The next day, the rising sun tore through the mist, showing all the bloody killings of last night.
Liu Qian reined his horse and stood on a gentle slope, his eyes sweeping over the wreckage of the Reese camp.
Broken spears, charred tents, solidified dark red blood, and ownerless horses scattered everywhere restless in the scorched earth,
Neigh.
Looking at this scene, Liu Qian smiled.
Last night, with the cooperation of the wind blowing group of the Prince of the Cage, he succeeded in the sneak attack.
Governor Trigg O'Moron of Reese, Reese officers of the Slave Corps, and the leaders and core mercenaries of the Mu Nu Regiment, the Flag Breaking Regiment, and the Pike Regiment were not spared.
He escorted the remaining thousands of captured mercenaries to the construction site in Crowntown for Coburn's call.
And the 25,000 slave soldiers with blank eyes were left behind by him.
They were driven aside and quickly dispersed into a team of auxiliary troops, waiting for the most painful and tiring errands of moving, digging, and building walls.
The most dazzling of the trophies are the robust horses.
There are 1,000 dwarf horses left by the Mu Nu Group, and 700 horses in the Flag Breaking Group.
However, none of this was enough to move him.
Only the nearly 2,000 war horses of the Piket Regiment really attracted his attention.
The Piket Regiment had only 800 men, but it guaranteed that one person had at least two horses.
Different from the dwarf horses of the Mu Nu Group and the Flag Breaking Regiment, these heavy riding horses with high shoulders and broad bodies and sculptural muscle lines are covered with a layer of armor and stomach, and eye protection devices are also installed at the eyes.
They were given priority to his most elite eight hundred dragon spirit guards, who wore Valyrian steel armor and sat on the strong back of the warhorse, as if the man and horse were integrated, exuding a terrifying sense of oppression.
It wasn't that he didn't want all the Dragon Spirit Guards to be equipped with war horses, but the weak skeletons of other horses could not bear the inhuman weight of the Dragon Spirit Guards, and the Long Spear Regiment only had two thousand war horses.
In order not to let these precious horses wear out too quickly, he still kept two or three horses per person.
Therefore, only eight hundred dragon spirit guards can be equipped with war horses.
The rest of the good horses selected from the Mu Nu Regiment and the Flag Breaking Regiment were distributed to officers and scouts.
As for those short crossbow horses, they can only undertake some logistical transportation.
In the following month, Liu Qian received Reese's wealth in an orderly manner.
Blankets, perfumes and wine are the lifeblood of Reese's economy, all of which require a wide range of disputed plantations as raw materials.
Compared with Telossi, Reese's territory is larger, and the latitude is relatively south, with strong light and sufficient heat, which is suitable for grape growth. This is why Reese is famous for wine, while Telosi is famous for pear brandy.
The four governors of Rees owned vast estates in the disputed land, which now also fall into his pocket.
He was given large pastures, cotton fields, blanket workshops, perfume workshops, and grape plantations.....
After the huge industrials of the four governors were swallowed up by him, the little nobles trembled for fear of following in their footsteps.
However, Liu Qian declared to those little nobles that as long as he did not openly oppose him, he would temporarily open the net.
This is not in Liu Qian's benevolence, but in order to stabilize the situation in Reese.
After squeezing Reese dry, his gaze turned to Mir.
From Reese's mouth, he learned that Reese and Mir had made a fragile alliance agreement.
However, the stupid Trigg actually rushed to the outpost tower impatiently before the allied mercenaries arrived, giving Liu Qian an opportunity.
If Trigg and his soldiers had huddled around the vineyard on the defense line, they would not have been easily attacked by Liu Qian.
However, when the Mir learned the bad news of Reese's downfall, they did not panic and attacked, but like a frightened turtle, they retracted their heads deeper into the hard shell of the highland fortress.
They frantically looted slaves from the workshops and farms of Mill City and the riverbank, and kept cramming into the stone castle that guarded the key points on the central hill.
The reconnaissance scouts sent by Liu Qian reported that tens of thousands of soldiers had gathered in the fortress.
What made Liu Qian even more vigilant was that these soldiers always poured out of their nests during the day, gradually built a dense wooden tower and earthen wall around the fort, and dug a bottomless trench to turn the highland fortress into an iron hedgehog full of spikes.
Obviously, the Reese fiasco taught them a bloody lesson.
In between receiving the manor, Liu Qian was not idle.
He drove a huge army of slaves, logging and assembling new trebuchets, day and night.
The trebuchets, which were left behind by the Reese and ordered by him, were dragged one by one to the plain opposite the highland fortress.
Thirty behemoths raised their heads in the fortress's field of vision, and their solemn arms pointed straight at the sky.
The slave soldiers were still in full swing carrying wood, and the skeleton of the new trebuchet was gradually taking shape in the dust, and Liu Qian was not in a hurry to attack.
The highland fortress is located on the top of the central hill, surrounded by a wide grassland with an unobstructed view of the dry yellow under the midsummer, and the possibility of a successful sneak attack is almost zero.
He decided that right here, he would fight a head-to-head positional battle.
His strategy is clear and ruthless.
Liu Qian first asked the slave soldiers to build a simple but practical rammed earth fortress on the other side of the central high hill, confronting the highland fortress from a distance.
Then, he sent cavalry troops to invade and harass the hinterland of Mir, and the Dragon Spirit Guards, scouts, and riders of the Wind Blowing Regiment bypassed the highland fortress and repeatedly stabbed into the hinterland of Mir.
They burned, looted, and destroyed farmland workshops, dispersed slaves, and ignited the smoke of the withered grass that rose day and night behind the Mill.
Every day, the Mir people who hid deep in the fortress could see cavalry teams full of cattle, sheep, grain and even captives, triumphantly passing through the open grassland and returning to the rammed earth fortress.
On the thick stone walls of the highland fortress, Commander Mir Tomombu looked at all this, and couldn't help but feel that his nerves were like blades of grass scorched by flames, which would break at any time.
He clenched the Mill lens in his hand, his knuckles turning white from the force.
He clearly saw that groups of cavalry returning from a rage appeared on the northeastern plain.
They drove large herds of cattle and sheep belonging to Mill Farm, and the dust raised by the horse's hooves dragged long smoke tails on the scorched horizon.
Every time he saw such a scene, Tomombu had a headache.
It's been more than ten days!
He received orders from the Governor's Office of Mir.
If the mercenary group has not reached the central hill, they must hold on to the castle and not come out.
Tommonbu understands the concerns of the Governor's Office.
Due to the rapid fall of Reese, the Governors of Mir felt deeply threatened and were unwilling to follow in Reese's footsteps.
But what about those damn mercenary groups?
They were still slowly grinding on the road, and Mir sent countless letters of urging with pleading words to the mercenary group, all of which sank into the sea.
It wasn't until the Governor's Office gritted its teeth and pulled out the almost doubled commission that the greedy mercenaries quickened their pace.
Tomon Bu put down the heavy lens, raised his hand and wiped the sweat from his forehead.
After the lens was removed, the ugly rammed earth fortress a mile away and the trebuchet array in front of the fort came into view again.
The slave soldiers were busy around the trebuchet like ants, and the new skeleton was still being built.
He turned to the adjutant beside him, who was also gray-faced, and his voice was a little hoarse with pent-up anger: "How long will it take those damn mercenaries to climb here?" "
The adjutant's Adam's apple rolled slightly, his eyes dodged, and his voice was obviously uncertain: "My lord——— scout's last return——
Maybe—maybe four or five days—
"Four or five days!"
Tomombu took a sharp breath, his voice with a hint of despair.
Four or five days was enough for those locust-like cavalry to gnaw the rear of Mir until only scorched earth remained.
Tomombu was also a nobleman of the manor of Mir.
He seemed to have smelled the burning of the vines on his family estate, and heard the whining of the livestock being slaughtered on his ranch.
The foundation of his family's wealth was being burned and plundered little by little in these damn four or five days.
The huge pressure made him feel dizzy, and he had to hold on to the cold and rough stacked stone wall.