Chapter 60: Her Highness the Princess II

Princess Charise could not help but be slightly stunned to see Old Wilson taking the initiative to offer his allegiance. Throughout this journey, she had already seen the betrayal of too many aristocrats and had even encountered the hindrances of some who had pledged their dependence upon the church.

However, Old Wilson’s expression was very solemn. The etiquette with which he treated Princess Charise was also the most honorable amongst the aristocrats, enough to prove Old Wilson’s attitude.

Furthermore, there were also many knights behind Old Wilson, especially the small number of heavy armored knights. With one look, she could tell that they were the most elite amongst the elite. To gain Old Wilson’s allegiance would be to gain the allegiance of so many knights.

This was an exceedingly great help to the fleeing Charise, as well as the others.

Nevertheless, just as Princess Charise was about to agree, Commander Mance, who was next to her, took a step forward and said in a soft voice, “Your Highness, our main focus now is to escape from the Kingdom of Light so we cannot be too slow. This Wilson is merely a baron, and even if he has a hundred or two heavy armored knights with strong fighting capabilities, how can he be compared to our knights of the Firebird Legion? If we bring these people, they’ll undoubtedly become a burden. Look at their convoy, there are womenfolk, goods, and materials. Surely, they’ll be slow, and that’s a great disadvantage to us, especially when it’s very likely that there are still people from the church chasing us from behind. Your Highness, please reconsider!”

Commander Mance’s words caused Princess Charise, who had been in an extremely good mood, to immediately fall silent. Indeed, setting Old Wilson himself aside, he might be a strong Elemental Swordsman, and with his two hundred heavy armored knights, they might have great combat power.

Nevertheless, two hundred heavy armored knights were not all that Wilson had. He also had even more ordinary knights, some womenfolk who had no fighting capabilities at all, and heavy goods and materials. If they were to bring all these with them, the speed of the entire troop would definitely slow down. If there was a great hoard of knights from the church chasing after them, then they would be in a very dangerous situation.

A hint of hesitation appeared on Princess Charise’s face. Although she had gone through many hardships during the past few days, she was still far too young. There were many decisions that had to be made by Commander Mance.

Commander Mance’s words impacted Princess Charise greatly.

Princess Charise was somewhat unable to make a decision. Commander Mance gave Old Wilson a cold glance, before saying in a low voice, “Your Highness, our knights of the Firebird Legion possess extraordinary combat power; I believe Your Highness has already seen it. We’re definitely capable of protecting Your Highness and His Highness the Prince very well, and we will arrive in the Kingdom of Blackmoon safely. As for the others, we should do our best to not risk having new problems and complicating the situation.”

Princess Charise could sense a hint of unhappiness in Commander Mance’s words, from his tone of voice. At the moment, Princess Charise and Prince Benin needed the protection of the Firebird Legion, which was under the leadership of Commander Mance. Therefore, on the issue of Old Wilson, she could not afford to create any more conflicts between herself and Commander Mance.

Thus, after a moment of hesitating, as she murmured to herself, Princess Charise made her decision.

“Baron Wilson, you are an upright, courageous and loyal aristocrat! But we still have to hurry on, and if we bring all of you along, our objectives will become tremendous. It’d be really dangerous instead. So, we should still go our separate ways.”

Princess Charise sighed softly as she spoke. Following which, she left the place slowly, leading the knights of the Firebird Legion.

Hoo…

Seeing Princess Charise leave with her men, Merlin let out a long sigh of relief instead. The other party not accepting Old Wilson’s allegiance had saved Merlin from having to talk a lot.

“Wilson, get up. They’ve left.”

Baron Parman came to Old Wilson’s side. Seeing that Old Wilson was still kneeling on the ground with one knee, he shook his head helplessly and spoke to him as such.

Old Wilson stood up slowly. He turned around to watch the backs of the Firebird Legion knights as they left, with a complicated expression on his face.

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A long time elapsed before Old Wilson finally opened his mouth to speak. He said in an inexplicable manner, “Back then, Prince Frederick had pointed out my mistakes during training. Without him, there would be no Wilson Lehman on the battlefield, and I’d have most probably died in the ‘slaughterhouse’…”

Merlin and Baron Parman exchanged looks; it turned out that there was the existence of this reason as well. Old Wilson had never mentioned it in the past.

Prince Frederick had given Old Wilson an exceedingly great help in the past. Perhaps, to Prince Frederick, it had cost him little to no effort at all. Perhaps he had never even remembered giving pointers to a quiet and nameless knight, but Old Wilson remembered it deep in his heart. Because of that, he had not even hesitated in pledging his allegiance to the Royal Family when they were in their most dangerous condition.

“Let’s go. We might be safer following them from behind.”

Old Wilson had recovered the side of them that was merciless and decisive, moving quickly and vigorously.

Merlin nodded. Old Wilson was right; they would be safer indeed if they followed after the knights of the Firebird Legion. At least, if any problems were to occur in front, the Firebird Legion would solve them one by one. They would practically be clearing off obstacles for Old Wilson’s convoy.

After all, on their path of escape, danger did not come merely in the form of the church, but also as bandits that existed everywhere!

***

“Did you take a good look? Is it really the Firebird Legion, one of the four great armies of the Kingdom of Light?”

A man with strange patterns drawn on his face asked in a low voice.

“Big Boss, we’ve already looked at them clearly, the armor they’re wearing is indeed, the standard armor of the Firebird Legion!”

Three men wearing clothing made out of rough cloth answered in soft voices, with traces of excitement upon their faces.

“Not bad.”

The man with the strange patterns drawn on his face was the big boss of this band of people. He nodded slightly and stood up from the ground. Rubbing the black armor on his body lightly, he said with a cold smirk, “The Royal Family of Light has direct command over the Firebird Legion. Now that the Kingdom of Light is in chaos, the ones who can afford the protection of the Firebird Legion knights must be the members of the Royal Family. This is a fattened goat; members of the Royal Family will definitely have loads of wealth on them. All we have to do is take them down, and we, the Hurricane Bandits, will be able to buy sophisticated armor and sharp weapons. By then, we could even take advantage of this disorderly situation in the Kingdom of Light and attack a few cities. We won’t have to be stuck here anymore.”

There was a flash of excitement in the eyes of the Big Boss. Not only was he the leader of the Hurricane Bandits, but was also a bandit chief who possessed extremely wild ambitions. He even dreamt of being able to take over a few cities one day.

Now, the best chance had come; these members of the Royal Family, who might be bringing with them immeasurable treasure, currently had the protection of merely a few hundred knights. This was an opportunity gifted to them by the heavens!

“But, Big Boss, there seems to be a gigantic convoy behind this Firebird Legion, with approximately a thousand or more knights.”

The few bandits hesitated for a moment, before reporting the truth.

Big Boss did not care, however. He smirked as he said, “Those are merely some small aristocrats fleeing for their lives. We’ve already encountered quite a few of such small aristocrats over the past few days. They’ve been living lives in comfort and prestige, and their knights no longer know what bloodshed in battle is. There is no more fighting blood in their bodies! We’ll just scare them casually, and they’ll run off pathetically.”

“How about this. Third Commander and Fourth Commander. The both of you lead a thousand and five hundred brothers to go and deal with this convoy. Remember, kill all the men and bring all the women back!”

The strange patterns on Big Boss’s face glinted dimly with light the color of blood, causing his expression to look exceptionally savage.