Outside the majestic city gate, before the envoy group's carriages could even approach, an entire team of cavalrymen had already walked out of the city gate to welcome them.
A tall knight in black armour rode a black horse at the front of the cavalry.
"Are you Faustian's Princess Angelina?" asked the knight in black armour. Asked the black-armoured knight. Locke could already feel a powerful aura coming towards him from afar, as though it was real.
It didn't seem like the strength of a Knecht.
"I am!" Angelina's melodious voice rang out from the carriage, and soon after, she appeared in a silver magus robe.
The knight in black armour asked the convoy to stay where they were and approached the envoy alone, not paying any attention to the heavily armed Faustian soldiers around him.
"Under Lord Garcia's orders, I'm here to welcome Princess Angelina to Princeton," said the knight in black armour meticulously.
"May I know your name, powerful knight?" asked Angelina with a smile.
"You can call me Herr Garen," replied the knight in black armour.
"Then I'll have to trouble you, Herr Garen," said Angelina.
Many people noticed that Herr Garen addressed Princess Angelina as "you". If he wasn't a high-ranking knight who was comparable to Angelina, it could only be because he was strong enough to break free from the shackles of the secular monarchy.
With Herr Garen in the lead, the convoy followed closely behind. Angelina sat back in her carriage.
Locke and the others followed behind Viscount Cage and walked in front of the envoy, very close to Herr Garen.
They didn't ask any questions or talk nonsense. The Faustian envoy behaved very calmly and appropriately. Their meticulous attitude made Herr Garen, who was secretly observing them, nod in approval.
Compared to the envoys from other countries that he had received before, these Faustians left a good impression on him.
As they walked through the tall and majestic city gate, Locke was fortunate enough to see the customs of the Aomar Empire.
Herr Garen didn't speak much, but the knight next to him, who seemed to be a follower, was more talkative and introduced the various situations in Babrado to the envoy.
The city was located at the southeastern border of Aomar and the Duchy of Lyon, and it was called Barrado.
Although the attendant repeatedly explained that Barrador was the poorest city in Aomar, Locke didn't believe him at all.
From the height of the city walls and the prosperity of the city, he had only seen Faustian's capital Felor and Shalor's Audis that could compare.
It was a big city that could accommodate at least 200,000 people. Even though he had only toured less than a third of Labrador's urban area, he could already estimate the size of the city.
In Faustian, apart from Peterstown and Felor, he had never heard of any other cities that could accommodate more than 200,000 people.
Ignoring the servant's nonsense, Locke continued to observe his surroundings.
Their resting place was a Labrador courier station in the southwest corner of the city.
Although it was called a courier station, it was actually a large hotel. It covered an area of fifty square miles, and was divided into three floors: top, middle, and bottom. It gave the delegation a feeling that it was more like a palace than a courier station.
The people from Aomar seemed to be used to the surprise of the people who had just arrived in their country, so they ignored them after arranging the accommodation for the people in the caravan.
That Knight Garen, after bringing everyone to the place, had left at some point.
"Find your rooms and rest for a day. We'll continue tomorrow!" said Cage.
The servants lived in four-person rooms, the ordinary soldiers lived in three-person rooms, and the squad jarls lived in two-person rooms. Only the nobles and jarls like Locke were assigned single rooms.
Using his authority, Locke arranged single rooms for Glace, Lia, and the other girls.
"Are we leaving so soon?" asked Locke as he walked to Cage.
He thought that the caravan would stay in Barrador for a few days before setting off.
"The princess's classes are about to start, and we have to go to the palace to prepare our documents. We need to reach Princeton a month in advance," said Cage helplessly.
"Isn't there still more than two months?" It was only the end of December, and there was still some time before the princess started school in February.
"I doubt that we'll be able to reach Princeton in a month," said Cage before he walked away, leaving Locke dumbfounded on the spot.
During dinner, Locke talked to Bond and found out why Cage said that they wouldn't be able to reach the imperial capital of Aomar in a month.
Aomar was too big. According to Bond, Aomar was a hundred times bigger than Faustian based on the map.
It would take them ten days to cross Faustian at full speed, but it would take three years or even longer to cross the entire Aomar Empire.
The total population of Faustian was around two million, while the total population of Aomar was around seven hundred million according to official statistics.
This was the first time Locke heard that there was a unit of measurement after ten million.
Locke couldn't imagine how big Aomar was with a total population of seven hundred million. He felt that he would never be able to understand how huge a number seven hundred million was.
No wonder the accompanying knight said that Barrador was the poorest city in Aomar. It only had a population of around two hundred thousand people, which was insignificant compared to the seven hundred million population.
After resting for a whole night, the convoy set off again before Locke could experience the surprise that Barrador brought him.
This time, in addition to the accompanying Faustian soldiers, there was also an Aomar escort team led by Garon.
The escort team's duty was to monitor rather than protect.
The Faustian emissaries didn't slow down even though they had doubled in size. On the contrary, with Garon's escort, the convoy's speed increased by several notches and their journey was unimpeded.
"Garon should be the deputy castellan of Barrador," said Angelina as she chewed on an unknown fruit that she had just bought in the passing city.
"The deputy castellan?" Locke was puzzled. It had been half a month since they left Barrador, and they had passed through more than twenty cities along the way.
Locke was shocked at first, but now he was numb.
It was no wonder that Barbuda was the most barren city in Aomar. The cities they passed by were all larger than the previous one.
The city called Genoa, which they had left this morning, was almost three times the size of Felor. It was said that it had a resident population of 800,000.
800,000? Heh, this city had exceeded Locke's understanding, and it wouldn't stop for the time being because they had yet to reach their destination, the imperial capital, Princeton.
Locke was very curious about how magnificent the capital of Aomar would be, since it had a population of seven hundred million.
As for why Garon was the deputy castellan of Barrador, Angelina explained that every Ritter in Aomar would be given the position of castellan by the emperor.
In Faustian, a Ritter was enough to be conferred the title of marquis by the king, but in Aomar, he could only be a castellan.
However, owning a city with at least two to three hundred thousand citizens was not much worse than being a marquis in a small kingdom. Apart from the city itself, the surrounding villages and towns were all under the control of the castellan.
"This Knight Garen must have offended someone, that's why he was sent to a city like that to be the Deputy Castellan." Angelina laughed. Her carriage was soundproof, so she didn't have to worry about the people outside hearing them.
It was the intrigue between the nobles again, and Locke lost interest every time he listened to it.
"How many Ritters are there in Aomar?" asked Locke. Locke asked the question that concerned him the most. He wanted to know how strong this empire that dominated the continent with hundreds of vassal states was.
"Aomar is also known as the Kingdom of Ten Thousand Cities," said Angelina slowly as she glanced at Locke.
"The Kingdom of Ten Thousand Cities," murmured Locke. Locke murmured to himself. If a city had more than one Knight, then Wan City …
Locke realised that he had only just uncovered a corner of the world's veil. It turned out that he was still a frog at the bottom of a well.
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