Crusader Kings: Prisoners of War.

Chapter 204 New Navy

Tiya stood in a relatively inconspicuous position, carefully observing these chiefdom leaders while shaking her head: "The last time I saw such a pure barbarian tribe, I remember it was in the westernmost part of the Africa Province. According to my experience, these people are not reliable at all. It's good enough if they don't drag us down in the war.

Do we have to find these people to fight for us? I think their combined combat power is only equivalent to one or two battalions, so we can’t rely on them.”

"We don't need them to fight the Vikings head-on, it's enough for them to harass them. Unlike people like us who rely on farmland and towns for survival, these peoples only need resources from nature to survive. It's not easy for the Vikings to rob them, which is a very significant advantage for them.

Moreover, it is definitely not a good idea to let the Anglo-Saxons, who already have an advantage in the area, dominate alone. Finding opportunities to make these barbarians in the north more civilized and powerful will definitely be beneficial to us in the short term."

Tia was not stupider than Orville, so she could certainly understand such a small thing. She nodded slightly after hearing it, reluctantly approving of the plan and agreeing with Orville's way of doing things.

"Well, I hope your plan will work. By the way, let me tell you about the fleet. The fleet I brought has about fifty warships, plus the forty ships you have, which together make nearly a hundred warships. This navy cannot be lost. It is our last naval force in Gaul. I spent a lot of effort to put together this fleet.

If we lose this navy, we will probably have to fight the Vikings on land, which will be very unfavorable to us, so be careful not to mess things up and let the Roman people down."

When Orville mentioned this, he became a little gloomy: "It's my fault. I underestimated the enemy and Trajan was killed by the barbarians."

This matter was a thorn in Orville's heart. In his opinion, this result could have been avoided. He and old Trajan were not very close friends, but they were comrades-in-arms who had fought all the way from Palphi, and they had more or less some friendship. Directly appointing him as the admiral of the navy was more of a consideration for political balance. He did not expect that in the end, he was not well-considered and ignored the general's original ability to march and fight, which led to such a tragic incident.

Seeing Orville like this, Tia came closer and patted her shoulder, while maintaining this posture and whispered: "It's not entirely your problem. If it were me, I would probably make the same decision. After all, we don't understand naval warfare and would do things that seem childish and ridiculous to professionals. I'm afraid we all underestimate the dangers and difficulties of life at sea.

It's a pity for Trajan. He was a brave warrior and my right-hand man. He was highly valued by me and my father. He still had a long life ahead of him and should have a brighter future. But things have already happened and we can't change the outcome. Let's try to make up for it. His wife and children are still alive. The children should be almost at the age of adulthood. Since he lost his father at such a young age, we should take care of him and compensate him."

Tia felt no better than Orville. Old Tula was an old subordinate of her father, and was like an uncle to her. He had taken good care of her and taught her a lot during her military career, so she took the initiative to help look after and guide his descendants.

"I have no objection. Let's do as you say." Orville agreed with Tia's suggestion. Putting aside the potential identity of the other party's son, this is what he should do as a boss.
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After the Celts took the weapons, equipment and food, they also fulfilled their agreement and began to harass the Vikings' garrisons. They would either take advantage of the Vikings' outings to plunder or fall asleep when their defenses were lax, or they would deliberately launch attacks with much ado about nothing, causing many Vikings in the garrisons to be restless.

They even relied on their numerical superiority to break through several small camps without wall protection. In just two or three weeks, many Vikings had to choose to withdraw from the camps on land and move their garrisons to offshore islands. The Vikings' power on land had obviously declined, and they also carried out various retaliatory actions against the locals. Orville frowned when he read the text descriptions of some of their actions.

Seeing that the resistance movement was effective, more chiefdoms joined the movement, and the intensity of the conflict between the Celts and the Vikings continued to escalate. Today the Celts destroyed several temporary strongholds, and tomorrow the Vikings would row boats along the river to capture the Celts, and then torture and kill their compatriots or sell them as slaves.

In short, these people took up a considerable part of the Vikings' energy. In addition, the Vikings' military forces were also constantly being tied up in other places.

In Ireland, the Irish princes represented by King Comfort of Ulster gathered a coalition force of more than 30,000 people and began to besiege Ivar's ruling center on the island of Ireland, which is the future city of Dublin.

Ivar had no choice but to rush into battle. He gathered six or seven thousand men and began to confront Confauld. It was still unknown what the outcome of this war would be. According to an optimistic estimate, Ivar would be driven out of Ireland in this war, and by then his land in the north would only be a bunch of scattered islands.

In addition, in the lowlands, Rollo was also very rude to his own people. He was not just pretending to deal with Orville, he was really using iron-blooded means to wipe out the local pirates. An important reason why pirate strongholds could survive was that they were hidden enough, but Rollo knew the location and special features of most of the pirate strongholds.

As mentioned before, Rollo's defection to the Romans was a huge blow to the Vikings. High-level rebellion is troublesome for any organization. They know too many secrets. At least twenty strongholds have been eliminated in these two months, and countless pirates have been eliminated.

Orville has already prepared new rewards for the other party, and will give them out after the Viking problem is basically solved. He is a man of his word, and he will do what he says. Rollo will get what he wants based on his military merits.

However, not all what we have heard so far is good news. According to information from Rollo's informants, the Franks have also made new moves.

The King of the Franks persuaded the King of Denmark through some means, and he assembled an expeditionary force to help Ragnar's sons fight against the Romans. The number of people is at least nearly 10,000, and the fleet should be on the way now.

(End of this chapter)