As the name suggested, the Dark Rolling River was dug out by the dwarves of Lone Dragon City. It was an underground river that connected Northern Noska Bay and Southern Noska Bay. The dwarves of Lone Dragon City could use this secret river to communicate with the outside world, trade, and even send troops. This river deep underground in the Noska Mountains became the lifeline for the dwarves of Noska to contact the outside world.
However, this lifeline couldn't be used all day because it would easily alert the Noska Dwarves or the Skaven Ratmen. Therefore, the Dwarves of Lone Dragon City chose to use it at a safe time and reduce the number of times it was used to keep it hidden.
The Dark Rolling River was incomparably dark. There were only a few rune stones of the Noska Dwarves and torches on the ships to light the way. The complicated and ever-changing river even had different rune markings that needed to be identified. If one went the wrong way, it would either lead to a dead end or a trap, or even a deep hole that led to who knew where.
In the end, Laing woke up early and found that it was dark outside. There were stones on both sides, stones on the ceiling, and stones in the distance. Knight King looked around in boredom and found that he had nothing to do after staying on the deck for a while.
Little Sol Green and his good friend Jed were still on the deck. The two of them liked this kind of cave the most. It was needless to say that the Dwarves especially liked this kind of environment. For Dwarves, they were born with a love for mines and caves. Little Sol Green talked about what he would do if he was the Great King of Lone Dragon City and how he would build this place. It was obvious that he didn't take the Supreme King of Eternity Peak seriously. Little Sol Green was just like his father, a little arrogant. After all, even without the Supreme King's help, didn't they take back Eight Peaks Mountain?
"Oh, it's His Majesty Laing." Little Sol Green was very happy to see Laing. He bowed to Laing and then said to Laing, "Have you eaten breakfast? Do you want some? "
The two were eating breakfast on the deck. The Dwarves' breakfast was beer, sausages, goat cheese, and Dwarven soda.
Laing thought to himself, 'You're making this kind of hard food so early in the morning?' Knight King quickly shook his head. "I've already prepared it. I'm not used to eating such hard food in the morning."
"Aha, looks like His Majesty Laing has better food." Jed smiled sincerely. He was very respectful towards Laing. He was currently combing his beard. Although Jed's beard only reached his chest, dwarves had always regarded their beards as a symbol of status and seniority. Beards needed to be combed and washed frequently to be beautiful and smooth. Naturally, these two were the younger generation. They washed their beards every day on the passenger ship.
"Eh? His Majesty Laing, why did you shave your beard clean again? " Jed immediately noticed that Laing had shaved his beard clean, leaving no stubble, so he complained, "Your Majesty, you are good at everything, but why don't you have a good habit of growing a beard? I know that humans and dwarves have different habits, but don't you humans grow beards when you're old? "
"Uh …" Laing rubbed his bald chin. He couldn't tell Jed that the Goddess of the Lake was afraid of pain and tickles, could he?
Speaking of which, this goddess of his was a little too much. Now that he wanted to be intimate with her, he had to make her feel comfortable first. However, she knew Laing's weakness too well. Both of them had already confirmed their relationship, and Laing still shamelessly submitted to the goddess.
After thinking about it, Laing could only smile and say, "That's easy to deal with. It's just like how many people in the Empire like to shave their heads."
"His Majesty Laing, we will arrive at Lone Dragon City in two days. When we were supporting Örengrád, I had a conversation with High Lord Tolgarde. The dwarves of Lone Dragon City have been separated from the Mountain Kingdom for seven thousand years, so their culture and customs are very different. When we arrive there, no matter what High Lord Tolgarde says, as long as it's not too excessive or too strange, please do as he says." Little Sol Green held a piece of bread in his hand and added, "It shouldn't be too difficult for us. Lone Dragon City fully participated in the defense of Örengrád and the Bagration operation. I also told the High Lord about your deeds."
"It seems that the Supreme King's law doesn't work on Lone Dragon City?" Laing understood Little Sol Green's meaning.
"We've been separated for too long." Little Sol Green shook his head. "We should be glad that the Norska Dwarves aren't like our chaotic cousins. It's already very fortunate."
Laing nodded silently.
The system of enfeoffment and expansion that many people advocated had similar problems. It was true that enfeoffment was the fastest way to control some remote and undeveloped areas, but enfeoffment easily led to two problems. The first was that the vassals were localized, and the second was that the vassals were too powerful.
The problem of annexing territory was already mentioned, so it won't be repeated here.
Laing had always been opposed to the view of some people, which was that a large number of immigrants and enfeoffment could promote one's own culture, spread one's own bloodline, and expand one's own laws. It didn't matter if one could really control it, as long as one recognized one's own race and used one's own culture and system. Everyone felt that the meat would rot in the pot in the end.
In fact, this was a very wishful thinking. Take the dwarves for example. The two largest branches of the Mountain Kingdom during the time of the Great Discovery were the dwarves of Lone Dragon City and the chaotic dwarves of the Dark Realm. The former maintained a strange state of being neither independent nor subservient, while the latter simply surrendered to the chaos, abandoning the belief of their ancestral god and becoming the subjects of the Father of Darkness, Hasuth.
Even the dwarves, who valued tradition and the glory of their ancestors, were like this, let alone the humans.
These were the two most common problems of enfeoffment. The first was that the vassals were too powerful. Take Lone Dragon City for example. The dwarves here had already formed their own culture and social organization after coming to Norska. They were unwilling and didn't want to return to the Mountain Kingdom, so after the Supreme King and the Supreme Dark Lord negotiated, the two sides could only maintain the status quo.
Who would have thought that they would have another master above them?
The second problem was even worse. Like the Chaos Dwarves, when they were far away from the borders and separated from the central government, the Dwarven Expeditionary Army quickly localized and abandoned their original culture. They gradually turned to worship Chaos and became enemies with the Mountain Kingdom. They even claimed to be the orthodox Dwarves.
Then, there would definitely be people who would say that this happened after contact was broken. But what if contact wasn't broken? What if they were enfeoffed outside the country's borders? What if they were enfeoffed with the Supreme King's bloodline to ensure legitimacy?
Take the Celestial Empire in Laing's previous life as an example. Enfeoffment outside the country's borders had happened before. Most of the enfeoffment were controlled by the Emperor, but there were also enfeoffments. But once there was a precedent of enfeoffment, the enfeoffment would gradually spread to the core of the country. For example, the Regional Commanders system was gradually formed.
As for enfeoffment with the royal bloodline, it was even easier. Zhu Lao Zhu had already explained everything with the King System. When the central government changed, these royal bloodlines all had the right to inherit. Guess if they were willing to continue living a hard life in the desolate enfeoffment, or bring their army back to the central government to fight for their own position or even the throne?
The Rebellion of the Eight Princes was a warning.
As mentioned earlier, as time passed, problems would definitely arise in the central government.
Moreover, even if the enfeoffments were linked together, it was easy for the enfeoffment to gradually "localize". The four Khanates of the Mongol Empire, except for the Yuan Dynasty, were all completely green within a hundred years.
Why? Because the enfeoffment population was small, there were only two ways. The first was to kill all the natives. For example, the United States did this to the Native Americans. The second was to simply localize themselves, just like how the four Khanates gradually localized themselves.
Of course, the third way was for the central government to continuously give large amounts of blood, money, people, and resources.
Regardless of whether such a large amount of blood transfusion was the way to destroy the country, why would the central government send large amounts of blood to other people instead of sending bureaucrats to manage the enfeoffment?
Therefore, it was very difficult. Close enfeoffment was courting death. Long-distance enfeoffment was also not beneficial for expansion. If they did not plan to do what the United States did to the Native Americans, they needed a large and sufficient population. Otherwise, they would either be chased away (like the Yuan Dynasty) or gradually localized like the Chaos Dwarves (like the four Khanates).
However, Laing did not think that enfeoffment had no value at all. For example, if the enfeoffment's immediate family members were far away and could not return, and there were no natives, they could be self-reliant and leave some seeds of hope. There was more or less room for manipulation. For example, Australia's Eastern Song Dynasty, North America's Daming Dynasty, and the Third Rome.
For example, Brother Kiliman's Five Hundred Worlds established the Second Empire at the critical moment of Horus's rebellion. He resolutely took on the burden of reviving the Human Empire and claimed to be the orthodox Empire! At least there was still some hope of revival.
In fact, according to Little Sol Green, Lone Dragon City even retained more traditional rune technology and ancient forging techniques than the Dwarf Mountain Kingdom. However, because they had not experienced the Cataclysm and faced with the destructive attack of the Green Dwarves, the dwarves of Lone Dragon City were very backward in civil engineering and firearms technology.
Laing's imagination ran wild until the Goddess of the Lake appeared on the deck. Today, the Goddess of the Lake was wearing a bright and dazzling laminated silk dress. Her long bright blonde hair was coiled up like a high elf lady's hairstyle and fell down like a waterfall, almost reaching her ankles. Her beautiful feet were wrapped in thin white laced pantyhose and a pair of fishmouth high heels with golden iris embossments. Her beautiful toes wrapped in silk stockings were exposed, and her nails were painted with green nail polish. She was bathed in a platinum rain of light. Seeing Laing in a daze on the deck, the Goddess of the Lake called him, "Laing, what are you doing on the deck? Come here. "
"Breakfast is ready?" Laing noticed that except for himself, no one on the deck noticed the appearance of the Goddess. It should be her illusion.
"Yes, Morgiana is ready." The Goddess of the Lake motioned Laing to come quickly.
Laing heard and returned to the cabin. He shrugged and smiled at the Goddess. "Look, Lilith, it's dark everywhere. I almost thought it was not breakfast, but dinner!"
"Dinner? Dinner is good. After dinner, we can exercise a little, so that our Knight King doesn't get enough exercise! " The Goddess of the Lake skillfully took Laing's arm and pressed her plump softness directly on Laing's arm.
"Ugh …" Laing's face turned a little green. During this time, he had to deal with both Lilith and Morgiana at the same time. These two women were heavy users of psionic energy. Morgiana, as the divine power generator and reservoir that the Goddess of the Lake had carefully selected, could absorb Laing's psionic energy almost limitlessly. Recently, because Morgiana could absorb a lot of psionic energy from Laing, she had begun to try to break through to the peak of the Sanctuary-realm.
This was originally impossible because ever since she received the inheritance of the Lake Goddess and the power of the Goddess of the Lake, Morgiana's strength was basically fixed. It was impossible for her to break through.
But this was Laing, a man who could make the impossible possible.
It's just that the process is a little tiring … Laing thought to himself.
Walking into the cabin, Morgiana was obviously in a good mood. The Lake Goddess of the Lake was wearing a white button-down muslin blouse and a pink miniskirt. Under the miniskirt were long flesh-colored stockings, a pair of cotton slippers, and an apron in front of her chest. She put the last fried egg on a plate, then picked up the plate with one hand and pressed down on the miniskirt with the other in embarrassment. "Laing, you're back. Breakfast is ready."
Laing couldn't help but smile. He took the plate from Morgiana's hand, helped her untie her apron, and pulled her to sit down with him. The Goddess of the Lake only ate some fruit as usual.
While eating breakfast, the two talked about other things. Seeing Morgiana leaning on Laing and eating, the Goddess of the Lake said unhappily, "Oh, right, about that Councilwoman Jialan you arranged before? She's called Catherine, right? "
"Well, yes." Laing thought for a moment. "But that thing was approved?"
"It's quite controversial." The Goddess of the Lake nodded. "In the end, the knights and nobles saw that Kalad had made such a great contribution, plus Suria's approval, and she had already given birth to a child, so they finally recognized her new identity."
The Goddess of the Lake was talking about Catherine, Veronica's disciple. After Catherine was lucky and successfully gave birth to a boy, Kalad asked Laing to make Catherine his countess.
It was a very troublesome thing. It was not unprecedented for a witch to become the countess of a noble, but it was really the first time in Brittany. Fortunately, it was settled in the end.
"Very good, but she won't be a countess soon." Laing smiled and put down his fork. "She will be a marquess soon. I've already planned to make Kalad the Marshal of Brittany and Marquis Garamente when I return home."
Laing had already planned to go back and continue the centralization of power.
"The second thing is that Emperor Karl-franz plans to use this opportunity to send some of the Rick Guards to reorganize the army in the northern provinces of the Empire. At the same time, he will build Rick Fortresses in some key towns." The Goddess of the Lake revealed the second news. "At the same time, the Emperor has announced the Rick Regular Army system. He is preparing to take back a small number of provincial elites that the Electors can't control and have lost too much to the Empire's palace to re-train and build a new guard army under his direct control."
"That's normal. Now that the Empire is in chaos, the Emperor's army hasn't suffered too much damage. This is the best time to strengthen the centralization of power and build a new army." Laing nodded slightly. "Seems like Karl has learned a lot from me."
Don't underestimate Card Emperor's financial difficulties. Rick Territory had a population of 6 million. Brittania only had 8 million people. With such a large population base and tax revenue, Card Emperor would be able to catch its breath very quickly.
After the two things were discussed and breakfast was finished, Laing hugged Morgiana and was about to say something. However, the Knight King immediately noticed that the Goddess of the Lake had closed the cabin door. He quickly wanted to get up. "No! Lilith! Not now! "
"You can't say no, my champion! I believe in you, you can do it! "The Goddess of the Lake pressed Laing down. The Goddess smiled and said," Morgiana, come, let's go together! "
"Okay." Morgiana nodded shyly. She suddenly reached out and hugged Laing's neck, blocking his mouth and not letting him get up.
"Ugh …"
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