Arthur watched the handwriting on the letter, his smile gradually fading, then returning to his usual calm. He folded the letter and put it away.
He lifted his head, his gaze sweeping over the exhausted soldiers, then gave an order to Toman: "Toman, take your soldiers and enter the city!"
"Go to Willow Wood City to rest!"
Arthur's voice was clear and strong, and his subsequent words invigorated the weary soldiers.
"I've already had roasted meat prepared. There's plenty of meat, eat your fill! You deserve the best reward!"
Toman's face instantly flushed with emotion, and the soldiers, despite their fatigue, stood up and cheered.
Arthur patted Toman's shoulder and continued: "Once your men are rested,"
"take over Willow Wood City's defenses and the siege of the inner keep. I need to relieve my own troops."
Toman instantly understood the meaning of this order. It meant that Arthur's original soldiers, who were used for the siege and defense, could be freed up to become a powerful, mobile army capable of launching offensive strikes.
In Willow Wood City's temporary command hall, Arthur's finger moved across the Legge Family's map table.
Toman's four hundred reinforcements increased his total strength to over nine hundred men. Including Hakon's troops, he now had over a thousand men.
This was a force capable of defeating any single resisting Legge Family vassal, as long as the Legge Family army failed to gather.
And now, his greatest advantage was the asymmetry of information, allowing him to defeat them one by one, dismembering and dividing them.
Lucien, Brin, Hake, and Toman stood before him, awaiting orders.
Arthur's gaze fell on Brin. He pointed to a familiar yet unfamiliar location on the map, Dreadfort, and began to give his systematic arrangements: "Brin!"
"I'll give you three hundred men, including your own brothers."
"Your mission is to reclaim my family's castle."
"And…?"
Arthur looked at the four men, all his trusted subordinates. His voice was calm, a hint of coldness flashing in his eyes. He raised his hand, making a gesture for silence, his movement gentle and clear.
"On the battlefield, swords have no eyes."
Killing nobles on the battlefield was a matter of course.
Brin's breathing hitched slightly, but he quickly understood who Arthur was referring to. Killing nobles carried no psychological burden for him. He nodded heavily: "I understand, Lord."
Arthur's gaze then turned to Hake. Hake swallowed, straightened his back, and waited for Arthur to continue his arrangements: "Hake, you take two hundred of my soldiers."
His finger traced over the Legge Family's directly administered lands and villages on the map. He wanted to bleed the Legge Family dry.
"One hundred soldiers, dressed in the captured, blood-stained Legge Family standard equipment, are to disperse throughout the Legge Family's directly administered territory."
Hake's face showed a puzzled expression.
"Your mission is to create chaos and spread fear, and most importantly, to fabricate countless false rumors!"
He tapped the wooden blocks on the sand table that represented the Legge Family's directly administered villages and towns.
"Go to the remaining small villages and towns of the Legge Family and spread fear and chaos, making them abandon their land and homes and start fleeing. Tell them that Willow Wood City has fallen, and the entire Legge Family has been captured."
"The Legge Family's army has been completely annihilated, and also 'manufacture stories of Legge Family deserter atrocities'."
"Burn everything! – Everything!"
Arthur's voice was very low, sometimes requiring certain methods, and filled with coldness.
"Then, you are to have our remaining hundred men appear, protect the fleeing commoners, let them harvest the grain from Willow Wood City's directly administered lands, promise them public land to cultivate, and lead them to our lands."
"Pack up everything that can be taken."
Hake grinned, revealing two rows of molars. As a former bandit, he was a professional: "I understand, Lord Arthur."
"Leave it to me!"
Arthur drew a circle on the sand table, encompassing the Legge Family's vassals and the territories of several surrounding lords, and continued:
"This is not enough."
"The Legge Family's vassals and those surrounding lords, I want you to muddy the waters, making them busy seizing the Legge Family's fleeing commoners and unguarded property because of this chaos, letting them gorge themselves."
"When a pack of hungry wolves is devouring a prey, they will have neither the energy nor the desire to help another dying beast, let alone the beast they are currently devouring. They will only hope the situation becomes more and more chaotic."
"I want the Legge Family's vassals, upon hearing the false news of Willow Wood City's fall and the false news of the entire Legge Family's capture, to be busy dividing his property, too preoccupied to unite against us. The longer, the better."
"I will find them."
"Let the blood flow! I decide the beginning and end of this war!"
The orders were given.
Brin and Hake, Lucien, and Toman immediately took their leave, their footsteps echoing in the empty hall, full of decisive execution.
This war would determine his position at the poker table. Arthur gripped his sword hilt.
Over a hundred soldiers marched through the muddy ground, sinking with every step, disgusted by the rotten earth.
The river wind brought the stench of the swamp beneath them, mixed with the smell of rotting fish.
Jero Legge reined in his horse, gagged a few times, fanned his hand in front of his nose, his face filled with unconcealed disgust.
He looked at the soldiers, his voice sharp with mockery: "This is Dreadfort?!"
The so-called castle before him was merely a solitary stone tower, short, ugly, and without even a proper wall. In his opinion, this tower was not even as large as his stable.
The distant village was a settlement haphazardly constructed of mud and water plants, long deserted, with only the whimpering sound of the wind passing through its empty doors and windows.
Jero Legge felt like laughing. This was truly land befitting that idiot Arthur!
He had requested his father's permission to lead a hundred soldiers to occupy this territory, the territory of a scoundrel who dared to challenge his family.
The thought of that name filled Jero's chest with a burning jealousy and anger.
Arthur, younger than him, was already famous in the Riverlands. A fellow who crawled out of such a cesspool, who acquired a title without honor, dared to challenge a family with a thousand years of noble blood, and was even given the title "Black Lion".
He was even called the Protector of the Riverlands by the commoners of the Riverlands. Before this, he had known the Stinkfort Family only as one of the infamous families of Westeros mentioned by the maesters.
Jero cursed under his breath: "It's an insult."
"An insult to the Riverlands!"
"An insult to the nobles of the Riverlands!"
When did the Riverlands need such a person to become famous throughout the Seven Kingdoms! He had decided! He would make this place disappear completely from the map!
Sir Adam, the Old Knight accompanying the army, was about to say something when he was suddenly interrupted, his words abruptly cut short: "Young Master, we…"
Jero raised his riding crop, interrupting the Old Knight's words, and pointed to the solitary tower: "Tear it down for me."
Sir Adam was stunned, as if he hadn't heard Jero Legge's words.
Jero's voice became sharp and angry, annoyed at the Old Knight's disregard for him: "Throw every one of those filthy stones into the river for me!"
"Tear it down for me!!"
"I want him to come back and not find even a single stone to shelter him from the rain!!!"
Sir Adam's face changed. He urged his horse forward, his voice urgent: "Young Master, we cannot do this!"
"Oh?!" Jero glared at him, suppressing his anger. From the beginning, this old man had been somewhat disrespectful of his orders.
The more he thought about it, the angrier he became. It was clearly because he saw him as young, despising his authority. The more this old man tried to dissuade him, the more he wanted to do it!!
!
Sir Adam tried his best to keep his tone steady: "Although this tower is small, it is our only foothold here."
"If we tear it down, we will have to sleep in the wilderness, and if we are ambushed, we will be defenseless!"
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