Since the Accounting: A Chronicle of the Roman Khanate

Chapter 765 The Plan to Exchange Trade Routes with Vassal States

By the end of the battle, the Hungarians had nowhere left to retreat.

After receiving the news, they abandoned some of the supplies carrying their spoils and sent out numerous scouts to investigate the Ming army's location. However, with Bernhard's main force destroyed, the entire plain was now teeming with Ming troops. Unless they retraced their steps and fought their way back, the outcome would be largely the same regardless of their strategy.

As their formation was constantly under attack, the Hungarians were forced to retreat gradually. Although they launched several counterattacks, they achieved little. With the Venetians joining the battle, the outer ranks of the soldiers were even more overwhelmed. While they didn't completely collapse, they could no longer maintain their formation.

The rest of the people crowded together on a narrow, flat area next to the road construction site.

Upon discovering this situation, Oliver, the captain of the Gold Master's Guard, reminded them that they could replace the group and use shoving as a weapon to compress the enemy's space and not give them a chance to breathe.

The Ming army commanders all agreed that this made sense and immediately arranged for a rotation, sending militia from several towns around Trento to take over from the mountain people who had been fighting.

The town where these militiamen were stationed was also a member of the "Railway Protection Alliance." However, after the battle at the city gate ended, they remained on the second line, so their physical strength and capabilities were relatively well preserved.

And although they were called militia, their equipment was in no way inferior to that of the elite private armies of many noble families. Most of them wore a complete set of chainmail, over which they wore a full breastplate, neck guard, and dome helmet. Citizens with some money would also purchase additional greaves, or even jointed shoulder and arm armor and specially made infantry leg armor. The price of this equipment with jointed parts would immediately skyrocket, making them more luxuriously dressed than many minor European nobles.

The battlefield was so brutal that many militiamen were worried. The militia captain of the valley town of Predazo bluntly said that although his men were well-armored and their formations looked orderly, he doubted whether they could hold out.

They weren't exactly incompetent fools, nor were they like the guards of large cities like Rome, whose positions were merely lucrative and accessible only through connections. Because in places like these, fighting was still necessary to defend against thieves and rival city-states. Therefore, they underwent rigorous training regularly.

However, compared to professional soldiers, his men lacked practical combat experience and had never fought in a tough battle. Suddenly facing such a ferocious enemy and having to rotate shifts in front of them, it was uncertain whether they could complete the task.

However, Oliver said there's no need to think about it too much right now.

When he joined the army, the king ordered his family to pay for shields; if they couldn't raise the money, someone would have to serve. His family had no money, so he had to go to war.

According to English law, a knight must bring at least three mounted squires when going to war to be considered a complete "lancer" and to fulfill feudal obligations. However, his family could not afford to support so many people, so in order to make up the numbers, his father included him and lied that he was already 16 years old and could be counted.

Actually, he was not even 13 years old at the time, and his training was not yet complete when he was dragged to the battlefield to fight the French. These Hungarians, although fierce, were still a step below the French knights. In any case, it was much better than when he was a child going into battle.

Besides, there's no need for complex tactics or for them to utilize their weaponry skills in hand-to-hand combat. Based on his experience fighting in France, in this situation, pushing and shoving is more lethal than weapons. The enemy is already surrounded in the mud; now all they need to do is hold up their shields and push their way in.

Hearing his experience, the militiamen decided to do the same. The captain found a few of the strongest men, dressed them in armored uniforms, and sent them as the vanguard. Then, they charged forward headlong into the enemy lines. The Hungarians, as expected, couldn't stop this fresh force; slips and trampling soon followed their advance.

The remaining men, stepping over the corpses and those still alive, continued to retreat towards the center. The militia in the rear, armed with swords and short spears, finished off any remaining enemies who hadn't been trampled to death. The enemy's controlled area shrank, until they were completely crammed together, while the attackers continued their relentless advance according to orders.

In the end, they did not surrender—of course, it's also possible that they were so crowded that they couldn't send a surrender signal, and the people around them probably wouldn't care anyway.

The battle didn't completely end until evening. Almost all the Hungarians in the encirclement, including the high-ranking nobles, were killed. Meanwhile, the Ming army couldn't rest; they still had to clean up the battlefield.

Most of the soldiers who had fought were exhausted, so Louis and Adil had some prisoners brought over to help clean up the bodies.

Some officers suspected that the prisoners might try to escape or pick up weapons from the battlefield to fight back, but Oliver, being more experienced, said there was no need to worry about that.

The fallen soldiers were piled up in a small area, especially the last of the Hungarians, most of whom had been trampled to death, or suffocated in the crowd. The bodies, piled together, were grotesque and quite gruesome in the setting sun.

Many of the prisoners they captured were also temporary recruits of civilians and cheap mercenaries. They had never seen such a tough battle before, and were terrified by the sight. Some were so frightened that their legs went weak and they couldn't get up from the ground.

Some people, thinking the Ming army was going to drag them there to be executed, kept explaining that they had never done anything wrong and that the robbery was ordered by a certain nobleman. This left everyone speechless.

Besides these people, they also captured quite a few nobles.

Because the attack on the city was sudden and caused their collapse, and unlike other "peasant armies," the Ming army had a considerable number of cavalry, most of the nobles were killed or captured alive outside the city. Some who were quick on their feet managed to escape the battlefield, but to get home, they had to traverse the unfinished roads in the mountains, making it virtually impossible to avoid the local mountain people.

As a result, in the following days, the villagers who stayed behind, as well as the elderly, women and children in the village, successfully captured these exhausted fugitives.

The Swiss custom was to kill all these people. However, Louis believed that what the Wu royal family needed most was money, and it was common knowledge that noble prisoners could be ransomed.

Some nobles were simply called in to help and didn't actually know the hostages, so they reported to the Prince's Palace, asking them to contact the hostage families and have them bring money to ransom the hostages. It was at this time that the Prince's Palace gradually resumed contact with some upper-middle-class nobles.

However, some people are truly heinous criminals. For example, Bernhard, the mastermind behind it all.

After his capture, Bernhard was gripped by fear. The locals, including "native shepherds" like Adil, believed he should be publicly executed by torture, otherwise they couldn't explain it to the people. The County of Tyrol, at its peak, had also ruled parts of Switzerland, so the Swiss also disliked him and wanted him dead. Only the Venetians and some Italians from the south had an ambiguous attitude, but neither offered to protect him. However, Louis, the project's leader, was an outsider and felt that in the current situation, recouping some funds was the priority. Once this side was strong enough, which nobleman couldn't they eliminate?

So, on his own initiative, he sent someone to inquire about the price, wanting to see how much Bernhard could fetch before making a decision.

However, Bernhard's family refused outright.

They told the envoy directly that their family was completely bankrupt and couldn't afford a single extra copper coin. The situation in Tyrol was utterly chaotic, and they were incapable of re-establishing rule—all thanks to the Ming army's activities. There was no possibility of any production from this region in the foreseeable future.

The people now in power in the family are the same group who opposed Bernhard's expansion in the first place. Therefore, they've decided to abandon this place, return to their ancestral home in Saxony, and leave the trouble here alone.

Moreover, the messenger learned that the more important matter was no longer the ransom. Bernhard had already borrowed far too much money for this damned territory and all the associated burdens, and now it was simply impossible for him to repay it.

The creditors are pressing for repayment every day, but according to custom, if the territory is relinquished, the debts on that territory are naturally forgiven. Currently, the county is completely bankrupt, and they don't want this desolate place anymore. Let the creditors find the new count to collect it.

Now, the family doesn't want any more trouble. Whether it's the King of Wu or the mountain people—whoever occupies the place is fine with it; let them do as they please. Bernhard is also left to their fate, as the family has decided to break away from him and leave him alone.

The new patriarch even hinted to Louis's envoys that they should execute Bernhard quickly and make it public, so that the family would be eternally grateful and would repay him in any future opportunity. This was because if the count himself were killed in the war and no one inherited the lands, even the previous lords would be unable to force them to repay their debts.

However, the envoy hadn't really thought that far ahead; he simply wanted some money. Seeing that the family had already gone this far and it seemed they really wouldn't give him a single copper coin, he had no choice but to leave and think of another way.

The envoy was just a young student who had studied in Reims and knew several languages, which was why Louis had taken him along. He didn't really understand the intricacies of the situation. However, the new patriarch's words did give him some insight—it seemed that the lord was also involved with Bernhard and the debts of the territory.

He realized that, according to tradition, lords also had an obligation to rescue their vassals. If a vassal was captured, the lord was required to pay a portion of the ransom.

Earlier, Reims' army had been conscripted to fight against England, but suffered a defeat, and many knights were captured by the English. In those days, many knights had little spare money and lived off their lord's salary. Therefore, their families protested daily outside the Earl's mansion. Finally, the Earl had no choice but to pay half the ransom himself to bring the knights back. According to feudal obligations, this was indeed what he should do. Otherwise, he feared no one would fight for him in the future.

Although Bernhard was a high-ranking nobleman, he still had powerful figures above him. Therefore, in order to complete his mission, he decided to go to Vienna to find Bernhard's lord.

This method is quite risky, because many powerful nobles have bad tempers—especially when dealing with commoners. The Wu King's power hasn't been formally recognized by the nobles yet, and going there alone is very dangerous; he could easily become a target for their wrath. However, in order to recoup his losses quickly, he can't worry about that now.

He traveled to Vienna at his own expense, then claimed to be an envoy of the King of Wu, seeking an audience with Duke Albrecht. Surprisingly, the Duke quickly granted him an audience and did not cause him any trouble.

During the meeting, the Duke also introduced him to his assistant—the renowned banker, Monsieur Fugger. He told the envoy that he had long heard about their road construction. However, previously, as a feudal lord, he had been obliged to respond to Bernhard's request for aid. Now that the war was over, they could discuss post-war reconstruction.

He said that Bernhard had previously borrowed a large sum of money from the Fugger Bank to fund the war. But now, the war has been lost, and Bernhard is dead. Therefore, this debt has become a problem.

Since he had also acted as a guarantor at the time, he had to help the Fugger Bank resolve this matter. Therefore, he decided to seize a portion of Bernhard's property and negotiate with the Fugger Bank for debt extension and interest reduction. This portion of the property would be used as collateral to offset the debt.

Bernhard initially claimed that the road had been built without permission on his territory, and therefore he wanted to confiscate the right to that section of the road. However, Albrecht stated that he could give the road and its surrounding area to the "Road Protection League," or the King of Wu, or anyone who could act as their leader and representative, and help them legalize the remaining sections of the road, thus preventing other nobles from causing further trouble.

However, the condition was that his own caravans could also use this road to Italy. Furthermore, he wanted to establish an outpost at the road's exit, on the Austrian side, to collect taxes from passing merchants, and the mountain people were not allowed to attack this place at will. As long as they agreed, everything else would be negotiable.

His attitude left the envoy somewhat dumbfounded.

The messenger reminded him that Bernhard was still alive and being held captive in Bolzano by the Wu king's army. According to feudal custom, he was obligated to pay half of Bernhard's ransom, release him first, and then announce the confiscation of his property to settle the debt. But Bernhard wasn't even here; saying this to a mere messenger was pointless…

Upon learning that Bernhard was still alive, both Duke Albrecht and Monsieur Fugger were somewhat embarrassed and disappointed. However, Fugger, on behalf of his lord, reiterated the previous conditions and requested that the messenger secretly take the news back. He didn't elaborate on what to do with Bernhard and simply asked him to leave.

However, the messenger came only to demand a ransom. He repeatedly requested an audience, saying he came on behalf of the "Tyrolean mob," and that they couldn't just ignore the arrest of their count. They insisted that the issue of cooperation between the King of Wu and the Duke could only be discussed after this was resolved; otherwise, they would kill him.

However, the Duke refused to see him again and repeatedly sent him letters, refusing to acknowledge them as a mob and insisting they were a legitimate organization, urging him to return immediately to report. The Duke also consistently avoided addressing the messenger's demand that he fulfill feudal obligations and quickly pay money.

Fugger even visited him privately once, threatening him to go back and kill the hostage immediately, otherwise the interest on his side would continue to rise over time.

The envoys were all a bit dumbfounded. Who among them actually wanted the mountain people to rebel, and who wanted the nobles to fulfill their feudal obligations?

However, after half a month of this ordeal, he had run out of money for his journey and had no choice but to leave Vienna in disappointment. And then, without further pressure, Bernhard was soon put on a public trial and executed amidst everyone's expectations.

(End of this chapter)