Knight Lord: Start with Daily Intelligence.

Chapter 373 Deer Blood Wine and the Growth of the Territory's Monster Cavalry

The expeditionary force was undoubtedly very large and impressive, with nearly 1000 elite knights, which was not a small number for any legion.

When this expeditionary force marches to Maleburg, it will at least be comparable to the power of an earl, and thus at least have the right to enter the tent for discussions. Unlike other barons and royal knights, they won't have to wait outside the tent, completely unaware of the decisions made from beginning to end.

However, supplying such a large army for more than a month to march to Maleburg and obtain enough food for the subsequent expedition was not an easy task, requiring a large amount of resources.

Su Li then asked, "How are your logistical preparations going? Do you need any support from the territory?"

As the Grand Master of the Expeditionary Legion, Grand Master Constantine calmly stated, "The Legion has raised 6500 gold coins during this period. This wealth is enough to buy more than 30000 tons of food. Divided equally, it is enough for each of us to consume 10 tons. We are not worried about food."

"Furthermore, we have reached agreements with as many as five caravans. A large caravan will follow our legion to provide supplies, trade with us, and recycle spoils of war."

Su Li nodded. The legion's considerations were quite comprehensive; this was basically enough for them to march all the way to Maleburg.

Once we reach Maleburg, supplies will be more plentiful. As for the subsequent operations of the entire army, that will naturally be left to a higher commander to oversee and plan.

However, Su Li felt that such a large army would not be an easy task even if it advanced into Mount Oka and established a base behind enemy lines. The marshal of the Suland Province would likely choose to divide his forces and launch a multi-pronged attack, then engage in a decisive battle in one place.

Grand Commander Constantine shared the same analysis. After all, when it comes to military deployments on a large scale, there are only a few methods. Aside from the Rebellion of the Seven States, it's impossible for an oddball like the King of Wu to have gathered two or three hundred thousand troops in one place.

So Constantine continued, "I anticipate that we will likely face a fierce battle in Mount Oka, especially after splitting up. The monsters are likely to focus their attacks on one area, so we should try to defeat them from different directions. Therefore, improving our combat strength is of paramount importance."

"We have no shortage of ordinary supplies, but we hope to receive Your Lordship's support for extraordinary pasture, extraordinary seeds, and extraordinary tools. These are the military and national supplies that can truly change the course of this fierce and stalemate war."

A fierce battle raged for two days and two nights in torrential rain. The outcome could very well be altered by a batch of extraordinary supplies. For example, Moonlight Clover could genuinely keep warhorses galloping for several more hours. Perhaps one more charge would secure the knights' ultimate victory!

In response to Grand Commander Constantine's request, Su Li generously replied, "Since everyone else has already sponsored the expeditionary force, I cannot be stingy or fall behind. Therefore, I will donate 1000 bundles of extraordinary pasture and 1000 catties of extraordinary seeds to the expeditionary force."

Upon hearing Su Li's generosity, Gilles and Constantine, as the commander and mentor of the expeditionary force, stood up simultaneously and solemnly and boldly assured Su Li, "We will certainly live up to the lord's expectations and win glorious honor for the lord in the expedition. Let the name of Black Forest Territory and the Goddess of the Sun be renowned throughout the expedition."

Su Li nodded in satisfaction and said to the group, "Then I'll leave the rest to you. If everything goes smoothly, I hope I won't have to worry about military matters anymore and can focus all my energy on developing the territory."

He had only just returned from the Spider Caverns, and since the Radiant Festival of the Sun Goddess, his energy had been focused on military and diplomatic affairs. It was time for him to refocus on developing his territory.

The knights, all of whom were exceptionally capable, immediately stood up and said, "My lord, we will take full responsibility for this matter and will certainly not cause you any trouble."

After the others left one by one, Sylvanas deliberately stayed behind last. Then, when the others weren't paying attention, she approached Su Li, extended a slender index finger, and gently poked his waist muscle, whispering, "Lord, are you alright? I was very worried about you. I heard you've been working hard these past few days, so I specially prepared deer blood wine for you in the forest."

"Deer blood wine?" Su Li's eyes lit up. He had been drinking a lot of dragon saliva recently, which had greatly increased his desires, but also caused him to expend a lot of energy.

Perhaps it is indeed possible to improve one's health through medication.

Sylvanas smiled, her eyes crinkling: "That's right, I led my men to kill the mutated stag king of the Emerald Forest. I specially collected its blood and then brewed a medicinal wine with strong rum, fresh lemons, and Stardew Orange. It's said to strengthen bones and muscles, replenish qi and blood, and more importantly, it can also help improve your health."

Improve your health?

Su Li immediately understood. He coughed lightly and replied seriously, "Then come to my room tonight and check if my back muscles are damaged. Also, use some medicinal wine to help me regulate my body and relieve my condition."

After calming down, Sylvanas blushed slightly upon hearing Su Li's words and quickly whispered, "We'll talk about it tonight." Without daring to look at Su Li again, she turned and fled, catching up with the others.

Su Li smiled; clearly, her previous cultivation had left an indelible impression on her.

The main reason was that it was to celebrate the successful completion of the Sun Goddess Glory Festival; otherwise, it wouldn't be so exciting and thrilling on ordinary days.

After Sylvanas left, Su Li turned to Hilder and asked, "My steward, is there anything else scheduled for today?"

Hilde nodded slightly and said, "If you have the time, His Excellency Vandal Oak, the Minister of Agriculture and Steward of the Treasury, would like to report to you on the current situation in the territory."

"Oh, he's here to report on the work summary I asked him to do before, right?" Su Li suddenly remembered this.

During the harvest season, Su Li instructed him to take advantage of the Sun Goddess's Radiant Festival to compile statistics on the harvest in the territory.

At least a year has passed, and Su Li now clearly understands the classification and yield of various grains in his territory.

This is actually a very normal territory statistic. Basically, every lord should be clear about the output of various resources under their jurisdiction.

The statistics bureau does this job, but everything in the territory is nominally Su Li's wealth, so Fandall, as the treasury manager, also takes on this responsibility.

Hilde replied, "That is indeed the case, and summer planting has already begun. The Church of Dawn has a very positive drive to promote the overall development of farming in the territory, and he needs to report to you about it."

“Then let him come over.” Su Li thought for a moment. He didn’t really have anything to do that morning. After all, he had just been completely drained by Ariria, so he had nothing better to do. “I’ll talk to him about the bishopric.”

Following Su Li's orders, Fandral quickly arrived at the castle.

Instead of staying in the manor, Su Li climbed the castle walls and gazed at the beautiful scenery of Black Forest Territory.

It is now early summer, a time when flowers are in full bloom and trees are lush and green. The vast foothills north of the Bauhinia Palace, extending to the green hills, are the noble lands of the estate. This foothills have not been cultivated, and the land is exceptionally beautiful, dotted with endless plains and verdant forests, giving people a feeling of endless vitality and energy.

If the world weren't so dangerous, this estate would truly be a picturesque place, a perfect example of idyllic pastoral life.

As he was thinking, Fandral's giant eagle landed on the castle's terrace, where the castle's aerial mounts took off and landed. In front of the tall castle, the square was spacious and imposing.

The armed attendants immediately stepped forward, took the giant eagle away, and then led Fandral to Su Li.

Before he could get to the point, Su Li asked another question: "My minister, have you taken stock of how many monsters there are in our territory?"

“Monsters?” Fandral asked calmly. “My lord, do you mean mounts other than warhorses?”

“That’s right.” Su Li looked at the giant eagle that had been taken away and said, “Monster cavalry is the most powerful type of military force in the empire, and our territory must also pay attention to it. Before, the scale was insufficient, so we raised them in a scattered manner. Now we should have a certain number, and we should form several monster cavalry units.”

Fandall had clearly taken stock of all this, so he calmly replied, "If we're talking about monster cavalry, we do have quite a few in our territory."

"Currently, there are two Silverhorn Giant Deer in the territory. These are powerful forest sacred beasts that can produce Moonlight Alfalfa. Lady Luna Deshan has tamed one, while the other remains in the Sacred Forest without any activity."

"Lady Luna Deshan tamed a silver-horned giant stag?" Su Li immediately smiled; this was an unexpected delight.

The Giant Deer Cavalry is essentially the top-tier unit of the Church of Tar, comparable to the Griffin Riders of the Human Empire. Of course, the Church of Tar has an even more elite unit, but it almost never belongs to human factions, so human territories generally disregard it when taking stock—that unit is the Dragoon.

Su Li didn't expect Luna Deshan to be able to tame a dragon. He had already gone through a lot of trouble to ride a dragon. If Luna Deshan wanted to ride a dragon, wouldn't she have to sacrifice herself?

After all, dragons are inherently addicted. Wait a minute, Su Li suddenly realized that deer seem to be the same way. Otherwise, why would Sylvanas have given him deer blood wine?
He was suddenly filled with curiosity and asked, "How did Lady Luna Deshan tame the giant deer?"

His eyes were practically brimming with gossip.

He also remembered that Luna Deshan, the handmaid of Tal, was quite wild. During the summer solstice celebration, she couldn't control her eyes and would wander around looking for male knights with exposed muscles. She would unconsciously move her feet towards the area with the most male knights with exposed muscles.

You can always find this maid next to the most imposing and handsome knight.

Fandall's thoughts were much simpler than Su Li's. He smiled and said, "Speaking of this, I also admire Lady Luna Deshan. She really gave her all for the sake of spreading the faith. After the giant stags rejected her many times, she simply moved to the Sacred Forest and lived with the giant stags day and night, sharing food and shelter, and taking care of the two giant stags."

"Her passion and devotion, after passing Tal's test, finally moved a silver-horned giant stag, which signed a contract with her and became her guardian beast. You must know that this is not easy, as giant stags only become the mounts of the purest maidens, and Lady Luna Deshan has undoubtedly proven herself."

The purest girl, huh?
Looks like there's no big gossip to be had. But Su Li remembers that these giant stags weren't so principled back then. They were quite resistant to Luna Deshan, the pure priestess, and much closer to Hilde, who carried Su Li's aura.

Regardless, the Church of Tar seems to be thriving.

Su Li asked curiously, "How many people are there in Luna Deshan and their church now?"

Fandall shook his head regretfully: "Only Lady Luna Deshan knows the specifics. I only know that, with your intelligence, the Church of Tar currently has three Giant Deer. In case of an emergency, they can deploy three Giant Deer Knights."

"As you know, seeing a giant stag is not just seeing a wild beast; it represents the core of the forest being given form and vividly presented before the world. A knight riding a giant stag will have extraordinary power on the battlefield of the forest. Even charging on the plains, a giant stag rider can easily knock away more than a dozen goblins."

"Another type similar to the giant stag is the giant eagle. Our territory currently has two war eagles and four giant eagles. These flying mounts can carry archers or druids, and their support capabilities on the battlefield are very significant."

"The most numerous flying riders are undoubtedly the Grey Swan riders. Currently, thanks to the prosperity of our territory, the halflings have earned a considerable fortune. It is said that there are already more than 40 Grey Swans in their territory, but no one can confirm this information. According to the agreement, there are still 24 Grey Swan riders serving us."

These monsters were considered mounts for other races and churches, so the most important things for the territory next were griffins and pegasus!
Fandall reported in detail: "Currently, there are a total of 5 griffins in the territory, namely Deathclaw, Tiger Soul - Calamity Mark, Tear Bloodstain, Severe Mane - Storm Wings, and Golden Thunder."

Griffins are so prestigious that within the empire, each tiger-striped griffin is unique, has its own name, and can be clearly distinguished from other griffins.

These five griffins held extremely high status in the Black Forest Territory, serving as mounts for military commanders, whose owners were at least champion knights.

Including Jin Ting, whose master, Orion, is a Sun Knight who is very skilled at fighting the undead. With him as the mentor of the Sun Knights, the Sun Knights' attack, defense, skills and other aspects in fighting the undead will be significantly improved.

"Next are the half-griffins. After being tamed in the griffin forest and collecting half-griffin eggs, we now have as many as 36 half-griffins in our territory."

"Still only 30-something?" It seems the growth rate of this half-griffin isn't fast. He remembered the last time it was close to 30. It's still only 36, equivalent to one and a half battle groups. The growth rate is a bit slow.

Fandall immediately replied, "The main reason is that the knights have been focusing their energy on the Sun Goddess's Radiant Festival and the Holy Crusade during this period, so fewer of them have gone to the Griffin Forest."

"Even so, we have seen growth because the griffin grove we built in the Green Hills has gradually taken shape. There are now nearly 20 griffins living there, and some of them became pregnant after spring and successfully gave birth to new griffins."

That's definitely good news.

Su Li asked excitedly, "Griffins are being produced so quickly? That's much faster than I expected."

Fandall laughed and said, "This involves the gestation period of the griffin. It is a hybrid of a lion and an eagle, so its gestation period is somewhere between the two. But the gestation period of a lion is only about 110 days."

110 days, less than four months, that's really fast.

Fandall continued, "Only one half-griffin has successfully conceived this year, and there may be more next year. But Your Majesty, you should not expect a large number of offspring. Half-griffins are very difficult to tame, and this griffin was able to conceive only because the griffin forest we have created is still quite similar to the wild environment."

"Once the scale gradually expands and it becomes a pasture, the half-griffins will lose their ability to reproduce."

Su Li remembered this very clearly. Fandral had mentioned it many times before: there is no such thing as a tamed griffin in the world. Human attempts to breed griffins have almost never been successful.

Therefore, even powerful knightly orders always send knights to the Griffin Forest to challenge, rather than breeding Griffin offspring themselves. Perhaps these noble creatures lose their proud nature and reproductive ability once they are sent to pastures.

So Su Li pondered for a moment and said, "We can solve this problem by building more griffin forests. Anyway, the green hills to the north will not be developed and will maintain their natural ecology. We can set up more forest farms in the green fields, so even if only one griffin in each griffin forest can get pregnant, our griffin population can still grow slowly."

Fandall frowned slightly and said, “This is not easy, my lord. You must know that maintaining a griffon forest requires the participation of at least one druid and two nuns from the Church of Dawn. They have to constantly plant trees and communicate with the griffons. Even with the ability to soothe them, a nun died in the griffon forest last year.”

"If you want to build more Griffin Forests, the consumption of both manpower and material resources will be enormous."

Su Li smiled and said, "This is one of the reasons I invited you here. I plan to invest a large sum of money in the bishops' conference to expand the development of all churches. This scale will not be less than 10000 gold crowns, and your Dawn Church can obtain a fortune of nearly 2000 gold crowns from it. What are your plans?"

10000 gold crowns—that's definitely not a small amount.

In other words, Su Li made a fortune through the Glorious Arena and this cleanup of the Spider Nest; otherwise, it would have been difficult for him to directly donate more than 10000 gold crowns to the church.

This is essentially donating the money directly to someone else. From now on, Su Li will have no way to interfere with how the money is used; it will be entirely up to the church to decide.

Aside from gaining considerable goodwill from the church and political influence, Su Li couldn't obtain any other direct benefits. The main gains were in promoting development, with the potential to indirectly benefit from the future expansion of his territory.

Such a large donation caused the wrinkles on Fandall's old face to gather instantly, like a blooming flower, as he excitedly said, "My lord, if your donation arrives, we have so many plans and ideas in mind."

"First and foremost is the issue of the Griffin Forest that you mentioned. We will resolve it as soon as possible. We will recruit more church members to help strengthen and prosper our villages, farms, and ranches."

“Then we will build more buildings of Rhea’s grace. You know, faith in Rhea is strongest where the goddess’s grace is most needed—in the countryside, in the fields and on the farms. The ancient stone circles and Ogan stelae are her temples, some of which even date back to before humans came to the Old World. We will rebuild these temples and ancient ruins so that the territory may be bathed in more of Rhea’s grace.”

"Of course, we will also further suppress the Church of the Drunkard Aholt, whose followers have been spotted in our territory."

Su Li raised an eyebrow and asked, "Does your Rhea Church also have opposing churches? Tell me about this deity."

"The bloodthirsty Aholt is a primordial fertility god who existed before the descent of Emperor Ridmar, and his church has recently appeared in the south of the empire. His priests burn prisoners imprisoned in wicker dolls and indulge in the worship of dark gods who demand human sacrifices to feed them. Aholt hates Tal and Rhea for usurping his rule—if the priests of the latter two are captured by his followers, they become sacrifices that are particularly pleasing to Aholt. Rhea's priestesses hope to suppress the abominable Aholt church. But worse, some of the church's rituals may be mistaken for Rhea's rituals."

There are quite a few gods in the Imperial Pantheon.

However, Fandral was clearly unwilling to talk much about this evil god, since some of his powers could easily arouse the interest of the lords.

So he continued, “Of course, the most important thing is to improve the priesthood of our church so that we can supervise the people to improve their production. The priestesses of Rhea are often compassionate. They are honest and straightforward, but they are also empathetic in making their admonitions and advice not too sharp. When faced with people who have betrayed their lovers, are greedy, or are lazy during the harvest season, the priestesses can also become strict and firm.”

"With more sacrifices, during the subsequent planting and harvest seasons, the lazy commoners can be supervised to work harder and store more food to cope with possible years of famine and crisis."

Su Li nodded slightly. There was no doubt that in the Black Forest Territory, the followers of the Rhea Church played the role of encouraging agriculture.

Perhaps this is what distinguishes the empire from the East.

(End of this chapter)