Chapter 544 Königsberg

Vittorio came to the trade department to report the next day, and everyone held a small welcome ceremony for him. Then he began to devote himself to the intense work.

Vittorio saw a super large map here, on which Europe all the way to India was drawn. There were also various dots, which were important ports and commercial cities in Europe.

As the head of the Western European region, his duty was to find ways to expand Rome's trade in Western Europe. But as a person who grew up in Florence, he felt that it was not an easy task.

Because of the growth of the Roman economy in recent years, the trade of other countries has been damaged. Therefore, tariffs were increased on Roman goods, but they could not do without spices and silk from the East, and they kept buying them. Now the rising tariffs became Roman gold coins.

Now Rome has begun to invest in Spanish Banya and Sardinia, and discuss trade treaties with England, preparing to completely complete the closed loop from the Mediterranean to the Baltic Sea. Other countries can only join passively, rather than actively open up new trade routes.

For him, now he not only needs to open up the markets of Western European countries, but also needs to find new countries or colonies to activate trade. It is best that there should be a country across the endless sea to trade with them.

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Konigsberg, after two or three months of preparation, Vlad was finally ready to attack.

Faced with the Teutonic turtle tactics, Vlad changed his strategy and did not attack Marienberg, but directly bypassed and attacked Konigsberg in the east.

In 1255, the Teutonic Knights conquered the Sambian tribe of the ancient Prussians, and a new fortress was built on the spot, called Konigsberg, meaning the King's Mountain, in memory of the Bohemian King Przemysl Ottokar II.

In 1340, Konigsberg became a member of the Hanseatic League, and the city quickly developed into an important port in the southeast of the Baltic Sea, where goods from Prussia, the Kingdom of Poland and the Grand Duchy of Lithuania were traded.

If Vlad conquered Konigsberg, he would not only greatly expand his own territory and strength, but also make the Knights lose their largest stronghold in the east, thereby losing control of the entire Teutonic. Therefore, the importance of Konigsberg is comparable to that of Marienberg.

The soldiers of Königsberg were standing on the city wall, looking at the dark mass of enemies under the city, all of them looked nervous. Behind them were the people who supported Teutonic, who were even more nervous.

Kruger, the garrison officer, saw an old man trembling all the time, and his shield fell to the ground many times, so he stepped forward to comfort him: "Don't be afraid, the enemy can't attack! Since the city was built, it has never been broken by the enemy!"

His words made the soldiers feel a little relieved.

When he walked along the aisle on the top of the city, inspecting the entire defense situation from west to east, and seeing that there were enough soldiers in every place, he also had his own confidence.

Woo～～～～～

The attack horn sounded, and the attacking soldiers were like hungry wolves, howling and rushing towards Königsberg like a tide.

They soon reached the moat, and the soldiers running in the front quickly put the rafts they were carrying on the moat; then the soldiers carrying the ladders stepped on the rafts, crossed the moat, and ran straight to the city wall; followed by the soldiers holding sabers...

At this time, the attack on the city wall also began to become fierce, with arrows, javelins, and stones raining down, and the casualties of the Berlin Alliance soldiers suddenly increased...

Their ladders were overturned by the push rods and quickly put up again. The soldiers climbed up the ladders one by one, the first one was knocked down, and the next one accelerated upward without hesitation. The soldiers of the Alliance were not afraid of arrows, and they also fired arrows at the defenders on the city...

Their fierce offensive soon achieved results, and the defense of the city wall was breached many times, and Kruger had to mobilize the people to the city wall many times. He knew: the enemy could not always maintain such a fierce offensive momentum, as long as they could withstand this period, they would be powerless. Therefore, while sending all the defenders, he shouted loudly to the soldiers, encouraging them to bravely persist in fighting.

By sunset, they finally held Königsberg. They only needed to wait for the reinforcements from Marienberg to arrive to solve the siege problem.

As more and more people joined the war between the alliance and the Teutonic, Vlad ordered the members of the Hanseatic League headed by Lübeck to immediately form a large fleet to guard the security of the Baltic Sea.

At the same time, he also issued orders to the members of the alliance: in addition to the city, all other troops in the alliance began to assemble. Prevent the Polish army from attacking.

The issuance of these orders meant that there would be a lot of military action, but the alliance was still a calm picture on the surface. While the Constance Conference was still in session, they quickly attacked the Teutonic.

When the Teutonic asked Denmark for reinforcements, Eric tactfully argued that the Teutonic and Berlin Alliance were both important partners of the Kalmar Alliance. Because of this, they had to remain neutral to avoid hurting the friendship of one party. If they agreed to the Teutonic request, they might cause the Berlin Alliance to misunderstand that Denmark had joined the Teutonic side, so they had to refuse.

When they asked Poland for help, Władysław refused to see them. He told them to leave and said he was not in the mood to help them.

Now they are alone and can only negotiate to save themselves.

So outside the city of Königsberg, Grand Master Jungingen and Vlad negotiated. As for the Pomeranian region and Danzig, the master was unwilling to give up. The local developed commerce and fisheries were one of their main sources of tax revenue. The master was willing to reduce their taxes, but forget about independence.

However, the Prussian Union and Vlad must let this piece be pulled out. They spent 10,000 gold coins to get it, so they were willing to spend 20,000 gold coins to buy it back.

The master thought it was an insult to him, an insult to the God's territory that the Knights had finally obtained. He could not agree.

But he also knew that the war could not continue. Rome and Moscow joined forces to take away 70% of Lithuania's land and paid a ransom. Now their Knights were no longer able to fight a protracted war, and the war must end immediately.

As a compromise, the master proposed to cede the land west of Danzig. And exempt the local area from taxation, but Vlad still rejected it, because without Danzig, the land here would have no meaning. They needed the port city of Danzig to boost their economy, so Teutonic was being completely insincere in doing this.