Chapter 132: Education of the Snow Fox Countess

The hot temperature made it difficult for the knights in the north to adapt.

Fortunately, this place is not very far south, and it is not as humid and hot as the southernmost part, so it did not cause the knights to suffer from acclimatization.

The longboat driver friend of the Earl of Buck gave these knights some intelligence, which made them not completely ignorant of the terrain here.

In the afternoon, when the heat was at its hottest, a team of fully armed knights walked along the tree-shaded path.

One of the knights whose emblem was a green leaf was cursing. The village they had just passed by had been robbed and there was not much profit to be made from it. They were also too lazy to waste the durability of their weapons on killing people.

Now they were about to pass through the Snow Fox Territory.

Of course, they had heard of the reputation of the Snow Fox Countess, so they all decided to hand over the task of dealing with this difficult character to Rand, Viscount Crescent, the military rising star of the Frost Moon Kingdom, who bordered here.

However, now that they were returning from looting elsewhere, they had to pass through the territory of the Snow Fox Countess. Fortunately, the road was not long and they could soon reach the Crescent Territory.

At first they were a little disdainful of Rand's defense, but now thinking back to those trenches and bunkers, they still felt safe, so they planned to go back quickly.

Although the knight with the green leaf emblem was complaining just now, they still managed to rob a lot of things. The pirates in the Ice Sea could only rob along the rivers and coastlines, and they had not set foot in many inland places, so this was just the knights' turn to rob.

The only downside is that they don't have a convenient means of transportation like a longboat.

An arrow with a snow-white tail flew straight towards the knight with the green leaf emblem, but was blocked by the vigilant knight's gauntlet and fell to the ground.

Of course there wasn't just one arrow, there would be a rain of arrows.

The knights took a look at the tripwire in front of them, quickly grabbed the reins, turned their horses' heads, and prepared to retreat amid the neighing of their war horses.

At this time, a team of knights with snow fox emblems appeared in the rear.

"Ambush!" Meaningless words.

The Snow Fox Countess stood at the back and sneered. The tactics of most nobles in this world were only to use cavalry charges, and those serf infantry would be scattered by the knights' charge.

The Snow Fox Countess would use a little trickery, such as ambushes.

Such a simple strategy made her invincible on the battlefield, and this time was no exception.

In her eyes, the nobles in this world were too stupid, with their minds filled with only words like glory, bravery, and then charging forward.

And she would let these stupid, short-sighted and extremely greedy northern barbarians see the strategies of the military strategists of the southern kingdom.

Now, as long as these reckless knights are dealt with, the next target will be Viscount Rand. Although Viscount Rand likes to build defenses and hide in his own territory, no one knows what he is doing.

But how solid can the defense line built in a short time be? It is impossible that the newly promoted Viscount Lander would have many knights, right?

…

In the hideout, Rand was observing the newborn cattle and horses despite the hot summer day. These were twisted creatures that were created by using the power of the Black Goat Mother to forcefully crossbreed two species that were originally reproductively isolated.

In fact, it doesn't look distorted. It looks a bit like the wildebeest before Rand traveled through time. However, since it was just born, not much can be seen.

The mount Rand needed was one that could be tamed, and when grown up, had enough height and length to carry a knight in full armor. It also had to have enough speed and endurance, and it would be best if it was smart, but not too smart.

This was really a whim of Rand's, but the lack of excellent mounts in the hideout forced him to do so.

Now the hideout has to rely on itself alone, and can only equip the magic fine steel armor guards, whose number is always maintained at 50, with war horses and horse armor, as well as scouts.

In fact, the total number of horses is about one hundred and fifty, but now it is more important to maintain the number of scouts.

The total population of Crescent Territory and New Moon Territory finally exceeded 10,000, which means that the number of available soldiers in Rand has reached more than 1,000. Unfortunately, most of them are infantry.

If a large number of infantrymen do not have enough scouts to support them, they will be blind on the battlefield and will easily fall into a passive situation.

In this era, knights were a very difficult type of soldier to recruit. Not only horses, but also cavalrymen who were sufficiently trained and good at horsemanship were also very difficult to train.

Except for a few mercenaries, the rest of the infantry can be described as garbage.

Rand's development speed is already fast enough. The average viscount does not have as many cavalry as he does.

After asking the cultists who managed the horses to take good care of the new twisted mount, Rand took Olenna back to the lord's hall under the sun.

In fact, Rand could use the ice stored in the ice cellar to cool down, but he couldn't bear to do so.

After entering the summer, the sales of iced drinks skyrocketed. Although they were originally in limited supply, many people bought them.

After working under the scorching sun, it's so addictive to drink a glass of iced distilled ale or iced blended juice at noon or in the afternoon.

So much so that Rand was stingy with his attribute bursts and would rather endure the heat than use ice.

Ellie was wearing a light yellow dress with lotus edges today. She walked from the office to the lord's hall with a few pieces of paper in her hand, sat down on her seat in the lord's hall, and stretched her legs.

A backrest seat made of expensive luxury wood, with a symbol representing Ellie painted on the back - an alchemical potion bottle. Anyway, it looks like Ellie is also very hot.

Looking at Ellie, Rand said, "Would you like some ice to cool down?"

Ellie's eyes suddenly lit up, and she turned to look at Rand who was lying on the giant lord's chair: "What? Has our miser Lord Rand changed his personality?"

Although Rand was lying down and Ellie was slumped, their postures were so similar that it made Olenna, who was watching from the side, feel a little funny.

Well, it's like a mudskipper that's about to die of thirst, jumping around in place from time to time, but it doesn't seem like it really wants to jump around.

Rand said unhappily, "Miss Ellie, isn't it you who have the management authority over the ice cellar? How dare I use the precious ice cubes to cool off without your consent?"

Ever since the giant stone lord's chair was built, Olenna liked to sit sideways on the armrest of the lord's chair.

This position allows her to see Rand's neck, provided that Rand is sitting. If Rand is lying down, what Olenna can see depends on his lying position.

Olenna was now also sitting sideways on the armrest, watching Rand and Ellie bickering over and over again for more than a dozen rounds, but still no one was the winner.

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In short, neither Ellie nor Rand was willing to commit the "sin" of using ice to cool off.

Now the two of them felt that the conversation was a little heated, so after bickering for a while, they stopped talking and continued to perform mudskipping in the same place.

Olena looked at the paper in Ellie's hand, ready to end the childish argument between the two: "What's the matter?"

"No." Ellie stretched her legs again. The dress she wore was very long, but when she moved her legs, she could still occasionally see the white skin of her calves. "Just a little bit of the financial report. The revenue of the big bathhouse has also increased significantly during this period."

Ellie raised the paper in her hand and asked Rand, "Do you want to see the data?"

Rand nodded. He was never careless about the management of the territory. He got down from the lord's chair, walked to Ellie and took the paper in her hand.

After standing there and taking a closer look, Rand frowned and asked, "A lot of villagers who come here to pay taxes and trade are going to the big bath to spend money?"

Seeing that Rand looked a little serious, Ellie sat up straighter, and her expression was no longer as casual as before. She said, "Is there a problem here?"

Rand's eyes remained on the data on the parchment: "They are likely to get sick."

"I'll arrange for people to closely monitor their situation and temporarily ban ordinary villagers from using the big bath." Ellie said immediately.

After saying this, she immediately got down from the chair.

Rand patted Ellie on the back and said, "Don't worry. The medical level in the hideout has improved. Nothing serious will happen."

Ellie reached out and squeezed Rand's fingers, then trotted towards the office.

Rand twisted his shoulders and said to Olenna, who had always been with him, "Let's do what we can."

Olenna did not ask Rand what he wanted to do, but just followed him quietly.

There are already several alchemists in the alchemy workshop. After seeing Rand and Olenna, they all bowed and then went about their original work stiffly.

In fact, soap making has already been attempted.

The main reason why people of this era did not take a bath was because bathing was a dangerous activity. Most of these villagers only had one piece of clothing and had no room to change clothes. If they did not change or wash their clothes, the clothes would become starched.

If it weren't for the dust and dirt on the body, it would be very easy to get sick if the body came into direct contact with the patina.

Therefore, Rand wanted to make soap to reduce the difficulty of washing clothes. It was summer now, and even if there was only one piece of clothing, it would dry quickly by hanging it out to dry after washing.

The problem was that Rand didn't know how to make soap.

Making soap is high school knowledge, but we only know about the saponification reaction. We know that alkali, salt, and lard are needed, and the rest can only be left to the alchemists.

Ellie didn't tell Rand that alchemists didn't actually do these things. Alchemists generally studied magic and alchemical potions. It was more reliable to expect them to invent new types of photo crystals than to do these things.

But Rand asked these alchemists to do these things, and these alchemists did not dare to refuse. After all, the direction was given, the funds were in place, the treatment was also very good, and Rand seemed to have a hobby of whipping people, which made them really dare not refuse.

Alchemists are all respectable people. If they were really tied up and beaten, they would lose all face and would not be able to continue living as human beings.

(End of this chapter)