When the Saint comes, she does not collect food

Chapter 744: Horn Goes to North Mound County
The whispers of the Duke of Wing Nest's meeting melted into the water of the Nauan River in June and diluted in the clear river bay.

The river seemed to know everything, but nothing changed.

Thousand River Valley and Gravel Plain officially entered a state of war.

Relying on chariot forts, high-speed marches, and a very efficient military system, the army of Qianhe Valley achieved remarkable results in the Gravel Plain.

After the Battle of Rust River, the more than 20,000 troops of Thousand River Valley were divided into two groups.

Andre's Iron Fist marched northeast along the Rust River, while Meliati led the Knights of the Thousand Valleys to march north along the Nauan River.

The meeting point of the two sides is at Yantanji.

Afterwards, many battles broke out, including Meliati's straightforward inside breakthrough tactics and Andre's classic outside encirclement tactics.

Even in mid-June, Andre had fought as far as 60 kilometers away from Yantanji.

It’s a pity that the follow-up troops failed to catch up in time and missed the excellent opportunity to fight.

After entering July, Meliati stopped its advance because it had advanced too deep, and instead turned back to clean up the originally occupied areas.

Because the battle lines were intertwined and the two sides were intertwined, Horn was not sure about the actual acreage comparison between the two sides.

Overall, the Qianhe Valley army still had the advantage.

In the imperial public opinion field, not to mention the Kingdom of Leia, which had always opposed Meliati, even the Imperial Parliament and many Fran scholars labeled Meliati an invader.

The situation is the opposite in Qianhe Valley.

The pride brought by the expansion of territory, the rapid expansion of the wool trade, and the market prosperity brought by military orders pushed Meliati's status higher and higher.

Major newspapers even hyped up Meliati as "the second Alexander the Great".

Even Pravda had to take the boomerang and admit that Meliati's military operations did bring a lot of benefits.

Without the middlemen to make a profit from the price difference, the price of wool was almost halved. Meliati imposed a tariff, which raised the price to 70% to 80% of the original price.

The reduced costs were generously turned into ready-made garments by Horne that hit the Leia market.

Migrant laborers on the fringes of towns and villages found a way to make a living.

Some of the Holy Word monks and Cheka sent by Horn would specifically take migrant laborers with them to smuggle cloth and sugar.

With these smuggling gangs as the core, a large number of migrant workers actually converted to the Holy Way Sect.

Horn didn't know whether this was a good thing or a bad thing.

Because the rumor from the windmill area was that when the refugees entered the Holy Fathers Church, they had to swear eternal piety to Horn's portrait.

If both parties want to make any oath, they must also swear in front of the Holy Grandson.

Not to mention the refugee rebels in Leia and Fran, who all think they are the great-grandsons of the saint and are always ready to ask Horn to take over.

As for the Kingdom of Leia, apart from condemning Meliati every day and excommunicating Horn, there was basically no major action.

Horn was basically certain that King Jiji did not have the intention or ability to deal with Qianhe Valley for the time being.

Then he had no reason to oppose Meliati's actions.

The Cheka recently received some unfavorable information, saying that rumors were spreading in Hotam County that Meliati was a witch.

Horn wasn't sure if this was Meliati preparing to unveil her future self or if the secret had simply been revealed.

He ignored it. With the support of war bonds and victory, these rumors did not cause much response.

Rumors like "the two tribunes are rivals during the day and husband and wife at night" need to be dealt with.

"Leave it there." Sitting in his office in the Holy See Building, Horn threw the Cheka intelligence aside.

René walked forward slowly, sorted out the messy information, and inserted it into the locked file cabinet. "Have you arranged the itinerary?" Horn finished reviewing the last document, stretched, and leaned back in his chair.

"The car and boat are ready."

"Okay, let's set off tomorrow morning." Horn stood up and walked to the gear-shaped round glass window.

Since the Kingdom of Leia could not attack in a short period of time, he had to put his originally planned trip to North Mound County on the agenda.

His trip had two purposes.

The first was to comfort Meliati. He had to make a political gesture to express his approval of the decision of the despot.

Otherwise, a small crack made by the two tribunes would appear as an abyss to the people below.

Previously, the two had a very bad relationship because of the Battle of Gravel Plain, and there were rumors everywhere that the Despot and the Patriarch had broken up.

Therefore, Meliati took the lead in showing goodwill and introduced the monks of the Holy Way into the Gravel Plain to help Meliati stabilize the rear.

The specific measure is to form a religious army with shepherds and Holy Way monks to help Meliati maintain the food supply and eliminate bandits.

They would even help Meliati attack small monasteries and churches.

Anyway, she has basically torn relations with the church, so this little crime doesn't matter.

They just wanted to exploit the castles of the local nobles the most, but they couldn't let the Crusaders do whatever they wanted.

These centrist nobles are the ones that Melia wants to win over.

Horn did not want the political alliance between the two sides to be broken at this time - that would have to wait until after the war.

For some reason, looking at his reflection in the glass, he felt as if he were shaking his body and pretending that the carriage was moving forward.

The second purpose is to visit the mine owners in North Mound County.

At present, there has been no progress on the lightning furnace, and he has an urgent need for mountain copper and steel.

Since new technology has not yet been developed, continuing to use needlepoint carving based on the old technology has become the only option.

The wet process of ironmaking had already reached its limit, but Horn's arrival still brought the latest breakthrough.

That's peat and clockwork engines.

The former brought abundant heat sources, while the latter brought relatively reliable automatic machines.

In this case, use hydraulic hammers instead of manual hammering, and use conveyor belts and mixers instead of porters and mixers.

Clockwork pumps can dig deeper mines, concrete materials can support heavier tunnels, and railcars can transport ore faster.

As for the remaining manpower, they will be fully retrained to become operators, so that the smelting workshop and even the smelting plant can be further expanded.

Once the problems of craftsmanship and manpower have been solved, the only problem left is materials.

Okay, so where do we get the raw materials?
In May, the first batch of smelting potions produced in Black Snake Bay was delivered to Black Snake Bay, where normal public order had been restored.

At the same time, Kasha County and Lower River County were vigorously clearing abandoned farmland. The Holy Scythe Monastery signed contracts with farmers in many places to purchase the raw materials for medicines grown by them.

Now the material basis was basically complete. The only difficulty facing Horn was the Steel Guild's refusal to expand.

After all, for the dwarves, once they expand according to this model, it means that their technology will have to be trained to operators in large quantities.

Once the technology is made public, the original dwarven craft system will be dismantled.

The negotiations between the two sides lasted from May to July, but no conclusion was reached.

This time Horn decided to personally fight with these stubborn dwarves and mine owners.

(End of this chapter)