Steel, gunpowder, and spellcasters

Chapter 138 Guests
When the three men said goodbye to Lieutenant Mason, the senior student was very reluctant to part with them. He insisted on stuffing several large bags of beef jerky and pork jerky into their saddlebags, saying they were specialties from the ranch. He also insisted on seeing them off for a while, eventually accompanying them more than ten kilometers away.

Before leaving, Mason almost begged, "You must come to see me again when you have time, please." After that, he stood on the earthen slope by the roadside and watched him go until his view was obstructed by the terrain.

Winters, Bud, and Andrei embarked on their journey back to their base with heavy hearts.

During a rest stop, Andrei said dejectedly, "If the Japanese don't let us go, we'll probably end up like that in a few years."

“Lieutenant Mason is in a worse situation than us.” Bud said calmly and coldly as always: “He may look like the warden, but what difference is there between him and the prisoners?”

"Like a frog being slowly boiled in water." Winters threw the quartz in his hand into a puddle in the distance and sighed, "Always thinking there's a way out and not daring to take a gamble, we ended up with the worst outcome. If we had just escaped back to Venetta when we first arrived at Kingsburg, we might not have had so many troubles."

The white quartz stone arced through the air before splashing into the water and disappearing, leaving only a few small ripples.

……

Bud went directly back to St. John's via Little Rock.

Winters first returned to Blackwater with Andre to get back their original mounts, then parted ways with his friend again and returned to his camp.

The Blackwater Town and the Wolf Village Town are separated by the Blackwater River. There is no bridge across the river, but there is a shallow ford that can be waded across.

When Winters arrived at the crossing site, he found that Anglu had already been waiting at the crossing point for a long time.

"Lieutenant!" Angru told Winters eagerly, "You have guests! Two guests!"

Waiting for Winters at the police station were two guests he never expected.

“Gold?” Winters could hardly believe his eyes. “You? How did you get here?”

The dark, thin man in front of me laughed heartily, revealing a mouthful of gold teeth. He was none other than "Lucky" Gold, a former pirate, sailor, and seaman.

“I’m not the only one who’s come, sir!” Gold laughed loudly. “There’s another acquaintance of yours.”

A boy ran out from behind Gold and rushed forward to hug Winters.

The sudden turn of events caught Winters off guard. He stood there stunned for a long time before recognizing the boy who was hugging him: "Charles? Ah? Is that you?"

If he wasn't mistaken, the person hugging him was Ben Vinutto's third brother, Charles. It had been a year since they last met, and the boy had grown considerably taller. His face had lost its childishness and he now looked quite grown-up.

"It's me, Brother Winters!" Charles said excitedly, "We've finally found you!"

"What...what are you doing here? Did my letter arrive so quickly?"

Winters never expected to run into old friends in Wolf Town, let alone Charles and Gold—two people who had almost no connection.

“That’s a long story,” Gold said, pointing at Charles with a laugh. “This kid’s here to deliver a message to you.”

“Who sent you two to deliver this message to me?” Winters asked.

"No, no, no! It's not me, it's him." The former pirate captain shook his head repeatedly, saying smugly, "I'm not here to deliver a message to you. Your mother and your fiancée are worried that this kid isn't capable of delivering the message, so they hired me to protect him along the way."

There were so many problems in what the other person said that Winters didn't know how to respond for a moment.

“What nonsense are you talking about?” Charles glared at Gold and explained to Winters, “It was Mrs. Serbiati and Miss Navarre who sent me with a message.”

“A letter? Where is the letter?” Winters’ breathing suddenly quickened.

Charles used a knife to cut open the hem of his clothes and pulled out a roll of paper wrapped in felt.

"What's the point of all this clever tricks? You might as well just keep it in your pack." Gold said disdainfully as he saw Charles take the letter out of his clothes.

Charles immediately retorted, "Who knows if there are bad guys?" As he said this, his eyes were fixed on Gold.

But Winters' mind was no longer on the two of them; he eagerly opened the letter and read it as quickly as possible.

There were three letters in total: one from Cossa, one from Elizabeth, and one from Anna.

The letter contained nothing particularly noteworthy, just a few words. Perhaps out of fear of interception, it didn't even mention Winters' name.

But for Winters, these letters were as sweet as the first breath of air a drowning person could take.

After hearing Charles's account and combining it with the contents of the letter, Winters roughly understood what had happened.

Rewind a year, Ben Vinutto was kidnapped by the Monta gang at the docks, and Ciel sought help from Winters. To prevent Ciel from being retaliated against, Winters asked Bard to take him to Flora.

In the days that followed, Xia Er stayed at his relatives' house in Baihua City, listening anxiously to the news coming from Hailan, until the storm gradually subsided before returning to Hailan.

Five months had passed since the massacre of the Monta gang. Charles wanted to thank Winters, but learned that Winters had already boarded a supply fleet and gone to Taneria for the second time.

Because Winters had given prior notice, and Cosa remembered that Charles was Winters' classmate's younger brother, Charles spent the next six months apprenticing in Giovanni [Antonio's brother]'s workshop.

As for the minor incident a few months ago, Charles never mentioned it to anyone. No one in the workshop knew he was Ben Vinutto's brother, and no one knew he had sought Winters' help.

Then came the incident where the United Provinces Army sent Vineta graduates to Palatour.

While Winters was constantly thinking about "how to get home," his family in Hailan was also trying to find a way to rescue him.

Due to communication difficulties caused by geographical distance and deliberate deception from the United Provinces, the Venetta side initially obtained almost no valuable information.

At first, the Governor's government only knew that the warrant officers who went to Guido City to attend the commissioning ceremony had disappeared, but they had no idea where the warrant officers had gone and assumed that the provincial military had imprisoned them.

One by one, messengers sent back by the consul in Guido arrived in Hailan, and Venetta learned that the warrant officers had been sent to Palatour.

It was too late to send someone to chase after them, so the Governor's government could only negotiate with Palatour's side.

But the highlanders, having suffered in silence, became even more defiant, directly scattering and reassigning the Vineta lieutenants. Before Debera's envoy even arrived at Kingsburg, the Vineta lieutenants had already been sent to increasingly remote posts.

Only then did news of the officer's disappearance spread from the upper echelons of Venetia to ordinary citizens. Immediately, the Republic of Venetia was filled with outrage and public opinion was in uproar.

The officer's family was filled with grief and indignation, and launched a public petition in Parliament Square. Ordinary Venetian citizens, who had no relation to the officer, were equally outraged upon learning of the federal government's treacherous and provocative actions.

For the Vinetta Governorate, the sum of the cities equaled the nation. The peasants of Vinetta had virtually no political rights, a legacy of the era of autonomous cities and the wars for sovereignty.

As the heart of the Republic, angering Aquamarine is tantamount to angering the Republic of Veneta.

The anger of the citizens of Hailan was like boiling lava, and the ruling committee was under tremendous pressure from public opinion.

The governor of Debera had to personally step in to appease the public, publicly promising that he would "save our children."

Despite Debera's confident and impassioned pronouncements, not a single Lieutenant Veneta could return home until the Kingdom of Galloping Horses was satisfied. How could the Paratus be satisfied?
Return the Plattite officers who had been sent overseas to them.

Therefore, the Venetta administration can actually do nothing.

Winters was sent to Palatour, António remained stationed in Tanilla, and only Cosa and Elizabeth, along with Sofia who was temporarily staying, remained at their home in Aquamarine.

Cosa wrote to Antonio, asking her husband to send someone to bring Winters back to Veneta. But Antonio, unusually, opposed his wife's idea.

Antonio's reply contained only one word—"Wait".

But Kosha, who was anxious, couldn't wait, which is why Charles traveled all the way from Hailan to Wolf Town with a letter.

"Did they receive my letter at home?" Winters sensed something was wrong.

"A letter? What letter?" Charles was also very surprised.

"It was a letter I sent through the church."

"I haven't received it, at least I don't know about it."

Winters thought for a moment and asked, "When do you depart from Aquamarine?"

"The month before last, six weeks ago."

Winters' letter was sent out just two weeks ago; six weeks ago he was still busy organizing the militia.

"Then how did you know I was in Wolf Town?" Winters asked, increasingly puzzled.

“I have to thank Miss Navarre for this,” Charles said with a mischievous grin. “Miss Navarre really likes you, Brother Winters.”

Charles explained the connection again, and Winters then realized that Anna had used her connections with the Navarre Trading Company to find out that Winters' residence was in a town under the jurisdiction of the city of Gevordan.

Anna told Cossa the news, and then Charles and Gold immediately set off from Aquamarine. At that time, Winters' letter sent through the church had not even been written yet.

“When we set off, we only knew you were near the city of Gevodan, but not which town exactly. So we had to search town by town.” Charles said happily, “Thank God, we found you after only five searches!”

“Wait a minute, are you saying that Mrs. Serbiati and Miss Navarre sent you here together?” Winters emphasized the word “together”.

“Yes, actually I could have come alone.” Charles glanced at Gold with dissatisfaction. “I don’t know why we had to bring this pirate along. That pirate took advantage of the situation and extorted a lot of money from the lady!”

"Rely on you? You'll be dead before you even get out of Veneta." Gold was utterly disdainful of Charles's words. He looked at Winters and said, "Sir, your mother and your fiancée hired me. Although my price is a bit high, it seems your family isn't short of money anyway."

Charles snorted. He knew about Winters' family background, but he couldn't be bothered to correct Gold.

"Doesn't that mean Auntie already knows about Anna?" Winters suddenly realized this, and he felt a wave of dizziness.

While Winters was still in a daze, Gold gently kicked Charles.

"Alright!" the former pirate captain said gruffly. "We've already seen Lord Montagne, and there's no one else here. Stop hiding it and hand it over."

Charles was struck dumb by Gold's words and froze on the spot.

Gold sneered, snatched the wooden staff from Charles's hand, placed it on his knee, and snapped it hard.

The wooden staff broke in the middle, and more than a dozen finger-thick, dark yellow metallic-looking pieces fell out of the staff, landing on the ground with a clattering sound.

Winters picked up one of the pieces, and he could tell what it was without even looking at it.

He raised an eyebrow: "Gold bars?"

“They are gold bars, all twelve are here, not one is missing. Madam and Miss Navarre asked me to bring them to you.” Charles nodded, then took a small wooden tube from his trouser leg: “Miss Navarre also asked me to bring this to you. She said there is a receipt inside, which you can take to Albert the goldsmith at Kingsburg to exchange for gold coins.”

"That kid is incredibly stupid. He thinks I don't know anything about him," Gold sneered. "He carries this broken stick everywhere he goes, even sleeping with it in his arms at night. He won't let anyone touch it, does he think everyone else is an idiot? If I had any malicious intentions, would he still be alive today? Even if I didn't have any malicious intentions, does he think he can get away with everything on his own?"

Charles's cheeks flushed red, and he wanted to retort but couldn't find the words to say for a moment.

"Why are you sending me money?" Winters asked.

“Madam said you’ll definitely need a lot of money, and you’ll definitely need a lot of money when you’re out and about,” Charles honestly repeated. “Madam also said you’ll understand what she means when you see money.”

Winters was indeed short of money, but he didn't quite understand his aunt's meaning.

"Could it be that they want me to bribe the Paratul?" he wondered. "Or does it mean I can use this money to escape? But I'm still a member of the military in Paratul; what will happen to my military status if I run away?"

The twelve gold bars were each as thick as a thumb and as long as a middle finger, and they felt heavy in the hand.

Winters took out six of them and handed them to Gold: "Captain Gold, thank you for protecting the Charles all the way here. I am deeply grateful and would like to accept this as my thanks."

Charles stared wide-eyed in surprise.

“Although I really want the gold bars, I can’t accept your money.” Gold waved his hands repeatedly. “I’ve already received money from your family; there’s no reason for me to take from both sides. Wouldn’t that make me a traitor?”

Winters smiled. "Then how about I hire you to escort Charles back?"

Unexpectedly, Charles shouted, "Don't be fooled by this pirate! I'm not going back! Brother Winters, if you're not going back, I'm not going back either! I'll stay here and help you."

"What nonsense are you spouting, brat?" Winters couldn't help but slap Charles on the head. "Aren't you going back to Hailan? You're staying here?"

“Brother Winters, do you remember what I said?” Charles looked straight into Winters’ eyes. “I swore that as long as I could save my brother, my life would belong to you. How can you manage all by yourself here? I’ll stay and help you. I can stay as your assistant; I can do everything—wash clothes, cook, clean.”

Winters was about to object when Gold agreed.

The pirate captain said seriously, "Sir, this place is different from Veneta. In Veneta, you have plenty of connections. But here, you don't have a single person you can trust. If something really happens, it will be too late. Besides, even if I take this kid away, he'll definitely run back halfway. You should leave him here."

Winters was at a loss for words.

Girard's voice came from outside. Old Dussac pushed open the door and laughed, "Where did such a fine horse come from behind the house? It looks like a horse! Winters, do you know whose it is? Hey... you have a guest?"

“What? A horse?” Winters looked at Charles and Gold in surprise.

“Yes, that’s right.” Charles nodded. “I’ve also brought you good luck.”

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(End of this chapter)