When the sun rose again, the morning light shone in the thick fog, and the whole world looked extremely strange.
Tamworth is so peaceful, as if all living things have died.
A ramp made of the flesh and blood of the dead stood beside the city wall. The bodies of the dead were still warm, and the smell of blood was still telling of the battle last night.
A large area of the Russians and Balmoks slept, but a small group of people who claimed to be in good physical condition had woken up and were carefully cleaning the battlefield with their own weapons.
A corpse that was gorgeously dressed and obviously different from ordinary people was removed from the javelin inserted in the body. However, the arrows of the crossbow were stuck in the body of the deceased, and the iron rings of the chain armor were stuck in it. If it is stuck, you must exert great force to pull it out. The corpse was simply tied up with exquisite leather boots, and regardless of the more than ten arrows on the chest, it was dragged to the resting place of the big shots.
Even when the sun rises, the battle continues.
On the city wall, there were sneaky people sticking their heads out, and they were greeted by crossbow snipers. Regardless of whether it was actually hit or not, the person who probed the area disappeared instantly.
This was a bald middle-aged man. He was hiding behind a wall and panting. He grabbed his cloth hat, put it on his head and ran away in despair.
He fled to the church in the city with very bad information, and hurriedly approached the bishop who was preaching in front of thousands of people, and whispered a few words in his ear.
Tamworth, who was already uneasy, suddenly changed his face so much that he was unable to do the next thing.
A very obvious fact is before our eyes. Prince Botwulf was killed in the battle, and few of the armored city defenders survived. The huge royal city was full of prayers. They were frightened and even lost the idea of escape from the city.
The strength of the Viking soldiers was simply not enough to surround the entire city of Tamworth, but the bonfire formation at night created the illusion of terror.
They felt that the enemy had indeed surrounded the entire city. Just as the priest said, they were a group of humanoid monsters from hell, and their purpose of existence was to kill.
The people did not dare to flee. They also burst out with strong fighting power in critical moments, but this momentum disappeared with the death of the prince.
The prince's wife and the queen were responsible for taking charge of the overall situation, but these two women were frightened by the current situation. What is the end of the world? They think this is it.
All the noble people in the city gathered in the church to listen to the bishop's teachings.
"Why is there such a situation? There are many degenerates among you, because your depravity has attracted demons..."
Where are there so many devout people? Of course they believe in the existence of a God. Noble people usually refer to the words of priests, and ordinary people also need to accept the command of nobles. They were not very sure in the first place, and now they have to re-examine - maybe I am really guilty?
More than two thousand people crowded into Tamworth Church, and the outdoors was even more crowded..
The bishop himself suddenly left the scene, leaving two or three young priests to take charge of the situation, which immediately caused a violent and low roar. People were whispering, some even saying that even the clergy had abandoned the Lamb.
In fact, this was not the case. The bishop was shocked and thought of the only way.
The old priest who had obtained conclusive information at the top of the city continued to report what he had seen. The more he told the story, the more dangerous the situation seemed.
"There are corpses everywhere, and the blood stains the grass...the barbarians are still strong. Sadly, today is their siege day. We...if I don't handle it well, we will all die. "When the bishop said these words, his eyes almost burst out.
The old priest also had his own ideas and said: "Pada. In my opinion, we can escape."
"Escape? Where to go? We can't escape. This is God's plan for us. Sanctions."
"But those barbarians are clearly not devils. They are a kind of warriors that we have never come into contact with. Maybe..." A word is coming out: "They are Vikings."
p>"Damn outsiders!" The bishop clenched his fists. He wanted to escape subjectively, but his identity was confirmed by Rome. To escape from the monastery was to betray everything.
Cursing can't change any situation, but if some changes are not made, the people of the entire city will be slaughtered. As for resistance... they have lost their courage and strength.
"Maybe... we should try this method."
"What is it."
The bishop gritted his teeth and decided to risk it: "You, hurry up Gather all the children. Let's organize a delegation and bring the queen and the princess with us to pray for peace."
"Is this a betrayal?"
"No! When Pope Leo I persuaded Attila's barbarian army to retreat, I am naturally not as good as the Pope, but I am confident that I can save the lives of the people." Bishop Tamworth is certainly not lying. Things back then were very complicated, but in the end it was considered a successful peace negotiation. Over the past four hundred years, this story has been continuously processed, and it has actually become a credit that can be inherited by successive popes.
"But people outside the city are demons! I saw corpses and blood everywhere."
"Go!" As the bishop scolded, he looked up at the church. The beam confessed to God: "Lord, forgive me. I have a reason for making peace with those barbarians. I am doing it to save your lamb and bless me to succeed."
However, as soon as I heard the request, Going to make peace with the barbarians, the queen, who was the wife of King Wiglaf, was frightened on the spot. After she woke up, she was wailing and saying that she couldn't go. If he could not commit suicide because of his faith, he would have committed suicide by hanging himself.
On the contrary, the princess decided with tears to stop the barbarians. She entrusted her son to the priests and ordered them to protect her closely. She secretly carried a dagger, just to find the prince's body and kill him. Fight with his murderer, how canShe was afraid that she would be killed and die next to her husband.
If the Crown Princess dresses up a little, even if the kingdom is in decline, the dignity of the royal family cannot be compromised. She dressed herself up like an ancient Roman woman and wore an extremely rare purple handkerchief to show her dignity, even though she had never seen those ferocious barbarians. But the black burqa covered it all up.
The bishops also put on a huge pomp. According to the etiquette standards of festival celebrations in peacetime, they were not only wearing simple and plain robes (unlike the pursuit of the royal family, the priests in this period were very Paying attention to simplicity), holding a large number of black crosses, lined up towards the city wall, towards the terrifying stairs paved with flesh and blood.
The bishop himself held a precious manuscript of the Gospel, and all the priests walked tremblingly, chanting Hallelujah to stay calm.
When they saw a large number of corpses, they were no longer calm, even though they had buried many corpses in the previous battle...
At the same time, it was almost noon. , the Vikings who got up one after another gathered around the pots and urns to wait for the food to be boiled. Some people even couldn't wait for the wheat to be cooked, so they took it out of wooden bowls and ate it with big mouthfuls.
Rurik had woken up and saw Magnut and others pointing at a "general" who died in battle.
"Rurik, my son, come and see this man." Magnut waved happily.
"This man?"
"Yes, you can judge. Well, maybe you should be the one to chop off this man's head." Magnut said the same thing With good intentions, the Balmok family leaders present reached a consensus that Rurik was the greatest hero of this war, even though he still seemed to be a weak young man.
"Cut off the dead man's head? Forget it." Rurik glanced at it a few times and felt more and more something was wrong.
Just looking at this person’s clothes, they were too exquisite compared to other deceased persons. Even though he was wearing chain mail, this man actually wore two! The armor-piercing arrow fired by the steel-armed crossbow will kill him, but it is also difficult to pull out because of this strange chainmail.
Rurik gave the order, and then several strong men used great force to pull out the sword from the deceased.
"Have you seen any clues? I speculate that this man is a general, and it was he who led the troops to resist, causing us great losses." Magnute said with a hint of regret.
"No." Rurik shook his head.
"What do you mean by that?"
"He is not a general. He is nobler than a general."
"He will never be their king. ”
“Of course not. Their king might fight with Eynred’s Northumbrian army again. You and I have seen that the enemy we face is very tenacious. He is not the coward that our army faced in the raid a few days ago."
Magnut and many other families nodded, "Maybe this person is the heir to the throne, so he is fighting so hard.life. ”
“Maybe. "Rurik sighed and stared at his father-in-law: "If a hero dies in battle, even if he is an enemy, how should you treat his body according to your methods? ”
“Are you asking me? "Magnut smiled and pushed his eldest son Biyongni again.
"Of course I saw his head as a wine bowl. "After saying that, Biyongni laughed loudly, and the ax in his hand really chopped down.
Rurik was shocked, but there was no way to remedy it. "Alas! What are you doing? I also want to give this hero a full body burial. ”
“Forget it! "The laughing Biyongni pulled back a gloomy face that looked like he had been constipated for a week, and then slashed wildly at the forehead of the head, revealing a terrifying red and white thing.
Such a close range Observing this, Rurik felt that he had seen enough blood and had a strong psychological quality. This time, a strong feeling of vomiting surged into his throat. If he hadn't held it back with his strong willpower, he would have been in trouble. Embarrassing.
Everything is as Biyongni said, no matter who he is as a general or what his status is, it must be this person's determined resistance that caused the Balmok Army to suffer the most tragic losses since the landing.
Rurik wanted to say something with this noble body, but in this situation, it was meaningless to say anything.
He immediately changed the subject: "You can do whatever you want. I don’t care how to dispose of this man’s body! Our soldiers have basically recovered their strength, and the next step is to attack Tamworth. Tell me, what are you going to do? ”
Magnut shrugged: “What else can we do?” We rushed in, killed them, and took away their wealth. In this battle, everyone will make a fortune! "After saying that, the family leaders laughed.
"This... is really too extreme. "
"Are you pitying them? "
"So, at least he is a respectable enemy. Their men may be wiped out by us, leaving only women and children. "Rurik had already thought of the countermeasures after the city was broken. Since the words were rushed here, he might as well say more: "You may say that I am merciful, at least this time I should be merciful. ”
Magnut was actually a little relieved in his heart. He had long known that his son-in-law Rurik was different from other madmen. Sometimes this boy was really kind, but he was extremely cruel on the battlefield. He couldn’t make up his mind.
“You want to forgive them? Don't think too highly of them, they are obviously not docile pets. Rurik, they will fight to the death to protect their property, for..."
While Magnut was speaking, the crowd gathered not far away was already extremely commotion. More than a dozen soldiers hurried over, shouting Shout: “The Mercians are attacking again! We will fight them to the death! "
Hearing this, Magnute pouted, followed by the buzzing sound of a sword being unsheathed: "You pity them, this is how they repay you. If they wish to die in battle, we will grant their wish. Brothers, let's keep fighting. ”
StayRick also stamped his feet, looked at the lowering of the city wall and whispered: "I wanted to restrain my army and give you a chance to leave peacefully. You Mercians have the guts to fight to the last soldier, so let's fight."
Russians and Balmoks holding shields are gathering, and a large number of crossbowmen are loading and charging arrows.
What was very subtle was that Rurik quickly realized that this seemed to be another confrontation. However, if his subordinates did not take the initiative to attack, the local situation was probably very problematic.
He cautiously approached the front line, only to discover that the intelligence about the Mercian attack was false.
The Mercians did come, and those who came were actually priests and monks.
"Stop!" Rurik shouted at the people around him with his sword. After a while, he called his cousin and ordered him to restrain his brothers and not move.
Indeed, at least thirty priests suddenly appeared, uniformly dressed in solemn black robes, holding high a huge wooden cross, and walked down the "slope of flesh and blood" under the leadership of an old man holding books in his arms.
"Kill them, so as not to cause trouble." Arik, who had just expressed his intention to restrain his brothers, declared this.
"I want to negotiate with them personally."
"It's not necessary, I'm afraid there's fraud."
"So I need your protection. Bring a few brave men to protect me."
Arik smiled, showed his sword, and flicked his neck: "Let's go."
"Don't worry yet. Rurik added: "Let's take the noble body with us. Even if it's missing its head, they should recognize it."
"It's okay to ask him who he is."
p>The priests and the princess, who was in a complicated mood, all stopped. Facing the barbarian army, everyone was naturally filled with fear as they watched them at such a close distance.
Even the bishop was uneasy. He wanted to talk to the barbarians, but for a moment he didn't know where to start, let alone whether they could understand what he said.
The whole scene was strangely stiff!
Finally, something happened in the Viking camp.
The headless noble corpse was carried on a cart. Arik led more than a dozen warriors with clean white cloth coats, put on shiny helmets, and led Rurik forward aggressively.
After a while, the two sides met under the city.
Rurik leaned out from under the protection of the guards, glanced at the wrinkled old man holding books in his arms, and then asked: "I won't ask anything else. You guys first take a look at this man?" Dead, do you recognize it?"
This was said in Latin. In order to ensure that his language was accurate enough, he also called John Invar.
The priests in Mercia couldn't believe what they heard. The bishop asked in Latin casually: "You! Who are you? You! Who are you again?"
Rurik will not return for the time being. The guards let a gap open, where the headless corpse appears.The body was pushed out.
Seeing this step again, the priests were speechless. Only the bishop clutched his head and shouted: "It's the prince! He's dead! His head is gone too!"< /p>
The tragedy of the corpse was clearly seen by the Crown Princess. Even though the head was missing, there were only two women in the world who knew the body of Prince Botwulf best, and one of them was the Crown Princess.
The most unfortunate thing happened before her eyes. She had been prepared and suddenly pulled out the prepared dagger.
After all, there are brave princes who are not afraid of death, and there are strong princesses.
Perhaps, without the Viking Age, without the expansion of the Rus, and Wiglaf would have died from a piece of chicken rib stuck in his throat while eating, the couple would have been able to lead the restoration of Mercia again after the prince succeeded to the throne. Former hegemony.
A woman rushing towards me with a gold-plated dagger?
Arik is still holding two steel swords this time! As an old warrior, he could even see the murderous aura in the air. A woman who lifted up the hood of her black burqa and held a dagger rushed towards him. He did not hesitate to regard her as a respectable female warrior. She dares to fight and is a female warrior! The Vikings' attitude towards enemy female warriors was extremely straightforward, either being killed by her or killing her.
Arik acted extremely decisively, giving the Crown Princess a Viking-style dignity in front of the priests...
New killings were in front of them, and many priests collapsed directly. , the standing cross also fell to the ground.
The bishop was shocked and hurriedly bent down to pick up the gospel book that he had accidentally dropped. He immediately knelt on the ground and humbly prayed in Latin: "Brave foreign warriors, I beg you to spare our lives."
The cousin’s decisiveness and the woman’s assassination forced Rurik to review his father-in-law’s advice. Indeed, this group of people is not worthy of trust.
Even so, killing Rurik will not feel any fun. He can't control how brutal other Vikings are. Only the Russian army must be organized and cannot turn into unorganized bandits anytime and anywhere.
He stood up and patted his chest: "I am the commander of this army, and I am the only one who can speak Latin. Priests of Mercia, tell me now who the dead we have brought are. And this assassinated woman. Isn’t it a blasphemy for you to attempt an assassination?”
Is there anything more bizarre than that a young man is the commander of a barbaric army? At least this young man incredibly understood Latin, and the bishop said: "That headless man is the prince of the kingdom, and he leads the people to resist you. This woman is...the crown princess."
"Unexpectedly Are they a couple? Both husband and wife are very brave."
The bishop asked boldly: "Sir, can you forgive us? The city is full of women and children. They cannot fight with you. Dare to fight. If you need wealth, you can take it as long as it doesn't hurt the remaining people."
Rurik nodded: "It seems. you are a lordteach. I ask you again, where is your king? "
"The king and the army are not here. Before the fierce battle with you, someone has already informed the lords everywhere that perhaps one army after another is already on its way to Tamworth..." In order to survive, the bishop explained many things, including but not limited to reinforcements, the royal family Information about the treasures and the actual number of residents in the city, he hoped that his cooperation would gain the people's peace.
The knife was already placed on his neck. If he angered them, he would be killed. If he died, he would die. , but there are still ten thousand women, children, old and young in the royal city, they must survive! Since the king cannot protect their lives, maybe the king's wealth can.
The bishop actually took it out personally without Raulurik's words. A plan that made him feel comfortable was for the people to evacuate the city and leave peacefully and empty-handed, with the remaining treasures going to the Viking army.
Until this time, Rurik was surprised. The enemy still didn't know that the people he was fighting were Vikings. He solemnly announced his identity, and the bishops and priests didn't look very surprised.
However, the war is not just about the Russians and the Balmoks. The war against Mercia has expanded into a new round of all-out war between the military alliance between Northumbria and the Viking army and the Kingdom of Mercia.
This is when the priests who learned the truth really learned the truth! Expressing surprise, the bishop looked up to the sky and even cursed loudly: "Wiglaf! You are the king of stupidity! You provoked Northumbria, and now their Viking mercenaries are going to kill us all! You don't deserve to be king! "
Mercenary? Rurik heard this word and immediately retorted: "Idiot, we are not mercenaries. Stop cursing and obey my command now. "
The bishop lowered his head and remained silent.
"I will not release people casually, but I will also promise to stop the killing. Of course, all this depends on your cooperation. You go back, bring all the people out, and gather them by the river. I will send troops to guard them. When the Northumbrian army arrived, all these civilians were handed over to the Northumbrian king. You should also think about it. Even if you want to die, I can help you now. If you plan to go to Northumbria in the future, you can survive. ”
Undoubtedly, they all chose the latter. As for letting the people leave the city and be willing to be controlled by the Vikings, the bishop bluntly said that he would think about it.
But Rurik had no intention of fighting with them. If he hesitated any longer, he warned: "My patience is very limited, your assassination makes me angry. Thank you for my kindness. This is the only chance I give you. Let yours come out quickly. Our army will enter the city tomorrow morning. The Mercians who have not left by then will be regarded as soldiers who resisted to the end and will be mercilessly killed. . ”
The bishop hurriedly agreed, and immediately led the young priests to escape back to the city, climbing up the slope of flesh and blood...