Chapter 418 — The Road of Vengeance
Blade of Dawn · Page 2 of 4
The viscountess had by now presumably gathered the scattered remnants of the nobility in the northern regions and was leading them toward the Stonehold Fortress at the border of the Plains of the Holy Spirit. At her side were the loyal guards she had cultivated over ten years, along with several dozen well-trained, well-equipped Cecil soldiers. She was walking her road of vengeance, and she walked it without looking back, fearing no pain or hardship.
The hatred accumulated over ten years of endurance was not so easily discharged. To Gao Yang, the bombardment at Gravel Ridge was the beginning of the southern reconquest; to Viscountess Ropenny Geran, it was the starting point of vengeance. Frankly, Gao Yang had never imagined that a lady who appeared so frail and powerless would go this far—when her secret report arrived, stating that she would continue sending those nobles to their deaths, even he had been startled.
But he knew he had best let Ropenny do as she would. In this matter, no one could do it better, or with more devotion, than she.
All he had to do was keep the promises he had made—to destroy the last remnants of noble resistance when the time was ripe, and in the process to protect the Geran domain and protect her daughter.
He looked at little Patti, sitting beside him swinging her feet, and asked casually, "With your mother away from home, are you afraid?"
"Not afraid at all," Patti said, tilting her chin up proudly. "I'm ever so brave! And at night the maid stays with me... and lately there are new maids and guards in the castle, and they tell me stories too."
"New maids and guards, is that so." Gao Lan gave a perfunctory reply, feeling somewhat reassured.
Those so-called "maids and guards" had all entered Geran Castle before the war began, through the Viscountess Ropenny's channels. They were well-trained Steel Ranger soldiers and agents of the Military Intelligence Bureau, charged with protecting her castle and daughter while Ropenny Geran was away from her domain—and, on the other hand, with monitoring conditions in the Geran domain.
Gao Yang trusted Viscountess Ropenny a great deal. He believed that even for the sake of vengeance, the viscountess would never betray the covenant she had made with him. But he dared not trust the loyalty of the other people in this era's noble domains—especially in the Geran domain, a place with a history of rebellion. And Ropenny Geran herself clearly agreed.
No one could guarantee how long the Geran domain would remain stable with the viscountess away from her lands and her whereabouts "unknown." According to the intelligence Gao Yang had gathered so far, in the regions of Carroll, Peibo, and Consco, disorder had already broken out within a week of the news spreading that the noble coalition had suffered a crushing defeat. He could not allow the same to happen in the Geran domain.
Looking at little Patti before him, Gao Yang sank into thought.
By now Ropenny Geran should have reached Stonehold Fortress, or be on the verge of doing so. According to the timetable they had agreed upon earlier, it was time for him to send men to "receive" the Geran domain—after all, if the Cecil army, fresh from total victory, deliberately ignored the Geran domain, it would easily arouse suspicion.
……
Trudging across boundless, savage wilderness, eating the coarsest fare, wearing tattered clothes, wrestling not only with the mud and broken stones of the wild but also forever ready to do battle with the wolves and brown bears that roamed there... The past dozen days had been nothing short of a nightmare for Carroll and his companions.