Crusade against the Pope

Chapter 52: Organizing the Army
The Kingdom of Jerusalem was a young kingdom founded in 1099 in the Chinese calendar.

It has been exactly 87 years so far. During these 87 years, the royal family has changed again and again, and Anjou is the most prestigious one among the many royal families...

After all, the Kingdom of Jerusalem reached its peak in the hands of the House of Anjou, and it was also in the hands of the House of Anjou that the pagan armies were defeated several times. There was even the Leper King, a king with a legendary story.

And if we review the succession history of the throne of this kingdom, almost everyone would subconsciously feel that no mortal should be king in Jerusalem.

In the nine successions to the throne in 87 years, six generations of kings had no descendants, one generation of kings had no sons, one generation of kings had no daughters, and there was only one king who had both sons and daughters.

In such a difficult situation, the Anjou-Jerusalem Dynasty was able to occupy 9 seats among the 4 generations of kings and lead the kingdom to prosperity. Naturally, it had a very high reputation among the civilian Frank community.

When Gellis displayed the royal seal ring, the villagers present could not help but reveal expressions of admiration. The late King Baldwin IV had added so much sacredness to the pattern on the seal ring.

Of course, from another perspective, these villagers didn't really care about the authenticity of the seal ring. They didn't even realize that the young boy Isabel who was writing the record was the real owner.

The Royal Signet provided them with great righteousness, but what really moved them was Garys in front of them.

After Garys showed the scars on his body to the villagers present, everyone's expressions could be described as fanatical.

There is no need to deliberately display more miracles. Just this scar, which is impossible for an ordinary person to survive, is enough to make these people pray and admire subconsciously.

"Great Heavenly Father, everything is under your control. You are the supreme ruler."

"However, in this chaotic era, what we see is that the Mandate of Heaven has been profaned, and the throne is occupied by a pheasant instead of the rightful ruler."

"The order you established has been torn apart, and justice and truth have been buried."

"In this moment of rupture, you gave the man who died from the knife wound a mission. He is your son, and you are his father. He returned to the world to turn the world around. He should restore order and light."

"Now, I pray to you, may you give us extraordinary strength, wisdom and will, so that we can follow him and accomplish this great mission. May your grace and justice come again, re-establish the eternal truth and justice, and restore the world to its due peace and glory."

“Your kingdom come. Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.”

"Amen."

"Amen."

……

This meeting did not immediately lead to the conclusion of a long-term feudal contract.

However, there is a consensus that most of this year's summer taxes will be exempted.

In return, each village needs to send at least one-fifth of its young and strong men to come to Ahmed's residence for military training in order to prepare for potential cleansing operations by Reynard's army this year.

This number is actually not large, but Garys and his men still have high requirements for young and strong people. They are about to fight with real swords and guns. Compared with the advantage in quantity, Garys values ​​the stability of quality more.

After all, Gairis did not expect these newly recruited soldiers to fight bravely on the battlefield. The main reason why Gairis needed to recruit these peasants was to have a more stable infantry formation.

This is so that after the knights charge into the enemy's formation, reinforcements can rescue them, and so that the knights or themselves can be protected after being exhausted.

According to the experience of the Kingdom of Jerusalem over the past few decades, the knight's charge is invincible on the battlefield, but if there is a lack of a stable infantry formation in the rear.

Then the probability that the knight will not give it for free is as metaphysical as the carpenter John’s wife saying that she is a virgin.

The same goes for Garys. He doesn't know how many enemies he will face, whether he can absolutely deter the enemies, or whether there will be any accidents on the battlefield.

To this end, he should be more prepared and anticipate the enemy's weakness.

What's more, this is also an opportunity to facilitate more people to integrate into one's own religious group.

While young and strong men were being selected from each village and sent here, the three villages that had been taxed were also happily getting their taxes refunded.

Garys and his men did not return all the taxes collected by Ahmed at once. They retained a portion of the royal tithe, and the food would be used as rations for the training of new soldiers.

In addition, Garys and his team also used the money collected from Ahmed's family to buy some livestock from various villages to ensure that the recruits could get enough protein during training so that they could survive the arduous training.

There are roughly two to three hundred households in the nearby Frank villages, with two young and strong men in each household, which means about five to six hundred people. If one-fifth of them are selected to receive training, there will be more than a hundred people in total.

These more than one hundred people, together with some of the new recruits, almost formed a company.

Gellis appointed the knight Purdock, who had previously conducted military training for the villagers in Monterey Village, as the captain of the company and assigned two servants to assist him in training the group of new recruits.

As for the seven new recruits that Simon was training, Garys did not transfer them and let Simon continue training. This group of people, blessed by Garys, was called Paladin, which means holy warrior.

These recruits are different from the temporarily recruited militia. They have long-term service and have a strong religious warrior color. Their training intensity is higher and they follow more rules and regulations.

After passing the assessment, if they voluntarily take the oath, they will be awarded the title of Paladin, which is a lifelong honor.

As for the other knights, except for those who were assigned fixed positions by John, they all gathered in Ahmed's mansion and began to prepare for the battle.

When everyone had assembled, before starting to arrange the troops in more detail, Gailis gathered everyone at Ahmed's martial arts arena and stood on the stage.
"Today! Are you all united together because you want to rebel? No! It's because in today's world, if everyone doesn't stand up, they will soon die!"

"As far as I know, the amount of taxes that everyone has to pay every year has reached an appalling level! In the eyes of tax farmers and Reynard, the Frankish village is nothing more than a big treasury!"

"They are determined to take away at least 400% of the grain every year! After working hard for a year, each person can only get 160 pounds of grain, but those greedy guys want to take away 240%. Isn't that pounds of grain gone? The remaining pounds, is it enough for us to eat?"

　First update

　　
　
(End of this chapter)