Chapter 198

"Rosalyn?" Elsa heard Orson say this name and immediately became alert.

"When did she come to see you?"

"About a month or two ago? At that time, I met her at a masquerade. We had a smooth relationship. I didn't expect that she would actually be able to cooperate with His Highness."

With this emotion, Orson told Elsa about his encounter with Rosalind and his subsequent introduction to Alsace.

When Elsa heard Orson say this, her mood suddenly worsened a lot.

Who would have thought that Orson would indirectly help Alsace.

If Scaloni becomes the new Duke of Naples as he wishes, Alsace can take the opportunity to expand his power and influence, which will be extremely detrimental to Elsa.

Immediately, Elsa thought of a way.

"Orson...I suddenly thought of a way."

"Ah?" Seeing that Elsa didn't criticize him immediately, Orson thought of a way instead. He was also stunned for a moment, and then asked: "Your Highness Elsa, what did you think of?"

"Why don't you compete with Scaloni? I will support you in becoming the Duke of Naples."

Chapter 115: Strange Troops

Orson was stunned for a moment after listening to Elsa's words, and then asked uncertainly:

"Your Highness, what you just meant was that you want to support me to become the next Duke of Naples. I heard you correctly, that's what you meant, right?"

"Yeah." Elsa nodded. "The only factor currently preventing you from becoming a duke, Orson, is mainly one thing.

"

"one?"

"Well, that's family identity." Elsa said.

"There has never been a situation in the history of the empire where one family controls two duchies. Orson, you will not be able to set a precedent. So if you, Orson, want to become the Duke of Naples, you can only leave first." The Stranik family, and you can’t leave on your own initiative, you have to have the Stranik family drive you out of the house because of an incident, creating a feeling of death and destruction.”

"A fish is dead or a net is broken..." Hearing Elsa say this, Orson lowered his head.

"Of course, Orson, you can act out a play so that your family doesn't know anything, or you can tell them directly now and let them act with you."

"Whether you act like or not is not the most important thing. The most important thing is that you cannot continue to be the Duke of Naples as a member of the Stranik family."

After hearing Elsa's words, Orson lowered his head and started thinking.

Generally speaking, this matter has more advantages than disadvantages for Orson. After all, the Duchy of Naples is not poor, and is even richer than the Duchy of Antica. Even if it is currently in chaos due to the war, as long as the war is over , the new Duke can quickly regain his pre-war vitality if he rests and recuperates.

But in this case, Orson needs to leave his family and establish a new family.

Although he himself was not related by blood to Lucius, after all, they had lived together as a family for nearly twenty years. Separating him at this time was not much different from leaving his biological parents.

Whatever you do is a difficult decision.

Finally, Orson raised his head, looked at Elsa, and spoke his mind.

"Your Highness Elsa, I promise you, I will contact my father tomorrow and tell him about this matter."

"Okay." Elsa knew that Orson would agree in the end, and she nodded with satisfaction at this expected thing.

…

On the other side, the city of Romulus.

Since locking Downey in the basement, all matters concerning city defense and public security have been decided by Giovanni himself.

After news of the repression in the city came out, Giovanni continued to implement his high-pressure rule. Eventually, citizens began to flee in the city. Many people took advantage of the darkness to sneak to the city wall or bribe their acquaintances in the military. Let them open the door secretly. When Giovanni learned the news, more than four thousand people had already escaped from the city.

Of course, these more than 4,000 people brought the news that the protest march in the city was suppressed.

When Scaloni heard that Giovanni was treating his people so roughly, he slammed the table angrily, and then increased the intensity of his daily siege, striving to save the citizens from dire straits as soon as possible.

On the eighth day after the first siege, the city wall to the north of Romulus was finally captured, and the next step was to enter an extremely bloody and tragic street battle.

When the city of Romulus was originally designed, it was used as a bridgehead to pacify the southern separatist forces at that time. Therefore, many places inside the city were also set up as fortifications. During the period of being surrounded, Giovanni mobilized everything Resources strengthened the city of Romulus, which was about to turn the city into a cold killing machine.

Giovanni's idea succeeded briefly. At least for now, the losses caused to the enemy in the entire city have reached expectations.

In order to capture the northern city wall, the enemy suffered 20,000 casualties. In yesterday's street fighting, the enemy lost more than 4,000 people throughout the day.

Although they also advanced a few streets, on average, they paid a price of more than a dozen lives for every further advance, which made the enemy's advancement difficult.

If we continue fighting like this, I am afraid that the enemy's losses will exceed 50% in the end.

Of course, it’s not easy here in Naples either.

This battle can almost be called the final battle of the South, and Giovanni bet everything on this battle.

If he succeeds, he will have a chance to survive, and if he loses this battle, he will not leave himself any way out.

Now, the number of defenders in Romulus City is less than 30,000, and the enemy he faces is at least 80,000.

It seems that Giovanni's failure is only a matter of time.

But in fact, it is far from that.

In the coalition army tent outside Romulus City.

Ten thousand soldiers from the Duke of Orleans also arrived here three days ago. After two days of rest, they were involved in the tragic siege yesterday, leaving nearly a thousand bodies.

"Everyone, although our losses are slightly greater than the enemy, according to intelligence, the number of enemy soldiers is less than 30,000. Romulus City has a large area. We will cooperate with the soldiers on the east wall to control the east tomorrow, so that the number of soldiers we can put into the battlefield can be doubled."

At the combat meeting, Scaloni told the commanders of each legion about his ideas.

The reason why the attack in the northern city yesterday could only capture a few streets was largely because the battlefield was limited. Even if more troops were deployed, the number of soldiers actually engaged in battle with the enemy would not change.

After capturing the eastern city wall, the engagement area will be further expanded, so that the enemy needs to pay more defensive power and the casualties caused by the enemy will increase.

The coalition forces are not afraid of death now. The first priority is to capture Romulus City as soon as possible and send the sinner Giovanni to the court of trial.

At this time, the messenger ran in from outside the military tent and said:

"It's bad! It's bad! The enemy has sent out a very strange army. Our position in the northern city was taken back by the enemy not long after we took it!"

Hearing this news, Scaloni was stunned for a moment, and then asked in disbelief: "How is it possible? We have more people than the opposite side. The northern city has invested 10,000 people. With so many people, you tell me that the position is lost?!"

"Yes, it's true!" The messenger said anxiously.

"It is said that the people in that small group are very strange. They are not afraid of death at all. Even if they are cut by swords, they will not make any sound. They are extremely fierce. Our brothers think they are weird. Under their leadership, our position was quickly beaten back by the enemy!"

Chapter 116: I will find a good cemetery for you

"Not afraid of death, they don't make any sound even if they are cut by swords, and they are extremely fierce? Are you sure you are describing humans?" Scaloni looked at the messenger below and asked in surprise.

As one of the major local forces in the empire, it is reasonable for the Dukedom of Naples to have some elite armed forces, just like the Dukedom of Antica, which has a black army that follows Lucius and has played a key role in the previous battle against the orcs.

However, because the Dukedom of Naples is not on the front line against foreign enemies, there has been no large-scale war in the territory for many years. Therefore, other parts of the empire know less about the elite troops of the Dukedom of Naples, and many people even think that the Dukedom of Naples does not have the so-called elite troops at all.

But this time, according to the description of the frontline soldiers, the Duke of Naples obviously still has elite troops.

The messenger was also stunned by Scaloni's question.

"This... According to you, General, these people may not really be human... But..."

He himself could not give a definite answer to this question at the moment.

"Forget it, you go down first, we will respond later." Scaloni sighed and said so.

This strange situation must be reported to the central government of the empire.

...

On the other side, in Romulus City, the Naples army stationed.

This strange army appeared on the battlefield, not only attracting the attention of the coalition forces, but also the attention of the friendly forces.

"Hey, have you heard? Yesterday, the Duke sent a very powerful army to directly recapture all the positions that the enemy had captured, and even drove the enemy to the city wall!"

"Yes, it's true. That army is really powerful. I heard that they are all fearless. We will move our positions forward today and take over the positions they occupied."

"By the way, have you seen the true faces of those soldiers? I heard that they all wear full body plate armor. The armor is so heavy that they don't take it off even when they are fighting in the heat. Their physical fitness is too terrifying."

"It's no wonder that they are so well equipped. Most people can't wear that heavy armor, let alone wear it to fight."

"I was ready to say hello to them when I saw them setting off yesterday, but I didn't expect them to ignore me. In the whole queue, there was no other sound except the sound of walking on the road."

"It proves that their military discipline is very good. It seems that we really have hope to rely on this legion to repel the enemy."

"Yes!"

The discussion about the sudden appearance of the elite legion gave the remaining Naples soldiers confidence in victory.

Although that elite army only had a few thousand men, it defeated 10,000 men in a direct confrontation yesterday.

In the Duke's Palace, Giovanni looked at the north wall with a slight smile on his face.

"Sure enough, as long as my army takes action, no matter how elite the troops are, they will be easily captured in the end."

"Of course, as long as you are willing to pay enough chips, we can provide you with more such troops."

Behind Giovanni, a man with a cane said with a smile.

The skin on his hands was wrinkled, but his face was very young, looking only in his twenties.

"I don't lack people, let alone dead people." Giovanni shook his head.

"As long as I can take over the city of Saint Laurent, even if the entire Duchy of Naples is buried with me, I don't care."

"Haha, that's not the case." The man behind Giovanni shook his head.

"If everyone dies, who will rule for us? Besides, these people won't let us do this, right?"

Hearing what the man said, Giovanni didn't say much, just shook his head silently.

"Andrew, according to this transformation method, how many more people can you transform?"

"Don't worry, all this takes time."

"I order you to build an army of more than ten thousand people for me in the shortest possible time. I only give you ten days."

"Duke Giovanni, isn't ten days a bit..."

"You can use the resources of the entire city of Romulus."

"Ah... That will be much easier. Thank you, Duke Giovanni." Andrew said this and nodded with a smile.

"By the way, you should know the consequences of playing tricks, right?" Giovanni said, and a cold light shone in the shadows of the room.

"Of course I know this. Duke Giovanni gave me this old life. I will naturally fulfill my mission."

"In that case, I'm waiting for your good news." Giovanni said, turned around and left the room.

Andrew stood there and waited until the disgusting smell in the room dissipated before snorting coldly.

"Just be patient for a while."

Then, he also walked out of the room and went straight to a warehouse in the Duke's Manor.

…

After Giovanni and Andrew said goodbye, they went directly to the basement of the Duke's Palace.

When I opened the basement door, an unpleasant smell came out.

At this moment, Downey was chained to a wooden stake in the basement. He saw Giovanni walking into the room with hopeful eyes in his eyes.

"Father! Let me go quickly. I feel so uncomfortable now. We must have misunderstood something before..."

"I'm sorry, Donnie, my son. In order for you to be able to inherit such a huge future, you have to bear these pains." Giovanni said this and came to Donnie.

"...Father, you mean that I have to be here again..."

"Well, believe me, Donnie, as long as you get through this period of time, you will be reborn and regain your life." Giovanni said this, looked at the button connected next to the wooden stake, walked over, and then pressed the button Down.

Downey on the wooden stake could no longer speak after Giovanni pressed the button. The burning pain from the four chains had made him unable to utter anything except screams.

"The potion I gave you will make your body stronger than ever before, but currently you can't suppress the side effects of the potion. You can only suppress it with the help of external forces. When the side effects dissipate, you can control the side effects at will. A powerful force.”

"Believe me, Donnie, when you really come into contact with that power, you will thank me." Giovanni said this, ignoring Donnie's screams, turned his back, and left the basement directly .

"Keep an eye on Donnie for me. He will be suppressed three more times today." He ordered coldly.

"As ordered." The black shadow that emerged around him bowed respectfully and accepted the order.