When the Saint comes, she does not collect food

Chapter 1184 This is my home!

"This is my home!"

The young knight collapsed onto the Western-style carpet in despair, his chin trembling.

He was a recent addition to the Shooting Army, having previously served as a knight in the Baconburger.

In Bearhold, the status of knights and freemen is not much different. In the lower and middle classes, it is actually more equal than in the strictly hierarchical Leia.

Correspondingly, compared to nobles at the level of earls and great princes, they were more inclined to stand from the perspective of commoners.

He initially believed Alexei and led the people of the Baconburg to launch an uprising to welcome the "royal army."

When the vampires arrive, given their methods and traditions, it would be strange if they didn't put on a bloody feast at the burger.

The council chamber of the Salted Meat Castle was actually a long wooden corridor with dozens of men dressed in animal skins standing on both sides.

They were all knights and free citizens of the Bacon Keep. Yes, wealthy free citizens in the Norn Territory could participate in politics if they wished.

However, what they were discussing now was not spring plowing or hunting, but the impending army of vampires.

Everyone naturally looked worried, but more than anyone else, they were cautiously trying to decipher Alexei's expression.

Is this fair-skinned boy truly the destined heir to the Grand Duke, or just a cowardly paper tiger?

Amidst the many gazes, Alexei seemed still reeling from the failed recruitment attempt and the shock, sitting silently.

This has clearly disappointed many people.

“Or we could follow the example of the Holy Grandson and lead the locals south to the Shattered Stone Plains fortress area…” someone suggested.

"Are you crazy?" Groyev objected. "The Saint's grandson only had a thousand or so people back then, but the Salted Meat Fortress, along with the nearby residents, had nearly ten thousand! By the time they were all assembled, the enemy army had already arrived."

"But didn't the Holy Grandson and his group succeed back then?"

"Let me just say this: back then, the Holy Grandson had mountains and swamps as cover, but what did we have?"

"What should I do?"

"Preserve the firing corps first; we can still evacuate now."

The young knight completely broke down: "But this is my home! You brought me here, saying you wanted us to have a good life."

Now that we haven't even had a good life, are they going to abandon us now?

The council chamber fell completely silent, and everyone looked at Alexei.

"Answer me!" the young knight continued to shout.

Groyev winked at the axe-wielding guards at the door, signaling them to come and take him away.

The two guards immediately understood and stepped forward.

"Wait." Alexei stood up from his chair and blocked the way for the two guards.

Under the watchful eyes of many, he looked at the tearful young man and reached out to straighten his shoulder.

Then, with a low gasp, he took a step back and bent over heavily.

The knights who had been whispering gradually quieted down, some of them hardly believing their eyes.

Although the Norns are relatively equal, a hierarchy still exists.

Someone of Alexei's caliber, the heroic son of Grand Duke Petrov, wouldn't even need to bow down to the Elector of Norn.

For a great king, or even a noble of the rank of duke, admitting a mistake is a matter of courtesy, while denying it is their duty.

They set the rules, so who can set rules for them?
But at that moment, Alexei took off his hat and bowed deeply to the knight: "I'm sorry, I was wrong. It was our mistake. I was too reckless, which led you into this situation."

Faced with the attack of 30,000 royal troops, including a large number of auxiliary troops, Alexei's 3,000 archers were still no match.

A counterattack is impossible.

So what about sticking to the old ways? That's still a dead end.

Even with the material support from the Holy Alliance, there is no way out.

The cured meat fortress was not close to the waterways, and supplies were usually transported by horse-drawn carts, which often got stuck in the mud. So Alexei's first step upon arriving here was to build roads.

But now that the road is not yet finished, the enemy has arrived, and he realizes that the first thing to be repaired is the city wall of the Salted Meat Fortress.

The wall is very thin, only one layer.

Even with the battlements, the thin city wall is only six or seven meters high, and the skeleton soldiers can climb it by forming a human wall.

This was not prepared for large-scale wars at all; it was simply for protection against wild animals and bandits.

If we had been able to capture Bacon Castle directly last time, given its status as the Grand Monarch Castle and its river transport, holding out for two or three months would not have been a problem.

If we can hold out for two or three months, given the current unity of the empire against the common enemy, they will soon be able to send reinforcements.

Even if the Empire doesn't want to come, there's still Andrei's Legion, and the Iron Fist Battalion stationed on the border!

They would probably be happy to take down this enemy force.

Although the Holy Alliance is not part of the Empire, and is even an enemy, it has also entered the process of declaring war on the Royal Court.

But they failed because, lacking scout cavalry, they were ambushed by the vampire army of Baconburg and missed their chance.

Or perhaps he wasn't prepared at all for this match.

They should rely on the fortified defenses along the border of the Shattered Stone Plains to continuously launch small-scale harassment campaigns against the vampires.

He rigidly imitated the path Horn took to rise to power, seeking a base of operations, fearing he would disappoint the Norn.

But now he realized that on the vast plains of the Roaring Corridor, there was no soil for establishing a base, and it was impossible for a miracle like that of Saint Sunhorn to occur.

He rushed in without waiting for the right opportunity, and now he has only reaped the bitter fruits of his actions.

Alexei then realized just how many mistakes he had made so far.

"If you make a mistake, we'll all die?" The young knight was now completely uninhibited.

"what are you saying?!"

"How dare you criticize His Highness Alexei!"

Alexei's core loyalists immediately jumped out and shouted at him.

Groyev and Teomier looked with even greater concern at Alexei, who was slowly straightening his back.

Despite his travels to many countries, Alexei had rarely experienced great hardship, let alone faced such immense pressure from tens of thousands of people.

They know the Norn people's nature best; to put it nicely, they are brave and cunning; to put it bluntly, they are bullies who prey on the weak and fear the strong.

Those who can control them are the tough, unyielding types who refuse to back down even when they're wrong.

Alexei bowing his head now is understandable; it can be interpreted as an act of kindness.

But if he showed even a hint of weakness at this moment, he would surely be looked down upon by the other Norn Knights.

In the end, it's estimated that people's hearts will fall apart before the vampires even arrive.

This was what Groyev and his men feared most—Alexei would show weakness as he had in the hussars' camp.

We shouldn't have done that. Haven't we learned our lesson from the Death Hussars?
The rules of the Roaring Corridor are different from those of the Holy Alliance. The Holy Alliance can yield and reason, but the Roaring Corridor cannot!
Didn't Alexei see it?

As he bent down, many of the knights who had been standing on his side frowned, while many more sneered.

The people living in the Roaring Corridor face far greater natural disasters and dangers than those in the south.

When blizzards come, when cattle and sheep diseases break out, when large groups of bandits attack, people have no way to have the best of both worlds.

So what can we do? Only sacrifice, only tough it out.

At this point, what they need is not to come up with a solution, but to find the person who makes this decision that everyone hates.

A leader can make mistakes, but he cannot be weak. That is the rule of the Roaring Corridor!
"Watch your words!" Alexei's first words as he stood up startled the knights. "It wasn't me who killed you, but the vampires. Who are you pointing your sword at?"

(End of this chapter)