When the Saint comes, she does not collect food

#729 - Irresistible

"Damn it." Count Laville pulled the scarf from his neck to cover his face and quickly discarded the noble fox fur coat he was wearing. "The transport team goes first!"

Those Franconian smugglers ignored the corpse of the caped man on the river and jumped into the cold water to start pushing the boat, while the rustling sounds from the reeds behind them grew closer and closer.

The packhorse panted in the reeds, emitting bursts of dissatisfied neighs under the master's desperate whipping, but still turned direction in the chaos.

Huddled behind the riverbank rocks and trees, the vagrant private soldiers rummaged for short swords, round shields, and powerful crossbows from their waists or horseback.

The sound of the crossbow's bowstring tearing through the night, the three-edged arrows drilled into the reed stalks, and the fibers they brought out scattered like gold threads.

However, all that could be heard from the reeds was a clanging sound, and the scattered gold threads swirled and twisted in the air.

A knight in full heavy plate armor but moving freely, even capable of jogging and leaping, appeared before the many vagrants.

Looking at the blue bee crest on the knight's chest, Count Laville's pupils filled with blood in an instant: "Damn it! It's the King's guard!"

The Earl's muttering was now drowned out by the shouts of "Release the arrows! Release the arrows!" from the robber knights under his command.

The rain of arrows from the crossbows landed on the knight's plate armor, splashing out a shower of blue sparks.

Except for the specially thinned edges of the plate armor, seven or eight arrows were all deflected.

The knowledgeable robber knights had already reacted at this moment, and stepped hard on the ground to stop their horses.

If they were not mistaken, that should be Blue Bee Armor, that is, the unique armor forging technology controlled by the Blue Bee family.

At this time, Laville no longer thought about covering the smuggling horse team's escape at all, he just shouted "Scatter, into the reeds, meet at the old place!" and plunged into the reeds.

The rest of the vagrants, seeing that the situation was not right, immediately threw away their weapons and plunged into the reeds.

Laville also deliberately cut open the packhorse's saddlebags with a knife, in order to force these royal guards to stop and collect the white sugar.

The white sugar frost was poured into the mud, but the blue-armored knight leaped over it, but three vagrant daredevils blocked his way.

"Get out of the way! You lowlifes!" The long sword slashed in an arc, and three heads, blood, and exploding reed catkins flew up at the same time.

Laville crawled towards the reeds on all fours, his silk scarf soaked with sweat, sticking to the sugar frost, and showing a scale-like luster.

Feeling the sound of armor collisions behind him getting closer and closer, Laville suddenly stopped abruptly, and his incomplete left hand plunged into the rotten soil.

The pestilent rotten soil flew towards him, but the knight easily dodged it by tilting his head, and swung his sword again in a horizontal slash.

A circle of reeds flew up, but Laville narrowly dodged by rolling on the ground.

It was a pity that the thorns and gravel on the ground caught Laville's face mask, and when he stood up again in the starlight, he revealed his entire face.

"Laville?!" The knight's neck guard made a muffled sound, "Are you Count Laville of the Virginesburg Knight School, class of 1420? It's me, Cosimo!"

Laville did not speak, only waved his sword blindly.

However, Knight Cosimo flicked and brushed the tip of his sword, and the blade cut through the unarmored arm, and Laville's elbow snapped downwards in response.

Without a weapon, Cosimo directly smashed Laville's chest with the counterweight ball on the hilt of his sword, knocking him to the ground.

"Why?!" Cosimo's sword tip was against the chin of his childhood classmate, "Your grandfather's portrait is still hanging in the Royal Hall of Valor! Watching you every day!"

Laville obviously recognized this junior, and there was no trace of the past youthful spirit and joy of reunion in his eyes, only silent indifference.

"Speak! Laville!"

However, the Earl just sneered: "What does he have to do with me? Does he know my suffering?

He was good, he died, he gained honor and enjoyed happiness, the royal family remembers him, but does the royal family remember me?"

Raising his bird-beak-shaped mask, Cosimo looked at him in disbelief: "You are the founder of the Fraternal Order of Loyalty, didn't we all agree to dedicate our loyalty to the kingdom?"

"Ha! Ha! Ha!" As if hearing a great joke, Laville laughed strangely and crazily, "The kingdom's lords banned grain smuggling, but they are smuggling themselves, and the grains are all rotting in the granary,"

Laville grinned, his mouth bleeding: "My father hanged himself on a maple tree. If I can't raise the inheritance money for the king, then after my death, my family will forever lose its noble status."

"Is this the reason for your treason? Just because of dozens of pounds of inheritance fee?"

"Dozens of pounds? Do you think it's just dozens of pounds of inheritance money?

Wrong, you have to bribe the doorman to go to the heraldry, it costs money to adjust the noble certificate to get palace recognition, even writing a noble family history requires a tip for the heraldry officer." Laville, a nobleman, was about to shed tears at this moment, "Duke Virgil wants a luxurious life, wants a palace, wants a standing army, and also wants to support his musicians, tax collectors... For money, they can do anything!

Everyone has three pounds, and they have to spend five pounds to be decent! To overwhelm other nobles!

I love our Leia, but who loves me?"

"Absurd! You are simply absurd! You, you..." Cosimo's face under the mask turned red.

"Do you think you knights with fiefs are worry-free?" With tears in the corners of his eyes, Laville laughed like a night owl, "You have seen the Franconian Royal Constitution cavalry, are they knights?"

Cosimo was silent for a long time, and the voice under the mask was so disappointed: "Money, money, money, you have never been like this before."

"Don't be ridiculous, don't your banquets in the palace cost money? Doesn't the armor decoration for the martial arts tournament cost money? The price of weapons and horses, the price of magical beast meat, the price of potions... which one doesn't cost money." Although Earl Laville was lying on the ground, the shadow seemed to envelop Cosimo.

Nowadays, many scholars have pointed out that with the import of cheap food and precious metals from the royal court, prices are soaring at an imperceptible rate.

Prices are soaring, the income of the nobles cannot keep up with the prices, and the Franconian royal family has set off a trend of extravagance.

No wonder the nobles in the empire are frantically exploiting the people, with the support of transcendence, they dare to do it so excessively.

These robber knights who hang out with Laville in the suburbs, weren't they all knights like Cosimo?

It's just that they are all bankrupt. If they are lucky, they can join some noble's cavalry regiment and receive a meager salary.

Knights with bad luck or low levels of transcendence either become wandering knight mercenaries or become robber knights to rob houses.

Of course, the two often transform into each other, there is no difference.

The night mist of the Nauan River flowed between them.

Cosimo's sword tip trembled, and for a moment he didn't know how to choose, how to refute.

"Kill me." Lying on the ground, Laville's half of his arm was bleeding black blood in the night, his original madness was gone, and he was as calm as the starry night, "I've had enough, don't let me be humiliated anymore."

A moment later, the knight's long sword fell, with a sharp whistling sound.

As the head was thrown into a special lead box by the attendant, Cosimo picked up Laville's cane.

"Captain, it's packed."

Taking the lead box from the attendant, Cosimo stood stiffly in place for a while: "You guys clean up these things, I'm going to meet His Majesty the King, you give these stolen goods to the guild as a fine."

"Yes."

The knight walked away with confused and melancholy steps, and a young guard confirmed again and again, but immediately squatted down next to the sack of sugar.

Taking advantage of the officer's inattention, he pulled out a sewn-up special cloth bag from the lining of his clothes and frantically scraped the blood-stained white sugar on the ground into the bag.

"Are you crazy?" His companion grabbed his arm, "Aren't you afraid of being seen by the inspectors?"

The young royal guard pushed his companion away with an elbow and lowered his voice: "The royal military pay is said to be issued later, and we are being dangled every month with later.

Half of it is issued on the 10th, and the other half is issued on the 15th or even the 20th, or it's simply gone, they don't even want their faces!

This thing is white sugar, and it can make a 50% profit if sold, plus the original, it's a 150% profit, if you don't take it, I will!"

Filled with the pockets of the lining, the guard took out the blackened and shriveled salary bag and continued to scrape the blood-stained white sugar into it.

Looking at the guard scraping the white sugar in front of him, and thinking about the empty salary bag, the companion thought again and again, but gritted his teeth and threw the salary bag to the guard: "I'll stand guard, help me fill it up too."

"Okay."