"Rushing River..." The crowd who rushed out of the woods murmured as they looked at the wide river in front of them.
"Plop!" Suddenly a knight jumped off his horse and knelt down.
Then Roland was surprised to find that everyone knelt down. Renault, with red eyes, grabbed a handful of mud from the river bank, put it on his chest and cried loudly.
"Rapid River! The people of Lagran are back!" Renault burst into tears.
The crowd burst into tears. In their memories, the empire was shattered, their homes were ruined, and the remnants of the Lagran Empire were scattered across the continent, like children without a home. Today... they finally returned to the land of the empire...
"Fight for the revival of the empire!" Suddenly a torrent infantryman stood up and roared.
"For the Empire!"
"Long live Lagrande!"
"For the rushing river that gave birth to me and raised me..."
Roland fell silent upon seeing this. Although they were all living beings, he had always felt a sense of distance from them, thinking they were like NPCs. But now, Roland suddenly felt completely integrated into this world. Each of them was flesh and blood, they could be hurt, cry, and die. Each of them was a living person, his people, his family, and he was the last... lord of Lagrande!
"Everyone, get up... Let's work together to recapture Changhu Town, the pearl of the northern empire!" Roland's eyes fixed.
Note: In the history of the Lagrang Empire, the farthest city in the north was Lake-town. After it was destroyed by Smaug in the Third Age, its residents, led by King Bard, rebuilt the Dale State, and Lake-town was abandoned. In the middle of the Fourth Age, the advance party of what was then the Kingdom of Lagrang retook Lake-town and rebuilt it... Until the final destruction of the empire, it remained a refuge and important town for the northern human residents.
Roland had been misleading here. After all, Long Lake Town wasn't Lagrande's territory at the time. But Roland had the upper hand, so he shamelessly decided to seize Long Lake Town first. After all, what kind of lord is a lord without territory? Furthermore, there were over a thousand humans there, the foundation of Roland's current development.
"Wait! Smaug's death should be approaching..." Roland suddenly broke out in a cold sweat. You know, Roland now regards Lake Town as his own territory, and he certainly can't sit idly by and watch Smaug take over Lake Town.
"Everyone listen up! March quickly!" Roland shouted.
…
At this time, Thorin had arrived in Long Lake Town and lived in Bard's house. He paid Badan gold coins to let Bard get weapons for his group.
"What is this? We paid with gold coins! We bought weapons! Iron swords and axes!" The dwarves complained as they looked at the weapons modified from various hammers and harpoons.
The dwarves' violent behavior frightened Bard's son, Barn, and his two daughters.
"Thorin, why don't we just take these and go? After all, we've used worse ones before..." Balin comforted.
…
"The Rapid Infantry! As powerful as the rapid river!" The Rapid Infantry, who formed a complete rapid army formation, dispersed a group of orcs and killed them, then immediately put away their weapons and quickly advanced along the Rapid River.
"Die!" A Badanian archer shot an arrow through the eye socket of a wandering orc.
"Pass quickly!" Roland commanded the Rapid Infantry.
"Knights! Don't be alone! Drive away the orcs! Disrupt their formation! Leave the rest to the infantry!" Renault shouted as he took the lead.
"Archers of Badania, please pay attention to the orcs who have crossed the defense line! Send them to see the Dragon God! Don't delay, we don't have much time left!" Kaslo is still the rearguard.
"Swish!" Roland galloped on his horse and chopped off the head of an orc.
"Sir! The Dark Forest has been invaded! There are wandering orcs everywhere!" Renault looked helpless.
"Then kill them all! No one can stop the Knights' advance, no one can stop Raglan's revival!" Roland was like a madman, completely consumed by killing. As he chopped down the Orcs, the black blood of the Orcs covered his adamantine armor. The once beautiful plate armor no longer had its bright reddish-gold hue, but had taken on a purple-black hue...
The exhausted Torrent Infantry formed a square formation. They placed their lances on their shields and pointed them forward and to the left. Now all they had to do was charge forward...
"These orcs are really like cockroaches. There must be hundreds of them along the way, right?" Caslo took a breath.
With the current strength of Roland and his group, hundreds of orcs could be destroyed with a wave of their hands, but the infantry could not withstand the boss's exploitation of labor. They had been traveling for several days in a row, marching at high speed every day. It was a great achievement for them to lift their weapons, and it was not easy for them to keep up with the cavalry. Thanks to Roland and Renault who took turns releasing the aura skill - Holy Inspiration, the torrent infantry were able to run all the way.
Holy Inspiration: A special skill for the Paladin or Priest class that releases an inspiring aura to allies within a 100-meter radius. Units affected by the aura continuously recover their health and vitality, and gain magic resistance and stamina. Lasts 30 minutes.
"Holy Inspiration!" Roland rode his horse to the front of the Torrent Infantry and cast a group halo on everyone, continuing to exploit the labor force.
"Bang bang bang!" The originally scattered steps of the Rapid Infantrymen gradually became regular, and even their breathing gradually subsided.
"Brothers! Come on! The Long Lake is right in front of us!" Roland encouraged.
After a while, a silver light suddenly illuminated everyone. It turned out to be the sunlight reflected by the sparkling long lake!
"Wow! Changhu!" someone said excitedly.
"It's Changhu! The pearl of the northern empire!"
"The busiest trading hub in the North!"
"We're here!"
A group of people in front of me were talking about the sparkling long lake. Everyone was extremely excited and the happy mood was spreading among them.
"But how do we get there?" Suddenly a voice drowned out everyone's discussion.
Instantly, the whole place fell silent...
"Sir, I hope you have a way to get us through... To get to the land entrance of Changhu Town, we need to cross the entire Changhu Lake... We no longer have the energy and time to complete this feat. Everyone's physical strength has reached its limit." Renault looked at Roland solemnly.
Phew! Thank goodness! I signed in yesterday and got myself transportation. Roland felt extremely lucky. He waved his hand and released ten galleons from the magic ring. Everyone cheered when they saw the galleons.
Note: The reason why Roland's subordinates were not surprised at all when he took out 10 huge galleons out of thin air was because the system had implanted in their memories the storage artifact with a huge storage space in Roland's hand. They thought that this was something Roland had prepared long ago.
"Get on board!" Roland waved his hand.
"Oh!" Everyone cheered and jumped into the lake to clean the blood off themselves while swimming towards the boat. After all, boats have draft, and there is no professional dock here, so everyone can only let some people swim over to start the boat.
"Cut some wood and build a simple dock. Don't forget, we still have war horses!" Roland stopped his men's revelry.
…
"Is everyone on board?" Roland looked at the shore.
"Don't worry, sir, no one is left out!" Kaslo patted his chest and assured.
"set sail!"
In the sunshine, a water city appeared before everyone's eyes.
"Changhu Town, here I come!" Roland said silently as he stared ahead.