Chapter 270, The Bigwigs, the Rat Warlords

On a small hill that was not very high, except for the unlucky guy who died and the colleague who had just taken office and was still catching slaves, the remaining seven rat warlords all gathered here at this time.

They brought their own armies.

The huge number of rats almost filled the entire hill, from the armies of the seven rat warlords.

On the top of the mountain, these rat warlords gathered together to discuss and quarrel. The meeting was not formal enough, just seven flags stood, gathered in a small open space, seven chattering guys, without any special momentum.

Rather than saying it was a warlord, this posture was more like a gathering between the village chief and the militia captain.

Some militia captains were dividing the ownership of a piece of open space in a crowd, probably like this.

But in fact, these guys were actually involved in the fight for a complete province.

A province is not small. It can support thousands of villages, hundreds of towns, manors, dozens of small cities, and nearly 100,000 families and about 2 million people.

This is just the number of people supported by an ordinary province. As a grain-producing area, Lianyan Province has a stronger carrying capacity, 150,000 to 200,000 families, various lingering foreign races, and 3 to 4 million people.

Such a number, such a large number of people, their fate is likely to be changed by these seven like militia captains, squatting on the ground, noisy, gesticulating, excited, dancing, and such seven rats.

Rat warlords can already be considered big shots.

After all, among the many rats in the Eastern Expeditionary Force, there are nine rat warlords, one died not long ago, and now there are only eight left.

By the way, there are still a few in the underground rat city of the Desolate Mountains, but those few are said to be rat warlords, but they have angered Shu Zhan. When Shu Zhan is free next time and returns to the Desolate Mountains, those good-for-nothings will probably be executed by him personally.

When this war comes to an end, or when there are no more guys in the Desolate Mountains that Shu Zhan is afraid of, Shu Zhan will go back and hang those idiots with his own hands.

So now there are only eight serious rat warlords. Among these eight, there is one who is struggling to capture slaves and accumulate troops in his hands. The rest are all gathered here.

After a debate, the rat warlords finally came to a conclusion. They said it was a union, but in fact, none of these guys were particularly obedient to each other. It is impossible to unite the troops in the hands of the seven rat warlords through a meeting, but it is not that no consensus was reached.

An agreement was left.

No one can convince anyone, and no one can convince anyone. Under the same greed, they will launch an attack together.

Seven rat warlords will attack Lianyan Province from seven different directions.

As for who will get the most benefits in this place, it depends on their abilities.

After reaching a consensus, the seven rat warlords each led their troops to slowly retreat.

Qi is also one of the seven rat warlords, and he is the most eye-catching guy in this meeting.

Not because of his fame, Qi has not done the big thing that is famous among all rats, because of another reason, a set of bright silver armor.

Well, the inferior version of the Temple Knight armor that the rat caravan got was just for exhibition and publicity of their own strength, and they didn't think that anyone would really buy it. After all, the price is too beautiful and not affordable.

A set of such inferior armor is enough to arm a team of ten fierce knights.

In the rat empire, there are too many disparities, and the same is true in industry. In sharp contrast to the extremely cheap weapons and equipment supplied to ordinary rats is the high price of some better things.

Many factors.

Perhaps the slightly better armor and weapons always carry some elements of gods, engraved with those complex patterns, although the patterns vary, but the rat priests who sell weapons and armor can pat their chests to help you.

Your own weapons and equipment are all made by professional craftsmen.

This is different, understand, different.

With the operation of the endless ore-swallowing rat industrial zone, forging full-body armor is not a particularly complicated thing for the rats. At least for the equipment of the level of the Fierce Knight, mass production is just a matter of thought for the rats, but obviously, there is no need for it.

Even if these solid black heavy armors are really mass-produced, not so many rats are qualified to wear them. After all, ordinary rat warriors occupy the vast majority of the rat army. These guys have a more standard name.

Cannon fodder.

Who would wear heavy armor for cannon fodder? There is no shortage.

The industrial level of the Rat People is actually gradually becoming out of touch with what they actually use.

For example, the black heavy armor is still rare in the Skaven army. In fact, for the Big Claw Priests in charge of the industrial zone, they can have as much as they want.

You know, before the grand battle on the vast grassland, the Skavens were able to build a terrifying blast furnace that could stand shoulder to shoulder with the mountains.

The huge blast furnace standing in the barren mountains, the roads cast in the sea, and the bathtub warships of Shengqi are all good proof of this.

It’s just that the Skaven’s technology tree is too deformed, and it also carries the long-standing inertia.

In the metal smelting and increasingly huge industrial output, there is no other industry in the Skaven Empire to match it.

In addition to war, the Skavens have not studied anything else.

Although there are many big claw priests who can tinker with the ritual vessels of gods, even if all the rat priests have one of these things, how much metal production capacity can be consumed?

Countless slave rats, countless blast furnaces, and big claw priests with red eyes constitute the terrifying hell of scorching flames that never stop, swallowing countless ores and spitting out boiling molten iron.

The channels that can consume these metals in the rat empire are really limited. Weapons, war machinery, armor, and ritual vessels of gods, there is nothing else.

God's ritual vessels should not be included in the list. The consumption is still not enough. It's just that there is really no channel to use these metals in the rat empire. This is why there are so many forging workshops independent of industrial zones in the rat empire.

In theory, for a war-crazed civilization, things that can forge weapons should be controlled to ensure that everything is invested in the war.

But the rats are different. The rats can't use them all. Their deformed technology tree lacks branches and twigs.

At the same time, there is the inertia that has always existed. Countless slave rats cannot be considered normal members of the Rat Empire. The development of industry will not benefit them. Those free rats who have just emerged cannot be completely considered as healthy rats. It depends on whether they can make sacrifices and support the war.

These guys occupy 99% of the population of the rats, but they are not regarded as human beings. The development of technology and industry will not benefit them at all. They are all thrown into the war. This is why many big figures in the Rat Empire are already thinking about replacing the leather armor with more exquisite chain mail, but looking at the entire Rat Kingdom, there are still many slave rats using wooden and bone tools, and many rat caravans are using wooden bearing carts.

This is why those forging workshops will be popularized in almost every rat city. In terms of technology and production capacity, these forging workshops are not comparable to the rat industrial zone at all, but the things produced by the rat industrial zone will not benefit those ordinary guys at all.

Serious disconnection, extremely serious disconnection.

The rat forging workshops barely supported the lower limit of rat civilization by picking up broken spears and broken armor on the battlefield, and did not really let the rats fall to the point where they had to rely on sharp teeth to gnaw and thick claws to dig when cutting trees and mining.

However, among the expensive weapons and armor, there was one thing that was an exception. It was not valuable because of the exquisite patterns engraved on the surface of the armor. The bright silver armor on the temple guards was a real good thing. The extremely high forging difficulty and tedious process made those bright silver armors expensive enough just by their own materials.

Even the defective products that were exchanged were so dazzling.

The flag was not a loss.

At this time, he was riding a ferocious giant rat and carrying the fur flag on his back. The particularly bright silver color made him feel like a real big shot.

Among the seven rat warlords who met, Qi's strength was not the best. He did not catch up with the first batch of slaves. He was one step late, which made him lose a lot of gains in the mountains and forests.

At the same time, it was also because of his extremely generous attitude towards his rat warriors.

He was an ambitious guy. At the beginning, he did not give a very high commission like other rat warlords, but wanted to benchmark Rat War.

Rat War did not take a commission from the spoils of the rat warriors. As long as you robbed under his command, that much was yours.

You could even accumulate merits and get rewards from him.

It was not because Rat War looked down on the spoils of the war, but the big share had been eaten by Rat War in other places.

When on the vast grassland, Rat War occupied the city and directly took a commission from the blood pool and slave trade. This was a big share that no one could escape. Rat War did not look down on the little that the rat warriors got. Anyway, they would all be taken from him.

Although the arrival of the Rat Lord later directly deprived Rat War of the right to do so, but in the later period, the logistics of the Eastern Expeditionary Force was directly undertaken by the Underground Rat City in the Desolate Mountains. The existence of the merit system was tacitly acknowledged and was also undertaken by the Underground Rat City and the Rat Parliament.

However, the things collected through the merit system have become a new source of blood mushrooms for Rat War. Many rats like those bits and pieces that can show courage, and there are also mineral veins in the captured areas. These are the sources of blood mushrooms for Rat War. With the entry of the temple guards, even land can exist as a commodity.

As long as the war continues, as long as it is not defeated, Rat War will not lack blood mushrooms at all, and naturally will not covet the three melons and two dates in the hands of the rat warriors.

But this is the confidence that belongs to Rat War. In order to keep the Rat War going, the Rat Parliament is willing to provide logistics for the Eastern Expeditionary Force. In order to buy the spoils in the hands of Rat War, the rat lords are willing to offer high prices and wave the blood mushrooms in their hands. Even the temple guards are willing to come to purchase the land of the Golden Province when the war situation has not been completely stabilized, and take over this land that is not yet stable.

This is the confidence that belongs to Rat War.

Sorry, other rat warlords, just don't think like this.

Even though these rat warlords started from the Golden Province and pushed the control area to the periphery of the Lianyan Province little by little, which is already a large area, the temple guards never came to them.

As for the rat lords, as rat warlords, they certainly have the qualifications to negotiate with the rat lords, and the rat lords can also provide them with extremely cheap weapons, but this is not because they have enough weight.

Qualification and weight are two completely different things.

The reason why they can give cheap weapons is that the weapons provided to ordinary rat warriors are so cheap. If they are higher, as long as they reach the level of black armor, they will not make less money at all.

Why did these rat warlords have to work hard to capture slaves all over the mountains and plains at the beginning? Why else? Isn’t it because the guys behind these rat caravans make too much money?

These immature guys can’t let the rat lords give in a little bit.

There is also the Rat Council. The Rat Council is more direct because the Rat Council has always been connected to only rat wars.

Under such circumstances, learning rat warfare is not a wise decision at all. The rat warlords must rely on the army in their hands to slowly accumulate strength.

Qi knew this, but he still gritted his teeth and reduced the proportion of resources he plundered from the army to the lowest.

One tenth, not one tenth belongs to those poor rat warriors, but one tenth is taken away by Qi.

This is simply a merciful proportion. Qi did not look like a ratman at all when he made this decision.

He took too little, too greedy.

This made Qi's process of accumulating strength particularly long. While the armies of other rat warlords were often more than 100,000 or 200,000, the rat army under Qi was only a pitiful 40,000.

But doing so was not without gain. More things belonged to him, bringing higher morale. Coupled with the words that Qi would emphasize loudly from time to time, it also gave birth to a trace of something precious among the rats in his army.

Loyalty.

Among all the Skaven warlords, the army under the bannerman is extremely rare and useful, even in the evaluation standards of the Skaven War.

Perhaps this guy is not too greedy, but too greedy.

The flag behind him flutters in the wind, and the armor on his body shines brightly.

It seems that he is an arrogant guy who wants to compete with the Skaven War.