Barondi stood on a very tall tower and looked at the busy crowd below, some of the snow in the distance had not yet melted, and the black ground and patches of snow that had already turned light gray reflected each other, and there was only a kind of cold loneliness that made people feel uncomfortable.

Just as Machiavelli knew that Alexander had returned to Pisa, Barentia was also well-informed, and as the road between Pisa and Montina was clear, it became more and more convenient to communicate with each other, so it can be said that if someone sneeze on the Pisa side, it would not be before Montina knew about it the next day.

In this regard, Barendi actually despised Lucrezia, in her opinion, Lucrezia was actually a brainless fool except for a beautiful face and a good figure that looked like she could tempt men.

At least Lucrezia did not see Alexander's intention to build the road from Montina to Pisa at great expense, and the Arno River from Pisa to Florence was already closely linked to Florence.

Barentia knew that in the vault there was a map of the road from Montina to Florence, which had been drawn by Alexander before he had gone to the Balkans, but at that time it was only a rough outline, and now it was given to the master named Leonardo da Vinci, who redrew it after some surveying.

Barenti knew very well what the changes would be made to the whole region if the road was completed, and that Montina would be completely integrated with the two cities, and that there might indeed be a country called the "Duchy of Romagna-Tuscany".

Barondi sighed secretly, she thought of Estles, which made her a little anxious, the worry of not having an heir always made people feel as if they were stepping on a soft cloud under their feet, and although they were glamorous on the outside, they could not be grounded.

And Alexander actually stayed in Pisa for several days after his return, which made Barendi feel indescribably bored.

The desire to have a child made her more and more uneasy, and she heard about the painting "The Baptism of Estelles" painted by the painter named Raphael, who is now famous in Rome, which made her deeply feel Alexander's love for his daughter, and at the same time she could feel a deep sense of crisis.

Barendi believed that she had her own pride, and that in her eyes Lucrezia was a pretty but brainless doll, and that men might like it, but it would not be her who would really help Alexander rule the future duchy.

It's just that even this rag doll has enough capital to be proud of, in addition to being able to fascinate men, Lucrezia's biggest reliance should be her daughter, and Barendi knows that she has the upper hand, at least so far.

"God willing, give me a son." Barondi prayed silently, she was not worried that her position would be threatened, but one of the other two women had already given birth to a daughter, and the other was about to have her child, which made Barendi feel uneasy.

A maid walked up the steps up the tower, and many people did not understand why the countess always liked to run to such a high place and stay alone for a long time, after all, it was not so pleasant to stand on it in such cold weather.

"Madame, the master da Vinci is here." The maid reported.

"Okay, I'll do it." Barendi nodded indifferently, even in front of the personal maid, she was so cold and unapproachable, this was the result of her father old Rovie Rei's years of education for many years, and old Rovelle clearly told her that a master without majesty would be despised by a servant, so even the most trustworthy servant should not let them feel that they were special in front of their master.

When Barondi appeared, da Vinci had been waiting in the vault for a while, but this did not make him feel impatient, on the contrary, many new things in the vault aroused his great interest, so that when Barenti walked into the vault, he did not notice at first.

"You need to pay a greater sum of money," but when it came to money and reward, da Vinci was no more open-minded than his colleague Michelangelo, who handed Barentie a very detailed bill and asked the countess to pay him for his labor. We had to dig a road through some of the hills, which would have cost a lot more than expected, and that didn't include some of the areas along the way that had to be leveled because of the terrain, which was a lot of money, ma'am. ”

Barendi looked at the piece of Zou Baba's paper, which was the approximate amount of money that needed to be used, and looked at the figure of nearly 100,000 ducats on it, Barundi couldn't help frowning slightly.

Leonardo da Vinci was paid 140 ducats, which he was paid for designing the monumental project, including the design of the four bridges and the selection of the roads to be excavated in the hills, as well as the cost of their survey on the road from Montina to Florence.

That's a lot of money, but it's nothing compared to hundreds of thousands of ducats.

Although he was well aware of the significance of the opening of the road to Alexander, Barendi was somewhat taken aback by the sheer amount of the budget.

In this era, the aristocracy either spent money on building castles to arm the army, or they spent lavishly on supporting the arts, and no one wanted to build roads, let alone such a large amount of money.

Barendi couldn't help but rub her forehead, which was a little painful, and she was wondering if she should borrow money from the sister-in-law who felt very kind, after all, as far as she knew, Naples was really rich now.

Not many people really know Naples' place in the trade leagues, let alone the real brother-in-law of this city, which is famous for its wealth, but actually holds a lot of wealth.

But Barendi was one of them, and she knew very well that the wealth in Naples was absolutely astonishing, and if it weren't for the surprisingly good relationship between Jossa and Alexander, Barendi would have been dissatisfied that Alexander would give Jossa such a great power of the trade alliance to him.

"Maybe you can borrow this money, or even tens of thousands of ducats," Barondi looked out the window, and now the construction of the castle of Montina was in full swing, and it was the largest construction project since the castle was completed.

After all, this is a new style of castle, and when Leonardo da Vinci saw the sketch of the castle, he was amazed by the designer's almost genius conception, and at the same time, he repeatedly wondered in his heart how to deal with such a fortress if he faced it.

To Leonardo da Vinci's surprise, he couldn't find the traditional one-piece fortress wall that he had abandoned for a while, but it was the weakness of the fortifications that were inlaid with numerous polygonal buildings, so to speak, that this castle almost perfectly eliminated all the defensive corners, and at the same time could protect the castle's guardians to the greatest extent.

Even the designers took into account the possibility that the anti-approach fortress built outside the castle would be used once it was occupied by the enemy, so all the fortresses were open to the side of the city wall, so that even if the fortress fell into the hands of the enemy, there was no barrier inside the entire fortress because it faced the city wall, which caused the enemy to be unable to use the fortress to attack.

This design was exchanged for Da Vinci's amazement and admiration, and when he learned that the castle was designed by the famous architects Bramont and Alexander, da Vinci couldn't help but be deeply interested in the design style of this castle.

It's just that Barenti thinks that he will not see the completion of the castle in his lifetime, and according to Leonardo da Vinci's estimate after looking at the construction drawings, it will take at least 30 to 50 years for the new Montina castle to be completely completed.

Maybe by then her sons would be old, Barendi thought to herself, and then fell into a flurry of trouble.

Barondi knew that she wanted a child so badly, that she had to have a child of her own and an heir in order to secure her position, or she didn't want to see Alexander bring to her one day the illegitimate child that a woman had borne him, and then ask her to recognize the illegitimate child as an adopted son.

Thinking of this, Barondi became a little impatient, she put down the letter she had just written to her sister-in-law, and just as she was staring blankly at a huge kite skeleton made of balsa wood in the corner of the vault, the door of the vault was opened with the sound of hurried footsteps outside the door.

The cold wind blew in from the hallway, blowing up a few sheets of paper that had been placed on the table, and also blowing Barondi's neatly combed hair.

Alexander was draped in a thick robe, and the hood he had just lifted from his head was casually huddled behind his head, and the chill on his body made Barondi shiver at first, and then she let out an unexpected whisper.

"God, is that you, Alexander?"

"Yes, that's me, let's see who's back!"

Alexander stood in the doorway and laughed, he saw in Barondi's eyes not only the surprise but also the inexplicable joy, the last time he saw it was when he returned from the Balkans.

Barondi seemed to want to make herself appear reserved and calm, but when she steadily walked around the table, the pace of her feet increased significantly, and before she could take a few steps, Alexander had already strode towards her, and in Barondi's whisper, Alexander had already hugged her tightly, and then simply hugged her sideways.

"Shel, watch the door." Alexander said to the guard standing in the doorway without looking back, and when he heard the sound of the door closing behind him, he looked at Barondi's gaze that had become full of meaning, "I think you look a little cold right now." ”

"It's a little cold," Barendi said a little cold, feeling the cold that Alexander still carried, but her face turned red, "Then you can quickly warm me up." ”

Looking at Barondi's narrowed eyes, Alexander couldn't help but smile.

Schell stood outside the door staring blankly at the empty hallway, the door of the vault was thick and tight, so there was no need to worry about any strange noises.

However, to Schell's surprise, after returning to Montina, Uliu suddenly disappeared without a trace.

At this time, Uliuu was on the second floor of a rather quiet house on the street side of the town, not far from the castle.

Looking at Leonardo da Vinci, who was staring at a sketch on the table with an obsessive look on his face, Ulliu had a gentle smile on his face.

"It's a miracle." Eventually, da Vinci, who broke the silence, finally raised his head and looked at the Moore man with a look of surprise: "This is a very complete picture of human anatomy, you can clearly see the direction of the internal organs, bones, and even every flesh texture, tell me where this came from, can you imagine how many failures caused by fallacies can be avoided by such a picture for a person obsessed with portraying reality?" ”

Ulliu looked at the excited da Vinci with a smile, he knew that this picture should make the master ecstatic, but da Vinci's overly excited emotions still made Ulliu feel a little funny.

But the pictures of the anatomy obtained from the Pavia Medical School not only did excite da Vinci, but also made the master somewhat interested in Alexander's other suggestion.

"Has the Count decided to establish a new university in Pisa?" Da Vinci asked with some curiosity, "You must know that real art is not something that can be mastered by learning, those who can peek into the truth are geniuses, and mediocre people are destined to be stopped from the palace of art for the rest of their lives." ”

Listening to da Vinci's conceited words, Ulliu pursed his thick lips noncommittally.

Speaking of which, Uliu's attitude towards the so-called great art and artists is the same, although he has seen the master's masterpiece in Milan, but in his opinion it may not be better than the nasty spring paintings that the Grand Vizier had in his private collection.

But the lord seemed to have a high regard for the master, and was interested in Brother Pacioli and Zorro Astro, as well as in the group that had come to Montina with Leonardo da Vinci.

So he had to do what he wanted to bring da Vinci these things that obviously interested him, and at the same time use his previous relationship with him to make a statement for his master.

"My lord is really obsessed with art, but the art atmosphere at the University of Florence is strong enough, so he would like to establish a new discipline at the University of Pisa, which is why I invited you, and I am sure you will be interested."

"A whole new discipline?" A hint of surprise appeared on da Vinci's face, and then he slowly shook his head, "Don't say anything new lightly, you must know that all the knowledge created by God so far has been almost completely mastered by people, and the only thing people can do in the academic field in the future is to tinker with these almost perfect foundations, just like this anatomical diagram, it can help me to understand the structure of the human body more deeply, but this does not mean that from this picture I can find something that I did not know at all before, Maybe there are some benefits to healing, but that's all, for example, in Montina I did see a lot of new things that I thought were new, but they weren't enough to support the oversized meaning of the term "new discipline", because it meant that we were dealing with something that had never existed before, and now it seems that the word new is very difficult to come up again. ”

Da Vinci shook his head slightly as he spoke, and his expression showed regret, as if he was feeling embarrassed and helpless for the advent of this apocalyptic era of knowledge.

Ulliu looked at da Vinci and frowned slightly, he didn't expect his words to cause such emotion from this master, and more importantly, he seemed to be very unhappy that Bisapavia University would establish a new professional discipline, which made Uriu feel a little uncomfortable.

Ulliu knew that Alexander would not be in Montina for long, that he had learned about the subtle changes that were taking place in Rome through various sources, and that, according to Caesar's messenger, the Pope's birthday celebration was to take place at the end of the month, which meant that Alexander would have very little time to stay in Montina.

This is why Alexander did not come to see da Vinci in person, and instead of being cold and cold after being invited to Rome without saying goodbye, it was better for Ulliu to come forward from the outset to convince these brilliant but often arrogant geniuses.

If Ludvico's butler, Giocomte, was valued for being the "gift distributor" of the artists, then Uliu was valued for being trusted by Alexander to act as his agent in some places.

No one would be hostile to him because he was a Moor, let alone despise Alexander's nominal servant, the Imperial Officer, the Chief of the Court, and the closest person to the Count of Montina, this was the image of Ulliu in the minds of others, so Alexander was not worried that Ulliu's presence would make some people think that he was being despised and insulted.

It was only Leonardo da Vinci's attitude that made Ulliu feel a little helpless, which made him think that perhaps he should let this proud master meet that strange woman named Gina Brigitte, and perhaps that would really stimulate this genius with amazing talent, but also too much conceit.

As for using this matter to disturb the master, Uliu immediately dispelled this idea just by thinking about it.

Uliu could imagine that he would not be able to see the shadow of the master easily in the past few days, and it was because of this that he was very clever not to follow the master like Schelle.

After all, as the head of the whole "House of Cambrai", he also had to thread the needle between Pisa, Florence, Montina and, if possibly, Wallachia in the future, so that the details of the lord's intimacy with any woman should be known at least nominally, the better, only in this way can he mingle among the lord's women.

As for Schelle, thinking of the Balkan man who seemed to be quite shrewd, Ulliu just wanted to say: "It's a little more tender."

"Are you going to move the University of Pavia to Pisa?"

Lying on a bearskin blanket near the hearth, Barondi, who was tightly wrapped, looked at Alexander and asked.

Barondi was very dissatisfied when she heard the news from Alexander, although she also knew that the cost of a university was staggering, and now she happened to be short of money, but as a person with a more long-term vision than many men, she was keenly aware of the importance of a higher education institution in the future.

"Pisa is a better fit than Montina, and there's so much to do, I think you have more important things to do than to be distracted by a university."

"What's more important?" Barondi was immediately intrigued, and she felt that perhaps only by constantly showing Alexander her role as a wife could Alexander become more dependent on her.

"Produce an heir to the crown I am about to receive, preferably now." Alexander smiled playfully.