The Pine and Sled Knight Order is a rural knight order within the territory of France. When Chen Xin initially instructed autonomous cities to form knight orders, several surrounding cities pooled resources together to establish this knight order.

As for the somewhat peculiar name of the order, it originated from the local specialties of nearby cities.

These cities are located at the foothills of the Alps, and they are small mountain towns. In the past, they primarily relied on tourists visiting the Alps and some agricultural and sideline products to sustain their financial income.

The local pine wood and handmade sleds are among the few specialties here. Therefore, when naming the knight order, someone suggested using this name.

The knight order isn't large; around twenty volunteers from nearby cities constituted the first batch of members.

They received a batch of passable equipment, along with some locally made sleds, which were provided by the neighboring cities. Together with a few snowmobiles owned by the members, this formed all the assets of the knight order.

Since the surrounding cities are quite small and sparsely populated, everyone knows each other, and many are even related. The knight order doesn't have many duties concerning security maintenance.

They mostly use the knight order's snowmobiles and sleds to help local residents transport goods or assist autonomous agencies with entrusted tasks, but none of these are combat missions.

For the members of this knight order, this arrangement seems preferable. Many of them are only forest rangers or ordinary local residents who joined voluntarily, hoping to do something for their hometown.

Having no combat missions actually makes them more at ease since no one really likes fighting.

Moreover, if there were indeed any security issues locally, they would likely be dealing with familiar faces.

So they are glad that daily tasks involve transporting items or helping autonomous agencies with repairs. Aside from, of course, being sent to the front lines for the blood tax, they've rarely ever fired their guns.

But for such small places, this isn't a problem. Some even idealistic young people voluntarily joined and became the new blood of the knight order.

As the industrial capabilities of European countries have recovered, and situations improved, the small towns where the knight order is based have also benefited, making life significantly better.

As a result, the knight order has also enjoyed better days and even acquired some new assets.

For the surrounding small towns and the knight order, this life can be described as quite good. If they didn't have to send people for the blood tax, they might not notice much difference from their previous lives.

It's just a bit darker and colder; though life is tougher, they can now manage to get by.

Originally, everyone thought life would continue like this. However, a piece of news spread after a batch of knight order members returned from completing the blood tax.

"Did you know? Countries are preparing for a major counterattack. Supplies are being stockpiled everywhere! While we were on the front lines, the army even attempted to reclaim some bulged-out lost ground!" A knight order member back from the front boasted about the insider information at the local tavern during a brief respite.

The main industries of these small towns were previously agricultural products and brewing was naturally among their skills.

Although after the disaster, there was no sunlight, and the grain yield was frighteningly low, once life got a bit better, they found a way to collect some fermentable materials and made a concoction barely worthy of being called alcohol.

For most of the old drinkers, it was merely a consolation, barely better than nothing, but it rejuvenated the local tavern.

People like to come to the tavern for a drink when nothing else, chat, and brag with others, providing one of the few entertainment activities available now.

Hence, those knight order members newly returned from the front naturally enjoyed visiting the tavern and boasting about their battlefield experiences.

But this time, what they were boasting about wasn't dancing cheek-to-cheek with alien creatures but the big news that countries plan to shift from defense to offense against alien creatures.

"Is it true, little Jimmy? Are they really going to counterattack those alien creatures?" An elderly man, hearing the knight order member's claim, couldn't help but ask.

This was the downside of small towns; everyone knows each other. Perhaps when you encounter an old man, he was someone who attended your baptism as a child, saw the priest dip your feet in cold water, and you, in turn, peed a puddle.

Compared to having their childhood embarrassing moments known by everyone, being called by a nickname wasn't a big deal anymore.

The knight order member known as little Jimmy put down his drink and declared confidently, "Of course, it's true! While we were on the front lines, we built several new ammo depots for the army, and they are already stockpiling ammo. And Bob even participated in a counterattack, where some frontlines that had bulged out were pulled back by the army. I heard from him that he killed at least two hundred alien creatures!"

"Well done, Bob!" The knight order member named Bob was also in the tavern. Little Jimmy's bragging made everyone cheer for him.

For those staying behind, alien creatures remained something distant as such small towns, under current conditions, were unlikely to see people from front-line fallen zones coming here.

Thus, their only understanding of alien creatures relied on the tales from knight order members who went to the front for the blood tax.

Bob raised his glass with a gesture to confirm that what little Jimmy said was true.

But even if it was confirmed that countries were preparing for a counterattack, this matter was still too distant for the residents of the small town. They were merely discussing it without any tangible sense of it.

While their discussion was in full swing, a Land Ship was landing at the knight order's base.

The knight order's commander and several key members stood in front of the Land Ship, awaiting the disembarkation of the person aboard.

Arriving was a logistics officer. Each time the knight order dispatched members for the blood tax, this officer came to receive them, and this time was no different.

Due to procedural reasons, the Land Ship fetching members for the blood tax and returning them afterward was not the same. One ship, filled with people, visited each knight order either delivering or picking up members in turn.

"Pine and Sled Knight Order, the blood tax consists of four people this time; board the ship," the officer confirmed the roster in his hand and checked members coming for the blood tax before allowing them aboard.

The knight order's commander watched them board, feeling slightly relieved. Completing the blood tax could be considered one of the most crucial tasks for the knight order, and successfully seeing members onto the ship meant half the task was done.

This time, however, there was a slight unexpected development. The logistics officer handed the commander a document: "I believe you've heard the news; countries are preparing for a counterattack. Each knight order needs to prepare accordingly. The specific requirements are in the document."

Source: Webnovel.com, updated by lotustale.com