years has a lot to do with their staying away from war. Because their economy and agriculture are quite developed, there has been no civil strife for more than a hundred years. The Franks have always had a bad impression of the Goths, with three points of alienation, three points of disgust and three points of contempt, plus one point of fear that they don't want to admit. But this large piece of good land, if it is not, it will not work.

Therefore, the final compromise is to use this place as the family territory of Marquis Kestrel, and then exclude their family from the top nobles of Frank. But they insisted that this is the territory of the Powatu family.

Their family, which used the falcon as its coat of arms, was extremely powerful at that time. But it was also feared by the mainland nobles. Even until now, people in the Frankish interior have an inherent view of "Eastern people"-however, Nils, who has been to Wallachia, knows that such a view is absolutely wrong. People from the East are not only not natives, nor are they countrymen. They even live better than many mainlanders. Their women wear fluffy skirts, and patrolling soldiers can also wear swords. They also believe in the Rohmanism, and there is little or no etiquette in saluting and returning salutes. It's just that one...they didn't respect the king very much. Therefore, Nils did not dare to continue to expand business routes to the east.

He is not afraid of the cuckoo. But fear of Pepin III.

But what he is afraid of now is another thing.

One because he was a supporter of Prince Carloman. Prince Charles was born in combat, and he has a glorious record. But Niels didn't like that. For the prince who is talented in leading the army, if he becomes a king, he will definitely start a war. In this case, many farmers in his territory will be drafted into the army... which means that his wine production will be greatly reduced. The noble position of their family was exchanged for money. Conversely, if there is no money. It is natural to lose.

However, Prince Roman failed. Whether he was assassinated or He Xiang, dead is defeated. He couldn't be the king, and he was on the wrong team. There is nothing wrong with dying. But he wanted to struggle a little more.

Is it too late to surrender again at this time? Dawn hadn't come yet, but he couldn't sleep anymore. He gets dressed. He walked out of the room without taking anyone with him.

Before dawn, the silent woods were as dark as the devil's claws. The wind was damp and cool, biting and cold, as if it was raining heavily. This is Solomon's grove, he thought. This is Frank's wood... but it's not Carloman's wood anymore.

Looking to the east—even though his vision was blocked, he always felt that the forty-six corpses were hanging in front of his eyes. Just thinking about it made his extremities go cold.

Am I the next wave?

He walked forward aimlessly, not knowing where he was going.

A Silver Iron Guard saluted him from the other side of the corner as if he had been waiting here for a long time.

"Hello, Honorable Count Nils-Michel.

Under Nils' almost numb gaze, the Silver Iron Guard said respectfully, "Your Majesty Solomon and Your Excellency Turpin are welcome."

Trying his best to suppress his urge to turn around and run away, Nils was silent for a long time, then nodded expressionlessly.

"Lead the way."