After Louis, Duke of Connet, and Duke of Lyonnesse left, King Richard sat alone on the throne, thinking about all this.
There was no doubt that Desmond's grandnephew, Anch Desmond, had failed Desmond. It was Desmond's mistake that led to the death of the entire army of knights. Desmond's grandnephew had to bear great responsibility for this war.
Now, the king had to face the aggressive dukes. The loss of the army would require a huge sum of money from the kingdom's treasury. In a short time, the king did not know where to find such a huge sum of money.
It seemed that he had to go to Duke Vanderguber Schultz of Marlinburg to discuss the matter of borrowing money. When he thought of the money the royal treasury owed Marlinburg, the old king's face twitched with pain. Last year, he calculated that Brittany owed Marlinburg hundreds of thousands of gold coins. This was not even including the long-term debt.
Well, money aside, Richard still had to face the question of who would be responsible for this war.
First, he had to set the tone that he, as the king, could not bear this responsibility. Otherwise, his throne would be in danger of being shaken.
In any case, Ansy was dead.
Adred was also dead. Only Baron Laing survived.
Thinking of this, Richard felt a burst of anger in his heart. It would be great if the situation could be slightly changed. For example, if Leon died, and either Angsy or Adelaide survived and led the 6000 remnants of the army to victory.
In that case, the nature of the war would change. He would vigorously publicize this tragic victory and mold the commander of this army into a national hero. He would vigorously advocate that the destruction of the Demon Rock would allow the country to be free of worries for decades. He would create a "victory is victory" and a "legendary victory" to shut everyone's mouths.
But the one who survived and won in the end was the champion of the Chosen of the Lake Fairy, Laing Macado.
Although this brat was very strong, he had never been one of them. Never.
He used to be a White Wolf Knight, his adoptive father was a White Wolf Knight, and his Godfather was the Griffin Duke of the Empire. He was both the Chosen Champion of the Lake Fairy and the vassal of "Long Legs" François, Duke Winford. From every perspective, he was not one of them.
At the same time, the army he led included Bastogne's army.
But could Richard punish Laing directly? Could he blame Laing for not rescuing the knights and Marquis Anci?
Richard's mature political wisdom told him that he could not pursue the matter, at least not now, because Laing had brought back victory.
At this juncture, he was the hero of this country. Richard could not punish him publicly, or his prestige would be damaged.
But from his standpoint, he couldn't give too much reward to this guy who didn't belong to his faction. Otherwise, it would be tantamount to encouraging the knights to form their own faction and disobey his command, which would further weaken the royal authority.
This would be no different from funding the enemy. Within the kingdom, François, Duke Winford, and Berchemund, Duke Bastogne, had always been in deep conflict with him. In this War of Knights, the armies of these two duchies did not suffer great losses and even went through a baptism of blood and fire.
Because of this, the king did not want to let them gain any more benefits.
However, it was Leon who had destroyed the Ten Thousand Demon Cliff, and he had brought victory back to his side.
This was almost a dead end. After going around in circles, it was still a dead end.
The king knew that he had to find a solution from another perspective.
As for not holding the Triumph Tournament, that wasn't a big problem. With such heavy losses, not holding the Triumph Tournament was barely acceptable no matter how one looked at it. Leon couldn't force it either, as the eight Dukes who had been completely wiped out would definitely object to it.
After thinking for a while, the king gradually came to a conclusion.
Victory was still a victory. This War of Knights was not a crushing defeat. Instead, it was a glorious victory!
Since he did not want to give the credit to the living, then he would give the credit to the dead!
As for Clayon's group, he would first give them the cold shoulder and kill their arrogance. Then, he would give them enough rewards to shut their mouths.
Now, he had to wait for the dukes to arrive. The king and the dukes were going to have a meeting to discuss how to end this war.
… …
In late September, when Laing led the right army out of the forest, the Brittany Knight King's Kingdom of Brittany was getting closer to autumn. The serfs were numbly harvesting food.
Walking on the field, the knights were quite happy. Through their efforts, they had protected the people in the field.
They were now the victors.
There was nothing more glorious than protecting one's home and country.
There was once a saying that if it weren't for the fact that the knights of Brittania rarely took the initiative to wage war in order to protect their country, and if it weren't for the fact that the knights of the Holy Grail needed to protect the holy land of the lady, perhaps the knights of Brittania could conquer the world.
Of course, this was an unreliable guess, but it showed how much the humans of the Old World feared the knights of the Knight King.
The army advanced along the road and arrived at the Attawa Castle. This castle was only a day's journey from Colona. Laing received orders from the Knight King that the army would rest in the Attawa Castle. Only Laing and a few other leaders could go to Colona and wait for further instructions. Of course, they would all rest in the Attawa Castle tonight.
Laing smelled something different about this order. Normally, an army was not allowed to enter a city after fighting with the creatures of Chaos. Normally, they would have to rest for a while to see what would happen.
However, Laing smelled something different.
When the army approached the Attawa Castle, Laing's eyes widened at the sight before him.
There was an army waiting for them.
No, it was not an army.
There were two armies.
Below the towering Attawa Castle, two elite squads of knights were waiting for their arrival.
On the left, the red dragon family flag swayed in the wind. The golden tassels under the flag swayed with the autumn wind.
Under the flag, the fiery red knights of the Bastogne Kingdom in full armor stood in formation. Their shields had the emblem of a red dragon on a yellow background. Dozens of knights of the kingdom stood in an orderly formation.
Their armor was gold and silver, and their feathers were splendid.
The knight standing at the front had a dragon-like aura. He had a resolute and weathered face. Around his body, the space was slightly sinking, and there was a faint red energy moving around him.
Without a doubt, he was the head of the red dragon family, the Duke of Bastogne, the 'Beast Butcher' Berchemund de Bastogne. "Salute the victorious knights!"
"Salute!"
On the right, the white pegasus flag fluttered in the clouds. The pegasus knight holding the flag was moving through the golden sunset.
"Long Legs" François, Duke of Vanford, stood in front of the silver-armored knights with a smile. Seeing Laing and the others arrive, the duke waved his hand. "Good afternoon, soldiers. You fought well."
"Father!" Angeli and Angelina called out. They did not expect the duke to be waiting for them here.
"Father! I … "Gabriel rushed to the Red Dragon Duke. The Red Dragon Duke laughed boorishly and patted Gabriel's chest." Not bad. You didn't embarrass the family. "
Only Laing was left. The Grail knight smiled awkwardly.
He was used to it. Ever since he came to this world, he had always been alone.
The attentive Suria immediately realized Laing's awkward situation. She immediately turned to Laing and said gently, "Come with us, Mr. Laing. Father has something to say to us."
"Okay." Laing shrugged. Seeing the female knight being so considerate, he felt warm in his heart.
The Duke of Red Dragon shook hands with him. "Thank you, young man. I've heard from Gabriel. I won't say anything else. As a Grail knight, I'll remember you."
"You're welcome. It's what I should do." Laing could feel the extremely terrifying aura coming from Berchemund.
The Duke of Red Dragon was more powerful than François, Duke of Winford. Among the powerful humans that Laing knew, only the Lake Goddess Witch and the Griffin Duke could be compared to him.
This model of knighthood, the great Sanctuary-level Grand Knight had always been loyal to the Lake Goddess. His dream was to become a Grail knight and protect the sacred land of the Lake Goddess. However, the Lake Goddess ordered him to take over the land of his ancestors and govern the people instead of becoming a Grail knight.
Even so, the Duke became a famous slayer of Orcs. Besides that, the Duke was not interested in governing his territory. He always gave this task to his deputy and led his family knights to eliminate evil. His lance pierced through the Doomsday Bull and the Green Warlord, and his Longsword killed the Vampire Earl and the Chaos Champion.
The Duke had always followed the teachings of the Lady of the Lake. Whenever his opponent was a human, he would use his lance to strike down his opponent and never finish him off. This had won him the respect of countless people. Even his enemies admired his noble character. The Duke had always been dedicated to fighting the evil in his territory. He would only return to his castle to rest when his territory was safe.
"You've worked hard, Laing. You've done well." François came before Laing and patted Laing's shoulder as he said, "It's not appropriate to talk here. Let's enter the Attawa Castle and arrange for the lodging and dinner for the soldiers. The soldiers are tired."
"Okay." Immediately, a specialized clerk answered.
Arranging lodgings and meals for four thousand soldiers was a difficult task, but it wasn't up to the knights to do it. Leon followed the two dukes and their descendants to the center of Attawa Castle, where the servants had already prepared a sumptuous dinner to reward the knights who had returned from the expedition.
The group walked towards the inner courtyard of the castle. Leon noticed that this was a very, very large three-story castle. It was built with thick and heavy stones, and there was a window every ten steps or so. The soldiers could shoot from the inside, and there were cannons and large ballistae on the walls.
"What a tight defense. Who's guarding the Castle?" Laing asked curiously.
Brittany wasn't without cannons.
Unlike the Empire on the other side of the Grey Mountains, if the Empire and the dwarves had an eternal blood alliance, then the relationship between Brittania and the dwarves was only so-so.
The Empire was rarely willing to share secrets about gunpowder with the Knight Kingdom, so the Knight Kingdom could only spend a lot of money to buy some outdated or obsolete cannons from the Empire or the dwarves. These cannons were good for defending cities, but they were not very effective in field battles.
"Baron Zieg is in charge of the Attawa Castle. He rarely stays here. This isn't his territory. It's under the direct control of the King." François answered Laing's question. "This used to be the territory of the Duke of Attawa, but after the Tower Incident, the Duke of Attawa joined the civil war."
"The Duke of Attawa died in battle? But there's no way he couldn't even find a successor, right? " Laing noticed that even after two hundred years, the Attawa family's coat of arms could still be seen in many places in the Castle.
The Red Dragon Duke, Bohemond, sighed softly. "I can't find it."
"Why?" It was Suria's turn to ask. She was also very interested in this matter.
"When the civil war ended, the Knight King Tayloff discovered by chance that the Duke of Attawa and his family were turning into vampires. They were gradually becoming midnight nobles. His Majesty Tayloff and the Lake Goddess Her Majesty started the War of Knighthood and wiped out the Duke of Attawa and his family.
"At this time, the entire Artois Dukedom had been harassed by the beasts for ten years. Many of the lands had been drowned by the forest, and many of the people had turned into dust. After the war, the title of Duke of Artois could not be found. Count Fogel, who was most qualified to inherit the title of Duke of Artois, died in the civil war. Therefore, the Artois Dukedom was divided between the Dukedom of Lyonasser, the Dukedom of Le-Angoulan, and the Dukedom of Connet. Since the Knight King was Duke of Lyonasser, the Dukedom of Lyonasser was given much more land than the other two dukedoms."
"I see." Laing nodded.
Before they knew it, it started to rain outside the castle.
The autumn wind blew, and the rain drizzled. Outside the castle, dark clouds covered the sky. The fine autumn rain fell from the sky, adding to the harvest of autumn. Sitting in the castle's banquet hall, everyone could smell the fragrance of the soil and the fresh air.
Amidst the sound of rain outside the window, everyone took their seats and enjoyed a sumptuous dinner. Clayon consciously sat at the end of the long table. Seeing this, Sulia sat beside him.
François looked at Laing and then at his daughter. He smiled meaningfully. "Laing, do you know how much trouble you've caused in the War of Knighthood? Now, except for Duke Pallaeon and Duke Bereon, all the other dukes in the kingdom are heading to the capital, Culona, to discuss the reward and punishment for you and your army. "
"I know." Laing smiled bitterly. He knew that his decision to go to the Demon Rock instead of going back to support Marquis Leonci was controversial. Knights were professional soldiers, and their duty was to follow orders.
Although, in terms of results and the long term, Ryan did nothing wrong.
"Well, it's good that you know your place. Let's eat first. After that, let's analyze this matter. Let's see what we can gain from this and what we have to pay for it."
"I understand, my Duke."
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