“It’s delicious!”
"It's delicious, and the heat is just right. Did you roast it?"
"Uh... no, this one was roasted specially for you by Miss Befa!"
Lily scratched her head a little embarrassedly. Although she was a master at making poisons, her cooking skills were average. Plus, she was a foodie, so she admired two people the most in the team.
One is Befa, who cooks delicious food, and the other is Yoel, who cooks food that can be poisonous to death.
The latter was secretly practicing making soup one night (wanting to make it for Dick), and Lily, who sneaked into the kitchen for a midnight snack, accidentally took a small sip.
As a result, Lily, whose physique was so special that she could not be killed by mustard gas, was knocked unconscious for a day and a night by this mouthful of soup. The first thing she did when she woke up the next day was to ask Yoel to become her apprentice, wanting to learn her super invincible craft. Yoel was so confused that he quickly said that he really did not know how to make poison.
Dick was at the scene at the time. When he heard that Joel was practicing cooking for himself, his gloating smile instantly shifted to Rita's face next to him.
In the warm spring sunshine, Dick leisurely ate roasted corn and looked at the pastoral scenery in the distance.
Lily stood beside him, her bright pink eyes would occasionally steal a glance at Dick's profile, and she found her heartbeat unconsciously began to speed up again. She knew that this was a reaction to being charmed, but she did not quietly distance herself from him like before.
Dick has succubus blood, and the opposite sex will be enchanted if they spend a long time with him. Lily knew this when she was first summoned. So she has been careful to keep a distance from Dick, and carries a homemade brain-awakening potion with her, and takes a gulp when she finds something wrong.
Although Lily is usually carefree and looks like a fool with lots of energy, she is actually a very innocent and shy girl. So when she accidentally saw her groupmate Tia rolling on the bed with their boss, Lily was so shocked that she ran away.
From then on, Lily deliberately kept a "safe distance" from Dick.
In fact, she didn't hate Dick, and even had a good impression of him. But when she thought that if they kept in touch with him for a long time, she would probably become like other colleagues and unable to control her feelings, Lily became extremely shy.
She was only seventeen years old at the time, not as mature as Tia who was eighteen years old.
However, children will eventually grow up. Before we knew it, it has been four years since Lily and Tia came into this world. She has grown from the ignorant age of fifteen to nineteen.
Looking at Dick again now, Lily found that her emotions seemed to have undergone some wonderful changes without her realizing it. Sometimes, even though the young master was not in front of her, just thinking of his voice, appearance and smile, her heartbeat would unconsciously accelerate as if she was bewitched.
But the most important thing is that she seems to no longer be afraid of this strange feeling.
But Lily is not Tia or any other older sister in the team after all. She cannot be as bold as Tia to confess her feelings, nor does she have the courage to follow Blake's lead. Just getting close to Dick has exhausted her courage. She even secretly hopes that Dick will notice her feelings and take the initiative.
If it was Dick who initiated the attack, Lily actually didn't mind being French once in a while.
The author says:
Author's words: The three cowards in the team are Natasha, Hongye and Lily.
059: Territory Storm
The day after returning from the outing, Dick saw a report in the newspaper that Crown Prince of Wales had left the imperial capital and officially started his northern tour.
He roughly estimated that after the other party's inspection, eating, drinking and having fun along the way, it would take about late August to mid-September to cross the central mountains and reach the northern border of the empire. Dick couldn't help but pray in his heart that the other party would not come to his territory.
Dick has been working hard on the development here and has seen initial success, but he doesn't want to be noticed by the higher-ups too soon.
But the problem was that he could not arrange the itinerary of the crown prince, and Laguge, as a place of cold iron production, was almost a must-go place for every northern tour. Dick would have to spend his already limited financial funds to entertain the crown prince and the northern tour inspection team he led, which gave Dick a headache just thinking about it.
Fortunately, they still have at least three months to prepare, so they are not caught off guard.
Dick recently made some personnel changes in various departments of the Governor's Office. He asked Ruby Eye to take over the Farmers' Association and the Chamber of Commerce from Tia, and Joel served as her assistant secretary and bodyguard. Tia, who was freed, led Lily and the three female ninjas to form a secret intelligence department, code-named "Forget-me-not", which was responsible for collecting intelligence from various territories in the northern region.
The two members of the medical team did not need to move. The Black and White Guns of the Knights were busy training the newly recruited cavalry. The only ones left in front of Dick were Befa and Rita from the maid team, and Lukoya, who was completely idle after conjuring up sixty tons of corn seeds.
Regarding Lukeya's arrangement, Dick originally wanted her to go to the Farmers' Association to assist the Demon Queen, but Lukeya bluntly stated that she would rather stay with Dick, and expressed her hope to switch from the agricultural group to the maid group.
To be honest, Lukoa's ability to be a maid is not a problem, and it can even be said that she is overqualified. But this hot dragon lady has a bad habit that Dick can't say is bad, which is that she likes to wear revealing clothes.
On her first day as a maid, Lukoya put on a performance art for Dick. She wore an "Aztec-style maid outfit" that exposed more than 80% of her skin, and swaggered into the study.
It made Dick stunned!
Later, under the strong intervention of Belfa and Rita, Lukoya had to reluctantly change to a relatively conservative British style, but it still looked very sexy on her overly explosive figure!
As expected, on the third night after traveling through time, Lukoya easily "took down" Dick with just a slight move, creating the legend of the fastest free kill!
In fact, although Lukeya's behavior was erratic, she was not an unscrupulous woman. She just liked to be an immersive experiencer. Since the slave contract was signed, Lukeya would unconditionally offer her body and mind to Dick before he died. Even if Dick was willing, it would not be a problem to give birth to a few half-god hybrid babies for him.
Just a few hundred or a thousand years, for Lukeya, who was once one of the gods of creation, it was just a blink of an eye.
And Dick is not an ungrateful little boy. He has both the desire and the courage to do it. If Lukoya dares to get into his bed without clothes, he will grab the dragon horns on her head as a steering wheel and "drive" her hard from behind.
To be honest, this big car feels great in all aspects. The headlights are super big and white, and the volume of the horn is loud but not harsh. Dick can have an excellent driving experience whether he is showing off his driving skills through fancy corners or sprinting at full speed in the final stage. This car also has an intelligent driving mode that will move automatically when the driver is tired.
The only drawback is that the fuel consumption is a little bit higher, and I have to use Dick's "big oil gun" to fill it up six or seven times to meet the demand.
After Lukoya (temporarily) joined the maid team, Dick's daily work on official documents moved from the study in the upper part of the main castle to the office area in the lower part.
During the previous winter, heavy snow hindered traffic, and Dick did not have to review many documents every day. Sometimes there were only seven or eight, and sometimes there was not even one.
But after the beginning of spring, the anti-bandit campaign came to an end. As the Governor's Office gradually restored its grassroots management capabilities in the territory, Dick's workload increased day by day. He had to review dozens of documents every day and was often busy in the office all day. Occasionally, when there were too many things to do, he had to work overtime.
The main reason why Dick was so busy was that he was dealing with the mess left by the former governor.
It is not just David who needs to take the blame for this. All the governors before him need to bear some responsibility for this to a certain extent. Just like the three-foot-thick ice does not form over a single day!
In addition to dealing with things below, Dick also has to be careful about dealing with pressure from above.
After all, the governor is not a lord, and Dick needs to report his work to his cheap father regularly. He cannot pretend to be too incompetent and make the old duke disappointed in him, nor can he be too arrogant and arouse the suspicion of the eldest son. He also has to be careful about stepmothers who may trip him up.
It seems that Dick's previous dealings with those unscrupulous businessmen were exaggerated by "someone with ulterior motives" and reached the Duke's ears, causing him to receive a few "verbal warnings" in his reply.
Dick was reviewing the documents at his desk when Tia knocked on the door and came in. Seeing that everyone in the office was her own people, she spoke directly.
"Master, something happened in Baron Luka's territory to our west."
"What happened?"
Dick continued to review the documents without looking up. The Barony of Luka was located on the other side of the northwest mountainous area. The territory was very small, only one eighth of Laguge, with a population of 5,000 to 6,000. The area was also affected by the super cold winter in the past, but the situation was not as serious as that in Laguge.
Baron Luka is a minor regional nobleman, and his family only has this one fiefdom, so there is no need for a governor to govern it, but the lord himself is in charge.
But even though it was his own land, the contemporary baron did not say how much he cherished it. The other party was the kind of person who "didn't eat beef" and had never done many anthropomorphic things.
Dick wasn't surprised at all when Tia said something happened over there, but when he asked what specifically happened, he was still a little shocked.
"Civil war? Who's fighting whom?"
"It was the Baron and his lady who had a quarrel."
"what?"
Seeing Dick confused, Tia briefly explained the situation she had.
The cause of the incident was very bloody. Baron Luca's wife was pregnant, but the psychopath and two-way plug of the baron suspected that the child was not his own, but the result of adultery between his wife and his uncle. So he found a well-trained doctor and wanted to kill his wife.
However, the doctor did not handle the matter properly and accidentally exposed it.
When the Baroness learned that her husband wanted to kill her, she was so angry that she simply rebelled against his mother.
Due to Baron Luka's long-standing "benevolent" behavior in the territory, many of his subjects had long been dissatisfied with the baron, so these people chose to support the Baroness, or to be more precise, they were supporting the "next baron" in the baroness's belly.
Whether the child's father is the Baron himself or his uncle who is the same age but different generation as the Baron, they are both descendants of the Luka family, which can constitute a claim of bloodline.
So this barony with only a few thousand people started a civil war in such a vigorous manner!
After listening to Tia's story, Dick's expression was like an old man on the subway looking at his mobile phone.
With his understanding of the situation in the empire, not to mention that the higher-ups probably don't know what's happening here, even if they do know, they will probably just let it go and let the Baron's family solve it on their own.
A small barony thousands of kilometers away from the imperial capital with a population of only a few thousand people. Even if everyone in the territory killed each other, the emperor would not care at all.
Perhaps King VII of Hesse would even applaud, because he hoped that the families of those great nobles could also get along with each other like this, thereby weakening themselves and reducing the threat to the Hesse royal family.
The author says:
Author's words: Reversing day and night schedules is the beginning of all vicious cycles.
060, The Starting Point of the Secret War
A fight suddenly broke out in the neighbor's house, which was a good opportunity for Dick to reach out.
The territory of Laguge is not small, with an area of more than 10,000 square kilometers and a population of about 50,000. The entire size is equivalent to a relatively large earldom.
But compared with the entire empire, it is truly a "tiny place".
In Dick's original plan, he would wait until he completed the integration of Laguge's resources and put the territory's development on the right track before he would secretly take action against the surrounding small nobles and bring their land and population under his control through economic and political means.
The Barony of Luka was the first target on his list, because there was a medium-sized sulfur mine in the barony, which was a strategic resource.
However, before the empire really fell into chaos, Dick could only use force to suppress bandits or civil riots in his own territory, but he could not allow his private army to cross the border into the territories of other nobles at will.
Unless the other party actively asks you for help.
So when Dick learned that there was civil unrest in the neighboring Barony of Luka, he was determined to get involved. But if he really wanted to intervene, he needed a plausible excuse.
Due to the small territory and small population, the civil war in the barony was purely a village fight.
The Baron occupied the castle, with a hundred armored private soldiers and three or four hundred temporarily recruited armed militiamen. The Baroness, under the protection of several retainers, fled to the manor of the Baron's uncle, and also gathered more than three hundred soldiers and horses, raising the banner to support the "future baron" in the Baroness's belly.
However, although the total strength of the two sides was less than a thousand people, the fighting was very fierce.
Although Baron Luka is a two-way plug and has been having a lot of fun with his male favorites in recent years, this does not mean that he can tolerate his wife cheating on him. In addition, he may have been unhappy with his uncle for a long time, and this time he is settling new and old grudges together.
Of course! The Baron's wife and uncle are not easy to deal with either!
The baron's uncle was a wealthy manor owner. He knew that his eldest nephew, who inherited the baronial title, was always suspicious of him, so he was always on guard against him.
His manor was built like a small fortress, backed by a river and easy to defend but difficult to attack. The servants and serfs in his family had all received military training and were armed as militia.
The Baroness's family is Baron Bedi next door.
It is said that the Baroness has written a letter to her still living father asking for help, but it is not yet known whether Baron Bedi will help his daughter fight her son-in-law.
As for Dick, out of practical considerations, he is actually more inclined to support the "future baron" who is still in the womb, but it is undeniable that Baron Luka has a higher legal basis, and now is not the best time to intervene. Dick plans to wait and see for a while.
So Dick instructed Tia to have the intelligence department pay close attention to the civil war in Baron Luka's territory, and use that place as a "training ground" to train their newly recruited intelligence personnel.
In addition, not only the barony that is fighting a civil war, but also the movements of other surrounding territories cannot be ignored. Dick doesn't believe that he is the only one who has ideas about this matter.
Indeed, when Dick began to pay close attention to this village-level civil war, the lord of the Earldom of Hoffman, further west of the Barony of Ruka, also set his sights on this side.
The current Earl William Hoffman is 35 years old this year and is in his prime. He is one of the most powerful local nobles in the northern border area of the mountain. He has a private army of 3,000 people, including 800 cavalry. He was nicknamed "Snow Wolf" because he often led his troops north to fight against the orc tribes that plundered from the south.
At this time, Hoffman was holding a banquet in his own castle. Several managers of large chambers of commerce who had just come from the east were describing in vivid detail the various shortcomings of the new governor of Laguge.
According to these people, Dick Best, the current governor of Lagoge, is an arrogant, greedy and incompetent man! He completely disregards the lives of tens of thousands of innocent people under his rule, and unreasonably lowers the price of grain, exploiting these kind merchants who have worked tirelessly to transport grain from the south, making the people of Lagoge miserable!
The count listened silently, always with a proper smile on his face.
It was not until the merchants finished talking and left that the Earl asked a gloomy man with black hair, black eyes and a hooked nose beside him.
"Yitzhak, what do you think?"
"Don't trust everything these merchants say, my lord."
"Dick Best... Yitzhak, have your students investigate thoroughly. I need to know this man's past experiences in the imperial capital and what he did after arriving in Laguge. David fell into his hands, so this man must be quite capable. If he poses a threat to us... deal with him in the old way."
"I obey my orders."
The gloomy man called Yitzhak bowed his head respectfully, then turned and left the hall.
The count glanced at the other person's departing back and couldn't help but sigh in his heart.
Although he cannot practice martial arts or learn magic, this Earth man who claims to have worked as a Mossad agent for eight years is indeed a seemingly plain and murderous blade!
Count Hoffman had just inherited the title, and with a try-it-out attitude, he paid a magician to perform summoning magic a few times, and he actually got a very good talent from Earth, that is, Isaac.
In accordance with the "advanced concepts" of Earth and combined with the various magical abilities of this world, Isaac helped Count Hoffman train a group of agents who were very suitable for doing dirty work.
These agents trained by Isaac are not only proficient in reconnaissance and intelligence gathering, but are also very good at assassination and sabotage. Isaac himself is an expert in torture.
Count Hoffman had seen Isaac's methods, which were truly eye-opening. It was hard to imagine how many people he had killed on Earth to develop such skillful techniques.
With the help of Isaac, Hoffman has completed the infiltration of many small noble territories in the surrounding areas over the years. Anyone who dares to disobey him will become very "unfortunate" and is particularly prone to accidents.
Only on the eastern side, a few small nobles sandwiched between the Earldom of Hoffmann and Laguge survived because they served as a buffer zone.
Count Hoffman's political stance was that he belonged to the royalist group headed by the chancellor, and opposed the noble group headed by the Duke of Best. But he believed that he had some overlap with the militarists in the noble group on the political spectrum, that is, he also supported the formation of the "Imperial Legion" to conquer the entire continent.
