In the northern part of the Anzu Kingdom, frost and snow have covered the ground.
This mountainous land is the coldest place in the Kingdom of Ansu. The fierce northerners take root here in the high mountains and cold winds, guarding the northern gate of the kingdom, and for seven hundred years Over the years it has struggled to maintain a delicate balance with its difficult neighbors further north.
Whether it is the Violet Kingdom in the northwest or the Holy Dragon Principality in the northeast, they are never easy to deal with.
But in this unsettling winter, new shadows emerge from the frost and snow, and in the eyes of Duchess Victoria Wilder, these new threats are even more elusive than those. China's northern neighbor is even more worrying - because the threat comes from within the country.
Victoria Wilder, the "Snow Duke", stood on the high terrace of Winter Castle, looking down at the city below. The snow that started falling before winter only stopped last night, all over the town. They are all silvery white, and the typical spire buildings in the north can effectively reduce the snow cover. The black spires pierce the winter silver, standing on the plain below the castle like black pines standing in the snowfield. Above, at a glance, there are many forests.
In most parts of the kingdom, the arrival of winter means production stops and people hide in their houses and shiver. However, in the coldest north, the situation is different. People here have already They have adapted to the cold, and in order to survive, they have to adapt to the long winter that takes up half of the year. Even in these days when the heavy snow stops, you can still see countless floating people in the city - they must survive in the next round. Before the snowfall destroys the city buildings, clear the snow as much as possible, open roads, and drag the bodies of homeless people who have frozen to death in the gutters outside the city. In the central square facing the castle, The largest crowd gathered——
The snow on the square had been cleared, and the people gathered there to watch the cultists being burned to death.
The figures in black robes were tied to tall wooden stakes one by one. Heavy black steel chains and inscribed shackles restrained their bodies and magic power at the same time, but because of their The twisted and horrifying face of the sorcerer still makes people shudder.
The crowd of onlookers has gathered in several layers in the square. The soldiers separated these crowds from the cultists. The bright swords prevented the over-excited citizens from getting closer to the dangerous blasphemers. During this process, firewood was piled up, and heated and melted animal fat was poured onto the pile of demolished hay.
“Burn them to death!” Someone among the onlookers finally couldn’t hold back and shouted loudly.
This roar echoed a hundred responses: "Burn them to death!" "They killed my children!" "Burn these cultists to death!"
A high-ranking priest of the Holy Light Church Walking towards the burning platform, he took the holy symbol from the hands of the believers next to him, turned around and looked at the excited people.
“The God of Light exposed these cultistsconspiracy, before more people are harmed, the Lord guides us to destroy the nest of these heretics! "
The high-ranking priest raised the Holy Emblem high. He turned around, used the Holy Emblem to inspire a powerful light, ignited the flammable grease and firewood, and shouted: " Praise the Holy Light! Praise my Lord! ! ”
Under the influence of holy light and grease, the burning platform was instantly enveloped in golden-white raging flames. The cultists tied to the pillars were twisting in the flames like wax, emitting various kinds of sounds. Indescribable howls and a sound like a roaring mountain and a tsunami sounded in the square: "Praise the Holy Light! "Praise the God of Holy Light!" "
The raging flames shot straight into the sky, and the howls of the cultists did not stop in the flames for a long time. Even after the flames burned their bodies, their roars continued to come from the flames. The people around them finally realized that something was wrong. They looked at the abnormal flames in horror and listened to the abnormal roar. The roar finally turned into words that humans could understand. The remaining spiritual power of more than a dozen cultists. It stirred in the air and made a terrible roar: "Laugh as much as you like! Cry all you want! Everyone will die! You will die like livestock, you will die like worms! ! When they come back, they will eat your flesh and drain your blood! ! ”
The flames suddenly turned black at this moment. The flames of more than a dozen fires merged together in the air, and a huge and indescribable dark purple mass rose from the flames, as if It was expanding violently as if it were going to swallow up everyone present. Even the priest who had just shouted praises to the Holy Light in front of the burning platform fell into shock at this moment. But at the moment when this terrifying vision came, a fierce A white beam of light suddenly shot from the terrace of Winter Castle to the square.
Under the impact of "Winter's Whip", the indescribable dark purple mass froze instantly, and then due to lack of follow-up. The support of energy suddenly shattered, and large swaths of ice crystal dust fell from the sky, covering most of the square again as if another blizzard had fallen. Both the excited crowd a moment ago and the holy light priests who chanted slogans were completely quiet. And above the silent square, the cold voice of Duchess Victoria Wilder came: "Clean up - and then praise Ansu and your founding king. "
The powerful magical power gradually dissipated on the terrace. Victoria waved her hand to let the magic book floating in the air return to her side, then turned and left the terrace.
Inlay The artificial crystal terrace door closed automatically behind her, cutting off the sounds from the square. The duchess returned to the warm lounge, with a rare look of exhaustion on her face.
Black. The hair-haired maid came forward, waved her hand to ward off the other attendants, and then put her hand near Victoria's temple and pressed it gently: "You rarely show such an expression - the last time I saw Gawain Sethi After Duke Er comes back. ”
“This time it is still related to him. If it weren’t for the police sent by the founding hero from the extreme south,"We have to wait until those cultists cause more damage before we realize that they have eroded to this extent," Victoria sighed, "This is already the fourth cult nest that has been destroyed since the beginning of winter - —The previous three were the Death Society of All Things, and this time it was the Eternal Sleeper. I wouldn’t be surprised if the Sons of Storm counterattack from the sea and make a comeback next time. "
"It is said that there are actually very few cultists in the South. They only appeared twice in total, but each time they were noticed and eliminated by the Duke..."
Victoria waved her hand gently, and the black-haired maid Maggie immediately stopped what she was doing.
"We have been comfortable for too long, and the entire kingdom has been comfortable for too long," Victoria stood up from the bench. She quietly stared at the portraits of the founding heroes hanging on the wall in front of her. The portrait of Gawain Cecil had been taken down, but she still stared at the blank space next to the founding king Charles, "From the King to the The local nobles are seriously lacking vigilance, but Grand Duke Cecil came from the most turbulent era of the kingdom seven hundred years ago. He is more vigilant than all of us. What is ridiculous is that the incompetent people in the royal capital are here. They began to regard the warning about cultists sent by the founding Duke as neurosis, as the fuss of the ancients in modern society... Well, now they are panicking. "
The black-haired maid stood quietly behind Victoria without making any comment. The duchess seemed accustomed to this. She paused and ordered: "The matter you are investigating has been revealed. What? "
The black-haired maid lowered her head: "Yes. The priests of the Holy Light Church have indeed been active more frequently in recent times, and new missionary teams have appeared in various places, but all their activities are reasonable - they are fighting against cultists, searching for and destroying cultists' lairs , missionaries are also promoting methods to identify cultists and protect themselves from sorcery curses in various places. The power of the Holy Light does have a unique advantage in this regard. In addition, they have no unnecessary activities, no conflict with other sects or robbing of faith resources, and no friction with local lords. "
Victoria frowned: "Is that so..."
The black-haired maid asked curiously: "Vicky, do you suspect there is something wrong with those Holy Light priests? What? "
"No... I'm just a little concerned about their recent movements. They suddenly became active," Victoria shook her head. "But it must be my misunderstanding. After all, the cultists are suddenly causing chaos everywhere. The only ones that can eliminate those cultists head-on are the Church of God of War and the Church of Holy Light. Among them, Holy Light magic is the most effective against evil spirits," Victoria said calmly, "We have no reason to interfere with their legal activities. ——Just continue to pay more attention. If they have any evil thoughts, they will always show their flaws. "
"Yes. "
...
After winter, the circulation of news became difficult and slow with the decrease of traveling merchants.
In this era where cutting-edge technologies are rare and not popular, and ordinary society still maintains a primitive and backward situation, the transmission of information is an embarrassing and inefficient matter. Although there are magic and props such as communication and mithril rings, because there are extremely few people who master these communication technologies and there is no effective way to share information with each other, these technologies cannot allow people to fully understand distant places in a timely manner. What happened, for most commoners and even nobles, was that the main means of dissemination of information were still traveling caravans, and commissioners delivering letters.
As for the New Cecil Territory, which is remote and not very attractive to business travelers, the slow transmission of information is even more of a problem.
In the territory, Gawain established a simple messenger team. In addition, the main population settlements of Lord Cecil are currently towns, logging camps villages in the west, and mining villages in the east (already developing rapidly). It has become a small town), so internal information transmission is not a problem, but if you want to contact the outside world, with the current manpower and material resources of the territory, it is impossible to set up your own channel, and you can only rely on extremely limited, from Vendors from Tanzanian town came to sell grain, cloth or slaves, as well as expatriates specially sent to Kande Territory and Leslie Territory to collect intelligence.
So by the time Gawain learned that signs of cultist activities had been found throughout the kingdom, it was already a month after he issued a warning to the royal capital.
This is the result of relying on the information channel of Viscount Andrew Leslie - without the fast griffon messenger, it would take more than a month to travel from the royal capital to the southern border with just one foot. .
Looking at the information in front of him, Gawain frowned tightly.
Amber didn’t know what was written in the letter that was sent from Tanzanian town early in the morning. She was carving a piece of wood with a dagger boredly beside her. She looked up and saw Gawain’s expression. , and asked casually: "What's wrong? The price of rice has gone up?"
"No, it's a cultist."
Amber immediately jumped up from the chair: " Want to fight the cultists again?! Hey, I have a stomachache now.”
“It’s not here,” Gawain glanced at Amber, “Except for the southern territory, evil spirits are appearing everywhere in the kingdom. Cultist."
Hubo felt relieved after hearing this, lowered his head and sat back to carve his own wood: "Oh, just don't bother us."
Gawain looked helplessly. Despite the shame of this elf, he couldn't feel as relaxed as the other party.
The situation was exactly as he had expected - the cultists had infiltrated into every aspect of the kingdom. Traces of their activities were not only found in the border lords' territories, but even near the royal capital and on the Holy Spirit Plains. Signs that they're up to something.
A large number of cultist nests have been discovered and uprooted, but in many cases, only a few traces have been found, and then the clues are lost.
Either by the time it is discovered, it is too late. The cultists have already completed their evil sacrifices.What Noble Fang discovered was just the bloody scene after the ceremony.
In addition to this disturbing information, another thing also made Gawain feel urgent and... awkward.
All the information is seriously out of date. The news from the royal capital was a month ago, and the situation in the north has not yet been obtained.
He needs to establish his own information channels, which must be in his own hands, and must be more efficient and more reasonable than various contemporary information channels.
The spell model of communication has not yet been analyzed, and attempts at electromagnetic wave communication have also failed. Technically, it will not be possible to realize the "modern communication network" envisioned by Gawain for a while, but Even if there is no cheap instant messaging method, he can still create a framework first.
The potions in the alchemy factory gave him an idea.