allonlinenovel Chapter 280 Murderous Maniac
Chapter 280 Murderous Maniac
"The army of the Count of Loire has arrived, and the army of the Count of Brittany has also arrived... almost all of them have arrived. Although those nobles are a bit greedy, they are still trustworthy."
Inside the embassy, John looked at the army near Bernas on the system map, and was quite satisfied with the integrity of the nobles today.
"Boom!"
Suddenly a dark shadow flew in from the window. Before John could see who it was, he was immediately blocked by the fully armed White Wolf Knight.
"It's me, my lord."
After the black shadow stood up under the guard of the White Wolf Knight, he saluted to John.
Hearing the familiar voice, John hurriedly said:
"Okay, Wesker, get up and put away all the swords."
After the atmosphere calmed down, John asked Wesker:
"I asked you to investigate the intelligence about the troops stationed in the border mountains and the clues about the barrel case. Have you made any progress?"
"All the currently known information is here, please take a look."
John took the dozen pages of intelligence handed over by Wesker and read them one by one. As expected, the efficiency was indeed different when it was handed over to professionals. Whether it was the information of the leading generals or the military deployment in the border mountains, this intelligence had a detailed description.
The Lana army stationed in the border mountains has a scale of 80,000 to 100,000, which is about half of the Lana regular army. At this time, the Lana army has completely occupied all the Midlan army strongholds on the mountains, and there is a trend of gradual expansion, trying to block the next attack of the Midlan army through this easy-to-defend and difficult-to-attack mountain defense line.
The leading general is named Schneider, and his title in the Lana Kingdom is a baron. However, according to intelligence, due to the success of this battle, the king is discussing in the royal city of Leon about rewarding Schneider with the title of court count.
What surprised John was that General Schneider was almost sixty years old and, as a noble, he did not discriminate against soldiers of commoner origin. Instead, contrary to the norm of aristocrats, he recruited some talented and meritorious civilians as his staff to give him advice.
At the same time, the old general often led the troops in this battle and rewarded the officers and soldiers with funds. Eventually, the morale of the Lana army was high, and all the Midland strongholds in the border mountains were completely wiped out.
After occupying the entire mountain range, Schneider immediately began to build fortifications to prevent the Midland army from counterattacking, and this has continued to this day.
However, when John saw the information about Schneider when he was young, he couldn't hold back anymore. Because when Schneider was young, he actually went to the Windham Military Academy in the Kingdom of Midland for further studies, and also joined the Midland army to fight the Yodas in the east. He had already understood the situation of the Midland army.
In this battle, Schneider directly led the most elite troops of the entire Lana Kingdom and dozens of cannons to launch a surprise attack on the Midland defenders in the mountains. Faced with the attack, Count Hoss actually ran away. The morale of the soldiers without command plummeted under the bombardment of the cannons, and they immediately ran away. Schneider's army didn't lose many people at all.
After reading Schneider's overall information and the previous battle with the Midland army, John found himself facing a difficult opponent. In John's opinion, an excellent general with an ordinary army is always more threatening than a stupid general with an elite army. Moreover, the offensive and defensive forces were different this time, and John had to capture the strongholds on the mountain one by one before he could enter the Lana Kingdom.
"It seems that this is the only way. Although it costs some money, we still have to do it."
So John sent a message:
"Send Hoss here. I want to see him before noon tomorrow."
While John was busy at night, Jacques was also having a hard time. After such an incident, there was still no clue about the murderer. Who would dare to work with him in the future?
"Captain, Lord Wesker asked me to give you the results of his investigation." Just then, a member of the wartime patrol team came in and said to Jacques.
"Bring it here quickly." Jacques grabbed the intelligence and read it carefully. As Governor John's spy minister, Jacques had to listen to what Wesker said.
After Wesker's analysis, the cause of death of the people inside was that they were stabbed in the vitals with melee weapons, and then the bodies were soaked in some kind of corrosive liquid. He speculated that most of the liquid was sulfuric acid, and the murderer used a copper barrel and coated it with silver powder, making people mistakenly think it was made of other metals.
"Go check quickly to see who has sold large quantities of sulfuric acid and copper barrels before." Jacques continued to ponder.
However, after seeing the report, the team member next to him seemed to remember something and said to Jacques:
"Captain, this incident is similar to the serial murder case from more than 20 years ago."
"What serial murder case?" Jacques was confused.
"Didn't you hear your parents say when you were little? They always said, 'Children, don't go out at night, or you'll be caught by Kish Bella and thrown into a barrel full of sulfuric acid.' I was so scared that I didn't dare go out at night until I was seventeen."
Jacques tried hard to recall, and his memory of this moment became clearer and clearer.
Twenty years ago, a criminal who specialized in kidnapping people at night appeared in Mont-de-Marsan. The victims, regardless of gender, age or status, all disappeared after going out at night. However, since most of the victims were poor people in the slums, the city defense army did not do anything about it.
Until one day, a citizen came to report that his tenant Kish Bella had secretly hidden a body in his backyard. When the city defense troops arrived, they found dozens of barrels in the backyard, each containing a body that was highly corroded by sulfuric acid. The body was so severely corroded that it was impossible to identify the body.
But by then Kish Bella had already left Mont-de-Marsan, and the city defense forces were unable to capture him, so they could only post wanted posters everywhere in the city. Over time, no one cared about the case.
After finishing his recollections, Jacques also felt that this case was likely related to Kish, but this did not help him solve the case at all, because it was also possible that he was copying the crime to spread panic.
However, to be on the safe side, Jacques still ordered:
"Find me a copy of the wanted poster for Kishbela, and have the printing factory make copies based on this template, and then post them on the streets for me."
At the same time, in a mansion in the noble district of Mont-de-Marsan, under the dim candlelight, a man in plain clothes was bending over a desk and writing something. The candlelight shone on his face with sunken cheeks and protruding cheekbones, giving people a feeling of being weathered and experienced.
A man in a black robe came up to him in the darkness and said:
"Sage, the number of troops near Bernas is still increasing and has exceeded 10,000 people."
"Um……"
The man called the sage nodded and said:
"It seems that Governor John is going to take the sea route to bypass the mountains and attack Lana. I admit that this is a very bold thing to do, but it will soon become impossible."
The sage took out a piece of paper, wrote something on it, then put it in an envelope, stamped it with wax, and handed it to the man in black robe.
"Before the port is closed, quickly deliver this letter to Leon and tell the Lana people to step up their defense. Once the Midlan army lands, their end will come."