Chapter 1411: Raid

“Don’t take that junk.”

“Why are you hauling this stone? There’s not that much space on the cart.”

“We’ll have it over there… ah, you just carry it on your back, as long as you can keep up.”

The affairs officer kept trying to persuade them; pots and pans were still fine, but they shouldn’t pile on every bit of trash. Those people would rather carry the firewood on their own backs than leave it behind.

Still, whether affairs officers or soldiers, they all came from the bottom rung, so they could understand the villagers’ way of thinking.

Because for these people, this was all the property they had left, saved up bit by bit. Even a few sticks of firewood were something they’d painstakingly gathered in preparation for winter.

“From now on you won’t have to worry about those wild beasts.”

“Any bandits or robbers who dare come, we’ll kill them!”

“Of course, our Lord…”

There was no way all that could fit on the carts, but the soldiers helped carry part of it for them. Such an attitude left the people a little flustered, yet once they started talking, they could feel the kindness behind it.

The convoy and those soldiers were helping relocate this village…

In line with Lance’s habits, everything was prepared in advance. As long as you plan ahead, you won’t panic when things happen.

The biggest difficulty with merging villages and having them live together is solving their livelihood issues. If you rashly move them into a town, they lose the land they depend on, and since they have no other survival Abilities, going into town would be little different from waiting to die.

Right now, although Lance is forcibly relocating them to that small town, he isn’t cutting their houses, land, or grain. All of it is being made up to them in full.

Maybe they’re still a bit unaccustomed now, but once next year’s spring comes and they plant a crop on the land allotted to them, the matter will be settled. The fields will tie them to that place.

A single village has barely a dozen households, all together only thirty to fifty people. The fields they depend on aren’t all that many, but letting them lie fallow is absolutely out of the question.

Grendel walked among them, scattering plant Seeds over the fields after the autumn harvest. With a wave of her Magic Wand, the soil rolled over and buried the Seeds underground.

As long as they get through this winter, next spring all sorts of herbs will grow here. Of course it’s better if someone tends them, but this area is destined to be set aside for now, to await future planning and proper development.

So planting herbs is relatively reasonable. Wild growth is a bit worse, but unlike food crops, it won’t so easily end in total failure.

“Hamlet’s land is more fertile than the mountains. Even without tending, quite a lot will grow. It’s just a pity it lacks certain special conditions—some plants can only grow up in the mountains.”

Grendel knew her task, so she had long since selected plant Seeds suited to these circumstances.

“Hamlet’s terrain is a typical alluvial plain. Rivers flow out from the mountains into the sea. Because the downstream flow is not as fast as upstream, the current slows, its ability to carry gravel and silt weakens, and the gravel and part of the silt accumulate in zones, forming this kind of plain landform.

Such areas usually have fertile soil and are major farming zones. This was why, after the Hamlet Region was developed back then, it could feed a million people. It’s just a pity that now Hamlet is torn apart in all directions—those lands have either been eroded by the wilds or swallowed by others.”

Lance stood with his hands clasped behind his back, gazing into the distance, his words full of emotion.

Only, unlike those who love to lament the autumn and sigh over spring, he carried a strange, quiet optimism.

“But this situation will change, and in our hands. This is only the first step.”

The three villages were all in similar condition. One round trip to move the people back, and a day was gone.

The population of that small town doubled, now about four to five hundred people. At night everyone gathered on the open ground, illuminated by several bonfires.

But this wasn’t any kind of celebration, it was a grievance meeting. The mayor and his cronies were dragged out and struggled against once more.

The ones presiding were just two or three administrative officers and the thirty soldiers left behind. As for Lance and his people, they continued sweeping the area with the main force.

Amid countless cries and wails, the darkness would pass; the sun would rise in the east sooner or later.

…

In a large town to the south of Hamlet, apart from the most prominent church, there were of course the grand mansions that signified noble status.

Unlike those on the borders, where war was frequent and castles were preferred as foundations, this was the interior, a place that hadn’t seen war in who knows how many years, so people no longer pursued those military attributes.

Thus these nobles preferred luxurious mansions beneath broad panes of glass, rather than dark castles piled from stone.

Yet even now, the warm sunlight through the glass failed to dispel the gloom in the mansion.

A man in the prime of life was sitting straight at the dais, with several close confidants around him. Today they were here for a piece of information that had just arrived.

The Lord of Hamlet was going to reclaim his lands—and had already marched, heading straight south.

This news came from the Romani. These people had a bad reputation, but the information they provided was generally accurate; after all, their trade depended on their name.

This particular message was free, but the detailed intelligence on Hamlet that followed had cost him dearly. Still, he’d obtained quite a lot.

For example, certain circumstances in Hamlet—population, resources, and so on.

Secondly, the Lord seemed to have already ascended to Legendary rank, his strength extremely formidable, and this time he was personally leading the southern campaign.

Third, Hamlet had dispatched three thousand troops, primarily Musketeers, with Cavalry and artillery mixed in.