Chapter 691: The Second Half of the Night of Drizzling Rain (Part 5) - The Old Merchant and Accents

Jier did not care how his subordinates killed the bandits who had tried to escape and were dragged back; he came to the riverbank once more and directed the second carriage to prepare to charge up toward the bank.

He first went to the side of the horses pulling the carriage and whispered some words of encouragement to the familiar animals. This Northland Horse, obtained from bandits near Bingxun Pass, affectionately rubbed its face against Jier's helmet, then nodded.

"Give it some effort!"

After encouraging the horses, Jier came to the rear of the carriage, took a deep breath of the damp, cool air, and then lowered his body again to grab the back of the carriage: "Go!"

The young man driving the carriage immediately flicked the Jiansheng, urging the horses to exert their strength to pull the carriage; as their four hooves churned, the soft mud of the riverbank splashed about.

Jier also straightened his waist at the same time, his arms lifting the rear wheels of the carriage. As the carriage moved forward, he stepped forward a pace, wading through the river's current and the mud and pebbles on the riverbed, simultaneously lifting the carriage upward and providing it with a forward thrust.

The stamina of Jier's two Northland Horses was not as good as the prairie horses of the Western Province, so this time Jier put even more effort into lifting the carriage body and pushing it forward.

"Giddy-up!"

This Northland Horse also exerted all its strength, shaking its head and tail as it pulled the harness straps fitted to its body.

Soon, the second carriage went up just like that.

The young man driving this carriage also actively let the horses ease their effort the moment the carriage went up, avoiding a situation where they would rush forward for a long distance in one breath.

The people who had been waiting on the riverbank nearby, once the horses pulling the carriage had relaxed and quieted down, helped each other climb back onto the carriage body. They honestly and proactively stacked the supplies that had been in a mess inside the carriage, then sat down leaning against one another.

The four physically weak and delicate rescued girls also climbed onto the carriage with great difficulty under the reaching hands of the young driver. Although they were mentally exhausted, they still kept their eyes wide open, curiously observing such a somewhat different young Knight like Jier.

As for exactly how he was different, their shallow life experiences could not figure it out, but their intuition told them that they could trust this young Knight who had just killed a Bandit.

"This Knight lord, how should we address him?"

The leading girl, who was slightly older, asked the young man driving the carriage.

But in truth, this young man had only met Jier today; he could not even call out Jier's name.

"Uh, ah, um."

After stammering for a while, he could not say anything of substance, and then he lowered his head with a look of regret.

It was the old man on the same carriage, holding a sleeping boy, who answered the rescued girl's question. The old man adjusted the waterproof animal-hide hat he had picked up, letting it shield him from the rain: "I did hear the young Knight say it once; it seems to be called Qiao, Qiao-Jier. Listening to his accent, he doesn't seem to be from nearby; rather, it sounds like the way people from the north of the Kingdom speak."

None of the others had noticed the accent, but the old man, who had traveled far and wide his whole life, began to analyze it.

The carriage moved a few steps, leaving the place where they had climbed the riverbank to avoid colliding with the last carriage. Not far behind, the young people holding weapons were escorting the bandits, who were trembling like cicadas in winter, as they climbed up from the grassy riverbank nearby, then they were tied back behind the carriage. As for the three corpses, they were dragged across the river by people, with a length of rope tied around their waists, ready to be hung behind the three carriages to keep the bandits company.

This was a naked warning, telling them not to harbor any clever thoughts; the end result of escaping was just like this.

The old man's voice rose: "The Kingdom is young, and most of the population migrated from elsewhere, with the most being from the Empire. But although people of the Empire also use the common language, the way they speak in different places is still slightly different."

Although the old man was just talking to himself, the people around had nothing to do anyway, so they all pricked up their ears to listen to what the old man would say, to avoid them recalling the memories and pain of being tortured and imprisoned by the bandits.

"The Eastern Province of the Kingdom has the largest population, but the source of the population is actually mostly from the adjacent west of the Empire. If you go to the Royal Capital in the future, you will find that the towns on the outskirts of the Royal Capital are no different from the Empire. Whatever the Empire is like, the outskirts of the Royal Capital are the same."

"The people there have the accent of the population from the west of the Empire. As for the people of the Southern Province, they are refugees who fled from the Holy Land in the southwest of the Empire, so their accents are quite mixed. When I was young, people in all places mostly maintained a relatively uniform accent. But by the time I grew old, decades later, the accents of the people in various parts of the Southern Province were very different."

A smile appeared on the old man's gullied face: "After everyone settled down, they stopped moving, and each place slowly developed its own set of accents. Sigh, it's really fast; in my short life, less than half the time since the founding of the Kingdom, people have already diverged into different ways of speaking."

He shook his head, seeming to feel that the future of the Southern Province was not very good, let alone the current chaotic situation that had led to him being trapped and then rescued. Last year, they fought a crushing defeat, which led to the Noble Knights from all over the province having to assemble on a large scale, gathering more troops than last year before daring to launch an attack.

But if they were defeated again this year, then it would truly be all over.

For the next dozen years, except for parts of the Province Capital that could still maintain peace, it is estimated that all other places will fall into chaos.

This includes, but is not limited to, bandits in various places taking advantage of the situation to grow and become a local threat; secondly, there are the defeated troops fleeing back to their hometowns and occupying small towns, leading to war; additionally, there are the deaths and injuries of Knight Families, leading to a long-term vacancy in the power to pacify a region.

On a deeper level, the loss of local low-level Nobles will inevitably lead to the rise of high-level Nobles, and the Royal Party will inevitably suppress the Noble Council in the Southern Province.

The old man dared not think further; he shook his head and turned to talk about the population source and accents of the Western Province.

"The people of the Western Province, apart from some migrants who migrated again from the Southern Province and the Central Province, are actually more of the landless population who fled from the southern kingdoms. Although the population composition is the most complex, it is precisely the Western Province that is a place without any accents."

"Why?"

The boy in the old man's arms did not know when he had woken up; he asked curiously.

Perhaps this boy had actually never been asleep.

"It's very complicated. Based on my own observations while doing business in the Western Province, haha, the terrain there is flat, there are many people doing business, the land is suitable for grazing and not for farming, and the population mobility is also very high. Everyone sees so many people they don't know every day, and they communicate with each other, so naturally, there are no accents."

Seeming to see the doubt in the boy's eyes, the old man explained carefully: "Think about it, if you speak your hometown dialect, will a customer who comes to buy things from you today come back again?"

The boy shook his head.

"Right, the other party will only look for a shop or stall next time where they can communicate smoothly, because if they don't understand your words, they are also afraid of being at a disadvantage in the transaction. A transaction will only continue if both parties feel satisfied and beneficial. Once one party feels that there is something wrong, this invisible thread of transaction will easily snap."

"Besides that, the two powerful external threats to the Western Province have also helped with the communication in various places. Does anyone here know which two survival crises the Western Province faces?"

Facing the old man's question, the young people on the same carriage shook their heads shyly. Only then did they realize that compared to this old man, how shallow their book of life really was. Let alone a classic tome, it couldn't even compare to the account book in the hands of a street vendor.

Even the young Refugees holding weapons beside the carriage looked up and pricked up their ears, hoping that the old man could say more news they didn't know.

Finally, it was a frustrated middle-aged Merchant in the corner of the carriage who rubbed his face and said with a dejected look: "I have been to the Western Province, ran to Montoka City twice, and heard people in the tavern say that they have to select Soldiers every year to hand over to the local Earl, to, to resist what sea was it?"

"Grass Sea."

The old man nodded and repeated the explanation: "It is called the Grass Sea. This mysterious place is in the central region of the Western Province; in short, it is a magical place. People say that even if Knights ride horses and run around the boundless Grass Sea, it would take at least a month. Hehehe, this must be an exaggeration, after all, riding a horse around half of the Western Province wouldn't take a month. But it is too strange and mysterious there; various contradictory statements conflict with each other, but everyone thinks they are not wrong."

"The Grass Sea rushes out a large number of wild beasts and Monsters every year, heading straight for the Human towns and settlements closest to the Grass Sea. Therefore, Soldiers from all over the Western Province have to be transferred there to serve, uniformly obeying orders under the Earl."

He continued: "So, young people from all over gather together, facing the same inhuman danger, getting to know each other and communicating, and when they return to their hometowns, this makes the Western Province have no differences in accents."

"Then what about the other one?"

A girl with eyes like a little deer, huddled in her sister's arms, gathered her Yongqi to ask about the other survival crisis of the Western Province.

The old man smiled and reached out to gesture at a height of about 1.3 or 1.4 meters in front of him: "The other one is the Dwarf. But I have never seen a Dwarf outside the Kingdom, but I have heard from familiar friends that outside the God-Standing Border to the west of the Western Province is the kingdom of the Dwarfs. They launch military attacks every few years, very fiercely."

At this time, the old man suddenly thought of something, and after a light cough, he said with a smile: "Speaking of which, if the war on the southern border this time happened in the Western Province, it would probably have ended last year, right? The neighboring country in the south is just a small country; how could it be fought into the current state? Sigh, they are all provinces of the Kingdom, yet the strength is so different; where exactly does the problem lie?"

The answer that this knowledgeable old man did not know could naturally not be explained by these young people around.

They were stirred up to talk, and instead began to talk about the appearance of the Dwarfs in the stories they had heard.

The Dwarfs in Human stories were always clumsy and rude; as for what they actually looked like, none of them had seen them, nor did they understand.

Jier finally lifted the third carriage up.

He rinsed his combat boots and palms by the river, then mounted Tianxuecao and ran toward the riverbank.

"Set off!"

Jier shouted once, and after the group distinguished the east and west directions, they walked toward the west along the Shanglu.

The group moved much faster walking on the flat Shanglu; the carriages no longer creaked and swayed, and the young people no longer had to worry about being startled by Poisonous Snakes suddenly jumping out of the grass on the flat, grassless Shanglu.

The Bandits had it miserable; looking at the Bandit corpses dragged behind the carriages beside them, it was hard for them not to think, with a sense of "the rabbit dies and the fox grieves," that it would not be long before their own end might be the same.

The Bandits all believed that, regardless of the young Knight's promise that surrendering would spare their lives, judging by the other party's ruthless style of action and the young Refugees around them who glared and cursed at them viciously from time to time, surrendering might only be delaying the time of their death.

A few Bandits regretted it; had they known that death was unavoidable in the end, they should have just died with their brothers at the time, so that their corpses could be burned together by the flames after death, and perhaps their souls could keep each other company while heading to the afterlife.

Even though they would inevitably have to compete with the young Refugees who died at the same time.

Just like that, the group walked through the fine curtain of rain for an hour, and finally, in a boundless curtain of dark rain, caught sight of a continuous stretch of firelight in the distance.

The firelight was only a small dot when viewed from afar, but as they walked closer and closer, the scale grew larger.

Also seen by the rescued people on the carriages were far more people than they had expected.

"This scale?"

The old man shifted his ill-fitting, wide, waterproof animal-hide hat, muttering to himself.

"No wonder, no wonder they could defeat the Bandit group. With so many people here, no wonder." The old man was astonished that the young Knight was actually leading so many people, while a dejected middle-aged man on the same carriage blinked his eyelids, his eyes slowly rotating in their sockets.

This person's intuition was sending him the last and most important opportunity to turn his life around, now that he had fallen to such a state.

"People, so many people. The young Knight's subordinates." He muttered to himself, as if he had grasped something, yet as if he had not grasped it at all.

Hearing this person's self-talk, the old man turned his head to look at the dejected middle-aged man, and his kindness flared up, so he offered a reminder: "Looking at the scale, there are at least several hundred people. The food, clothing, and daily expenses for so many people are exactly the time for us Merchants to pull ourselves together and show our skills. Young man, seize this opportunity."

His gaze changed rapidly from confused to clear and spirited; the dejected middle-aged Merchant widened his eyes, first confirming once again that by the firelight in the distance were several hundred people, several hundred people who obeyed the young Knight. Then he looked at the old man holding a cowering youth.

He knew that youth; if the old man had not driven away the rats, that youth would have long ago had his throat bitten through and been killed by rats as big as cats while in a coma. Moreover, the old man had later given much of his own food to the dispirited youth to eat.

Everyone saw all of this, but at the time everyone was living from hand to mouth, and no one cared about this "meaningless" act of the old man. Only when the old man urged the youth to eat would he repeatedly tell the youth comforting words about opportunities for fate to turn around.

But no one expected that their already miserable situation would reach its most desperate moment during the Bandit civil war, only to be saved by the young Knight who suddenly appeared at the most desperate time.

"You, aren't you also a Merchant? And just now, the things you said, your skills must be quite significant! Why?"

The middle-aged man did not understand why the old man, who was also a Merchant, would not take this opportunity to turn things around and rise again?

Giving him the reminder for nothing, letting the opportunity go for him to take.

One must know that among those of them who were rescued, besides that youth and a wealthy middle-aged Merchant's wife, the others were all Merchant Guild Stewards and leaders captured by the Bandits.

Some were even the founders of small Merchant Guilds.

Facing the middle-aged man's confusion, the old man smiled and pointed to himself: "I am already quite old, and this time I was plundered and captured by the Bandits, then imprisoned and tortured for half a year; there is no possibility of returning home alive. After all, the journey is long. I would be very satisfied if my ashes could go back."

"And I don't need to worry about my family. To tell the truth, if I hadn't been a traveling Merchant my whole life and couldn't stay idle even in my old age, there wouldn't have been this disaster and suffering. I should have been enjoying life at home long ago and cultivating the younger generation."

Speaking of this, the old man stroked the hair of the cowering youth in his arms: "But it's not bad now; all the experience and knowledge of this old man's life has someone to carry it on, so I'm not afraid of leaving nothing behind after I die."

The middle-aged man nodded: "Do you need me to take your letters and that, find a chance to bring them back to your hometown later? Consider it me repaying this favor."

The old man shook his head, deliberately looking down at the youth, letting only this middle-aged man see: "Like this."

"Like this?"

"Like this."

The middle-aged man nodded in understanding, turning to discuss in a low voice with the old man the method of being the first to catch the young Knight's eye in the upcoming opportunity.

The old man didn't say much, just slightly pointing out a few key points he had observed; as for the rest, the other party was not a green, fledgling Merchant, so he naturally had his own skills and did not need much reminding from him.

The middle-aged man took a deep breath of the cold air, looking at the clearing and the bonfires getting closer and closer, as well as the hundreds of young people.

He felt that the opportunity to turn his life around was right before his eyes, and it was definitely his, and it would surely be his.