I'm not a lord

Chapter 169 As long as we don't attack the city, I won't lose.

The Duke of the Marsh's main force continued its eastward advance, now only fifty kilometers from the royal capital, Amber Harbor.

If they march at full speed, they can reach the city in less than two days.

But the Duke still did not intend to attack the city directly.

According to the information he has received, King Maurice has already gathered a large number of loyalist troops in the city, with a total number of no less than three thousand.

Although Maurice suffered a major defeat in Coron, he was still a formally crowned king and retained a certain degree of influence in the Crown Territory.

In addition, Amber Harbor is home to more than 20,000 citizens, and at least 3,000 armed citizens can be mobilized, which is also a force to be reckoned with.

The Duke of the Swamp has about the same number of troops he can mobilize as the city, around six thousand.

Of course, the morale of his troops was far higher than that of the defending troops.

If you take him out to fight in the wild, he'll most likely win.

However, King Maurice had the twelve-meter-high city wall as cover, and the defeat at Cologne was too crushing for him to be foolish enough to venture out of the city to fight the Duke in the open field again.

Amber Harbor is a coastal port located on the north bank of the Jinghe River. Its east and south sides are natural barriers, making its west and north sides suitable for attacking the city.

As the wealthiest city in the Northern Kingdom, the city's garrison is undoubtedly well-equipped and equipped with a large number of defensive weapons.

The difficulty of conquering this city is incomparable to that of Koren City.

After carefully analyzing the situation, the Duke of the Swamp was naturally unwilling to launch a full-scale attack.

A forced siege could result in defeat, and losing one battle could mean losing the entire game.

But as long as he doesn't attack the city, he will always be invincible.

It is currently mid-April.

He planned to spend one to two months gradually wearing down the patience of the city's defenders, ultimately achieving victory without a fight.

To this end, he formulated a three-step strategic plan.

The first step was to send the newly allied 'vassal armies' to attack in all directions, including nobles, bandits, and robbers, with the target being the rural territories surrounding Amber Harbor. The aim was to cut off Amber Harbor's food supply and leave the city isolated and helpless.

The second step was to send out the main force to besiege Amber Harbor, display a large number of flags to demonstrate the strength of their own forces and undermine the morale of the defending troops.

The third step was to continuously send envoys to contact the royal family and various forces within the city, exert pressure on them, promise them benefits, divide the resistance forces within the city, and accelerate the collapse of the city's will to resist.

This plan was certainly sound; if it could be implemented, King Maurice would ultimately have no choice but to surrender.

The only problem is that it takes a long time and is easily affected by external factors, thus ending without success.

The Duke of the Marsh chose this extremely time-consuming tactic mainly because he had the confidence to drag it out.

In the Crown Territory, he has already secured the allegiance of four powerful earls, including Earl of Coldwind.

Most cities along the Jinghe River also chose to surrender, obediently handing over gold coins and provisions.

Apart from Amber Harbor, there are no other significant resistance forces in the Crown Territory.

The Duke of the Marshland has no shortage of military funds or food, and is surrounded by nobles and cities that are loyal to him.

The morale of his troops remained high, and they did not resemble an army that had ventured deep into enemy territory alone at all.

The reason is that these soldiers all saw the dawn of a great victory.

They would all be founding heroes once their own duke donned the Northern Crown.

Because the recent series of operations had gone too smoothly, the Duke of the Swamp also revised his final strategic objectives.

Originally, he planned for his eldest son, László, to marry the little princess, while he would remain a duke and his eldest son would become king, eventually merging the two territories into one.

Now, he plans to be crowned king himself to guard the Crown Kingdom, and his eldest son will return to Golden Deer Castle after marrying the princess to take over the duchy in his place.

In his view, there was not much difference.

In any case, the throne and territory will eventually belong to his eldest son, so it's good to let his eldest son gain experience as a duke first, so that he can better inherit the throne in the future.

When László learned of this, he had no objection and even expressed his loyalty, lowering his usually proud head and saying, "Father, I will obey you in everything."

The Duke of the Marsh encouraged his eldest son, saying, "My son, Amber Harbor and the throne will ultimately be yours, and the entire North will be truly unified in your hands!"

True unification, of course, means eliminating the other two dukes and letting the glory of the crown shine on every corner of the North.

As for the two dukes, they were not worth mentioning in the eyes of the Duke of the Marsh.

The Duke of the Valley was young and lacked prestige, making it difficult for him to command respect. Even the earls under his command dared to defy him, and he was unable to organize a sizable army. At best, he could only stage demonstrations on the border.

As for the Duke of Meadow, although he was fierce and ruthless, he was limited by the size of his territory and the number of people, and could not achieve great things. In the end, he could only rob a little and run away like a bandit, and it was completely impossible for him to break through the castle defense line set up by the Duke of Swamp on the west side of his territory.

The Duke of the Swampland surveyed the North and found that the only threat to him was the newly emerged Lynn of White River Territory.

The geographical location of the Baihe River basin is too dangerous.

If Lynn can occupy Three Rivers City to the south, he can geographically connect with the Valley Duchy, completely cutting off the Marsh Duke's retreat route.

Fortunately, the Duke had a close relationship with Jürgen, the mayor of Terreux, and also had a large number of supporters in the city council.

According to the latest news from Jürgen, Three Rivers City has now cut off all trade with Lynn and plans to send ships to block the White River waterway in order to completely block the White River Territory's access to strategic materials.

Upon receiving the news, the Duke of the Marshland was overjoyed and wrote two urgent letters praising the Mikawa City Council.

In his letter, he promised that if Sanhe City could hold out until this autumn harvest, he would exempt Sanhe City from all city taxes for this year and the next two years.

He also secretly informed Jürgen that Jürgen would definitely have a place in the Council of Kings after he was crowned King of the North.

The changes in the White River basin did indeed give the Duke a fright.

However, Lynn is no longer able to obtain large quantities of strategic materials such as iron ingots, weapons, and armor. With only six small agricultural territories, he cannot cause any trouble.

As for breaching Sanhe City, that's utter nonsense.

How could the second largest autonomous city of the duchy be so easily conquered?
Indeed, the city was rife with factions, making it difficult to centralize power and the military.

But if Lynn dares to attack the city, the various factions within the city will surely unite against him.

The Duke had instructed his wife beforehand to keep a close eye on Lynn's movements and to send troops to aid Three Rivers if necessary.

Therefore, the Duke was quite at ease with the city of Sanhe.

However, the situation in Sanhe City had already taken a sharp turn for the worse.

Faced with the fortified city, Lynn's thoughts were surprisingly similar to those of the Duke of the Marsh.

As Lu Xun once said: "A general should consider defeat before victory, so that he can win every battle."

Lynn also believed that as long as he didn't attack the city, he would never lose.

Based on the intelligence gathered from Sanhe City, he had already ascertained the distribution of military forces within the city and was aware of the conflicts between the major factions. In fact, the conflict between the militia leader Kuno and the church was almost an open secret.

Simply find a tavern in Sanhe City, spend a night there, pay for two glasses of ale, and you're sure to hear some gossip from some old drunkards.

"You've heard of Bishop Rotterge, right? The one who's a city councilor. They say he likes young boys and often does dirty things in the city's churches, tsk tsk tsk."

"How do you think I know? Of course, I heard it from someone else. Oh, and I'll tell you a secret, but you absolutely mustn't tell anyone else."

"I suspect that Commander Kunno deliberately leaked this information. It is said that the boy's parents once caused trouble at the church gate and were almost beaten to death by the church guards. It was the commander who saved the poor family."

"The troupe leader is a good person, always willing to take care of us ordinary citizens, but what's the use? Even the mayor is a devout believer in the church!"

Lynn returned to River Marshland from White Bear Territory with his family. As soon as they disembarked, they received a secret report from Three Rivers City.

Starting in March of this year, Leon, at his behest, assembled an intelligence team.

This intelligence team was very small, consisting of only about ten people.

Their main task is to gather intelligence and information through various unorthodox methods.

Taverns, docks, brothels—valuable intelligence can be found in every dark corner of the city.

This kind of thing doesn't require highly skilled people to do.

Leon simply spent a small amount of money to hire some thugs, that's all.

These seemingly insignificant people from the city's lower class have repeatedly brought various small surprises.

After learning about the conflict between the two major military forces in Three Rivers City, Lynn's task became quite simple.

Outside the city, he would continue to plunder manors and rural areas, and try to annihilate the church's cavalry forces, destroying as much of the church's assets outside the city as possible.

Inside the city, he will cooperate with Leon to continue gathering intelligence, attempting to sow discord among the various factions within the city and incite conflict between them.

As Lynn arrived in the Marshlands, Hugh had already led his cavalry out of the camp and officially begun his raiding expedition.

In response to the fact that the church's armed forces were relatively dispersed but well-equipped, the second and third brothers devised a set of special tactics.

Looting, especially looting church estates with some defensive capabilities, naturally requires tactics.

Rushing in and grabbing indiscriminately is not only inefficient, but could also lead to being surrounded by enemy forces.

In order to complete the task assigned by his eldest brother quickly and well, the second brother divided the 150 riders into four teams with different tasks.

The vanguard of forty riders, clad in heavy plate armor and carrying lances, longswords, and crossbows, was tasked with breaching the makeshift defenses at the entrances to the manors and, after defeating the defenders, assisting the raiding party in collecting valuables.

The raiding party consisted of sixty horsemen, dressed only in light leather armor and a few chainmails, carrying longswords, leather bags and ropes. They were responsible for killing the serfs who resisted, driving livestock and transporting valuables, and were the main force for carrying out the raids.

The guard unit consisted of thirty riders, also light cavalry, carrying simple barricades. They were responsible for occupying key road intersections outside the manor to prevent militia reinforcements from surrounding manors. If they encountered a large number of elite enemy troops, they would light smoke signals to notify friendly forces to retreat.

The rearguard, consisting of twenty fully armed riders, operates around the guard unit to cover its movements. If necessary, they may attack the enemy and cover the safe withdrawal of other units.

The second brother truly lived up to his reputation as an elite bandit trained by Lynn.

He deeply understood the essence of small-scale cavalry raids, which was to use the mobility of cavalry to crush fixed strongholds.

The enemy forces were holding their positions, while our forces had the initiative to attack and the advantage of mobility.

If the tactics are executed properly, the cavalry's high mobility and flexibility can be relied upon to achieve the effect of coming and going like the wind.

The sun rises as usual on a new day.

On the western outskirts of Sanhe City, the serfs of the Niden Abbey estate also awoke from their sleep and prepared to begin their work for the day.

As its name suggests, this manor was under the jurisdiction of the 'Niden Abbey', which had more than 2,000 serfs, eight villages, and more than 40,000 mu of cultivated land.

The manor and monastery were protected by five lance units loyal to the church, consisting of fifteen elite cavalrymen and twenty infantrymen.

In addition, each village has a small militia led by the village head, responsible for daily guard duty and maintaining village security.

As early as this morning, Niden Monastery had already learned of the enemy's general movements and knew that an enemy force was building a camp to the north.

However, the abbot of the monastery did not issue an evacuation order.

On the one hand, he hadn't received any notification from his superiors, and on the other hand, he didn't know where to go.

The eight villages were scattered, making it difficult for the serfs who had worked all day to get up and run away in the middle of the night.

More importantly, the manor had just finished spring planting, and the wheat seedlings had only just sprouted. If they ran away at this time, who would take care of the wheat seedlings?
Last autumn, the estate was looted by a group of refugee rebels.

The seeds planted this year were barely scraped together by the serfs from their rations.

If there is no harvest this year, these two thousand serfs will either starve to death or become refugees.

Just as the serfs in the northern village were drinking thin porridge with pickled vegetables, the urgent whistles of sentries suddenly rang out from outside the village, followed by the sound of dense hooves and deafening shouts of battle.

This is also the second-in-command's move.

Of course, when robbing at night, you have to sneak into the village and not fire shots.

But during the day, the bigger the commotion, the better.

These cavalrymen under his command represent all of Lynn's cavalry force; the loss of even one of them would be a significant blow.

The loud shouts of the entire force, combined with the sound of horses' hooves, can create an overwhelming sense of 'thousands of troops,' effectively undermining the enemy's will to resist and minimizing one's own casualties.

Hearing the shouts of killing outside, the serfs didn't even have time to drink their porridge. They immediately dropped their wooden bowls and ran barefoot outside.

At this moment, the second brother had already led the vanguard to break through the village entrance sentry post and swept through the entire village like a black whirlwind.

Black horses trampled the wooden fence at the village entrance, black flags tore through the morning mist, and the vanguard riders, with burning torches on their lances, looked like the Grim Reaper.

They were all dressed in black smocks, their faces covered with black headscarves, and they were even equipped with five black skull and crossbones flags fluttering in the wind.

Everything was done to instill fear in the enemy and to establish the reputation of the 'Skull Gang'.

Yes, that's right. Of course, you need a name to commit robbery.

The 'Iron Dough' used in the Valley Duchy is definitely no longer usable.

In order to maximize the effect of fear, the second brother named this cavalry unit the 'Skull Regiment'.

Soon after storming into the village, his hawk-like eyes quickly locked onto the village head, who was fleeing in panic.

The main problem is that among a group of skinny people, there's only one fat person, which makes him stand out too much.

The second brother spurred his horse forward, beheaded the village headman with a single sword stroke, then raised his head high and roared to the sky: "Take the livestock and trample the wheat seedlings!"

The vanguard cavalry, who were following closely behind, shouted: "Kill all those who flee south! If you want to live, flee north, and Count Shirakawa will help anyone!"

Behind them, the raiding cavalry surged in like a tidal wave, quickly looting the entire village!
(End of this chapter)