Age of Empires From Scratch

  Chapter 27 Prepare for the return trip

Maloney-Mansfield’s residence for David and Laura is located in the outer part of the inner city, which is not a good location. You can see the tall inner city wall when you open the window, except for the place on the window sill A few pots of green plants, only the green grass and flowers downstairs can be admired.

  The furniture and quilts inside are not made of high-quality materials, but they are clean and tidy, making people feel very comfortable, and they don’t emit any strange smells. This made Laura, who had walked all the way from the outer city, breathe a sigh of relief.

   "The environment here is not bad."

After Maloney's attendant Huey brought the two of them here, after introducing the basic situation and arranging adjacent rooms for the two, he left—it was a farewell, but Huey actually lived on the first floor, David Laura and Laura can always find him if they need anything.

   "It's like two different worlds from the outer city."

   "Actually, they are two completely different worlds." David glanced at the tall city wall. This huge city wall is not only the strongest defense line of Iron Tree Fort, but also a barrier between the two worlds. If ordinary people do not choose to join the pioneering team, they may never have the opportunity to enter the inner city for a lifetime.

  But what David was thinking about was not how to change the world. What he thought was very realistic: should we build a wall for the village of Winter?

  After thinking about it, it seems that it is not needed for the time being. With just a few houses, fields, and people in Lindong Village, everyone can find out and deal with it immediately if there is any situation. There is no need for things like city walls.

  Wait until the village grows and the population increases, and more ordinary people who need protection live in the village, the wall will be used as a defense facility.

   "What are you going to do in the next few days?" Laura walked around the room twice, went to her own room to look around, and then sent back to David's room: "Aren't you just waiting for the Inspector here?"

"I'm going to say hello to Addis and tell him about our arrangements. By the way, let him ask if anyone is willing to move to Cold Winter Village." David himself has to go to the outer city to make an announcement , I want to see if I can attract some farmers and blacksmiths.

   "I'll go with you!"

  Listening to David's arrangement, Laura didn't want to wait here, it would be too boring.

Going downstairs to call Huey, David first asked about the announcement, and found out that it was very simple to issue a "one" announcement, but if you want to issue an announcement that can notify the entire outer city, you need Just spend some money.

In this era when communication basically relies on shouting, and the civilians in the outer city cannot be expected to have enough culture, the only reliable way to make the announcement known to the entire outer city is to hire people and spread them all over the city' Speak 'to people.

  If you want to hire people, you will naturally have to spend money! But the crux of the problem is that David has no money.

  After Huey knew that David had no money, he didn't sneer or show any disdainful expressions. To be able to become the most trusted servant of officials, he still has the basic professionalism.

"If you don't want to spend money..." Just another way of saying it made David feel much more comfortable: "Then you can only post announcements on the squares in the outer city, where you can spread the news as much as possible, and this announcement can also Please ask the people in the town affairs hall to help with writing."

  The solution given by Huey is the most reliable solution at present, but there is still a need for someone to stand by the announcement to answer some possible questions.

David nodded, and Huey stopped talking after he said the solution. Someone must be guarding the announcement. One is that there are not many literate civilians, and it can even be said to be very few; Establishing a new village, recruiting farmers and craftsmen, it is impossible to write down all the details, and someone needs to answer in time.

  If David has money, of course he can hire someone to stand by the announcement to do this. If he has no money, he can only go into battle himself.

   "By the way, generally speaking, the Inspector needs a few days to do various preparations?"

   "I'm not very clear about this." There are some things that Huey can answer, but there are some things that he can't give accurate answers to, especially things related to his own master.

  David estimated in his heart that if Inspector Maloney-Mansfield is a relatively hardworking official, then two, three or five days should be enough. I'm afraid that this lord has serious "procrastination". Anyway, for this lord, what's going on in the village to the north has nothing to do with him, so what if we wait a few more days before setting off?

  In that case, there is no telling how long it will take.

Fortunately, the situation that made David extremely entangled and depressed did not happen. I met Addis, greeted him, and asked him to help find some farmers and craftsmen who were not satisfied with their lives in Iron Tree Fort and wanted to change their lives; and then went to Iron Tree The Fort Affairs Hall wrote an announcement and posted it on the square in the outer city, where it was watched by a group of people for a long time.

  After returning to the residence that Maloney arranged for him, just after dinner, someone came to find Huey, and then Huey notified David: "Lord Mansfield has confirmed the departure date, and we will leave after breakfast in four days."

  It was about the same as the fastest time estimated by David. It seems that this Inspector is a very hardworking official.

  With an accurate departure date, David can make an appointment with Addis on the departure time, and at the same time, he can also set a meeting time with those who are interested in going to Cold Winter Village.

  With full of expectations, David went to the square every day to guard the place where the announcement was posted. Unfortunately, there were not many people who asked, and there was not a single person who made it clear that he was willing to go to Cold Winter Village.

   After three days of guarding, he was directly lonely. On the third day, there were no people around to watch the announcement. Even if David kept promoting his village, at most, he would get back some suspicious eyes.

On the fourth day of departure, David met Inspector Maloney Mansfield again. The Inspector still had a faint smile on his face, and he greeted David very kindly, and he also offered a word of comfort : "People with an adventurous spirit have already joined the pioneering team, so don't feel discouraged."

   Obviously, the Inspector has a clear understanding of what David has been doing these days, and he also knows that David has not recruited half of them these days.

  He didn't feel surprised by this situation at all. Isn't that what the civilians in the outer city are like? As long as they can survive, they will survive. As for whether they will have a better life in another place? They don't think about it at all.

   What's more, the people who came back from the pioneering team have described the situation in the north in the past two years. A few people who are excited have given up those "unrealistic" dreams when they think of the descriptions of these people.

  David's Cold Winter Village wants to recruit farmers and craftsmen in Iron Tree Fort, which is more difficult than ordinary new villages.

   "Thank you, Inspector." David was prepared and did not express any disappointment. At this moment, he looked curiously at the people behind Maloney.

Judging from the attire, several of them were wearing armor and weapons, and they should be the accompanying guards. One was Maloney's servant, Huey, who should be in charge of taking care of the Chief Inspector, and the other two were wearing light clothes. , I can't tell what his identity is from the clothes, maybe he is Maloney's subordinate?

   Maloney didn't have any ideas for David, but just motioned for David to sit on the mount prepared for him.

Looking at David's slightly jerky movements, Maloney's expression didn't change; after noticing Laura's skillful movements, the doubts in his eyes became a little stronger, and finally he couldn't hold back and finally asked: "I don't know Miss Laura?" Your name?"

   "Crawford!" Laura glanced at David, saw him give her a casual look, and said her surname simply.

   "Crawford..." Maloney thought for a while, and he was sure that it wasn't a family in Iron Tree Castle, or even a big family in the surrounding area and King Tilan.

  It was absolutely impossible for him to think that the Crawford family came from Britain, a country that was very, very, very far away from the Kingdom of Tilan.

  After these few days, David had already vaguely guessed that Maloney might have misunderstood something, but he had no intention of explaining it, so let him misunderstand it. This kind of misunderstanding is not a bad thing for him.

  Maybe this Maloney’s preparation in just a few days has something to do with this misunderstanding. Even the two vacant horses next to it may have originated from this misunderstanding—there were several horses carrying goods, but two of them had only saddles and no goods, which were obviously specially vacated.

  Maloney-Mansfield's preparations are quite sufficient, not only the part of the work he is responsible for, but also figured out that David will bring 'several people' back to Cold Winter Village this time.

   Horses were arranged for David and Laura earlier, and horses were also arranged for Addis and Alfie, who will definitely travel with David and Laura.

Passing through the square in the outer city, David saw that the announcement he had posted had been taken down. There were many farmers and craftsmen who had asked him about it in the past few days. At this time, they used various Looking at myself, it can be seen from their expressions that most of these people have a mentality of watching the excitement, and the thoughts of envy and wanting to be together are completely non-existent.

  Advance along the main road—the direction facing the gate of the inner city will reserve enough space as the main passage for easy entry and exit. The people on horseback quickly passed through the vast outer city.

  As soon as he left the outer city, David noticed two figures, one big and one small, standing on the 'side of the road' and kept looking around. It was Addis and Alfie.

Addis had already known about the move to the north this time, and that he would go with officials of noble origin, but he did not expect that the noble officials would provide David and Laura with mounts. Looking at the team all riding horses, Addis thought I can only go on the road alone with Alfie.

   Unexpectedly, after the team stopped in front of him, David pointed to the two empty mounts and motioned Addis and Alfie to ride them.

   "Is there such a good thing?"

  (end of this chapter)