"This is what you said yourself! I didn't force you, did I?" Li You Ran said, pinching the lord's neck.
"Yes! I said it myself, no one forced me." The lord quickly admitted defeat.
"Take off the armor, that's mine! And bring everything from the Morgain family, if one thing is missing, I'll flay your skin, don't even think about trying to deceive me, my subordinate Field will check everything, you'd better pray nothing is missing, or I'll hand you over to Field."
Li You Ran's threat was very successful. In fact, the lord was worried about this. If he fell into Field's hands, it would be hard for him to die even if he wanted to.
"No! You can't do this, we are nobles! You can't watch your own kind die! We can't die at the hands of inferior people!" The lord shouted with righteous indignation.
Alright, Li You Ran could only admit that this was indeed a strange rule.
"Ah ha! Are these the ones you call countrymen? Why didn't they say that when they were robbing my food? Why didn't they say that when they were killing my people? Why didn't they say that when they were attacking my castle?" The lord was speechless, his face asking "how come they didn't say".
"Alright! Baron You Ran, I apologize for my recklessness. Actually, I was deceived by a magician who told me that a merchant had stored a large amount of grain in the castle of Feng Ye Territory. To be honest, Feng Ye Territory has been planning to attack my territory for some time now, so I decided to launch a surprise attack on the merchant's castle. I swear I didn't know you were a baron! If I had known, I wouldn't have attacked."
"Believe it or not! Once you've paid the compensation, you can go home. I can only guarantee your safety once, and after that, I hope you won't run into Field again."
Li You Ran directly threw the lord to one side, patted the nonexistent dust on his collar, and waited for the people behind him to come up.
The lord who was thrown to the ground did not resist, but instead consciously took off his armor, only to see him open the buckle on his waist, press a button, and then the entire armor retreated like flowing water, condensing into a square box, which Li You Ran picked up in his hand.
Zig and Morton have arrived, and Field, who was severely injured, also came up. After seeing what Li You Ran had in his hand, the rarely excited Field appeared on his face, but he endured it. Now this thing is no longer his, and for its sake, his family has already lost their lives. All of this is because of the greed of the person in front of him.
One hand broke free from Morton's grasp and grasped the long sword that had been lying there for a while, ready to stab the person in front of him, but was stopped by Li You Ran.
"Stop! Don't do it, Philoctetes! Your family's women and children are still alive. If you kill me, they will also die, and the remains of your men will be discarded. Do you want them to be forsaken by the gods?"
"Don't rush into action just yet, there will be plenty of opportunities later! Don't you want to retrieve the remains of your family member?" Li You Ran's words stopped Fei Er De.
"Are you saying that my child and the women of my family are still alive? Is it true?" Field asked, panting heavily, but he knew that even if they were alive, their fate wouldn't be good. All the men had been killed, so why would they spare the women? It was obvious what they would be used for.
"They're still alive, living well, don't worry they haven't been mistreated, I just had them locked up..." The rest of the words weren't spoken out loud, but Field wasn't a fool, he guessed the lord's intention, slave trader!
Although he had a mind to kill him, his own family was still in his hands, and his new master obviously would not let him kill him.
After receiving the news that some of his family members were still alive, Phil's grief-stricken mood was slightly alleviated, and then he fainted, Morton caught him and touched his neck, saying: "The master is still alive, but the situation is not good, the source of his physical energy is almost dissipated."
"Take it down first, and then rescue and treat it after settling down. Don't worry, I have a way." There were still three time-space seeds in the temple, and it was unknown whether they could be regenerated or not. Now using one would mean losing one, but this Phil felt that it was worth it. With just this strength alone, it was already quite good. Last time, if he hadn't taken action himself and Morton hadn't appeared in time, his castle would have been gone.
Morton got on a horse-drawn carriage with Field, and Li You Ran came before the lord and said: "Let's go, lead the way. I want to receive the spoils of war personally."
Li You Ran gave the lord a disgusted look, this guy was still trying to play tricks on him. He actually wanted to hide the fact that he was from the Feld family and didn't even think about having someone send over a ransom, instead deciding to directly go to his castle to take it himself.
The lord cried and covered his face, leading the way. This time he lost big, taking Li You Ran and others to the castle, they will definitely suffer a disaster.
Thinking like this, he walked slowly for half a day before arriving. By this time, the sun had already set, and surprisingly, there were no soldiers guarding Black Iron Castle. It was likely that the lord had taken all the soldiers who could fight with him, resulting in their complete defeat. Now, the castle was an unguarded treasure trove for Li You Ran.
But unexpectedly, the lord's imagined plunder did not occur. Li You Ran seemed to be unconcerned about wealth; he only had them release the hostages. The lord took them to the dungeon and released, along with Field's mother, wife, sister, and other relatives, over a hundred people in total. It was indeed a prosperous family, but now they were all hopeless. Only one man, Field, remained, except for the children.
Li You Ran sat on the high throne in the castle and looked at the lord below, saying: "So next we'll talk about compensation."
"I have nothing left! What do you want?" The lord said weakly.
"Judging from your appearance, you should be quite good at scraping by! Don't tell me you don't have a little stash of money. Tell me, how much are you planning to spend to buy back your life?"
The lord is very entangled below, he has money, no mistake, his territory has iron ore, so he is making armor and weapons, the military trade is naturally very profitable, it's no wonder that the lord of Maple Leaf Territory has designs on him.
The last lord gritted his teeth and said: "I am willing to use twice my body weight to redeem my own life!"
Li You Ran took a look at the lord, from his build, he was about 1.8 meters tall, and his body was quite large, estimated to be around 75 kilograms. Twice that would be 150 kilograms? Converted into gold, that's 300 kilograms! 300 kilograms is 15 million grams, multiplied by the current price, it's almost 400 million in income! Indeed, it's a golden belt worth killing and arson!
After a quick mental calculation, Li You Ran came to a conclusion that this deal could be done, however.
"Twice? What kind of person do you think I am? Ten times! Otherwise, I can only hand you over to Phil!" Li You Ran still didn't let go of the opportunity to extort.
Originally, it was just a thought that having some would be best, but not having any wouldn't matter either. However, the lord below lowered his head and thought for a long time before saying: "This...the quantity is too large, we really don't have that much gold. How about using magical materials as substitutes? Rest assured they are genuine goods! Oh right! The magician who incited me to deal with you is still in the underground laboratory! You can go catch him now!"
The lord hated the magician extremely. If it weren't for his instigation, how could he have lost his most powerful subordinate and been defeated to this point? He was not having a good time, and naturally, he wouldn't let the magician have a good time either.
Li You Ran raised an eyebrow upon hearing this, what a unexpected gain! He turned his head and glanced at Mo Dun beside him, hinting for him to go catch the person. Mo Dun understood, got the lord's indication of the location, and headed in that direction.
"Now that the person has been found, give me the compensation and let's rest here for a night. I'll leave tomorrow. By the way, since you're being so cooperative, I'll give you a heads up - the Maple Leaf Gang is coming soon, be careful."
After hearing Li You Ran say this, the lord's eyes widened in surprise. He hadn't expected this turn of events; otherwise, he wouldn't have used all his forces to deal with Li You Ran. At most, he would have just paid him off and sent him away. The lord of Maple Leaf Territory was not someone who could be easily bought off, and his desire for the territory had been burning for a long time.
"What! What's going on?! My troops have been exhausted in this one battle! Am I really going to lose my own territory?!"
Looking at the decadent lord, Li You Ran unexpectedly asked: "What's wrong! Don't you have any subordinate knights? Can't you gather your subordinates to participate in the battle?"
"Yes, there are, but since it's winter now, gathering them would require providing food and fodder. And since the grain tax has already been sent to the Duke, we don't have any stored grain! Without food, even if people come, they won't be able to fight!" The anxious lord said his words.
Li You Ran's eyes lit up, business is booming! He didn't come to this strange world just to fight and kill. Fighting and killing are so boring! He came here to do business, buying high and selling low, what a sense of accomplishment!
"Cough cough! You! Don't you know that I have another identity as a merchant?" Li You Ran reminded.
"Huh? You're willing to sell this to me?" As for whether Li You Ran had the ability to provide food for himself, he didn't doubt it. He just wondered if it was too suspicious that they had just fought and now were doing business together.
"Why not?! To be honest, I'm actually a merchant. You give me money and I'll sell you things, it's that simple. From small things like needles and threads to big things like weapons and grains, as long as you need them, I can provide them for you. The prerequisite is that you have to have the money."
"But, but it's a grudge between me and your subordinate, Field..."
"Oh! About this matter, I've already communicated with him and made one thing clear: this is a grudge between the two of you, and I won't get involved. However, remember that you can't harm others; otherwise, don't blame me for being impolite."