HCB Chapter 296 Support
Chapter 296 Support
"Oh."
John responded calmly, then opened the system map and found that the Basque port city was now marked as the Kingdom of Midland.
Seeing that John just responded calmly and then remained silent, Hospi kindly reminded him with a smile:
"Lord John, as long as I control the Port of Basque, the troops and supplies from the rear can be transported directly by sea."
This sentence reminded John. He turned around to see Hoss's malicious look. After a little thought, John understood what this guy was planning.
Since John occupied the entire border mountain range, it can be said that this border conflict has been successfully completed. In other words, John won all the military merits in this war, while Hoss, as the commander, not only did not get any military merits, but was inevitably reprimanded by the king and ridiculed by his colleagues after returning, so that he finally quit his job and was abandoned by his allies.
However, since John had to continue working in the Governorate of the Southwest until the king recalled him, if he wanted the Lana army to stop harassing his territory during this period, he had to annihilate Lana's manpower and establish a buffer zone controlled by pro-Mitlan or pro-John forces.
With the opening of new battlefields, new military achievements also come. If Hoss wants to avoid experiencing the tragedy mentioned above, he must take this opportunity to establish new military achievements.
But during this period, Hoss realized very clearly that in terms of meritorious service, the unrestrained John's efficiency could be said to directly crush him, the airborne coach who had been defeated time and time again.
If the two sides were in a superior-subordinate relationship, he could still take the credit for the military achievements as the commander-in-chief. However, the order sent by the king's envoy was very clear. John's role as the Governor of the Southwest was just to assist, and he did not give Hoss the power to command the Governor of the Southwest. Moreover, John did not care about him, so he had to give up this idea.
Since they cannot be compared in terms of meritorious service, there is only one thing Hoss can do at this time, and that is to make trouble for John openly or secretly. As long as John is defeated once, John's value in the king's mind will decline because of his greed for merit and recklessness, and Hoss can take advantage of the chaos to accumulate military merits by using the huge force of the standing army to fight more men against fewer men. If one rises and the other falls, then in the end, in the eyes of the king, Hoss and John will reach the same level. Even if the king really wants to punish someone, Hoss can take someone with him.
This time, Hoss's advice to himself was a warning. If John did not give in to Hoss, Hoss would definitely not allow the transport ships to unload the goods at the Basque port, forcing John to transport the goods through complex mountain roads, which would cause great difficulties for John's plan to resolve the war in a short period of time.
"Okay, okay, that's how you play it, right? You've already fought abroad and you still want to start a political civil war. Why don't you just lead your own troops to fight me and that's it."
John did not slap Hoss directly, but said directly:
"That's great. Bernas happened to have some armor and equipment left there. I'll send someone to order the ship to load the goods. It will arrive in Basque Country in about half a month."
Hoss was stunned for a moment and looked up at John. He didn't believe that John didn't understand the meaning of his words. It was obvious that his warning to John was ignored.
"Then I will send someone to the Basque Country right away and ask the port there to 'pick us up' when the time comes."
Hoss continued, and after seeing that John had no reaction, he had no choice but to lead his men back to his tent.
"grown ups."
Wesker walked over from a distance and said:
"That Hoss is threatening us, shouldn't we do something?"
John responded casually:
"Let him do whatever he wants. Let's do it according to our plan. First, let's find out what the situation is in Basque Country. Second, let the Simon Chamber of Commerce in Bernas send someone to load the goods."
At the same time, John leaned over and whispered to Wesker:
"Remember to leave one hundred mercenaries in each transport ship."
Wesker understood what he meant and quickly left the camp on horseback. A week later, when John was observing the enemy's movements, Wesker came in from outside and handed Basque's intelligence to John's desk.
As John received more and more intelligence, he gained a preliminary understanding of Basque.
According to common sense, the Basque Country should be positioned as a free port city like Bernas, with great autonomy.
However, unlike Bernas, which serves as a transportation hub on the west coast of the continent, the port of the Basque Country has only one function: to send cheap raw materials imported from Midland to local workshops for processing.
It can be said that the Basque Country is a port that prospered because of trade with Midland. All its taxes and production are closely related to Midland.
As the war between Lana and Midlan broke out, Midlan's navy quickly blocked the route to Bernas. Basque merchants had intended to smuggle goods by bypassing the Midlan fleet's patrol route, but found that pirates from Issu had filled these empty spaces.
Without the influx of raw materials, workshops cannot produce, workers lose their jobs, and citizens can only buy more expensive foreign goods.
As time went on, the entire Basque country, from top to bottom, became dissatisfied with the Lana authorities, and some even proposed to pledge allegiance directly to the King of Midland and make the Basque country a part of Midland. This would not only ensure the import of raw materials, but also allow Midland's navy to protect the shipping routes.
At this moment, Hoss smelled opportunity and immediately sent people to meet with some members of the city council who supported the annexation of Mitra, claiming that as long as they cooperated with Hoss's actions in the border mountains and attacked the Rana army from the north and the south, he could satisfy these people's political intentions.
But it was obvious that with Hoss's defeat, Basque did not launch an attack on Lana's army as promised to Hoss, and never had any communication with Hoss again. It was not until John broke into Lana's territory and Hoss led his troops into Basque that the city council announced that from today Basque officially became the territory of the Kingdom of Midland.
If what Hoss said was true, then Basque was the anklet that John had wrapped around one of his feet when he approached Leon. If it wasn't dealt with immediately, it would only end up being a burden to him.
John put down the information and began to care about Basque. Since Hoss wanted to disgust him, why not just take Basque for himself and support someone who listens to him?
Thinking of this, John continued to order Wesker:
"You can search for intelligence on the Basque City Council again, focusing on those politicians who are now out of power."