Chapter Four Hundred and Seventy-Fifth, Liuli Designed to Draw Salary From the Melalen People

"The Rise of Rurik ()"

Gold and silver could not be eaten as food. The returning Rus army was still waiting for their leader to distribute the treasure. The hunger in their stomachs forced them to immediately go to the sea and row fishing boats to start fishing.

During the war, the women in the rear could not be expected to row into the sea to fish a lot, and the people in the rear did catch some fish. Even if they fished hard, the remaining fish was not much.

Not only because of their inherently weaker physical abilities as women, but also because there is too little labor in the rear.

When the army returned, it was mid-September, and the migrating salmon began to run to the rivers where they were born.

Ross's men are already gearing up, they have received extremely critical information from Cowen's allies, and they are waiting to run north after getting their war dividends.

No one has expected the merchants from the Lake Mälaren area to provide material. It is a group of migratory birds-like visitors who come in winter not to sell agricultural products, but to process and buy the leather obtained by the Rus for profit.

A group of merchants have arrived and brought good news of the good harvest of the lakeside farmland of Lake Mälaren.

Once upon a time, all kinds of fish were used to feed the people of Ross, and now the scarce wheat is no longer expensive. In other words, it is because the money in the hands of the clansmen has increased.

Ross's men are warriors, hunters and fishermen. Of course, pirates also naturally become pirates on the sea.

Pure plundering wars cannot stably feed a large clan, and it is very risky to pin their hopes on the future of life in trade. They must engage in production operations, that is, desperately fishing for fish and even hunting giant beasts in winter.

The men are heading north, to the far north Ross town of Fort Elronorava for a merciless catch for migrating salmon. Some men have also made plans to stay here throughout the winter, and continue to go north in the winter to hunt rare small animals to obtain precious leather.

Of course there will be a "northern hunt" this winter, but Rurik suspects that the business explorers from Narvik Port will return and even spend the winter in Elrond.

The matter of northern hunting is still in the future, and Rurik urgently needs to solve the current material distribution problem, and then organizes a huge fleet to rush to Lake Mälaren.

Take your own principal and interest, that is, 800,000 pounds of wheat is one of them.

Taking huge sums of money to purchase various materials is the second.

The third is to win over local men to emigrate with their families and their families.

Because problems that can be solved with money are not problems at all. Rurik figured out a plan to slash wages from the bottom of the Mellarens, which was to use profit as a bait to relocate the Mellarens to New Roseburg. At that time, their group of immigrants would no longer be Mellarens.

A few days after the return of the army, almost all the men, women and children of the entire tribe gathered here on the beach of the Rus.

A grand event to distribute the spoils was held!

Here Otto and all his old cronies, all dressed in fancy clothes, took a hot bath, washed their hair with soap, and had a sauna in the steam room.

The Rus' flag was flying, and many were still wearing the Rus' blue-and-white robes.

Everyone was very neat, they fastened their belts and hung their steel swords around their waists, chatting and laughing with each other as they waited for the Duke's reward.

Every expedition will have the most basic reward, one hundred silver coins, regardless of whether they die in battle or not.

In addition, each of the brave flag teams who killed the enemy will receive fifty silver coins.

For the deceased, his wife enjoys all the above, and also enjoys up to two hundred silver coins.

How many enemies did the war against Gotland kill? Rurik tentatively counted 10,000 enemies, and took out 10,000 silver coins to distribute evenly among his brothers as a "killing bonus".

There are other people who work hard and do a great job. For example, a soldier in heavy armor, whether dead or alive, will be entitled to the "Reckless Award" of fifty silver coins.

Those warriors who have been on the expedition since June, each of them will have an additional bonus of one hundred silver coins.

And some of the craziest warriors,

It is the people who followed Arik from the east coast of the island to the west coast. Only a small number of these fifty people returned to their hometowns alive, but their almost crazy bravery and the important information they detected on the enemy were worthy of Very high reward. Or people, or the family members of the deceased, will be rewarded with an additional 200 silver coins.

In this way, it is completely possible for a strong and hard-working warrior to receive more than three hundred silver coins today, that is, three pounds of silver.

However, only the two warrior flag teams, the Melalen flag team, and even some adult men in the shooter flag team who participated in the war could only enjoy the spoils. Although many people participated in the war, they either did not enjoy the war dividend, or partially enjoyed it.

Rurik is trying to fix this complicated thing. What is this called? This is called reward and punishment!

In fact, compared to the gold and silver treasures that were plundered, Rurik took out only a small part.

How many silver coins are there in the "principal treasury" of the Rus? The roughest is more than ten thousand pounds of silver, and this is only the plunder of gold and silver.

But no one complained that the duke gave too little. Compared with the previous trophy dividends, the small Ross families have received unprecedented wealth. Even in a family whose husband was dead, life should have been suddenly difficult, his wife had the pension given by the duke, and the war bonus due to the deceased husband, the life of himself and his children was not difficult. Because the duke has guaranteed honor and power, as long as there is grain in the warehouse, every native resident of the Ross tribe, men, women and children, can exchange one silver coin for ten pounds of wheat, and ten pounds of wheat is enough for a woman to live for a month.

Wait a minute! The Duke of Ross, the great Rurik is indeed a saint! The husband died in battle, and the future living expenses of the children have been contracted by the Duke. Children will be trained to receive a life-saving meal every day.

They are fighting for the Ross tribe, not ordinary mercenaries who only want money.

They got the huge sum of money they deserved while laughing. The woman who received the money for her deceased husband and son held heavy sackcloth bags and burst into tears. Her husband gave the warrior salute.

Soldiers get bonuses, and families of fallen soldiers have no worries.

The sailors who participated in the war, the elite mercenaries, the soldiers of the Melalen flag team, and the allies of the Kewen people and the deer breeders were all rewarded to varying degrees.

At least they all received the reward of the tall one hundred silver coins. As for the soldiers of the Melalen flag team, they even received a commission of twenty silver coins of their own, which was nothing compared to the bonus.

The happiness of Melalen's mercenaries didn't stop there, because they had become Russ.

The dividend convention has finally reached its fiery peak.

A group of extremely special treasures are waiting to be distributed, and as treasures, they have been waiting for a long time!

Yes, a selected group of up to twelve hundred captured Gotland women, waiting to be distributed to their new men.

Those women who were captured early and tattooed have been taken away by their new husbands. Rurik sent people to screen out the underage women and stuff them into the "Valkyrie Legion", and then leave out the rest of the older women, regardless of whether they gave birth or not, and whether the children were around, all of them were distributed.

Of course, this distribution is free of money, or they themselves are equivalent to a coin.

Rurik was unwilling to follow the Viking tradition and set up a slave market on the beach. He didn't really like this idea, although it was reasonable based on this era.

Rurik wanted a touch of humanity, the nominal denial that these captives were slaves. only in name.

The captives were divided into three, six, nine, and so on based on their age, orientation, and whether they had children. Within a day, they were divided by the Rus.

Therefore, the last "ninth class" was separated by the newly recruited Melaron people. They are grateful in their hearts, because it is difficult for them to get a wife in their hometown. In the past few months, life and death for the Rus people, money has a wife, and everyone has a bright future.

They took their new woman, and the night was a joy...

The Ross tribe seems to have completely digested all the seizures, and the population has exploded because of this, but are these women really integrated into their new lives?

Rurik was a little worried, but fortunately, the winter was approaching, and they would adapt to their new life well in the long winter.

The most important event seemed to be over. A large number of fishing boats rushed to the north. They took the Kewen people as guides and carried a variety of fishing gear to plunder salmon and perch.

For example, the Elon River (that is, the Kemi River), the river where Elon Orava Fort is located, has a large lake upstream. Ross explorers have determined that there are quite rich freshwater fish resources here. The lake is not like the sea, it is calm. And this lake was as pure as a girl before it was explored by the Ross explorers. It had not been developed in any way, and the resources in the lake were like a god rewarded to the Ross people.

Nearly a hundred boats left first, and Rurik was also actively preparing to go to Lake Mälaren.

The time is already late September.

A bad rain hit, and the whole world became extremely cold.

No one likes rain, and if something has to fall from the sky, it's preferably snow. The autumn rainy season has begun? The light rain continued until the twenty-eighth of September. The only thing that made the Russ happy was that there was no strong wind, and the situation was not too bad.

The haze and dampness made Rurik feel inexplicably bad.

It was during this bad rainy season that the Sorgon fleet led by Arik came back.

Arik successfully completed the acceptance of the wheat, and he used force to deter him and extorted more wheat from the Novgorod Pine Needle Manor. Because of the men of White Tree Manor, they returned home with a large number of iron tools, and each of them also brought a captured round shield. After living with the Rus for a few months and being trained as Varyag warriors, the men of White Tree Manor were completely reborn. When hundreds of them got off the longboat and gathered, the manor leader Rigus couldn't recognize them for a time. Until the group laughed and shouted Slavic.

With the support of hundreds of soldiers out of thin air, Arik's search went very smoothly.

He scavenged nearly 300,000 pounds of wheat in Novgorod, and in Novgorod, he got a batch of agricultural taxes belonging to the Duke of Ross, compared to the former, the so-called agricultural taxes (tributes paid to Rurik according to the contract) The number is much less. In terms of population alone, the population of the Slavs living around Lake Ilmen is larger than that of the Melalen tribe, and in terms of their ability to scavenge wheat, the Melalen people are clearly superior.

During the transportation, it was raining, and the Ross people, who were shivering from the cold, carried some of the wet wheat to the shore and stuffed it into the Gould family's well-waterproof warehouse.

Arik returned home with his Asraki, and he excitedly introduced his new woman to his wife, Peravina, and a family feud began...

Fighting and fighting, the two women still have to get along.

Arik, he finally tasted the trouble of marrying two women. Fortunately, the second daughter finally set a rule, that is, Peravina is the wife, and the eldest son Askard will inherit all of Arik. As for Aslaqi and the children she may have in the future, they only inherited Arik's blood, not even a single copper coin.

So on the twenty-eighth day when the rain stopped, the elites of the Rus tribe gathered in the Rus court.

This shed for discussion has already existed. It started as a wooden shed and was rebuilt during last year's major construction work. I just saw the big council of the Gotland people, is this too small for the Rus people?

Small is really small, but the excellent design of its fireplace keeps everyone immersed in a warm hometown when discussing matters. Brothers can talk about big things without any scruples, and then serve with meat and spirits.

It's a pity that there is only jerky now, and there is no spirits at all.

Otto presided over the clan meeting as usual, which was called the Viking NORDIC meeting. The elites attending the meeting naturally have the right to express their opinions, but Rurik in the Duchy of Ross has essentially controlled military power, financial power, administrative power, divine power, and even the greatest right to speak, and Rurik is the one who makes up his mind. Be a well-deserved focus.

Having experienced unprecedented victories, the Rus people are unprecedentedly proud.

Otto just started the meeting, and in the end he became Rurik's one-stop shop.

Everyone talked and laughed about things during the war, about the women who joined the tribe, and the conversation turned to Arik, who made great contributions to transporting tribute.

Haruo Zuosen said with relief: "You kid, you are like a war bear on the battlefield. You brought back the food, which really solved our big trouble. Now my family is no longer worried about food."

Everyone was praising Arik's instant, after all, it was 300,000 pounds of wheat! This has been an extremely rare huge food reserve in the past.

The praised Arik was extremely arrogant, but Haro Zuo Sen laughed again: "I heard that the two women in your family fought with each other at one time? This is not good, you must control your women."

Everyone laughed aloud and began to give Arik some advice, and then some people took Rurik as an example: "My Rurik, he already has more than ten women, and he is really a role model for our generation."

"It takes effort to keep them from quarreling in the future." Arik pouted and complained.

Rurik coped with a wry smile. He didn't necessarily have to have so many women, but...

He knew that he could not escape such a fate, and I am afraid that there will be more women in the future.

Everyone talks about their women, and they are wild men who by nature want more wives, more kids. They also prided themselves on being good people. For example, they gave the captured female slaves official family status, and their children were also Russ. Such a high moral character was the highest in the entire Kingdom of Sweden.

There was a cheerful atmosphere in the chamber.

Taking advantage of this joy, Rurik clapped his hands to stop everyone's words.

"Three hundred thousand pounds of wheat was squeezed from Novgorod, which is more than we expected. But we have more from the Meralen. Now you all obey me! Especially you, ancient De!"

Rurik began to lay out his plans.

First: Organizing a huge fleet of transport ships, headed by the flagship Avrora, to Gould Island in Melalen. Organise an army of five hundred strong men to go to Melalen to fetch eight hundred thousand pounds of wheat belonging to the Duke. If King Karl refused, the Rus army directly attacked Karl's mansion, and announced that it would not fight the other houses of the Meralen tribe.

Second: Prepare a lot of money to buy various materials in Melalen and surrounding tribes, mainly agricultural products. In particular, try to negotiate with the local big landlord families and induce them to come up with more wheat at a higher purchase price.

The third: to redeem the debt slaves of the big landowners with money, and to induce the farmers, fishermen and craftsmen of the Melalen tribe to emigrate with money.

Gould and his eldest son Snowreva, who were sitting, fully affirmed Rurik's first plan and the first half of the second plan based on businessman's intuition. Almost all of the money plundered from the enemy belonged to Rurik, and how he wanted to use it was of course up to his personal preference.

But what happened next, Gould couldn't understand.

"Lord Rurik, I don't know something."

"What's up?"

"We are businessmen, and businessmen should try their best to exchange the least money for the greatest benefit. Why do you want to increase the purchase price of grain, wouldn't it make those big landlords and farmers fatter?"

"Ah! What did you say?" Rurik shrugged and asked: "You really don't understand?"

"Me? I don't understand..."

The people present really didn't understand, or in other words, they couldn't realize Rurik's deepest intentions.

"All the elites of Ross are present, and there will be no traitors among us. I might as well tell you. Me!" Rurik patted his chest: "It is to make the Melarens decline, so they must first make their rich people become To get richer, at least give them a chance to get rich.”

This remark is still incomprehensible.

Seeing that people were curious, Rurik didn't bother to speak obscurely, so he said in plain words: "I plan to only discuss with Melalen's big family, and negotiate with them an internal high grain purchase price. With the money in my hand, I will try my best to sell my grain, and this is just the beginning. They will try their best to get grain from ordinary farmers and sell it to us, so that although the Melalen tribe has a good harvest, it is not for those who For ordinary farmers, life is even more difficult than last year. Those big landowners have made a fortune and obtained a lot of silver coins, while farmers are destitute. Will farmers who feel unable to survive will find a way to leave?"

Otto pinched his beard with a grim expression, because he really didn't understand.

Gould and Snowreva suddenly realized that they slapped their thighs vigorously. This father and son, who were as fat as seals, also swayed the fat on their faces, and their excited smiling faces almost squeezed their eyes into the fat. .

"All, there is a third plan?" Gould asked excitedly.

Rurik nodded with satisfaction: "It seems that you have understood."

"But, those big landowners really do this?!"

"Yes, because their thirst for wealth has no end. You said, would you refuse a mountain of gold and silver? In order to plunder a legendary silver mountain, the Kingdom of Sweden has organized an army! This year, the self-proclaimed king Olegin, in the final battle for a silver mountain, died in the end."

Having said this, Rurik let out a long sigh: "Olegin at least pays attention to credit, Karl... I have to beware of his default. I plan to get at least another million pounds of wheat and bring back a group of immigrants. As for I don't care about the future of the Melalen tribe. I only care about whether our Duchy of Ross can quickly become strong with the help of the huge wealth of looting. The high priest Veria told me that decades ago we could only live, and we were killed by Melalen. People drove them away! They were allies? Not really. Listen!"

Rurik, on a whim, stood up: "Villa will leave, and she will watch us every winter as Speros, the Valkyrie, for this is Odin's order. Odin is the blessing. Ours, only we are true warriors, not Meralon. God is encouraging me to take revenge on behalf of the people of a hundred years ago, and I will use this new war, a bloodless war to destroy Mera The power of the Ren people. What second right to speak, it's just my words in Visby to stabilize those leaders. In the end, I am the king of Sweden. Oh, at that time, there will be no Swedish kingdom, only the Rus kingdom."

"Ah, then I'll praise you King Ross now!" Gould immediately praised in a timely manner, causing everyone to clap their hands stupidly along with the atmosphere.

The day of departure was chosen on the first day of October in the Julian calendar, and it was planned to arrive at Gould Island by the fourth day.

Residents near Lake Mälaren have been impatiently waiting for the big sellers of Ross.