Chapter 185

"Collecting tax is collecting tax, what collecting protection money? You really don't know how to speak." The brass dragon said unhappily.

Lisa disagreed and retorted: "Collecting tax is to invest in infrastructure, people's livelihood, and creating employment. If they don't do this, it's protection money. Are you more familiar with it, or am I?"

Negris instantly remembered Lisa's identity as a former saint. Sure enough, she was more qualified to judge than him, so he had to change his words: "Good, good, good, protection money. Why do they want to collect our protection money?"

Lisa glanced at him proudly: "It's not just collecting from us. Which family nearby hasn't been collected by them? But our momentum is big, so they sent more people."

"How many people are there?" Negris saw it himself very quickly. A full fifty riders were blocking the main road from Beauty City to the dock in a grand manner.

"Just this few people to collect protection money?" Negris was surprised.

Shafiya, who happened to come over, took the conversation: "It's quite good. They only sent twenty riders when they came to the oasis, and they were roared back by Lord Nai Aili."

"They also collect tax from your oasis?" Negris was surprised.

Shafiya shook her head: "In the end, they didn't collect it. First, the distance was too far, and second, they didn't want to conflict with Lord Nai Aili, so it was left unsettled. Beauty City is different. Although the distance is also very far, you can take a boat down the river, and the speed is much faster."

Negris scratched his head: "I'm not afraid of this. What I'm most worried about is that they will cut off the river. In this way, Beauty City's business will definitely be yellow. Have you asked Silver Coin? He has experience in this area. What suggestions does he have?"

The station of the Silver Knight Regiment is not very far from the river. They can easily split off a team to block the river, which is equivalent to directly cutting off the customers of Beauty City.

"President Silver Coin's meaning is to pull the enemy into the circle of interests, form a community of interests, let them help us promote and pull customers, and try to give up some interests, let them become our agents. After all, the Silver Knight Regiment's connections are wider than ours, rather than just paying tax," Lisa said.

"Eh, this idea is not bad. Using the connections of the Silver Knight Regiment to expand our customer flow is much better than just paying tax. Win-win. That's it, call them over. Uh, what is that guy doing?" Before he finished speaking, Negris suddenly asked in surprise.

I saw a knight of the Silver Knight Regiment, I don't know if he was bored waiting or what, suddenly ran out of the team, controlled his horse and stepped into the paddy field. The rice ears that had already been harvested and were about to be harvested were stepped into the mud by the horse's big hooves, splashing a wave of muddy water.

The knight laughed loudly, controlled the horse and wanted to leap forward again, shouting loudly: "Look at my horse skill!"

The horse leaped up for the second time and stepped down. A beam of light shone on the knight, flashing past. Half of the knight on the horse's back disappeared. The horse only felt light on its back, turned its head in confusion, and found that its master only had a pair of feet left.

Boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. From the side came the familiar shouts of the purple-bone Titans: "Don't grab, leave one for me. The third one from the left is mine."

"One, two, four, five, seven. Where is three?"

"One, two, then three. Can't you count?"

I saw Ang carrying a sickle, the little zombie burying his head in a charge, the little angel flapping his wings, leading a group of Titans to rush toward those silver knights.

"Sigh..." Negris sighed: "Alright, no need to choose. Eliminate the enemy." After finishing, he widened his eyes, bared his teeth, let out a roar like a young dragon, and rushed up with his little claws.

First, he was startled by the Holy Light Shine, and then he was startled by the Titans. Before these knights could react, they were submerged.

It wasn't until a week later that the God Knight of the Silver Knight Regiment, Trick, learned the news that this team had disappeared.

In the past few months, Trick had a very hard time. The only airship of the gnomes defected, and before leaving, it threw magic crystal bombs at the head of the camp. Fortunately, at that time, he was not in the command post, and only a few guards died.

However, he also took the opportunity to ask the Church for a lot of things and funding, which was not very bad. The worst thing was that the fallen angel ran to the Dark Side City.

This is a huge trouble. The Silver Knight Regiment was established to deal with the Dark Side City, and fundamentally had no ability to deal with enemies like fallen angels, and everyone was very afraid of facing fallen angels because they would be polluted.

Admittedly, now the Church, in order to appease those polluted people, has established a Fallen Knight establishment, and it is estimated that they are also studying ways to clear the fallen power. But the problem is, this will break up the organizational structure of the Silver Knight Regiment. After becoming a Fallen Knight, they might not be able to come back.

The Silver Knight Regiment has now become a tail-heavy interest group. Although there is no merit, the Church has to spend money to support them. Otherwise, those undead creatures in the Dark Side City might run out and make trouble, slaughtering one or two villages.

Luo Ge had sworn that since they came to the Dark Side City, they had never launched a large-scale slaughter of humans. Unfortunately, he had no way to confront the Silver Knight Regiment.

In order not to be targeted by Xia Mala, the Silver Knight Regiment took the initiative to retreat, away from the Dark Side City, and ran to the south of the East River. Several orders from the Church to encircle and suppress Xia Mala were dragged on and on by Trick on the grounds that the officers were seriously injured.

If Xia Mala takes root in the Dark Side City in the future, where should this Silver Knight Regiment go? Fight to the death to suppress Xia Mala?

Then the Church will say: You can even suppress fallen angels, what are those undead creatures in the Dark Side City? Continue to suppress, don't look for excuses.

If they don't suppress, and hide far away, the Church will also say: What is the use of you? No funding in the future.

Moreover, Trick already felt that with the independence of Anthony's Eastern Diocese, the atmosphere of the entire Church of Light had changed. The previous way of fishing in troubled waters was becoming less and less useful. Could it be that the Silver Knight Regiment, which had been established for more than two hundred years, was about to fall apart?

However, this worry was alleviated after hearing about the situation in Beauty City.

"You mean, the cost of one treatment in this Beauty City could be as high as tens of thousands of magic crystals? Once?" Trick asked in an unbelievable tone.

The deputy officer who reported was also unbelievable, nodding continuously and saying: "More than that, if you choose many items, the cost will double. For example, a seventy-year-old old woman wants to be ten, twenty, thirty years younger, the price is different. If it is a fifty-year-old old woman, the price is also different."

"And this is just wrinkle removal. Besides this, there are whitening, skin rejuvenation, disability treatment, bone shaving, height increase, enlargement, liposuction... Every item has a different price. I heard that Duke Leite's mother spent a full six hundred thousand magic crystals and became thirty years younger."

Trick's legs were weak from listening: "Six hundred thousand magic crystals?" Don't think that Ang earns hundreds of thousands of magic crystals from time to time and think magic crystals are worthless. Six hundred thousand magic crystals are already the tax revenue of an ordinary duchy for a year.

"If we collect sixty percent tax, wouldn't that be three hundred and sixty thousand magic crystals? It's worth three years of funding from the Church, and this is just one order?" Trick muttered and calculated.

Don't think that sixty percent tax is outrageous. In this day and age, which commoner's tax is not at this ratio? A territory that collects fifty percent tax is already very rare. A place that collects forty percent tax will be isolated and blocked by all lords, and they won't play with you, destroying the market price.

The tax rate must be unified across the plane, otherwise, the people will flow to low-tax areas.

Conscientious lords will count it as done after collecting tax. Some unscrupulous lords will also have apportionments, corvee, or split the tax into various names. Ordinary people don't have professional knowledge and can't calculate how much tax they have paid. If they calculate clearly, they will find that the tax and fees are as high as seventy or eighty percent.

This has led to the bankruptcy of many farmers, who have become slaves. Lord nobles will buy their land at low prices and then hire these bankrupt farmers to farm. Although they lost their freedom, their children lost their right to the first night, personal rights, etc., but at least they can eat and wear warm clothes.

This has also led to the appearance of people not as good as slaves in many places. In the Western Diocese, this situation is far more serious than in Anthony's Eastern Diocese.

Although Anthony cannot curb land annexation, he established a law many years ago: if believers in the diocese continue to decrease, the tithe in this territory will be increased to a fifth tax or even a second tax.

This tax is aimed at the lords, which leads to the lords in the Eastern Diocese leaving more room for exploitation and oppression, so as not to force the people to death. When encountering natural disasters, the enthusiasm for disaster relief is also very high. Otherwise, if too many people starve to death, Anthony will find ways to rectify them on the grounds of decreasing believers.

Now Beauty City has no lord, and it represents the Church itself. Is sixty percent tax a lot?

Of course, Trick just thought about it. He didn't know the background of Beauty City yet. What if they resist tax violently? But if sixty percent can't be collected, a fifth tax or tithe is also acceptable.

One-fifth of six hundred thousand is one hundred and twenty thousand, which is enough to offset the Church's funding for a year, enough to support their thousands of people. In this way, even if they lose the Church's support, they can still live.

Immersed in the beautiful imagination, a sharp shout suddenly came from outside the tent: "Who is it!"

Soon, the alarm sounded and went away quickly.

Trick increased his vigilance. Not long after, the guard returned to report: "The search holy light discovered a black warrior lurking outside the camp, and we took the holy spirit and chased it out."

"Black warrior? Is it Luo Ge from the Dark Side City?" Trick was surprised. Black warriors are man-made undead creatures, not something anyone can make. The only black warrior he knew was Luo Ge.

"Seems like it."

"Assassinate me?" Trick was surprised. If Luo Ge could assassinate him, he would have died tens of thousands of times. In order to guard against assassination, whether traveling or camping, various detection equipment was sufficient.

The guards around him had also undergone rich anti-stealth training, and he himself was a God Knight. His strength was not something that a pretty boy like Li Ao Na De could compare with.

Knowing it was impossible to assassinate him, why did Luo Ge still lurk outside the camp?

Trick immediately said: "Release flight units, scout the situation around the camp."

Trick's order had just been given, and the deputy officer returned very awkwardly: "My lord, you forgot, our last gnome airship defected, and the sub-dragon knight has been harassed by a unicorn recently, and has been scolding it for a week, and the sub-dragon is a bit irritable from being scolded."

"Scolding? Scolding what?" Trick asked in confusion. To say that he was attacked by a unicorn, stabbed by a horn, kicked by a hoof, he could understand, but scolding?

"Yes, scolding very ugly things. Something like dragon-born being ridden by people, ridden by thousands, not knowing shame, losing dragon face, having dragon birth but no dragon teaching, better to drain blood and change to urine, better to be urine-born..."

"Alright, alright, you don't need to repeat it in such detail. Sub-dragon? What reaction does the sub-dragon have?" Trick's head was buzzing. These words were too vicious. He could imagine what the sub-dragon's mood was when it was scolded.

Although the sub-dragon is a sub-dragon, it also has the arrogance and self-esteem of the dragon race. The greatest responsibility of a sub-dragon knight is not fighting, but serving the sub-dragon well, making it happy to do things. Being scolded, the mood is definitely not happy.

"The sub-dragon scolded it: You are the one being ridden. Then the unicorn replied: I am willing, are you willing? You are ridden by people and lose dragon face, is the giant dragon willing? There is a big pile behind, I won't repeat it. Anyway, the sub-dragon doesn't like to eat much recently, and doesn't like to let the knight ride it much."

Trick was dumbfounded for a long time before muttering: "Is this still a unicorn? A noble unicorn? Mouth so poisonous?"

Suddenly, a loud dragon roar crossed the sky. Trick rushed out of the tent, only to see a silver shadow flashing and flashing at high speed outside the camp, leaving a dragon roar.

In the camp, a manic roar sounded: "Damn silver dragon, don't think you are a superior dragon just because you can scold me, I will bite you to death!"

A huge warehouse was smashed, and a strange creature with a body length of twenty meters but a wingspan of forty meters, with a short and thick neck and almost no tail, smashed the roof of the warehouse and flew up.

Because the neck was short and there was no tail, this creature was much stronger than an ordinary giant dragon. It was only twenty meters long, but its thickness was comparable to an adult ancient dragon. Looking at its strong front claws, it was more like a giant bat than a giant dragon.

It flew up with a rustle and clumsily chased toward the silver shadow in the distance.

Trick couldn't help but scold: "Idiot, fat like a pig and still want to catch up with the silver dragon? People are deliberately leading you away, fool! Why is there a silver dragon? When did we offend the dragon race?"

Trick never thought, what if the sub-dragon is not stupid? What if the sub-dragon is deliberately chasing it?

The thick and fat sub-dragon flew away from the camp and began to ask the silver dragon in front in dragon language: "What do you mean by making me leave the camp quickly?"

"Awoo awoo!" The silver dragon roared.

"What do you mean? Speak dragon language," the fat sub-dragon said.

"￥#，@#￥#%，*%￥#（%……￥￥#……" The silver dragon said a long string.

The fat sub-dragon stopped: "Alright, I know." At this moment, it was looking back at the camp with its short and fat neck twisted. A flash of light exploded at the camp's position. In the dark night, it was like a group of holy light.

A few minutes ago, a gnome airship floated shakily above the camp of the Silver Knight Regiment, adjusting its position.

"Left a little, forward a little, forward a little more." Negris controlled the gnome with voice according to Ang's prompt. There was a black warrior lurking on the ground there. Ang could use the soul connection with him to determine the accurate position.

"Good, hover, wind speed east level 3, load magic egg." Negris shouted loudly.

Gear Master Waguli pushed a giant magic egg to the side of the board unwillingly, muttering:

"Magic egg is not used like this. Magic egg should be ejected by a dual-track cannon, drawing a beautiful parabola to hit the target. This conforms to the aesthetics of machinery, rather than throwing it down from the sky like this."

"What are you muttering about? Throw it quickly. If you don't throw it, I will throw your World Tree branches down and see if they can smash people to death." Negris scolded.

As soon as Waguli heard this, it was as if his butt was burned, and he pushed the magic egg out with all his might, falling freely toward the ground.

After pushing the magic egg, he didn't look at the result, ran back to the cabin, rushed to the corner and lifted the cover, seeing that bundle of branches lying there intact, and then he breathed a long sigh of relief.

The light and shock wave released by the magic egg overturned the entire camp.

In the chaos, before they could count the losses, the sound of rumbling horse hooves came from outside the camp. Thousands of sand people cavalry, three thousand undead creatures and chariots, led by dozens of Titans, rushed into the camp.

The silver knights panicked and released holy spirit angels. However, as soon as these angels appeared, they were pounced on by a black shadow, and the holy light on their bodies was looted.

"Fallen Angel Xia Mala! Xia Mala!" The camp was filled with panicked shouts.

That night, led by Xia Mala and the purple-bone Titans, with thousands of sand people cavalry, three thousand undead creatures and chariots, they wiped out thousands of silver knights and trainee knights.

Originally, in this kind of battle, killing one thousand would be estimated to lose five or six hundred, but unfortunately, Ang had too many ways to save people. Ordinary injuries were treated with Jing Yan Shu, broken arms and legs were treated with holy essence liquid, and even those who died were revived under the insect ash liquid.

Unless the whole head was smashed, then there was no soul, and they couldn't be saved.

Cleaning the battlefield, two days later, Anthony's communication came through: "Lord God of Knowledge, didn't we agree not to chop people? Why did you suddenly chop the entire Silver Knight Regiment? What to do now? Dai Sen of the Chenlun Land Diocese has launched a motion to eliminate all of you, just waiting for the vote to pass at the safety conference."

Negris laughed: "Hehe, hehe, no way, these knights have problems. They stepped on two rice seedlings in front of Ang."

"Stepped on two rice seedlings? That's not enough to chop everyone, right? Just let them pay?"

"Sigh, more than two. These guys have problems. I don't know how many paddy fields they stepped on along the way, and they chopped many date trees. Some green dates were beaten down before they were ripe, and they all rotted on the ground. The grass mats planted on both sides of the river were stepped on a lot, saying that running horses on the grass doesn't hurt the hooves. Ang was furious, I didn't dare to persuade."

Anthony was stunned for a long time before asking in surprise: "Are their hands so itchy?"

"Yes, if they just picked them to eat, Ang wouldn't care. The date trees on the road were planted for everyone to eat. But these guys just wouldn't. They ate the ripe ones, beat down the unripe ones, and ran horses in the rice fields, saying they were practicing horse skills. Sigh, looking for death." Negris sighed helplessly.

"Then what to do now?" Anthony was also speechless.

"I don't know what to do. At worst, go back to the Abyss of Peace. It mainly depends on what you do. I'll send something for you to see. You decide what to do. The Silver Knight Regiment defected to Dai Sen, do you know?" While speaking, he greeted people to carry things over.

A stripped corpse, it was Trick's. But as a God Knight, there were some strange tattoos on his back, tattoos that didn't look very bright.

Then there was a sculpture half a person high, then a finger bone. The finger bone was nothing strange, but this was a purple-gold finger bone. The problem was, sturdy bone Luoke's hands were complete. Whose finger bone was this?

Anthony started the teleportation array to receive, and replied: "Of course I know, otherwise where did those skeletons with undead bacteria come from? Didn't they come from the Chenlun Land?"

A flash of strong light, things were sent over. Anthony looked at those things and was silent for a long time. After a long time, he said: "I said someone defected to the evil god. It turns out someone really defected to the evil god. This is easy to handle. I established the Holy Church just to clean up the church polluted by the evil god. You accepted my secret bounty and discovered that the Silver Knight Regiment colluded with the evil god. In this way, I can speak justifiably."

A few days later, because of the abyss wanderers, the second motion was launched, and a strange voting result was obtained at the Plane Safety Conference: two votes in favor, five votes against, exactly the same as the last time.

The initiator of the motion, Dai Sen, undoubtedly voted in favor. The Dwarf War God expressed that he would vote in favor before the vote. If so, then what vote did the Pope cast?

Things were handed over, and Negris was very relieved. That guy Anthony was more cunning than him and would definitely find the best way to deal with it.

Going back to look, Ang, the little angel, and the little zombie were surrounding a sculpture. The style of the sculpture was the same as the one sent to Anthony, but now, the mouth of the sculpture had cracked a seam.

That was a spatial gap, a furry little claw stretched out, anxiously spread wide.

Ang took out a bean and put it in its palm. The little claw immediately shrank back, and the spatial gap disappeared. Not long after, the spatial crack opened again, and the little claw stretched out again.

Negris's head was buzzing. A claw penetrating the spatial crack, what kind of claw is this?

Ang's Hand of Dimensional Passage, penetrating space also almost exhausted him, and he slept for several months before recovering. Now this little claw easily penetrated space. Although I don't know what technique it used, the difficulty was absolutely not low.

Looking at it stretching out from the evil god's sculpture, could it be the evil god himself?

Ang took a small bean and fed it one by one. Others defected to the evil god, is he feeding the evil god?

No, if it were an evil god, just a bean, what is there to be anxious about.

Negris looked at the bean carefully, suddenly shocked, and pounced over, grabbing the bean from Ang's hand in advance.

The little claw couldn't get the bean, anxious, it stretched forward, almost stuffing its arm over. The little claw hooked desperately, like a cat's claw stuck in a bed crack.

Negris couldn't care about the evil god anymore. He looked at the bean in shock: "Elf bean? You grew it? Grafted it?"

PS: It's late, I squeezed out another chapter, three-in-one.