Chaos in Northwind Province

Chaos in Northwind Province

No money, no food. What were they supposed to do?

Starving to death was out of the question. They could only borrow from their neighbors.

Strictly speaking, Frozen Earth Territory had no neighbors. To the north lay the endless Fierce Winter, while to the south, they had to cross the Mountain Forest and Swampland before reaching the nobles of Northwind Province.

But they were the only ones close to Frozen Earth Territory.

"Have Deren and Arnor come see me."

Before long, Knight Captain of the Guard Deren and Carpenter Arnor appeared before Ryan. He looked first at Deren.

"I'll give you twenty men. Take them and the other Apprentice Knights hunting nearby. Try to secure enough meat before the cold fully sets in."

Ryan then looked at Arnor. "I know you have a unique talent for farming. My requirements aren't high. Plant whatever crops can mature quickly. I don't care what they are, as long as they're edible and can fill our stomachs."

"As you command." The two men left with obvious excitement, for this meant they had initially gained authority within the Baronial Territory.

Finally, Ryan's gaze fell upon Brandt.

"Brandt, gather all the Knight Retainers. We're heading to Northwind Province to pay our neighbors a visit."

Brandt moved quickly. By the time Ryan descended Rhino Horn Mountain to its foot, Brandt was already waiting with thirty men.

Seeing the scattered Knight Retainers, Ryan frowned. Then he turned, climbed onto a large rock, and roared.

With the strength of a knight, Ryan's voice was loud and commanding.

"Look at the state of you! Do you call yourselves an army? You're nothing but a pack of Mud Legs!"

"Now! Immediately! At once! Five men per row, six men per column!"

As he counted down from ten, Ryan drew the Iron Sword from Rosen's waist and walked to the side of his army.

"I want to see a single straight line before me!"

Ryan raised his sword. When he reached the third row, he pointed it at a young man whose head stuck out by half a head.

"Reyn, Severn..." Ryan called out six names in succession.

"Are you trying to make me think there are a lot of you?!"

Ryan then pointed at the remaining twenty-four men. "If you can beat them, each of you gets one Gold Coin."

"If you lose, then when we return, every one of you will haul stones for me!"

For Apprentice Knights and Knight Retainers to do a slave's work was not a punishment of the body, but a humiliation of their dignity. The six men immediately flushed red.

Frozen Earth Territory had no slaves yet. If they lost face before the commoners when that time came, they would never be able to endure it.

There was no surprise. Six against twenty-four—there was no chance for the six men to win. They were soon beaten to the ground.

"Five, four..." Ryan's voice rang in everyone's ears like that of a demon. At that moment, no one dared dawdle any longer.

Seeing the formation rearranged, Ryan did not go down to inspect it. He merely nodded in satisfaction.

In an army, nothing mattered more than obeying orders without question.

"One man makes a mistake, and the whole unit is punished. Remember, you will be going onto the battlefield. If you cannot even coordinate this much, all of you will die!"

"I do not want you to die on the battlefield. Besides, you are my Personal Guard. When the time comes, you will die before my very eyes."

Ryan's voice was cold, yet Old Beard's eyes beside him burned hotter than ever.

A noble lord who spent every day enjoying himself and exploiting commoners and slaves was an ordinary noble.

A noble who recognized talent, used people well, and saw things through from beginning to end was a capable noble among nobles, an outstanding noble who could keep a family's reputation from fading.

But if a noble could do all that and also understood military affairs, then he was an exceedingly rare noble, a supreme noble whose name could be recorded in history.

At that moment, he seemed to see Frozen Earth Territory rising. He saw the Ryan Family becoming a dazzling star of the Empire.

Seeing that the Knight Retainers finally looked somewhat presentable, Ryan nodded with satisfaction.

"Move out!"

The decision had been made only moments ago, and the action was even more hasty, but Ryan was not overly concerned.

The reason was simple. This was Northwind Province. Northwind had been part of the Empire for several decades, yet it had always remained in an extremely chaotic state.

How chaotic was it? Imperial law strictly prohibited nobles from attacking one another's territories, yet throughout the entire Empire, only Northwind Province had seen no fewer than ten open clashes between noble armies.

Although whenever one side showed signs of gaining too much power, the other nobles would muddy the waters and suppress it, this still proved how fierce the people of Northwind Province were.

That was only what happened openly. Behind the scenes, things were even more rampant.

Yet strangely enough, despite this rough and simple folkway, not a single noble had died in it over the decades. Even when a Baronial Territory had been beaten to pieces, and its Baron had been reduced to a lone man, he would still be casually released. Even now, he would remain safely in his own territory, exploiting serfs.

Besides the struggle for profit among nobles, there were also the native nobles of Northwind Province—the many nobles who had once belonged to the former Northwind Ducal Territory.

After Meyers occupied Northwind Province, the Duke of Northwind and his family, the land's original rulers, were taken to the Imperial Capital, where they would never be allowed to leave even a single step for the rest of their lives.

Of the lesser nobles who had once followed the Duke of Northwind, some had pledged allegiance to the Empire early on. Some became Wandering Nobles, seeking positions and territories in kingdoms to the South. Some died in the war. The final group became rebels, turning into bandits in order to reclaim their lands.

Ryan suspected that the assassin who had tried to kill him belonged to this final group of Northwind Remnants.

It was even very possible that someone within the Empire had contacted them, promising to restore their noble status in exchange for killing him.

Otherwise, assassinating an Imperial Noble—especially a Baron personally invested by the imperial family—would be a slap in the face to countless nobles across the Empire.

Such a massive risk could not exist without enormous profit.

Poor and cold: that was how the Empire's Southern Province viewed Northwind Province. Yet only the nobles within Northwind Province truly understood that this place was merely cold and chaotic.

Nobles would never be poor. They would think of every possible way to exploit their subjects and slaves. Northwind Province also possessed many Mineral Deposits, but because it was too chaotic, development remained extremely inefficient.

For those Mineral Deposits, many nobles squeezed their slaves to death in the mines. When there were not enough slaves, they sent Freemen in instead.

That was precisely why so many escaped slaves appeared in the Swampland and Mountain Forest near Frozen Earth Territory.

In fact, those who escaped were only a small fraction. Most slaves never even dared entertain the thought of fleeing, even when their noble lords forced them to mine with only a few hours of rest each day and gave them barely a morsel of food.