Chapter 71: Celebration Village, Bell's Welcome, Temporary Rest

Celebration Village was currently teeming with people: returning villagers, family soldiers led by Bell, young masters and misses from Knight Families, stationed Town Guards, noble Priest gentlemen, Merchant Guild assistants coming and going to provide supplies, and carriage convoys traveling incessantly between the village and Yemei Town, and so on.

The gathering of these people instantly made this small village the liveliest and most powerful place in the entire Sasi County.

Because the parasitic monsters in the surrounding area had long since been wiped out, some of the original villagers were already spontaneously venturing out of the village to try and plant some fast-growing vegetables.

After all, the various people mentioned above needed to eat fresh food, even if the Merchant Guild in town had been providing a steady stream of various cured meat and storable root vegetables these days.

"Things are getting better," Jier sighed.

When he first arrived here, the entire northern part of Sasi County was desolate, every village was empty, and the fields were left abandoned on the land.

But now, with their continuous fighting over the past few days, the situation in the entire Sasi County was improving step by step and gradually returning to the right track. The farmers starting to plant vegetables outside the village was a good start.

Don't ask where the water for watering the fields came from; although it hadn't rained, siphoning a little from the well water in Celebration Village was enough for irrigation. This was also a special order issued by Bell-Sasi.

The busyness of the farmers in Celebration Village also allowed the various other people temporarily stationed in the village to see that their efforts over these days had yielded results, and their morale was unconsciously boosted.

The drinking water that everyone lacked daily was brought in specifically from Yemei Town by two carriages dedicated to hauling large water barrels.

"Hey! I'm Jier! Notify Bell-Sasi that we have successfully completed our mission and returned! Open the village gate."

Jier shouted toward the village gate ahead; a dozen people were squeezed into a small space on the village gate, which was quite an interesting scene.

Soon, someone opened the south-facing village gate for the convoy, allowing Jier's convoy to enter Celebration Village along the road through the fields.

Along the way, because it hadn't rained for a long time and the carriages had to travel back and forth many times every day, the road was full of dust. When the convoy passed through here, the dust kicked up by the horses' hooves and wheels left every Warrior in the carriage covered in grime, and everyone had to keep spitting out the dust that had choked into their mouths.

Jier had long since kept his distance from the convoy and entered Celebration Village on horseback ahead of time.

As soon as he entered, he saw many Town Guards holding weapons lazily hiding in the shadows of the surrounding buildings and under the shade of trees; every farmer's courtyard was covered with the Town Guards' bedding and some personal items.

The villagers who had already returned were staying at home, and no one in the family was allowed to leave the house except for the adult males.

Most of them were lying by the windows on the second floor of their houses, watching the people outside to relieve their boredom.

The arrival of Jier and the others immediately gave everyone a new topic of conversation; they watched Jier riding past from afar, admiring the gorgeous cloak on Jier that fluttered in the wind, and secretly discussing just how hot Jier's gorgeous black-faced, red-bottomed cloak would be in this weather.

After all, black absorbs heat—that was something even a fool knew.

Jier, who had originally wanted to show off, almost bit his teeth to pieces; these ignorant fellows, didn't they see how good-looking this cloak was, and how well it matched his iron-gray plate armor!

Therefore, Jier rode to the center of the village with a sour face and found Bell's tent, which had guards, among a patch of tents.

But the other party was not there; a servant of the Sasi Family guided Jier to a village house nearby—that was a village building used to host merchants for trade and lodging, and at this moment, some of the big figures in Celebration Village were resting there, discussing matters of the counterattack.

"Find a place for my men and the convoy to rest and camp; you don't need to worry about how we sleep, just provide some open space. In this hot weather, sleeping on the ground at night is fine. But you need to ensure a large amount of water for drinking, cleaning weapons and equipment, and feeding and washing the horses."

Jier instructed the Sasi Family servant who was leading the way, and the other party nodded one by one: "Rest assured, my lord, we have had relevant experience in dealing with this these days. It's just this two-story building ahead."

This was a festive-looking two-story wooden building, which seemed to have been built specifically with different colors and types of wood; in a village where the shape and color were monotonous, it was undoubtedly an eye-catching place.

"Knight Qiao-Jier has arrived! Knight Qiao-Jier has arrived!" The servant took the initiative to push open the movable wooden door of the house and shouted loudly into the room from the side of the door. He did not enter himself; after bowing to signal Jier to enter, the servant took the initiative to step back to go and greet the entire convoy that was approaching with a rumble.

"Welcome, I've been waiting for you for a long time."

Bell-Sasi walked out from a room nearby, walking quickly with a smile on his face.

He was wearing a set of simple Swordsman armor, but he was not wearing a helmet on his head; instead, he wore a silver coronet inlaid with Gems.

Bell opened his arms to hug Jier, but was forced back by the smell on Jier's body when he got close.

"Haha, fighting for days without time to properly rest and clean up, there's no helping that." Jier smiled and deliberately acted mischievously by stepping forward to bear-hug Bell.

Bell had no choice but to pinch his nose and pat Jier on the back.

Following the Heir of the Sasi Family as he walked out were several young men and women from Knight Families; these people were Bell's staunch supporters who, in the future, would be like their fathers, guarding Bell's side and ruling the entire northern part of Sasi County together.

As for the southern region, it was sparsely populated and was a traditional area of influence for the Agricultural God Church; nominally it belonged to the rule of the Sasi Family, but in reality, apart from paying grain taxes, there was no need for outsiders to intervene in its governance.

"Then do you want to rest for a while first, and after we eat tonight, I will call all the important figures in the village to discuss the counterattack together? Actually, we have discussed these things repeatedly many times, but when it comes to the counterattack, no one can replace you and your Warriors."

Bell sighed and said: "It is truly shameful, whether it is handing such a heavy task to you, or that matter regarding the Sun God Church."

After he finished speaking, he looked steadily at Jier's face, especially Jier's eyes: "Did that 【Sun Child】 really not affect you much?"

Jier scratched his cheek, leaned his head to Bell's ear, and whispered: "The Sun God is the most foolish deity."

Hearing this, Bell almost couldn't keep a straight face, but he still understood what Jier meant, so he laughed: "It seems that what the Priests said was too serious, and the magical means don't seem to be that magical?"

"Perhaps? Maybe this method is one that only takes effect slowly? These days, the Agricultural God Priests in my team have been telling me about the Agricultural God and the Agricultural God Church in my ears without stopping; they say this is to hedge against the mental influence."

"Does it seem to have some effect?" Bell asked in surprise.

Jier curled his lips: "At least I am now incomparably familiar with the history of the Agricultural God Church. Speaking of which, thousands of years ago, during the rule of the Magic Empire..."

"Stop, stop, stop, I'm not curious about the stories of the great Agricultural God. As a family Heir, knowing the history of the church of our God of Nobility is enough. Listening to too many stories of other gods will affect my Faith in the God of Nobility."

Jier had actually always been curious about the Faith of this God of Nobility, because compared to other gods who had a broad base of believers, the followers of this God of Nobility seemed pitifully few; only in this Saint Hors Kingdom did the nobles of all levels seem to be believers and Priests of the God of Nobility?

This way of preaching and existing, which was very different from other god churches, made Jier very curious.

But Bell clearly didn't want to discuss this in public. He briefly introduced to Jier the young men and women from the Knight Families in their teens and twenties, most of whom Jier had met once before at the Sasi Family banquet in Yemei Town.

At this moment, they were formally introduced to Jier.

These people were the chosen successors for the next generation of Knight titles and status in the various Knight Lord families of Sasi County; naturally, they all had to undergo Knight Training. It was just that because their fathers were still robust, none of the families had officially conducted Knight Training, but were instead carrying out some early accumulation for Knight Training.

That is, diligently practicing various martial arts. This included horseback riding, wearing armor, fighting unarmed in armor, fighting with weapons in armor, lance fighting, ground archery, horse archery, and a large amount of training in using various weapons on the ground.

To say nothing else, they were all quite tall and robust, regardless of gender; one look and you could tell they were excellent Knight prospects who could fight ten men.

As long as they underwent Knight Training and accumulated Life Energy, they could fight one against a hundred and sweep across the army.

This was the most fundamental violence used by local nobles to maintain their rule.

As long as the noble held firmly onto these Knights who swore allegiance to him, he could naturally sit firmly in his position as a Lord. From a young age, Bell had grown up with these children of Knight Families who were not far from his age; they received literacy education together in the family manor and uniformly received martial arts training from various Knights.

They learned to ride horses together, ate together, and went out to hunt fierce beasts together.

Unless someone fell ill or died due to an accidental injury, they would grow up together, and the number would always be maintained.

But although they were both male and female, they would not have romantic relationships; after all, in the future, they would all have to inherit their respective family territories and status. If a certain female Knight married Bell and became Bell's first or second wife, then what would happen to that female Knight's family territory? Who would inherit it? Cultivate a new Knight?

How would the cultivation resources and expenses in between be calculated? Would the Sasi Family pay?

Therefore, when Bell introduced them at this time, these people were like childhood sweethearts who grew up together, but there was only familiarity between them, and no other deeper emotions. Jier could also intuitively feel this point.

"Then, I'll go wash up and rest for a while now. After eating tonight, I'll come back to discuss the counterattack for tomorrow together."

Jier's group was the last batch of reinforcements to arrive for the counterattack, and they were also the primary combat force; after all, they had killed an unknown number of parasitic Monster in recent days, and everyone could significantly feel their strength through the daily changes in the battle line.

The place temporarily provided for Jier and his men to stay was on the west side of the Cunzi, where several Farmer courtyards had been specifically cleared out, and it had been arranged with one household for Jier to spend the night in their house.

Although Jier had his own tent, because this battle required rapid movement, the caravan had not brought these things along, and they were still sitting in the courtyard of the Caimen Inn in Yemei Town.

These days, everyone had been staying directly in the houses of the Villager, or resting wherever they could inside the village buildings. This was not bad; after all, compared to tents, fixed houses were more comfortable.

Jier did not rest immediately, but instead first removed the Horse Armor, Weapon Rack, horse Backpack, Muan, and other equipment from Tianxuecao in the Farmer's courtyard, then used buckets of clean water arranged by his attendants to wash Tianxuecao's body; firstly to cool it down, secondly to clean the parasites off the horse, and thirdly to comb out the knotted hair and wash away the dirt and dust accumulated along the way.

Afterwards, he checked Tianxuecao's Horseshoe to see if they needed to be re-nailed. Because a horse's hooves were actually their nails, they were constantly growing. It was necessary to trim away the grown hoof and re-nail the Horseshoe every so often.

After finishing everything, Jier then tended to Tianxuecao, letting it drink water and eat, strengthening the bond between Knight and warhorse.

He and it were comrades-in-arms who entrusted their lives to each other, and their relationship was far more intimate than outsiders imagined. Usually, when not riding, Jier left the feeding and other work for Tianxuecao to his subordinates, the horse handlers, but when out fighting, Jier would handle these tasks himself if he wasn't too busy.

And this cultivation of their relationship also made Tianxuecao completely obey Jier's commands on the battlefield; even if Jier drove it to charge straight at a wall, or to charge into a Long Spear formation against its own instincts, it would obey Jier's command.

After tending to Tianxuecao and letting it move about freely in the courtyard, Jier finally took off his own Armor and weapon equipment, then removed the scale Inner Armor under the Armor, and washed his body with clean water while naked.

His hair had grown a bit longer; although it looked good, it was inconvenient for putting on and taking off his Helmet.

Thus, Jier picked up the Magic Dagger 【Heart Fire】 and personally trimmed his hair quite a bit shorter.

Tianxuecao seemed very curious about the hair that fell to the ground, lowering its head to use its tongue to sweep Jier's hair into its mouth.

"Hey, why are you eating that? Can you even digest it?"

Jier pried at Tianxuecao's mouth, but the horse had already swallowed his hair, and Jier had no choice but to let it eat the hair he had shed.

Having trimmed his hair, Jier lowered his head to look at his reflection in the bucket of clean water and nodded with satisfaction.

Afterwards, he changed into a set of comfortable casual clothes.

His weapon equipment was guarded by specialized Warrior subordinates, so there was no need to worry about it being stolen, and both the Yueshui Skull Two-Handed Axe and the Hunting Sword were placed by Jier next to his weapon equipment; without his consent, if others wanted to take Jier's things, they would be scared off by these two Spirit weapons.

Of course, they wouldn't just be scared off; these were bloodthirsty weapons that only recognized Jier and no one else. The Yueshui Skull Two-Handed Axe only killed wild beasts and Monster, not Human, and perhaps would only use its axe handle to knock people down and drive them away, but the Hunting Sword would truly fly out to kill people.

Jier himself couldn't remember how many people he had killed with this weapon, and his weapon perhaps didn't remember the number either.

He walked into the farmhouse belonging to the Farmer, and under the humble greeting of the owner, went to the second floor of the house and threw himself onto the large bed in the owner's room.

"Ouch!"

A cry came from the bed. Jier raised an eyebrow, lifted the thin quilt, and saw that it was actually a young girl in her teens.

Pushing open the door, Jier gave a look to the Farmer owner guarding outside the door and pointed at the girl cowering on the bed: "Who is this?"

"Replying to the master, this is my daughter. She has long admired your bravery, so she volunteered to come and serve you."

The middle-aged Farmer said with a smile on his face, looking as if it were a matter of course.

Jier smiled and shrugged, chased the person on the bed out, and slammed the door shut with a bang.

He was exhausted to death; where would he have the energy for this? Besides, your daughter isn't even that pretty! Jier's current body was that of a young and excellent youth; if something really happened, it was hard to say who would be the one at a disadvantage.

Jier slept from the afternoon until just after nightfall.

He did not rest in the Lady's Dream mainly because he really did not want to affect his lifespan by staying in the dream for too long.

Because he had once spent several months in the dream in one go to avoid the terrifying fire created by a Hunter under the God of Hunting, his actual age at that time had developed a gap of several months from what his age should have been in the World of the Living.

A few months was not yet very obvious. But if Jier stayed in the Lady's Dream without limit, then in the eyes of outsiders, he would only grow rapidly and then age prematurely, and his lifespan might not be as long as others.

Although subjectively, everything was normal for him.

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