In the early morning of the next day, Punk and the others had already left the Dolez city. The city army and the priests were also ready, and as long as the first light of the day hit the city, the attack on the Ti Xiaer church would begin.
At the same time, the refugees gathered in front of the city gate, and a bunch of energetic young people led by an older man was glaring at the nobleman Zweig on the city wall.
"You obviously have enough food. Why do you still want to force all the refugees to hand over all their properties? Is this the benevolence and kindness of the nobility?"
Several young people, while waving their clenched fists, protested loudly:
"Yes, quickly give us some food."
"They forced my sister to sell herself, quickly return her to me."
"Our whole family is going to starve to death, and these nobles are still hiding food that they actually didn't need."
"Hurry up and apologize, and then send down the food."
The refugees were filled with righteous indignation, and all of them roared with anger. The numerous companions around them gave these timid refugees incredible courage. Now, many young people even dared to point at nobleman Zweig and scold him.
At this moment, Dickie, Bilan, and Lo Lan were mixed among the refugees, but they couldn't stop what was happening. The refugees' raised arms even blocked the light of dawn. Lo Lan looked at the silent Zweig on top of the wall and knew that this nobleman was chosen as the scapegoat by the Dolez City's leading authority. And according to her, after a while, he would send food to the refugees and then drive them away.
The refugees were pushing and shoving each other, so Dickie had to protect Bilan and Lo Lan behind him as much as possible to avoid being trampled by them. They wanted to go to the front of the crowd and tell the man who initiated this protest on behalf of the refugees, "The cunning nobles have tricked you, stop all this quickly."
But everyone around them also wanted to go toward the leading older man who was still loudly accusing the nobles, and Dickie and others were stuck in the middle of the refugee wave and could not move freely.
"Look, nobleman Zweig is about to make a move." Lo Lan pointed at the city wall and exclaimed.
Hearing this, Dickie stopped struggling against the pushing crowd and stood on tiptoe to clearly see the scene on the city wall.
On top of the city wall, nobleman Zweig was instructing his servants, who were carrying large grain bags on their backs. Only after a few minutes, large grain piles appeared on the city wall, and the scattered grain particles filled the air with a fragrance of ququ wheat.
"Gulp!!!"
Seeing so much food being moved to the wall top, the refugees couldn't help but quiet down, and all of them gulped almost simultaneously.
Everyone, including Dickie, Bilan, and Lo Lan, was stunned. The amount of food on the city wall was truly astonishing to them.
Dickie was even more speechless. He had never thought these nobles would be so greedy that even when whole families were starving to death in the refugee camp, they would hoard so much food for themselves.
He couldn't help but think of those scenes where countless children starved to death and where families had to sell their children and daughters in order to obtain a small amount of food. Dickie still remembered a child of only six or seven years old, weakly grabbing a fist full of cold dirt and stuffing it into his mouth. He still remembered the lively young girl who secretly went to the barracks to sell herself in the middle of the night in order to bring food to her family. All of these happened because of the noble's unquenchable greed. So now, the large piles of grain on top of the city wall were like the most ruthless mockery of the cruel reality.
Because he clenched his fist a little too tight in anger, Dickie's nails sank deep into his flesh. He had lived in the peaceful town of Niailan since he was a child, so he couldn't imagine that there was such "evil" in this world, and there were people who would rather squeeze the poor refugees instead of giving away the about to rot food. He couldn't help but wonder if these noble had any humanity left in them.
The most terrifying thing was that those nobles would still plan to start a terrible conspiracy next. They would distribute the food and then drive all hopeful refugees to the abyss.
"Damn it! Damn it!"
Dickie's eyes were burning with anger, and he hated the fact that even after watching such unimaginable evil happen in front of his eyes, he couldn't do anything.
Just as the endless anger and hatred were about to consume Dickie's heart, a pair of soft hands covered his bloody fist.
Dickie raised his head in a daze. He saw a beautiful face that unknowingly approached very close to him.
"It's not your fault. We can't save everyone, and it's impossible to punish all evil, so just protect the person in front of you. Isn't this what you said".
Bilan's voice calmed Dickie's turbulent heart like a clear spring, and his clenched fists slowly relaxed.
"Yes, Bilan, our top priority is to save the person in front of us, but...".
Dickey looked at the nobleman Zweig, who seemed like he was about to give a speech, on the city wall with a bit of desperation.
"It's too late to stop..."
Lo Lan lowered her head in defeat. She knew the development of the following plot. According to the nobles' nature, Zweig would first say some false apologies and then persuade the refugees to go to other territories and finally give out some food to demobilize all the refugees.
Nobleman Zweig was standing on a high platform. Because he was too far away, no one could see his figure clearly, let alone the madness hidden in his eyes at this moment.
He took out an enchanted loudspeaker, took a deep breath, and said in an unquestionable tone:
"Now, I—Zweig-Koala, hereby give an order...to…Immediately burn all the food. Make sure nothing is left."
".................."
".................."
"What did that nobleman...say?"
The refugees below the city wall and the dozens of city guards on top of the city wall were all stunned. The actions of nobleman Zweig were beyond everyone's expectations, and they did not know how to react for a moment.
But five or six loyal private soldiers under nobleman Zweig reacted quickly. It seemed like they were already prepared; they took out the flint and then ignited the grain pile around them at their fastest speed under everyone's stunned gaze.
It was not known what material was added to the grain piles because it caught fire the moment the sparks touched it. And as the grain piles were very close to each other, the fire quickly spread to every other grain pile without failing, and the entire wall top became like a sea of flames within seconds.
Nobleman Zweig stood on the wall and laughed. The light and shadow of the flame behind him danced wildly on his greasy fat face.
"You group of untouchables actually dare to make demands from us nobles? Now I have obeyed Master Hutt's order and burned all the food. This is a little punishment from the nobles of Dolez. Haha. Haha, you are only worthy of being slaves, slaves for generations."
Nobleman Zweig smiled madly on the high wall, and more than 20,000 refugees stood in place, watching the raging fire with despair in their eyes.
"This! What is going on? The nobles shouldn't do this kind of thing, then... why…"
Lo Lan, standing among the crowd, spoke incoherently. The sudden turn of the matter was beyond her expectations. Nobleman Zweig actually burned all the food and then put the blame on the head of minister Hutt and all the nobles of Dolez city.
Lo Lan didn't know why this happened or what nobleman Zweig's gain was, but she knew that this situation was definitely not something the nobles wanted to see.
Comments