Wizards: Starting as a Potions Master!

Chapter 51 The Destruction of Hagia Sophia and its Voluntary Surrender

The next morning, as usual, when Baron Frank got up, he asked his personal male servant, a high-ranking servant, to fetch him a basin of hot water.

Then he asked a soldier who had just been promoted to his personal guard (all the original guards were dead) how the Bulgars in the territory were doing.

Are they still besieging the castle and plundering the villages surrounding it?

Baron Frank wasn't expecting a decent answer; he was even worried that the Bulgars could breach his castle and trample him to death with horses and cattle.

To everyone's surprise, the soldier hesitated and said, "Your Excellency, the Bulgars haven't attacked us..."

Baron Frank paused, then had his personal servant remove the towel from his face, a look of surprise on his face. "How could this be?"

"Have they withdrawn their troops?"

"Although they are not good at taking down castles... I thought I would have to pay them another ransom before they would withdraw their troops and stop the siege."

"Great! I can finally eat fresh vegetables and meat again. What have I been eating these past few days?"

The soldier glanced at the baron, surprised that even now, the baron was still thinking about being able to eat fresh vegetables.

But his people, including his family, all lost their lives.

The soldier hesitated for a moment, then said, "Your Excellency, it's not a retreat. It's just... all those Bulgars died overnight."

"Even the idols they took with them wherever they attacked disappeared completely from our territory overnight."

"And everything they had previously stolen has also disappeared."

Baron Frank turned to look at the newly promoted commoner in disbelief, his eyes wide with utter disbelief.

Because he had personally fought alongside the allied forces against the Bulgars on his territory, when they had deployed the tactics commonly used by the Storm Kingdom—the infantry iron square formation and the left and right flank cavalry tactics.

However, when faced with the incredibly agile Bulgar cavalry riding their horses and oxen, their infantry phalanxes appeared clumsy and laughable, and their cavalry seemed extremely vulnerable.

When the two sides clashed, their armies immediately collapsed, resulting in a devastating defeat.

But how could such a powerful Bulgar people have been wiped out overnight?

Who is the Bulgars' next target?

Baron Frank suddenly remembered something, and with great effort, he got out of bed and weakly looked towards the south of his territory—the direction of Baron Peter's domain.

He muttered to himself, "No wonder...Lord Su Nan didn't see us back then; it turns out he didn't need to see us at all."

"My territory has suffered too much damage. Even without the Bulgars, the lords of the surrounding territories are all potential enemies of mine."

"Moreover, the people of the former Eastern Empire within my territory will surely rebel."

Fifty-seven years ago, the people of the Eastern Empire welcomed the knights of the Storm Kingdom, believing that this would free them from the corrupt and decadent political system of the Eastern Empire and help them escape the predicament of a weak nation.

Who knew that the knights of the Storm Kingdom would indeed stop being corrupt and instead become feudal and semi-independent, resulting in even heavier taxes.

The knights of the Storm Kingdom were no longer weak, but each one of them was more rude and brutal than the civil government of the former Eastern Empire.

Therefore, there are currently some potential riotous sentiments within the territories of the various Storm Kingdoms.

"I need to find a powerful backer, or my Frank family will be wiped out completely," Baron Frank secretly resolved.

This time, his territory suffered the most severe losses, and those who were once his friends may now become his enemies, taking a big bite out of the remaining parts of his territory.

Seeing that Baron Frank remained silent, the soldier added in a low voice, "We've examined the bodies at the scene; there are wolf bite marks everywhere."

"Both sites have a Peter family crest from Maple Leaf Town left in the grass."

……

"Your Excellency? What's wrong?"

In the territory of Simon, Baron Simon, who had lost an arm, spent his days drowning his sorrows in alcohol to mask his pain and fear of the Bulgars.

So when he learned at noon that day that all the Bulgars in Frank's territory had died tragically overnight, he was so shocked that he stood up.

After receiving the specific information, his heart skipped a beat.

He glanced at Baron Peter's territory to the east of his own domain and muttered to himself, "Who did it? Most likely it was..."

"No, we can't provoke Peter's territory anymore. You...you...you...tell your men that they absolutely must not provoke the people of Peter's territory, and no one should trespass into Peter's territory without permission. Things are different now than before."

He roared at the top of his lungs, "Whoever dares to disobey me, I will kill them!"

……

In the afternoon, on the northern edge of Baron Frank's territory, near the mountains of Northern Thrace, in the encampment of the Tugo clan.

This is a temporary stronghold of the Tugo clan, a tribe in Bulgaria.

Inside the tribal tent, the clan chief was watching a Bulgar who had escaped being killed by the werewolves because he had left the herding community the previous night to rob villagers from the Storm Kingdom.

But he knew nothing, except that when he returned to the community the next morning, he found that everyone had been killed.

He was also uneasy, and took advantage of the fact that the people of the Storm Kingdom hadn't reacted yet to hurriedly escape back.

He gave a brief report on the situation.

The chieftain of the Tuge clan stared at him, utterly enraged. "So you're telling me that our tribe's two excellent herdsmen and their herdsmen all died mysteriously over there?"

"Then tell me, who is the murderer? Which baron from the Storm Kingdom is he?"

"By the Lord of Beasts, I will crush their heads."

A clan or tribe doesn't have many people to begin with; a small tribe like theirs only has a few hundred people.

Unexpectedly, two of their tribe's elite herding units were killed on the front lines overnight.

No, this isn't even the front line.

This is nothing more than a raid on the weak people of the Storm Kingdom. Who is still resisting?

Could it be that the Duke and King of Storm Kingdom have finally arrived?

The other chieftains of the Tuge tribe looked at each other in bewilderment.

They're not murderous maniacs; the reason they rob wherever they go is simply because they see the residents of Storm Kingdom as weak sheep and don't care if they resist.

Now that so many people have died at once, the herdsmen and herders are starting to get scared and want to leave.

They came to plunder food and treasures, not to die.

At this point, the chief also expressed his intention to leave.

They don't have the bad habit of head-on confrontation. This raid has already yielded enough spoils, and they have no intention of taking over the land or staying as lords.

Just then, a Bulgar man entered the tent and said to the people inside, "The powerful chieftain has sent a message from the north."

"The great Grass King Carloyan has slaughtered another city of the Storm Kingdom with a population of 100,000. This time it is the White City in the center of their kingdom, and he also burned down their proud St. Sophia Cathedral."

"The great Grass King Carloyan said that the people of the Storm Kingdom betrayed us, feigning surrender, only to have the priests in the Hagia Sophia Cathedral assassinate him. Therefore, he has given us orders to slaughter everything in sight, regardless of whether they surrender or not. Make the people of the Storm Kingdom feel the pain!"

The Bulgars inside the tent erupted in excitement and began to roar in low voices.

The chieftain, who had initially intended to retreat, suddenly felt a surge of courage and said, "No need to retreat. Let's not attack that direction first; let's attack the territories of the Storm Kingdom's lords in other directions."

"When more Bulgars and other tribes arrive here, we'll join forces to reopen this raiding route, burn all the farmland along it, and kill all the lords! Hahahaha..."

(End of this chapter)