Live Stream: I Am A Lord In Another World

Richard’s interaction with Lacey had made them quite familiar with each other.

Richard had many things to attend to recently and didn’t spend much time with Lacey.

After leaving the castle, he visited the military camp again to inspect the training of the troops.

After the recent battle, the two thousand new recruits had undergone a transformation.

During the war, their military achievements had been recorded.

These achievements were recorded monthly, and rewards were given based on the previous month’s performance.

The rewards were often substantial. For example, a soldier who performed heroically on the battlefield and killed an enemy would receive one military merit, which equated to one silver coin.

Capturing enemies also contributed to military merits, though these merits were distributed based on the total achievements and then allocated to the soldiers according to their individual contributions.

Basically, a soldier who puts in their best effort in a battle can earn an additional one or two months’ salary.

Soldiers who perform exceptionally well in battle receive extra rewards!

With rewards, soldiers are more motivated and more loyal!

You need to feed the horse if you want it to run.

In this world, talking about ideals like some bosses did before crossing over doesn’t work!

With the proper financial incentives and Richard’s authority, he could achieve absolute control over this army!

For very large wars, Richard typically rewarded achievements after the battle ends.

However, to Richard, yesterday’s battle hardly seemed like a war. It was just a training exercise, so naturally, military merits were accumulated.

For Richard, such rewards didn’t cost much.

The wage levels in this world were quite low.

Currently, the basic salary for a soldier was around four to five hundred copper coins, equivalent to about four to five hundred yuan. For Richard, even giving out rewards like this was completely affordable.

Wars weren’t an everyday occurrence.

Moreover, wars generally brought rewards.

For example, the spoils from yesterday’s battle were quite substantial. The rebel army had plundered a lot of valuables during their rampage.

Most of these valuables belonged to the murdered nobles.

The rebels were ruthless.

They typically killed everyone in the noble families, regardless of age or gender.

Women often faced horrific treatment, leading many noblewomen to commit suicide.

In other words, these valuables were effectively ownerless.

Richard was interested primarily in the gold coins.

Other items were not particularly appealing to him, so he had them all moved to the square and sold at low prices.

There were quite a few gold coins, and with the addition of silver and copper coins, the total value amounted to over a thousand gold coins. It seemed the rebel army had raided quite a few places.

The sale of other valuables also brought in a considerable amount of money.

This turned out to be a good deal for Richard.

“Master, more refugees are arriving!”

On this day, refugees continued to pour in.

Richard would certainly take them in.

Even if the king agreed to his conditions, and Richard defeated the rebels, became a count, and obtained half of the Northeast Region, Richard would still focus on Florencia City and develop the entire territory.

He had no interest in the other cities in the Northeast Region.

When the time came, these refugees would naturally be settled in his territory.

After all, the development of a territory relies on its population. Without people, how can one talk about development?

So, Richard would take in all the refugees who arrived.

Among these refugees, there were occasionally nobles, and even a viscount.

This viscount, upon realizing that Richard was just a baron and Fred was also a baron, still maintained a viscount’s airs.

Of course, despite his airs, upon seeing Richard’s soldiers, he obediently paid 50 gold coins.

When he entered the city and met Sir John, he regretted his actions and felt foolish.

Such a fool was unknown to Richard; otherwise, he would have been driven out of the city immediately.

Fred probably took the viscount in due to the gold coins, as a viscount was still considered wealthy and could bring considerable spending once in the city. The various oddities in the city could easily extract several hundred gold coins from his pockets.

Richard’s scouts continuously gathered intelligence.

After the rebels took Stone Fort City, the main force remained there to regroup.

However, smaller units had already been sent in various directions to attack the smaller cities with populations under ten thousand.

Many of these smaller cities were breached.

The defenses of many small cities were poor, and the garrisons were not substantial. Particularly, cities built by some viscounts couldn’t withstand the siege of thousands or tens of thousands of rebels.

However, some small cities or viscount’s castles managed to hold out.

In particular, some relatively affluent viscounts maintained a standing force of several hundred or even over a thousand soldiers.

They defended their castles, making it difficult for the rebel units to breach them.

But such instances were rare. Maintaining a standing army of a thousand soldiers cost several dozen gold coins per month.

The ordinary viscounts in the Northeast Region had an annual income of only a few hundred gold coins and were unwilling to spend so much on maintaining such a large army.

Just like the previous Viscount Ide, who sent people disguised as bandits to raid in order to sustain more troops.

There were not many viscounts in the Northeast Region, only a dozen or so, with barons being the majority.

Additionally, not all nobles had fled to Richard’s territory; very few knew about his city, so only a small number managed to escape.

Moreover, the few nobles who did escape were relatively fortunate. A large number of nobles were killed while fleeing.

“Master’s prediction was quite accurate. The total number of rebels in the Northeast Region has exceeded one hundred thousand.”

The next day, fox girl Gazia reported to Richard.

“Exceeding one hundred thousand?”

Richard murmured.

The rebel forces had suffered at least thirty thousand casualties while attacking two cities, and there were also many casualties during the attacks on other small cities.

Yet, despite these losses, the number of rebels had actually increased.

It seemed they had coerced many more people into joining.

Richard was not surprised by this situation.

During his conversation with Count Zane, he had predicted such a scenario.

However, the rapid growth of the rebel forces was somewhat unexpected.

It was actually quite normal when thinking about it.

Although they were called rebels, anyone who joined could be counted as one.

In the inner regions of the kingdom, the scale of the rebel forces had grown even more frightening, with one group reaching hundreds of thousands!

The numbers were indeed intimidating, but their combat effectiveness was very weak.

Of course, having such a large number still presented a terrifying prospect if they charged all at once.

Especially when they were starving and desperate.

Richard was not particularly worried. Outside his city, the iron mesh had already been set up, and there was more than one layer of it.

Each low wall had iron mesh behind it.

One end of the iron mesh was connected to a dedicated control center. By lowering the gate, electricity could be supplied to the mesh.

This was the most effective way to deal with the rebel forces’ human wave tactics.

Of course, if Richard really needed to take action against the rebels, he had many more methods at his disposal.

He was waiting for Count Zane’s reply.

Richard had also not forgotten to continue recruiting from the refugees. Those in good physical condition were enlisted.

He planned to form a specialized pike regiment, consisting entirely of pikemen.

Such a pike regiment had its drawbacks; it was less flexible and could be uncomfortable if the formation was broken.

However, it was sufficient to deal with the rebel forces and quicker to deploy than sword and shield soldiers.

Richard also bought weapons for them from the online store. To save money, this time he bought slightly lower-quality weapons, with wooden pikes costing only a few hundred yuan each.

After all, buying weapons for over a thousand people, at a few thousand each, still amounted to several million.

In the past couple of days, Count Zane had been focusing on recovering from his injuries.

Every day, he would visit the medical office to have his bandages changed. After changing the bandages, he mostly spent his time sleeping, with a small portion spent walking around the city.

Count Zane wanted to chat with Richard, but it was difficult to find him. They only managed to speak briefly when they did meet.

After the previous elimination of over five thousand rebels, with no rebels escaping and no news leaking out, the rebels likely had no idea that this force had been wiped out. For the past two days, no other rebel forces had arrived in Richard’s territory.

With this situation, another day passed.

The next day, a white pigeon flew into Richard’s territory.

This pigeon was specially trained to fly high, making it nearly impossible for regular archery to hit it.

“Count, Count, the king has replied!”

Once the pigeon arrived, the soldier in charge quickly ran to Count Zane.

“Hurry, let me see.”

Count Zane was quite anxious.

He took the letter from the tube strapped to the pigeon’s leg and quickly unrolled it.

On the letter, there was only one word: Agree!

The king had agreed!

Count Zane’s face showed clear joy.

After all, the territory wasn’t his to lose, and for him, reclaiming the Northeast Region had greater significance.

The Northeast Region was lost while it was under his control.

So, when Richard initially proposed the plan, Count Zane, despite being extremely surprised, actually hoped the king would agree.

Now that the king had agreed, he was naturally thrilled!

“Hurry, take me to see Lord Richard.”

Count Zane said to Sir John.

Sir John and several soldiers quickly pushed Count Zane’s wheelchair to find Richard.

“Master, Count Zane wants to see you.”

With the convenience of the intercom, Richard quickly received the message.

He met with Count Zane in the reception hall.

“Dear friend, the king has agreed to your terms!”

As soon as they met, Count Zane couldn’t wait to share the news.

With his level of sophistication, he wouldn’t usually be so straightforward in other settings or with other people.

However, after their last meeting, where Richard had called him out for playing games, Count Zane seemed to understand Richard’s style. He felt there was no need to be coy or beat around the bush in Richard’s presence.

【Ha! Looks like this old man has learned his lesson this time!】

【Wow, the king actually agreed to the streamer’s big demands, 666!】

【Seems like being a bit ruthless is the way to go!】

【Suddenly think the anchor’s ambitions are too small, should have gone for the entire Northeast Region to be satisfied~】

【…】

Richard maintained his consistent approach, reopening the live stream for this meeting, allowing viewers to see the entire process.

Although he didn’t interact much with the viewers, he had become a quite competent streamer. The live stream was engaging, and Richard felt that it was worth the viewers’ donations.

Hearing Count Zane’s words, Richard took out a piece of paper and said, “Well then, let’s write up a contract!”

“A contract?”

Count Zane understood Richard’s intention and couldn’t help but find it a bit amusing. He wanted to say that what the king said would not be reneged upon.

However, Count Zane didn’t say anything and started writing on the paper.

“Why is this paper so white and clean?”

While writing, he noticed the paper had exceptional texture.

Richard replied, “If you want, you can buy some from the city’s shops.”

Count Zane was indeed tempted to buy some.

He had never seen such white, clean, and neat paper before.

Soon, Count Zane completed the contract, writing exactly what Richard had requested. Of course, he was guaranteeing it in his own name.

Richard glanced at it and then took out a seal stamp, saying, “Count, please press your fingerprint here.”

“Fingerprint?”

Count Zane was puzzled.

Richard explained, “Everyone’s fingerprint is unique, which makes it more reliable than a signature.”

Count Zane could only comply and pressed his fingerprint.

“Dear friend, can we start recruiting soldiers now?”

Seeing Richard put away the paper, Count Zane asked.

“Recruiting soldiers?”

Count Zane said, “We’ll each contribute some money to recruit soldiers to fight alongside your army.”

Richard replied calmly, “No need for you to recruit soldiers. Just provide the money. I’ll handle the recruitment and equipping. For the new soldiers, let’s calculate one gold coin per soldier. We’ll need to recruit 2,000 more soldiers.”

Count Zane’s eyes widened in surprise.

【Poor Count~】

【The anchor is really pushing him to the edge, will he end up with dementia?】

【…】

The live chat burst into more amusement.

“Alright, alright, but isn’t 2,000 a bit too few?”

Count Zane calculated, and although the amount of money needed was significant, with twenty-odd nobles sharing the burden, it didn’t seem too heavy.

Richard said, “The territory only has this many people. Are we supposed to recruit the elderly to fight?”

Count Zane thought about it and found it reasonable.

Then he remembered another thing: “How do you plan to fight? I saw in yesterday’s paper that the number of rebels has exceeded 100,000. With so many people, it’s not easy to plan a battle.”

Richard said, “Let’s be clear. The war matters will be handled by me, and you can’t interfere. However, I can guarantee you that within a month, the entire Northeast Region will be reclaimed!”