Among the kingdoms, only the Gombis, Borui and Lant empires planned to expand the territory of the southern continent. Patriarch Tamor wanted to integrate the power of the southern expansion lords, but he misjudged the situation of the Gombis Kingdom, or rather

, failed to accurately grasp Victor’s true intentions.

The church's top leaders generally believe that it is more important to open up the northern continent than the southern continent. The northern wilderness that the Sasan Empire and Na'viel are planning to recover is a truly fertile land. If you sow a handful of green wheat seeds on the red soil, you will have a full harvest in the coming year.

; The Ghost Forest and Wharton Grassland targeted by the Dodo Kingdom have dragon bone steel, forest resources and herds of cattle and sheep; the Dusk Forest in the north of Suss has mithril, rare herbs and high-quality wood.

It is still unknown what rare resources the Southern Continent has, but there is definitely no red soil that can grow green wheat. The northern wilderness once supported billions of people, and the chosen wizards created a glorious city-state civilization there. In comparison, the Southern Continent has

It can only be regarded as a barren and barren land. Otherwise, why didn't ancient wizards and city-state knights set foot in the land of the southern continent? Fish people and golden water can't stop them.

Moreover, the orc tribe occupies the fertile northern wilderness, and their population size continues to expand, posing the most direct and urgent threat to the human kingdom. The political, economic, and cultural centers of the kingdoms are all in the northern continent. Recovering the homeland of the northern wilderness is not only

It can enhance the strength of the human kingdom and eliminate the huge threat of orcs, which has also been the sentiment of knights, nobles and clergy for thousands of years. From the perspective of human beings as a whole, everyone including Lord Gombis admits that relative to northern expansion,

Strategy, the strategy of southern expansion is just a retreat for the kingdoms and churches.

Under this situation, Tamor's ability to mobilize priests and paladins was very limited. He urgently hoped that the Southern Expansion Kingdom could unite and successfully open up the southern continent. The Borui United Kingdom had suffered losses at the hands of the southern barbarians.

They knew that it was not easy to open up the southern continent, and they were very willing to cooperate closely with the Kingdom of Cambis. The Kingdom of Cambis' overall national strength was far inferior to that of the Sasan Empire, but it had the most powerful political power.

In order to convince the Gumbis Kingdom to accept his own strategic concept of southward expansion, Tamor worked hard. While he encouraged the church to expand the size of the Templars, he also ventured to the south bank of the Great River Bend and captured an orc.

The Barbarian Fighter was given to Gombis. He was telling Gombis that the Gaogen Barbarians, who were as powerful as the Kingdom of Borui, could only occupy a corner of the Southern Continent. How many powerful indigenous alien races were there in the Southern Continent? The national power of Gombis and Borui was very different.

It seems that Gombis's idea of ​​monopolizing the right to develop the southern continent is unrealistic. It would be best for everyone to sit down and discuss the matters related to crossing the river and exploring the south.

Discuss? No matter how we discuss it, building a port at Fish Lake is an unavoidable topic.

In the long run, the geographical environment of Gombis is very bad, and there is no other direction for expansion other than crossing the river to the south. In the future, the center of the human kingdom will definitely be in the rich northern wilderness. Even if Gombis becomes a great southern empire, it cannot change it.

The natural conditions of the land. There are gaps in population, economy, military, and politics between the north and the south. As time goes by, this gap will only become more and more obvious. In the end, the Gombis Empire will not be able to compete with the Northern Empire.

Victor secretly deployed in the Eastern Alliance and sought access to the sea, not only to build a navy, bypass the Needham Swamp, march to the eastern coast of the northern wilderness, and compete with the lords of Sasan and Naville for the fertile red land. If Victor had a large colony in the northern wilderness and controlled sea power and shipping rights on the Jinshui River. He did not dare to say that the Gombis Empire would definitely be able to overwhelm the Northern Empire, at least the balance of power between the north and the south would not be unbalanced.

Fish Lake is an important node in this strategy, and Victor is bound to win it.

The August family didn't know Victor's ambitions, but they could see the significance of Lake Fes to the Cambis Empire. The Jinshui River was an insurmountable natural danger. Controlling Fes Lake, Cambis could not only relieve the northern The potential military threat posed by the lords to the Southern Empire can also significantly increase the political influence of the Southern Empire. All supplies and personnel exchanges between the southern continent and the northern continent are controlled by the southern lords. In case of a huge disaster in the north, the northern expansion will The lord would have to ask the lord Nantuo for support or accommodation. In other words, in order to leave a way out for the family, the northern lord and the southern lord must exchange children, so as to avoid the embarrassing situation of knights from the southern empire flocking to the northern empire. .

This is the strategic value of the Jinshui River moat. The most critical thing now is Fes Lake. Whoever can control the waters of Fes Lake can take the initiative in the strategy of crossing the river to the south. The western mouth of Fes Lake is located in Gombis. Within the territory, its conditions for building a port are clearly superior to those of Chebman Territory and Randall Territory. The Kingdom of Cambis gave up the plan to build a port at the mouth of the lake because it was worried that the Lant Empire would take the opportunity to build a port on the shores of Lake Fes.

There must be a port on the shore of Lake Fes within the territory of the Lant Empire. The Borean army is stationed on the front line of the Dusk Forest in Sousse; the Knights of Radiance are colluding with Neo West; and the Kingdom of Na'viel is working around it all for this purpose. In this matter, they are adopting a soft strategy now because they are worried about angering the Divine Knights. If they directly send troops to help the Lant Empire clean up the fishmen and build a port regardless, the Kingdom of Cambis will definitely launch a war of revenge against Neowest. But if Gumbis refuses to let go, the pressure he will endure will increase until he succumbs.

The United Kingdom of Borui and Gombis both belong to the Southern Expansion Lord camp, and the overall interests of both parties are consistent. However, in the short term, the water power of Gombis is far inferior to that of the Kingdom of Borui, both in terms of shipbuilding technology and experienced crews. A big chunk. Gombis needs time to develop the power to block the waters of Lake Fes.

The problem now is that if Gombis does not respond to the goodwill of the Borui and Patriarch Tamor, he may bear the military risks of southward expansion alone in the future. At least, the resentful Borui people will definitely try to drag Gombis down. leg.

After gaining control of the waters of Fish Lake, they suffered a military defeat in the southern expansion. In the end, they had to plead with the United Kingdom of Borui to send troops and make major concessions. So what was the point of occupying Fish Lake in such a hurry?

After seeing the captives of barbarians sent by Patriarch Tamor and the four guardians of Gombis, except for Victor, Sylvia, Roland and Goron were unsure and doubted whether Gombis was capable. Independently support the southern expansion strategy.

Against all odds, Victor proposed the strategy of opening up the Fish Lake and the Blood River Basin and the leap-frog strategy, trying his best to appease the regent and the three guardians, and strengthen their determination to resist external forces from building a port on the north shore of Lake Fish in advance. .

Although His Royal Highness Randall has extraordinary wisdom and has repeatedly performed miracles, and Sylvia and Marquis Goron also admitted that the strategic and tactical ideas he proposed are very sophisticated, the crossing of the Gombis river is of great importance, and they cannot just say anything by Victor.

What to believe.

Marquis Gron praised Victor for having no military command experience, but for having a genius leap-frog tactical idea. On the other hand, he was implicitly raising his doubts.

Can the modified warship travel retrograde on the blood river? Can the psychic warriors who fight against the first-level barbarian warriors be popularized? You have to come up with something real before we will accept your strategies and tactics.

Victor has full confidence in the secret method of Origin Blood, but he is not sure about transforming the battleship. But this does not matter, he just wants to delay time.

In short, the lakeside port must wait until Gombis's fleet sails across Lake Fez, and then the Golden Group will build and lease it!

In the evening breeze, Victor and others walked to the pier of Port Carril. Under the dim moonlight, a huge warship rowed across the quiet and deep lake and slowly sailed towards the pier.

It is semi-elliptical in shape overall, with a length of 35 meters and a width of 12 meters. It is as high as three stories from the water to the side of the ship. Four masts stand tall. The huge sail catches the evening wind and pushes the hull to break through the waves, as if

The appearance of the legendary beast in Basai Lake is inexplicably shocking. Standing on the bowsprit is a slender and graceful figure. She wears a spinnaker hat and only wears a white fine linen shirt, tight breeches and high-top leather uppers.

The boots outline a slender waist and a pair of straight beautiful legs of amazing length. A thin thorn sword hangs from the waist. She is heroic and high-spirited. She is Princess Roland.

Sylvia's stunningly beautiful face revealed a look of envy, and she exclaimed: "It's the first time I've seen such a big battleship, it's really spectacular." She turned around and saw Victor's calm face, her eyes moved, and she asked curiously

: "What? Don't you think it's very impressive?"

The maximum capacity is 1,200 tons, which is far behind compared to the 10,000-ton giant ship. It is not as pleasing to the eye as the Roland... Victor cursed and nodded calmly, "Baby, in the future I will build a ship just for you.

The ship is more spectacular and imposing than the Golden Fleece... Well, let’s call it the Dragon Slayer.”

Sylvia felt sweet in her heart and held her lover's arm. Dragon Slayer was one of her titles, and Victor's ship named after it would never disgrace the Dragon Slayer's reputation.

Before the ship docked at the dock, Roland jumped off the bow of the ship, holding a monocular telescope in his hand, pacing triumphantly back and forth in front of everyone, looking at everyone one by one with his deep eyes as beautiful as the blue lake.

Like a captain who is good at picking out sailors at the dock.

"I am Captain Roland August of the Golden Fleece. If you want to board my Golden Fleece, you must obey the captain's orders..." She pointed to the tip of her nose and said reservedly and majesticly.

Sylvia glanced at her, held up her skirt, jumped up, and landed on the deck of the Golden Fleece. Her movements were light and smooth, and her posture was elegant and elegant.

Victor picked up Trisly's leg sockets and held the female knight of the Furious Waves, who could not move her fighting spirit, in his arms like a princess. The breeze surrounded their bodies, they took a step forward and jumped onto the nearly 9-meter-high platform.

Golden Fleece.

Even if she doesn't use fighting spirit, she still has the strength of an ordinary knight. Even if she can't jump onto the side of the ship, she can still avoid Victor's princess hug. Whether she can hide or not is a show of affection in public. The shy Trisly's pretty face turned red, and in Ge

Before Marquis Long and the Prince Regent jumped up, they broke away from Victor's embrace, turned around, and ducked into the cabin.

Roland stamped his feet on the trestle, pouted, and was the last one to jump on the boat. When he saw the sailors bowing their heads to Sylvia, each of them assuming a respectful posture of obeying orders, he suddenly couldn't care less about being angry.

He hurriedly emphasized: "I am the captain of the Golden Fleece, you can't give orders to my crew."

Sylvia smiled, and the aura of the aloof queen turned into a spring breeze. She held Victor's arm and said softly: "Captain Roland, I need a decent cabin. By the way, I want to hire your mate."

I took my husband to visit the Golden Sheep with the designer.”

Roland turned his anger into joy, took off his captain's hat, and curtsied gracefully, "I am happy to serve you, noble lady...Marlena, take this beautiful lady to VIP Room No. 1, which is the most luxurious one on the Golden Fleece."

Good room... Baron Highgate, Mate Hansen, take a few gentlemen to visit my golden fleece, remember, except the captain's cabin."

The ship designer and the first officer of the Golden Fleece came over. Victor and Marquis Goron were about to follow them into the bottom cabin, but Roland blocked the way.

Looking at the captain's hat dangling in front of him, Victor looked up blankly and asked, "What are you doing?"

Roland glanced sideways at Victor and Marquis Golon, and said with disdain: "Pay! According to the rules of the ship, guests who board the ship must pay a deposit first. When you get off the ship, you will pay for your accommodation and meals.

Fee, drink fee.”

"Roland!" Marquis Gron's face sank and he said with suppressed anger.

"Old man, stop talking and pay me first!" Roland shouted without fear. Her next sentence revealed her true intention: "If you don't have money, you have to work for me on the Golden Fleece to pay off the bill.

It’s a rule!”

Victor touched his empty trouser pocket and said helplessly: "I don't have any money. Captain, can you pay me first?"

“You don’t get credit when you board the ship, and you don’t pay when you leave the ship.”

Victor silently picked out a crystal clear blue diamond from his belt and put it into his hat. Looking at the beaming Captain Roland, he couldn't help but remind him, "It's worth 750 gold soles..." and added

Say, "This is the deposit, remember to ask me for the money."

The eldest princess, who was entranced by the drama, patted Victor on the shoulder and said with sympathetic eyes: "Sir, you don't have to pay the bill when you leave the ship." Then she said very generously: "This gem will be considered as the ship fare for the five of you.

.”

Marquis Gron snorted coldly and raised his feet. Just as he was about to enter the cabin, he heard Williams and Roland arguing:

"Don't count me in... I work on the Golden Fleece to get paid."

Victor and Gron looked at each other speechlessly, and followed the mate of the Golden Sheep into the hatch.

"Sailors, there is no need to dock. Put down the cable and let the guests' entourage climb up by themselves. Each person charges... Roland, how much deposit does each person charge for the boat fare?"

"5 gold soles for each gentleman, 15 gold soles for each lady... Hey, Uncle Williams, I am the captain of the Golden Fleece!"

"Yes, you are the captain, and I am working for you to pay the bills."

"Bosun Bob, give this newbie a bucket and a rag and teach him how to polish my deck!"

"Uh... Roland, I think the job of wiping the deck is not worth the wages of 150 gold soles. I can act as captain. You have been sailing for a whole day, you should find a first-class cabin and have a good sleep.

, leave the night sailing matter to me... Bosun Bob, lift the anchor, raise the sail, adjust the course, we go to the town of Longbridge on the Siblinore River, and Captain Williams will be at the helm... By the way, the helm is at the helm.

where?"

"...Uncle, I'm not tired at all. Okay, I'll waive your deposit for the boat fare. You are now a guest of the Golden Sheep...Hey, don't touch my rudder, you frivolous newcomer!"

The footsteps on the deck were clearly transmitted to the lower cabin. Marquis Gron shook his head and said slightly embarrassed: "Victor, don't worry about those two guys, let's do our thing."

Victor nodded silently, suddenly turned around, and asked Hansen, the mate of the Golden Fleece:
Chapter completed!