King of Mercenaries - Chapter 49: Temporary "Expanding the Army"

To prevent being robbed by an enemy or an ally, Marin had a headache. You know, his team of 1100 people, with thousands of horses and thousands of armors, many can be blinded by greed.

This is not even the ransom of 4,000 French knights. Kohler calculated it and felt that these 4,000 prisoners could be exchanged for at least 2 million Ducat gold coins. Knights are not cheaper than horses, and war horses are easy to train. It takes more than ten years to cultivate a knight, and the investment is huge. Therefore, a knight’s ransom requires at least 500 gold coins. 4000 knights, at least 2 million gold coins, this is still not considered the “price” of those nobles.

“I drop a little boy, 2 million gold coins!” Marin had only money in his eyes!

“But, Master, if you take all these captives back, your emperor will certainly not give you that much money. Because the emperor itself is very poor!” Kohler said.

“What?” Marin was angry. However, he was right to think about it, the emperor could not give him that much money. Because he originally fought for the emperor, the loot should be given to the emperor.

However, if he wanted to get the title, he had to take a lot of prisoners. Especially the captives of the nobles. After thinking about it for a long time, Marin decided to compromise. Because what he needed most was the title. As for those horse armors, Marin decided to keep some of them in private use.

However, this wealth is too huge, he is not confident to protect it. So he decided to expand the army

“Expand?” Schwartz didn’t quite understand.

“It’s only temporary. I can’t afford too many troops. I want to recruit some soldiers and horses, in fact, it’s to scare others, so as not to be robbed by others.” Now Schwartz understands that it was bluffing.

“How much will we expand?”

“3000 people … Schwartz, you take someone to the Italian village to catch the people and say hello to them. When they arrive in Venice, let them come back, and by the way, ‘borrow’ some food from the peasant.”

The so-called “borrowing of food” actually means robbing food. Marin originally had only 1,100 people to solve the ration problem. But now with 4,000 more prisoners and 1,000 Italians, the food supply is far from enough.

Fortunately, in the valley before, before leaving, some butcher-born mercenaries skinned and butchered the horses that were killed and wounded and took them to the road. Otherwise, food is definitely not enough.

However, these horse meats are easily damaged in summer. In desperation, Marin sent troops to rob several towns near Piacenza and grabbed a lot of salt to preserve the horse meat.

Ten days later, Marin’s team has expanded to more than 8,000 people, which is extremely spectacular. Schwartz did catch 3,000 Italians to make up for it. However, that night the people rioted and ran away 1,000 people. As a result, Marin only had 3,000 Italians, including the previous 1,000.

Marin stopped in a remote area in the Duchy of Milan for a few days. By the way, the 3,000 Italians were simply trained. At least, let them learn to distinguish left and right, and march in formation. Moreover, Marin also made a simple black cross and white vest for them. Uninformed people looked at it, thinking that these 3,000 people were also soldiers. At least, they look neatly.

As for the weapons of this group of people, Marin directly sent a wooden stick with a sharpened wooden point head, brushed it with paint grabbed, and looked like a metal spearhead, which was actually wooden.

Then, Marin swayed with 4,000 “arms”, holding 4,000 French prisoners, and walked all the way to the Coalition camp in Venice.

At the same time, the Italian coalition was pursuing the remaining 3,000 Swiss mercenaries. Unfortunately, the Italians were afraid of being beaten by the Swiss, so they only dared to shoot the Swiss from a distance and not dare to launch an attack. Moreover, they did not know where the 8,000 French knights had gone.

Last night they heard some fighting, but they did not dare to send troops in the middle of the night, because they have never experienced fighting in the middle of the night. Not to mention them, even the 3,000 Swiss mercenaries did not dare to send troops in the middle of the night. Only Marin’s men, after training, dare to fight at night.

The Swiss retreated on the Roman avenue by the river and did not follow that mountain road. When they retreated, Marin’s previously dug the embankment, the water almost flowed, and a lot of water soaked into the fields.

The Swiss mountain people are very wild and are not afraid of going to the water. They took off their shoes directly and walked barefooted across the flooded road. The Italian coalition is not as hardworking as the Swiss. The Duke of Mantova first collected farmers and blocked the embankment. When the water receded the next day, the coalition forces passed through this lot. Then, continue hanging behind the Swiss.

After Marin brought his army into Venice, he originally planned to do business with the Italians. Initially, he planned to send someone to contact the Italian Coalition. After all, if he brought people into the Empire army station, the disposal of those captives would not belong to him.

However, he was afraid that the Italians would eat them. Therefore, instead of sending people to find coalition forces, he directly sent people to Venice, to find the Venetian Republican government, and negotiate with them.

“What? You say a Holy Roman Empire officer captured 1,000 French knights?” The Governor of Venice was stunned. Then, he convened the merchants of the Venetian Republic urgently to negotiate.

“What does this guy mean? Why tell us the news?” Someone was puzzled.

“It’s still a question? Want to exchange them for money with us…” The nobleman in business said the words of Marin’s motive.

“Ransom money?”

“Yes, a knight’s ransom must be at least 500 Ducat. This guy is here to do business with us…”

“Then why didn’t he go with the French himself?”

“Stupid, Antonio. He is just a middle-ranking officer of the Holy Roman Empire army. He looks like a legionnaire (Marin bragging). The captives in his hands must be handed over to the Emperor of the Holy Roman Empire.”

“What Maximilian I? It’s a poor beggar of emperor. When the captive arrived in his hands, what will happened to the ransom and that officer?” Said the Venetian parliament.

“Hahaha …” Everyone laughed, and they remembered that the Holy Roman Emperor is poor.