Chapter 195 Drinking War
After listening to Vitas' words, Viscount Sisse fell into a long period of thinking.
Viscount Sisse knew that Roning bribed the liquor sales staff of the Harland family and obtained the liquor brewing process.
Maybe it was because the benefits were too great, or maybe it was because he subconsciously felt that the Sisse family was stronger than the Harland family.
Viscount Sisse did not care about the Harland family and decided to touch the interests of the Harland family. He easily decided to get involved in the wine industry and compete with the Harland family without discussing with other family members.
He never expected that Richard would be so cruel and directly hit the Sisse family's weak spot.
The casino was attacked and many people died, so it had to be closed temporarily.
In addition, compensation for the death of gamblers and the gambling money brought by gamblers had to be paid. The total amount of money exceeded 3,000 gold coins, which was also a considerable amount of money for the Sisse family.
Although Viscount Sisse's territory has been developed for thirty years and has a population of 120,000, the cultivated farmland exceeds the territory of the Harland family, and heavy taxes are imposed on serfs. The total income of various types of income in a year is about 40,000 gold coins, of which the casino profit accounts for 8,000, the grain tax is about 30,000 gold coins, and the remaining 2,000 gold coins are commercial taxes.
Overall, Viscount Sisse's fiscal revenue is not as good as that of the Harland family.
The annual trade profit of the Harland family exceeds the fiscal revenue of Viscount Sisse's territory, not to mention the tax and grain profit.
The 8,000 gold coins of the casino are very important to the Sisse family.
Richard hit the casino of the Sisse family. Viscount Sisse must retaliate against the Harland family and show the strength to protect the casino in order to convince the public.
Only in this way can the casino continue to operate.
Viscount Sisse is clear about the strength of the Harland family. After all, Richard has made many military achievements, and he expanded his army on a large scale last winter, and now has 3,000 troops. The strength is a bit stronger than that of the Sisse family.
"At that time, I was blinded by the interests and rashly involved in the wine trade. The decision was too hasty."
Viscount Sisse thought to himself that he did not want to have a conflict with the Harland family, but his current position forced him to be tough on the Harland family.
In the competition among nobles, toughness is a necessary quality, and decisively submissive grandson is also a quality.
How to grasp the scale is the real ability of a noble.
Richard sent people to attack the casino of the Sisse family. Although there was no direct evidence left, Viscount Sisse immediately made a decision to retaliate in kind and immediately dispatched people to prepare to attack the brewery of the Harland family, causing the Harland family to suffer heavy losses in interests.
Viscount Sisse knew that if the casino was really attacked by the Harland family.
In the recent period, the Harland family must be on guard, and it is difficult to succeed in attacking important targets. He plans to endure for three months and wait for the Harland family to relax their defenses before launching a surprise attack.
During this period, Viscount Sisse increased his infiltration efforts into the Harland Territory and sent many spies into the Harland Territory.
After Richard returned to the territory with the action team, he reiterated the importance of confidentiality to the action team members, and then issued a bounty of 1,200 gold coins to the team members, and the remaining 4,000 gold coins were used as working capital for the territory.
For each member who participated in the action, the professional received a bonus of 30 gold coins, and the advanced students also received a bonus of 15 gold coins.
Doing this job is equivalent to earning a year's salary.
After returning to the territory, facing the possible attack of the Sisse family, Richard strengthened his defense.
The Harland Territory is very wary of outsiders. Although free people are not prohibited from moving in, the free people who move in must obey the arrangements of the territory and can only live near Vickburg.
Moreover, the free people who move in will not be given land, and can only engage in commercial or handicraft activities in Vickburg.
If you want to divide the land, you must sign a five-year slave contract. Only after completing the contract will you divide the land and house.
The Stopa Territory, where Vickburg is located, is an agricultural territory, and there is nothing that needs to be kept secret.
In addition, the Harland Territory also prohibits the residents from migrating at will, especially the residents of the Stopa Territory, who are prohibited from entering Fort William and Fort Sophia.
Civil officials will also repeatedly prohibit idle people from approaching the factory.
Any stranger who dares to approach the factory will be arrested and sent to the mine to mine with the orc captives.
The factory in the Harland Territory not only has security in the factory area, but also has garrisons nearby.
Over the years since the factory was opened, more than a hundred people who dared to spy on the factory have been arrested. Some of them are spies, and some are simply too curious.
Whether they are spies sent by other nobles or people who are too curious, as long as they are sent to the mine and accompany the orcs, they basically can't live for too long.
There are many innocent souls in the mine.
Richard attacked by pretending to be a mercenary caravan, so he was naturally wary of the caravan coming in from outside.
All caravans from outside are not allowed to enter William Castle, Sophia Castle and other secret castles, and can only trade in the market outside Vick Castle.
The market is built on a flat land, surrounded by towering walls on all sides, and there are garrisons at the door.
After the goods are counted in the market, the gold coins will be settled immediately, and the caravan will take the gold coins back and cannot walk around the territory at will.
In recent years, Harland has arrested many merchants who wander around.
Richard didn't care about the nobles' pleas behind him, and all those who didn't follow the rules were sent to the mine. ɱ
Harland is a typical mountain territory. There are only a few roads to enter this territory.
Generally speaking, there is only one mountain road, one flat road, and three waterways.
One mountain road goes directly from Baron Sharp's territory to Fort William. This road passes through Iron Mountain Fort. There is a squadron garrison on the road, and merchants are not allowed to pass at all.
The flat road is from Dirham Baron to Stopa Baron. This road can go all the way to Black River Fort, and it is also the main road for caravans.
Through three rivers, ships can approach important places such as brick kilns, Fort William, and Fort Sophia. There are also checkpoints and garrisons to prohibit foreign ships from entering the territory.
In the Kingdom of Grant, the lord has great power. If Richard objects, even official ships cannot enter Harland.
Because the territory has great restrictions on outsiders, Richard is not afraid of Viscount Sisse sending people to attack.
A large garrison is stationed in Fort Vick.
Although the Harland brigade is small, it only has four and a half squadrons, less than 700 people.
But the regular army of 700 people is enough to defeat most of the attackers.
Unless Viscount Sisse sends hundreds of elite soldiers to launch a surprise attack to defeat the garrison of Fort Vick.
But with hundreds of strong men entering Harland, the intelligence department is not just for show. They will soon find abnormalities and deploy troops in advance to eliminate the invading enemies.
Three months passed slowly, and Viscount Sisse had made all preparations, but the intelligence he needed had not been received.
Viscount Sisse has deployed more than a dozen intelligence personnel to Harland.
Because of the policy of restricting the free migration of the people, these intelligence personnel cannot penetrate into the core of Harland territory at all, and can only live a hard life near Fort Vick.
Although Fort Vick has a large population and good agricultural conditions, it is not the core of Harland territory.
Most of the high-level officials of the territory are in Fort William. Even Sophia and Margaret returned to Fort William to settle down after the war ended last year.
Sophia's magic laboratory was moved to Fort William.
Unable to enter Fort William and unable to contact the top leaders of Fort Vick, these lurking spies could not get any useful intelligence at all.
But the higher-ups were pressing very hard, so they had no choice but to make up intelligence to fool around.
Vitas, the intelligence officer of Viscount Sisse, was quite shrewd, and these fabricated intelligence could not be hidden from his eyes.
Because the Haaland Territory restricted the flow of people, it was very cautious against intelligence personnel.
Vitas had no good way, so he could only collect some public information from people lurking in Fort Vick to analyze the military, political, legal, and economic intelligence of the Haaland Territory.
As Vitas got to know the Haaland Territory more and more, he became more and more frightened, and felt that the chances of winning were getting smaller, so he began to dissuade Viscount Sisse, hoping to stop the attack.
Because there was no accurate intelligence, the attack was difficult to succeed.
Viscount Sisse once again summoned the officials of the territory and asked Vitas to take action and come up with accurate intelligence.
"Dear Viscount, the Harland Territory is a closed territory that does not welcome outsiders. They are very cautious about intelligence infiltration, and there is also a capable intelligence force inside the territory.
It will take a long time for our personnel to slowly infiltrate the key departments of the Harland Territory, and now we can't get any useful intelligence at all.
We only know that the Harland family steel plant is in Tieshanbao, and there are troops stationed nearby.
The Harland Territory has established a large-scale brick kiln factory, which can produce a large number of bricks every year. Even the roads near Vickburg are paved with bricks. The kiln factory that produces bricks is less than 20 kilometers away from Vickburg, and outsiders are also prohibited from approaching.
Through public intelligence analysis, we know William Castle has four infantry battalions and one cavalry battalion, and each castle has a certain number of auxiliary soldiers.
Their brewery is near William Castle, which is also the core of their territory. According to some public data analysis, William Castle has four squadrons of infantry and a cavalry of 300 people, and the number of Warcraft cavalry reaches 100 people.
Our intelligence personnel can only infiltrate Wick Castle, which has a garrison of one battalion. The Harland Territory Battalion is smaller, with only four and a half squadrons, about 700 people.
We can only collect this much intelligence in a short time. "
For more than three months, Viscount Sisse has thought of many ways, but still cannot restore the gamblers' trust in the casino.
After all, many people died in the casino that day.
Viscount Sisse had a conflict with big figures like Viscount Richard, and gamblers did not dare to go to Viscount Sisse's casino to avoid being involved in the conflict.
Without gamblers, the casino will naturally close.
Viscount Sisse heard about the conflict between Richard and the Holland family, and sent people to the capital to contact the Holland family, which was considered to have joined Prince Felix's camp.
Under the promotion of the Holland family, the capital set up a casino robbery investigation team.
The investigation team communicated with Richard, but they didn't even see Richard. Instead, they were told that the Harland territory was in rebellion and Viscount Richard was suppressing the rebellion.
If the investigation team left Vickburg, Viscount Richard would not guarantee their safety.
Official investigations can't shake the nobles with deep roots.
Besides, the Grant royal family has no tradition of getting involved in noble conflicts. Prince Felix can only mobilize a small number of people.
Richard also found someone in the capital, and the Harland family stood on Prince Chris's side politically.
Anything that Prince Felix supports, Prince Chris will definitely oppose.
The official investigation team came to a standstill, and the casino business faced competition again.
Because the Elena Castle Casino was closed, many powerful people in the Flame Castle have begun to take action and set up a new casino in the Flame Castle to compete with the Sisse family for the market.
The Sisse family has a deep foundation in the Flame Castle. The previous Viscount Sisse served as the head of the Crazy Lion Legion for 20 years.
However, the head of the Sisse Legion has been out of office for more than ten years, and many of the people he promoted back then have retired from active service.
The main foundation of the Harland family is in the Black River Castle, and its relationship in the Flame Castle is far inferior to that of Viscount Sisse.
However, when it comes to conflicts of interest, favors are often useless, especially favors from more than a decade ago.
Once the Flame Castle established a casino, it must be protected by the top leaders of the Crazy Lion Legion, and the security will exceed that of the Elena Casino. The Sisse family has no way to compete.
The situation has come to this point. Unless the Harland family nods and admits defeat, gives up the liquor business, and resolves the conflict, the casino can be restored.
However, the Flame Castle Casino has already opened, and it is difficult for the Sisse family to compete with the high-ranking officials of the Crazy Lion Legion.
The casino business will inevitably decline, and Viscount Sisse has a clear understanding of this.
Giving up the liquor business is simply not feasible.
Since he can't get any intelligence and can't attack the foundation of the Harland family, Viscount Sisse can only launch a trade war.
He sent professionals in the territory to attack the commercial sales staff of the Harland family everywhere, killing many people at one time and robbing thousands of gold coins of goods.
Richard certainly won't show weakness when this happens. He immediately retaliated and sent professionals to attack everyone who had a relationship with Baron Sisse.
In the next few months, hundreds of people were killed and injured in the two territories, and even professionals and two viscounts died more than ten people in total.
The conflict between the two sides has affected the stability of the northern border and alarmed the top leaders of the capital.
King Charles communicated with the Council of Nobles and sent high-level officials to mediate.
This mediating official was Richard's old acquaintance, Jerram Holland. Sending people from the Holland family to mediate shows King Charles's inclination.
After receiving this news, a hint of coldness flashed in Richard's eyes, and he kept this in mind.
The capital sent people to mediate, and Richard had to make a gesture of agreeing with mediation and willing to reconcile.
Under the preference of Jerram and others, the capital mediation team finally decided to divide the liquor market. The market in Gascoigne Province was allocated to Viscount Sisse, and the markets in Gedda Province and Rah Province belonged to the Harland family.