Chapter 597 Haze

In the eastern fortress of Solin Fort, which is made of boulders, Edmund Morn, wearing a black coat, sat on his high-back chair with a sinking face, and a letter that had been dismantled was placed in front of him. On the desk, the brilliance of the magic spar lamp illuminated the emblem in the corner of the letter—the crossed sword and plow, the emblem of the Cecil family.

The Doomsday Cultists invaded and destroyed the vital functions of the Sentinel Tower... The earliest erosion may have occurred hundreds of years ago...

If the team led by Duke Gawain Cecil hadn't discovered the clues in the shadow world by chance, the actions of those cultists might never have been discovered - until the magnificent wall fell, until the destruction of human civilization. will be discovered.

The long hall of the castle was shrouded in a layer of deep pressure, and the bad mood of the high-level superhuman made the waiters and guards in the hall shudder, until a steady and powerful footsteps came from the entrance of the hall, the eastern border of the whole body armor. Duke Silas Lauren walked into the hall, and the aura shrouded in this space gradually loosened and returned to normal.

Silas Lauren walked straight to the main seat of the hall, came to Edmund Morn, bowed and saluted: "His Royal Highness - what happened?"

"Letter from the South," Edmund said without further ado, pushing the letter forward. "Look at it, Duke Laurent."

Silas Lauren curiously took the letter with the Cecil family emblem on it. After a quick glance, he frowned: "Your Highness, when was this sent?"

Edmund's tone was low: "Arrived at Solimburg this morning."

After the winter, the Kingdom Army and the Eastern Territory, who had already entered a confrontation, further reduced their respective forces due to the severe cold. Edmund also temporarily returned from the front line of the giant wood crossing to the temporary base camp of Solin Fort. Therefore, the letter from the Southern Territory should be It will be delivered to him later than usual.

Silas Lauren quickly calculated the itinerary of this letter on the road, recalling a series of news from the south, and said thoughtfully: "It seems that Duke Cecil has just arrived at the wasteland border. Found these cases..."

Edmund took a light breath and looked at Silas: "Lord Loren, that's not the point."

"The focus is on those dark cultists," Silas Lauren said calmly, his eyes fixed on Edmund, "His Royal Highness, we have known this from the beginning."

"Yes, I know, they can't be trusted in the first place..." Edmund closed his eyes slightly, and when he opened them again, there was a chill in those eyes, "Lord Loren, we should pay attention to Cecil The Duke's warning, isn't it?"

"certainly,

Silas Lauren nodded expressionlessly, "To sweep away evil and maintain peace, this is what nobles should do. "

"Very good... Belk should return to Solimburg in the near future. After he returns, leave this matter to him - I believe that the upright young man will handle this matter well."

Silas Lauren lowered his head slightly: "Of course, as you wish."

Accompanied by steady and powerful footsteps, the Duke of Eastern Region left the long hall.

Edmund Moen sat quietly in the high-back chair, his eyes swept over the warning letter from the south again.

His gaze stayed on it for a moment, then looked at the many documents and maps on the other side.

The Royal Army adjusted its deployment after the winter. A mountain corps was stationed in the north of the giant wood crossing. The cold winter atmosphere from that area was even worse than that on the plains. The Grand Duke of the North, Victoria Wilde, was obviously on the front line, while the Grand Duke of the North The mountain guard regiment under his command is said to have no fear of severe cold...

Some towns in the eastern part of Solimburg have not been improved, and the influence of the old lords has not completely dissipated.

The decree reform in the Eastern Border encountered an unexpected backlash, and a large number of peasants were resisting the land replacement bill. This obviously cannot be their spontaneous behavior. Behind it, those conservative lords must be instigating, but he cannot find it. evidence.

Programs to advance education were slow, the people had no active literacy enthusiasm, and the low-level scribes and petty aristocrats who carried out orders hardly ever took their jobs seriously—even in many areas, they saw this task as a "punishment" and "deprecating", because "teaching the Dalits to read is a degrading job"...

The Royal Army is gaining a firm footing, the conservatives are resurfacing, the reformers are splitting, the people who enforce the decree are insanely slow, and the people...the people who he is trying to help, want to improve their situation, simply do not understand his bill.

In the beginning, everything went very smoothly. The legion's victories and trophies kept everyone's morale high, and the implementation of the decree did not encounter any difficulties, but since the war was deadlocked, since the New Deal began to involve "land" and "population" ”, and countless obstacles and dilemmas arose.

A sense of irritability inevitably came to mind - Edmund Moen suddenly felt upset, he reached out and picked up the water glass on the desk, wanting to take a sip of water to suppress the irritability in his heart.

- In order to keep his head calm, he has been abstaining from alcohol for a long time.

At this moment, out of the corner of his eyes, he suddenly saw an exceptionally bright flame rising from the fireplace on the side of the hall. There seemed to be some illusory shadow trying to condense from the hearth in the flame jumping, and even the decorations on the nearby walls. The candles on the sex lamp stand also seemed to be pulled by an inexplicable force and suddenly increased their flames.

This is not a dark room or the top of a sentry tower without outsiders. There are squires and guards standing all over the hall, which makes Edmund Morn's already bad mood worse. He frowned and turned to the fireplace. With a wave of direction: "Be bold!"

The flames in the fireplace returned to normal in an instant, and no matter who was going to be projected, it was obviously interrupted.

Edmund Morn snorted coldly, took up the water glass and drank it.

...

In the west of the giant wood crossing, in Baisong Town, a town under the control of the Royal Army, Viscount Horn in a dark red coat was sitting in the carriage, listening to the soldiers outside reporting the situation to him with a very displeased expression.

Heck, it's a cold winter! A viscount would go out to the streets where the pariahs live in this ghost weather, supervise some "shovel out evil", and listen to those stupid soldiers ramble - is this still a king's law? !

Viscount Horn scolded inwardly, but did not dare to say what he was thinking, because these things were ordered by Victoria, Duke Regent, and the Grand Duke of the North, who held the power of Bitter Winter, was stationed not far to the north. , he felt that every word he said rudely here would immediately reach the ears of the Grand Duchess - that's not a good thing.

The cold wind seemed to blow in through the gap in the carriage, Viscount Horn couldn't help tightening his thick and warm coat-he was originally a low-level spellcaster, but the color of his wine had long since emptied him. Even with the protection of the breeze shield, he felt that the weather was unbearably cold, and at the same time, he heard the soldiers outside saying:

"...Three people were found in the cellar, all dead, apparently blasphemous, blood-stained altars and containers of suspicious liquids were found at the scene...

"The whereabouts of the original owner of the house is unknown, and people on the street say they have been missing since the winter, which is consistent with the whistleblower's description...

"...The three cultists may have committed suicide, or they may have had internal strife, which requires your judgment..."

A trace of impatience flashed in Viscount Horn's eyes, but he still spoke in an unhurried tone - this way of speaking that maintains a certain rhythm and strictly limits the tone of each word is a must-have for a qualified noble. Respite: "I've figured it out - in a nutshell, someone reported to the knight that a cultist was found, and then you really found a desecrated altar and three dead cultists here, clear Exactly, right?"

The soldier's voice came from outside: "Yes, my lord—there is another missing resident..."

"I know, I know," Viscount Horn interrupted the soldiers, "I already know about this, so let's do it as we should, burn the cultists' bodies, purify the altar with holy water, and return the house to the lord, that's it."

After he finished speaking, he was about to give the order to leave this place, but the ignorant soldier was still talking: "But...but my lord, you...do you want to take a look...this is a rule after all..."

What a wooden head, I don't know who put such an idiot in the inner city guard.

Viscount Horn cursed secretly, quickly pushed open the cover at the window of the carriage, and glanced outside.

He saw a dilapidated street outside, the half-melted snow soaked the walls of the houses and garbage piles by the roadside, a few soldiers were guarding the door of a residential house, and three corpses that had begun to smell were thrown at the On the straw mat, there were also ritual daggers, clay pots, stone tablets and other objects that served as "evidence of heresy", and some timid poor people watched from not far away - some stood by the road, some hidden behind a window or door.

Those fearful and stupid gazes are very uncomfortable.

Viscount Horn just glanced at it, and quickly lowered the cover of the window: "Okay, I have witnessed it with my own eyes, do as I say-Mr. Pierre, give them the money for their errands."

Outside the carriage, the Viscount's butler took out three silver coins—the money for disposing of the cultists’ bodies and purifying the altar of evil—and handed them over to the captain of the soldiers who was waiting.

Afterwards, the viscount and his attendants and stewards left the street.

The few soldiers who stayed at the scene looked at me, I looked at you, or shook their heads or muttered a few words, and then waved their swords to drive away the onlookers who were too close. Throwing a silver coin to the other party: "Okay, do as the lord said, and find two people to deal with this place."

The soldier with the silver coin watched his captain turn his head away and shrugged.

Then he noticed that there were still a lot of poor people standing around - those ragged, yellow-faced and thin people who were driven away by swords just now, but most of them didn't run far, they just stood there blankly. On the side of the road, he was looking at this side with a strange, numb, and empty look, looking at the three corpses on the ground, and the house that had lost its owner and was about to be returned to the lord.

The soldier who was left was stunned for a while, and suddenly shivered inexplicably.

In this damn cold weather, the brains of these poor people may have been frozen and awake.

In inexplicable unease, the soldiers gave up their plan to search the unowned house—the people living on this street should have nothing of value anyway.

He raised his head, looked past the numb and sluggish poor people, and saw the two corpse-dragging people who had long been waiting outside the crowd-the dirty gray-black blouse and the death amulet hanging around his neck were the most conspicuous of the corpse-dragging people. These guys who deal with corpses have always had a sensitive sense of smell. I am afraid that within half an hour after the news of the corpse was spread here, the two corpse draggers were already waiting nearby.

"Today is really bad..."

The soldier muttered, called the corpse dragger to him, handed them a few copper coins, and instructed: "Drag the corpse outside the town and burn it -- remember, it must be burned, this is an order from above."

After saying this, he didn't care how the corpse dragger answered, and walked away from the place.

The main reason why he walked so fast was that he knew that the corpse dragger would negotiate the price - burning the corpse would require extra money for firewood and grease, and those few copper coins were not enough.

But after he left, it had nothing to do with him.

The lord has left, the steward has left, and so have the soldiers.

On the street, there were only dozens of poor people standing in the cold wind, three cult corpses lying on straw mats, messy footprints all over the place, and two corpses.