Chapter 651 西境急报
「我尊贵的伯爵大人，您一路辛苦了。拉瓦提人欢迎您的到来——」
「马里奥大人，您太客气了～」
骑马率拉瓦提商业行会几个重要人物以及十个侍卫前来迎接亚特的商业行会首脑马里奥下马后快步朝亚特走去，曲身微微鞠了一躬。 The entourage also dismounted and walked towards Art.
"My Lord Count, I have arranged a place for you to stay in the city. Tonight, the main figures from the Lavati Business Guild and the Citizens' Autonomous Conference will attend the dinner specially prepared for you. Tomorrow, representatives from the autonomous cities of Lombardy will gather in Lavati to discuss the severe situation currently faced by various places."
“Mr. Mario, you’re done.” Art sat on the saddle and nodded in greeting. "It's getting late, let's go into the city."
"Okay, Lord Count, let's set off now." Mario quickly stepped aside to make a way to the side of the road, shouting to the people behind him: "Everyone, get out of the way, Lord Count, please enter the city!"
Mario then climbed onto the horse with the help of the guards, and followed Art and his group to slowly walk towards Lavati. This was Art's third visit to Lavati. The first time was when I went south to the valley to explore the ruins of the ancient trade route. I walked all the way to Lavati, and by the way, I sneaked into Soronborg and killed the butler who betrayed the family with a knife, and avenged my deep hatred. The second time, he led the Welsh Army to surround Lavati, and finally entered Lavati as a winner. But this time, Art came to Lavati as a guest but not a guest. There are two reasons for saying this.
First, Art did not send troops to Lavati after defeating the Lombard army, but allowed the Lavati citizen autonomous army to maintain its original armed forces and be responsible for the city defense of Lavati. However, Lavati is a city that the Welsh Army has actually occupied. From this point of view, Yat is the actual ruler of Lavati.
Secondly, this time Yate went south, in addition to being invited to participate in the urban autonomy meeting to solve the current dilemma faced by Lavati. Another purpose is to strengthen Lavati's city defense and patrol the Guards Corps to prepare for the later attack on Sauron Castle.
Although Lavati has become part of the area occupied by the Welsh Army, Art did not take strong measures against Lavati as an occupier, burning, killing, and looting. Instead, it maintained Lavati's original autonomous city status, hoping to use Lavati's special status to win over other autonomous cities in Lombardy and disintegrate the rule of the Lombard court from within. In addition, this can also open up markets and sources of goods for the development of European commercial banks.
With the strong combat power of the Welsh Army to rely on, Lavati was able to openly oppose the rule of the Duke of Lombardy. This was like a heavy punch hitting the Duke of Lombardy, causing him to face a greater dilemma again·
The tower of the Lombard Palace was kicked off. Witote, Duke of Lombardy, who had been standing there for a long time, looked expressionless and stared into the distance quietly. The slanting sunset took away the light left in the eyes of the Duke of Lombardy at the last moment, leaving only the outline of the distant hills.
Since escaping back to the palace of Milan, he has never left the house again. Maybe it was the defeat on the battlefield that left him frightened, or maybe it was the rising rebellions in the city that made him uneasy.
In recent days, the Duke of Lombardy has handed over all military information documents to the Prime Minister of the Palace for review and processing. This is not because he turns a blind eye to the current war and rebellions and famines in various places, but because he is powerless.
Since he succeeded to the throne, he has never suffered such a failure. What is particularly intolerable is that as the overlord of the Southern Continent, he was defeated by an unknown frontier earl and almost lost his life.
What made him even more troubled was that his opponent used a murderous weapon that he had never heard of or seen on the battlefield. Hundreds of cavalry under his command were instantly beaten and fled, causing heavy casualties.
· Every time he recalled the blown-off limbs and broken arms and the torn brains, the Duke of Lombardy felt his stomach churn. Even after falling asleep several times, I was startled into a cold sweat by those bloody scenes and couldn't fall asleep for a long time.
Looking at the outline of the distant mountains being completely swallowed up by the night, the Duke of Lombardy sighed heavily. Standing for a long time made his legs and feet slightly numb, and the coolness brought by the evening breeze made him shiver. Then he wrapped the cotton robe tightly around his shoulders, turned around slowly,
walked towards the study with strenuous steps ".Your Majesty the Duke! Your Majesty the Duke~"
As soon as Duke Witott walked into the brick-paved passage leading to the city tower, the hurried voice of the palace prime minister appeared on the other side of the passage accompanied by the heavy footsteps of everyone.
Logically speaking, if it were not for a major military situation, the palace prime minister would not be in such a hurry to see the Duke of Lombardy.
Sure enough, when the Duke of Lombardy first appeared in the sight of the Palace Prime Minister, the already panting Prime Minister strode towards the Duke of Lombard·
"Duke is great~!"
Dang!
With a bang, the Prime Minister of the Palace fell to the ground with his legs crossed. "Why are you panicking!" The Duke of Lombardy yelled, which frightened the Prime Minister of the Palace to get up from the ground and limped towards the Duke of Lombardy.
"I'm telling you, Your Majesty the Duke, urgent report from the Western Front!"
On the fourth day after the Duke of Lombardy fled back to Milan, Provence, on the western border of Lombardy, rested for two days. They once again gathered their forces and rushed towards the western defense line of Lombardy. After a day and night of non-stop attacks, they captured the most important military fortress on the western border of Lombardy, Fort Axis, in the early morning of yesterday.
Axe Castle, as the first military fortress on the western border of Lombardy, is the strongest military fortress in the western border of Lombardy, with the largest number of defenders and the most abundant material reserves. Once Fort Axis is defeated, the western border of Lombardy will no longer be able to defend.
It was thought that the solid city defense of Fort Axis could be used to weaken the offensive edge of the Provence army, and then wait for an opportunity to drive the Provence border troops out of the country and stabilize the western front. Then he turned around and formed a pincer attack with the defenders of Sauronburg, annihilating the Guards Corps of the Count of Burgundy and the Legion of Wales in one fell swoop, ending the war to defend the country. But the military minister of the Lombardy Palace who was in charge of the war on the Western Front would never have imagined that the rock-solid Fort Axis would be captured by Provence in a few days.
Perhaps it was the war launched by the Principality of Lombardy a few years ago that almost wiped the Principality of Provence off the map. This time, Provence almost mobilized the whole country, vowing to wash away the shame and completely defeat the southern lion of Lombardy.
Driven by land, wealth and honor, a large number of young men in Provence joined this "battle of revenge", delivering a steady stream of troops to the frontline battlefield.
On the other hand, on the side of the Principality of Lombardy, the northern battlefield retreated again and again. The mercenaries hired with a lot of money were defeated in just a few days.
Nowadays, the Lombards are full of complaints and are asking the Lombard court to make peace with the Burgundians and Provence to end the war. At the same time, more and more ordinary people in Lombardy refused to be recruited by the palace, and even tried to overthrow the local lords, looted granaries, and gathered to cause trouble. For a time, rebellions continued in Lombardy and people were distraught.
The lack of soldiers made it difficult for the Western Front army to withstand the fierce offensive of Provence and retreated steadily.
Perhaps inspired by the Lombards' attack on Provence, Count Balian of the Provence border, who was responsible for attacking Axis Castle, ordered people to shoot a large number of surrender letters into Axis Fort, and incited the people inside to cause trouble with huge profits. Coupled with the nails planted in the city in advance, Fort Axis was finally breached in a way that the Lombards could not predict.
After a fierce battle throughout the day, both warring parties suffered heavy casualties. As night fell, Provence pretended to be defeated, throwing down hundreds of sets of weapons and armor along the way.
Seeing the defeat of the Provence frontier army, the Lombard Palace Military Minister decisively seized the "fighting opportunity" and sent a cavalry of more than 300 people to follow the Provence people when it was dark, trying to raid the Provence garrison camp under the cover of darkness.
However, all this was already expected by Earl Balian. When the "surprise" Lombard cavalry entered the Provence garrison camp, more than a thousand Provence soldiers who had been hiding around the camp and the two hundred heavy armored infantry in the camp cooperated with each other to kill all the old Lombards who had fallen into the trap.
After the incident, the Provençal soldiers immediately took off the Lombard armor and put it on, got on their horses, and ran towards Fort Axis under the leadership of several officers who could speak Lombard. Following closely behind were thousands of border troops commanded by Balian.
When the Lombard officer stationed at Fort Axis at night saw the cavalry returning from the city, he opened the city gate without hesitation.
As a result, the cavalry who had just entered the city gate took advantage of the unpreparedness of the defenders and killed them all.
With a lit torch appearing at the gate of the city, thousands of Provençal troops who had been hiding in the surroundings rushed in. In just a few hours, they defeated the garrison of Fort Auxiliary, killed more than 800 Lombard soldiers, captured more than 600 people, and the remaining less than 1,000 people retreated eastward. The palace military minister was shot in the left arm by a crossbow while escaping from the city. He fled out of the city in a hurry under the escort of his guards. In addition, in the battle of Aksiburg, the Lombard army was beheaded and one of the leading counts was killed and two people were captured. Nine of the leading viscounts were captured and three died. The total number of dead and wounded barons and knights exceeded fifty.
After this battle, the western border of Lombardy was no longer in danger and the door was open—
The Duke of Lombardy took the military information pamphlet handed over by the Prime Minister of the Palace, glared at him angrily, and then slowly opened it. The Duke of Lombardy's hands were shaking involuntarily, and his eyes moved up and down along with the words. Immediately afterwards, his breathing became more and more rapid, and his clenched teeth made a rattling sound.
Poof·—·
Suddenly, a large mouthful of blood spurted out from the Duke of Lombardy's mouth~
"Your Majesty, Your Majesty the Duke!"