Chapter 494: Wherever the Imperial Knights Go

"Ibamino! Ibamino!"

Hearing anxious shouts from behind him, Ibamino stopped his strides.

"what happened?"

The bulbous-nosed young man in a linen robe propped himself up on his knees and panted heavily: "Someone has fallen behind."

"Who, who's left behind?"

"Kevin Si's."

"Damn it." Pushing aside the crowded crowd of refugees, Ibamino walked to the end of the team.

If we get caught by the Lancers, we'll be finished.

In early October, the rain was no longer as frequent as before.

The September rain has stopped, taking away the heat completely.

The sky was bright with cold sunshine, but there was not much warmth. Instead, the cool breeze blew across the thin linen clothes, making people shiver uncontrollably.

The muddy puddles reflected the cloudless sky, and only the raindrops on the green leaves gave away that a lot of rain had fallen in the recent past.

The dirt road covered with puddles was no longer as desolate as before.

In the past, the farmlands on both sides would have been filled with farmers wearing tight short jackets, bending over to work in the fields.

But at this time, no people could be seen in the farmlands. Instead, the roads were filled with civilians migrating in panic and numbness.

They loaded their luggage into sacks, placed the full loads of luggage and livestock onto donkey carts, and moved slowly forward along the dirt road.

Objectively speaking, they were just moving slowly forward, but subjectively, these migrating civilians wished they could fly right now.

There were occasional houses and huts on both sides of the road, but not many people, and everyone was heading towards the non-knight area.

The so-called Knight District refers to the 21 hectares of land that Prince Condé requested to manage.

After Prince Kongdai's land distribution meeting was held, various religious and secular nobles confirmed the decision, satisfying Prince Kongdai's requirements.

Every family donated flesh and blood, and piece by piece, they actually gathered together 20 hectares of land.

Since Prince Kongdai had no money to support such a large army, and he could not find anyone to borrow money from, he had to let them raise the money themselves.

Although they were repeatedly warned not to rob or extort, these knights didn't believe in that. Isn't this just tax farming?
It's just that you have to pay your own taxes.

And since Prince Kongdai said it was a lease, there was no need to cherish it, as it was not really their territory.

After making enough money before withdrawing, the priority is to ensure the military pay for the next three to five months.

Under such circumstances, it is easy to imagine what measures the Imperial Order Company will take.

Now it was the turn of the various lancers in the Imperial Order Company. They were smart enough to first recruit a group of local knights to fill the understaffed Imperial Order Company, and then start the action.

The Lancers' job was simple: patrol and demand supplies.

They spread out along the road and demanded military pay from every village they found.

If there is no military pay, use other things to pay it off. No matter how much porcelain or ceramics you have, you will never have too little.

If you have no money or things, then sign a contract of sale and an IOU. The knights are very kind and it's okay to owe you money first.

Don't think that these knights will do anything like calculate how much they need and then collect that much.

The Lancers' behavior is to get as much money as possible and then find somewhere to spend it.

In less than a month, wherever the Lancers went, the people turned into phantoms.

As soon as the farmers who were under the jurisdiction of the Knights' District heard that the masters of the Lancers were coming, they would drag their families and carry their luggage to nearby places where the knights could not plunder.

After all, the so-called "Knight Zone" is a group of enclaves, and it is not difficult to leave the territory.

Although the Lancers had the Fugitive Slave Act, they had no power to pursue these fugitive slaves. Once they escaped from the Knights' District, they could only watch helplessly.

Because they only borrowed the land temporarily and did not have ownership, the real ownership was in the hands of the original lord.

Since the original lord didn't care, they couldn't hunt him down.

The original knights in the Knight District pretended not to notice this escape behavior.

Except for their own serfs, the other subjects ran away. The fields were still there anyway, and the town would not let them enter, so they would have to come back sooner or later.

During this period, his subjects must have suffered a lot of losses, but a double loss is better than a single win for the opponent.

Only the 500,000 acres of land where the lord died could be barely taxed, while other knight districts were in chaos.

"Don't just watch the fun, keep walking, walk faster." As they walked, Ibamino asked them to walk faster.

Ibamino is one of the fleeing subjects and also the leader of this group of refugees.

However, he has a special identity, he is a follower of Juano faction. He has confronted the lord and the manor steward several times, and has a high prestige among the people.

Especially since this year, with the existence of the Saint Sun Righteous Army, he can even summon the Saint Sun Righteous Army to carry out assassinations and attacks during the confrontation between the two sides.

Although it doesn't work against knights, it is very effective against the servants in the knight's castle.

In consideration of the strength of the Holy Sun Righteous Army and the Salvation Army, the lord finally took a step back and exempted this year's tribute.

Before Ibamino could celebrate, another piece of bad news came - the Lancers were coming.

Without stopping, Ibamino once again led the people in the manor to escape. The target was not far away, just over ten miles away in the Stonewall Town.

"Where have you been?"

"Did you go to the roadside to take a shit and miss me?"

"Let's go look for it, you guys keep going."

Wiping the sweat from his forehead, Ibamino left the team with a few young men and started searching along the way.

The cool breeze blew across his body, feeling both cool and cold, but it could not suppress the anxiety and anger in his heart at all.

"Where has this gone?" After searching for nearly twenty minutes, they found nothing and could only curse.

Suddenly there was a sound in the distance. Ibamino looked over subconsciously, but he only saw a group of wild birds flying up from the forest.

The young and strong men following Ibamino stopped and looked in that direction. He immediately put his head to the ground, regardless of the dirt on the ground.

The sound of horse hooves? Ibamino listened again in disbelief and confirmed that it was the sound of horse hooves.

"Let's go back!" Ibamino turned around and crawled towards the refugee group without even having time to clean the dirt on his clothes.

A flock of wild birds flew up from the woods, and Ibamino and others, holding wooden sticks, ran wildly on the muddy road in panic.

The trousers were torn by the thistles, the straw sandals were torn to pieces, and the mud and water invaded, turning them into a mess of weeds.

But Ibamino didn't stop for a moment. He felt his heart pounding and his lungs were about to be squeezed out of his throat.

The sound of horse hooves in the distance gradually became clearer, and the group of refugees in front of us also gradually became clearer.

"The Lancers are coming, run." Ibamino shouted at the top of his lungs.

"Lance Cavalry, run!" The other young and strong men around him shouted together.

Before he finished speaking, he felt a chill on his back, and a warm feeling flowed from his chest to his belly button.

Looking down, he saw the tip of a javelin sticking out of his chest, with bright red blood flowing out in streams.

He ran a few more steps by inertia, then completely lost his strength and fell to the ground uncontrollably.

"what--"

"Escaped slave! Die!"

"You betrayed the prince's trust!"

The Leia language with a strong windmill accent sounded, and dozens of horse hooves trampled past his face, crushing Ibamino's spine and arms.

The black-armored knights of the Imperial Order, holding their knightly swords high, charged into the chaotic crowd.

As the long sword swept across, former friends from the same village fell down one by one with their bodies stiffened.

The horses' hooves crushed the heads of children and even knocked a pregnant woman into the air. The blood fell like mist and rain on the flowers on the roadside.

"Don't worry about the luggage, don't worry about it, run into the woods, run into the mountains, don't run on the road." With his eyes wide open, Ibamino shouted desperately at the backs of the refugees.

But the refugees' ears were filled with fear and screams and they could not hear a single sound.

They subconsciously ran wildly on the road until they were pierced by the sword.

“No—no—” Ibamino watched helplessly as bodies fell in a pool of blood.

There were even a few knights who threw the girl's head back and forth for fun.

It didn't take long before these hundreds of refugees were strangled to death by a team of less than ten lancers.

The attendant knights who followed him looked at these commoners who once saluted him respectfully in the territory and were speechless.

He did despise the common people and even loathed Ibamino, but he never thought of slaughtering them like this.

"Hey, there's another one here." A Knight of the Imperial Order found Ibamino, who was only breathing his last breath after being trampled. "Can you still speak?"

"Fuck your mother! Fuck your mother!" Ibamino roared like a madman. He was already half crazy. "You will get your retribution sooner or later. The Holy Father will appear and the Holy Grandson will be born to burn away the sins of this world. You..."

Lifting its hoof from Ibamino's neck, the warhorse raised its head gracefully and went back the way it came, carrying a full load of spoils.

(End of this chapter)