37 — 4 (7)

The Forest Wurm fell, and the soldiers buzzed with excitement.

‘A promotion for the spearmen?’

Louis checked information he had never seen before. The spear unit’s experience had reset, and each soldier now bore a special status called Rough-Terrain Training.

Rough-Terrain Training granted a combat bonus on tiles that restricted movement.

By default, spearmen’s overall stats dropped when they fought in such backcountry.

It was a slight shame that Level 1 Rough-Terrain Training couldn’t erase the penalty entirely.

If the spear unit continued to grow without being wiped out, their combat power might actually increase in rough terrain.

If enemy infantry suffered terrain penalties while spearmen with Level 3+ Rough-Terrain Training launched an ambush? Even against an equal force, a single strike could inflict irrecoverable critical damage.

“My lord, thank you—truly.”

“Ah, Boromir. That was almost a disaster. My miscalculation.”

“No. If I had pulled back the moment we spotted it, we wouldn’t have taken such losses. I was greedy.”

“Understandably greedy. It was a Forest Wurm, Boromir. Heh.”

At Louis’s words, Boromir looked at the slain Forest Wurm.

‘By the way, where did the young lord learn to run a unit like this?’

With even the gnolls having abandoned the area, Louis’s planned monster purge was essentially complete.

They had even brought down the Forest Wurm; all that remained was to head back. Boromir marveled—Louis hadn’t slipped up even once so far.

‘His rhythm of rest and advance is spot on.’

Boromir had fought major battles against barbarians. He knew how hard it was to issue precise rest orders while managing a unit.

Even among the duke’s three sons, the most militarily gifted, Fred, didn’t time things this precisely.

‘Maybe his measure is greater than I thought.’

“Boromir, was that the only Forest Wurm?”

Boromir tore his gaze from the Wurm and looked at Louis.

“It seems so. It must have been growing in that marsh. The gnolls looked to be offering it some kind of sacrifice.”

‘It would be nice if there were one more, but that’s unlikely.’

Wurms tended to be solitary. Being juveniles didn’t change that.

Louis looked toward the great marsh ahead.

It was large, but not large enough to hide a fully grown Forest Wurm.

‘No matter. We’ll take the whole carcass back.’

Louis planned to put it up for auction. He didn’t know the exact amount he could fetch, but even after giving his father a 50% cut, there should be plenty left.

At the very least, it would surely keep the treasury from bottoming out.

“Boromir, just in case, could you sweep the area once more?”

Boromir had meant to ask for rest after taking wounds from the Wurm, but he changed his mind.

“…Of course.”

Handing Unit 2 to Boromir, Louis opened the Civilization System.

‘1,600 points… deposited. More than I expected. This is what all the trouble was for.’

He had expected 1,000 points for a Difficulty-3 quest, but perhaps thanks to the Wurm he received 1,600.

Adding the remaining 200, he now had 1,800 points.

‘Solid.’

He could unlock another trait, but it was better to return to the city and assess the situation first.

From experience, the most efficient next skill investment always depended on current conditions.

A follow-up quest.

Still Difficulty… 3. Louis shook his head.

There was no need to clear every generated quest.

If he diverted the whole army to pursuit now, domestic governance would suffer.

Quests couldn’t be explicitly canceled, but if left alone a few days, they naturally disappeared.

In quests, timing mattered most: if you failed to act within the window, the quest vanished.

---

The woman undressed before Dekal, garments slipping away with languid grace; he admired her narrow waist and said,

“Turn around.”

Young and full of freshness, she climbed onto the bed without the slightest reluctance and posed.

‘That pelvis pleases me every time.’

This handmaid was a slave Dekal had purchased on sight in the port city.

He had liked her immediately; even when the slaver named a steep price, he bought her outright without haggling.

Of course, it was a secret from his wife.

His wife lived far to the north of Pontina territory, in Obenroe, the city governed by the firstborn, Pierre—quite a distance away.

‘A pity I’ll have to get rid of her when I return.’

But that would be far off yet.

Dekal took her.

“Mm—”

The woman moaned, slightly in pain, but Dekal silently pursued his pleasure.

‘Heh… nothing better to cool the blood after a day at the Colosseum.’

After some time—just as Dekal reached a heated pitch—someone knocked.

The woman panted raggedly, gasping on the edge of breaking, so anyone outside would know—but the knocking came three more times.

It was a kind of signal. Important—take note.

And right now, the only matter that would bring a subordinate to Dekal was something related to Louis.

“Huff… huh…”

‘So, the upstart has come back.’

Dekal didn’t tell the subordinate to enter yet. He would finish and then hear the report.

If Louis had returned, either he had succeeded, failed, or reached a stalemate and needed help—one of those.

But Dekal didn’t consider that Louis might have succeeded; he guessed the boy had lost most of his force and was retreating—or had taken a critical blow and, out of pride, couldn’t withdraw, and would beg Dekal for reinforcements.

‘He needs me—ha ha.’

Dekal had already warned Louis that with recruits trained for only three weeks, he would accomplish nothing in that terrain.

Unless a master of at least Sword Expert rank led the van to raise morale—someone like Dekal himself—it was far, far too ambitious.

“Haah… ah… ha—hah…”

Clutching the woman’s hips, Dekal said,

“Areun…”

“…Hah… yes?”

“…………..”

“Mm—speak, master. I’ll do my best, as you wish.”

“No, not that… You—what do you think of the consul marching out to ‘subjugate’ with those clownish soldiers?”

‘…If the consul means Lord Louis.’

Areun pictured Louis. Though she was Dekal’s personal handmaid, she had crossed paths with Louis a few times.

Louis had never spared a glance for a mere handmaid like her, but whenever she saw him, she remembered his image vividly.

His features were delicate enough to stir a protective instinct, yet his aura was fierce.

It would be odd to say he lacked charm.

“I believe… he’ll return with heavy losses.”

She had listened closely and remembered the remarks Dekal often muttered.

Yet in her heart, given her position, she could not help but quietly root for Louis.

“…Right. Even a base slave reaches that conclusion—that’s exactly the callow judgment I’d expect.”

Satisfied with her answer, Dekal focused on his work again.

A few minutes later he climaxed, withdrew, and lay catching his breath. Areun quickly brought the water she had prepared.

Dekal drank, then called outside,

“Enter.”

The door opened at once and a man stepped in, properly formal.

“Report. The consul has exterminated the Green Skin coalition and is returning.”

“Right, there’s no way he—what?”

“……”

“Repeat that.”

“The consul has completed the monster purge.”

“Losses?”

“…According to the report, virtually none…”

“…With those ridiculous clowns?”

“…Yes, sir.”

“Damn it, what are you saying? That’s—huh?”

The subordinate said nothing more, and Dekal scowled.

‘My mood was perfect after the Colosseum, too.’

Dekal listened as the detailed report continued.

Near the end, a thought struck him.

‘Wait… even Lord Fred couldn’t have done quite this… No—no. The tactics were poor. It must have been luck.’

Dekal disparaged Louis’s tactics, though in truth they were nothing flashy—just textbook doctrine.

Even so, he had to revise his judgment of Louis again.

‘…He does know what he’s doing.’

This made the third time Dekal had been surprised by Louis.

---

People jammed the roadside. The reason such a crowd had gathered was the Forest Wurm carcass, hauled along by several wagons in a train.

“Wow, did they really bring that down?”

“As expected of Lord Louis.”

“They say the subjugation went well—we won’t need to fear monsters anymore!”

Women and children looked a little squeamish, but mostly they were fascinated. Citizens rarely got to see a monster like this.

At that hour, Louis soaked in hot water at the bath.

Bath culture had been developed by the Empire, the dominant power; other small states admired it, and within a century it spread worldwide so that every city had basic bathing facilities.

Water wasn’t abundant in Louis’s city, so citizens couldn’t bathe properly—but that hardly applied to the powerful.

In any case, Louis closed his eyes, savoring his fatigue melting away.

‘The marble has arrived… time to build the Wonder.’

The marble he had ordered had come in.

Between that and arming the troops, the treasury now held only 4.

With treasury 3 and maintenance at -3 per turn, he had one turn’s cushion left.

‘Cutting it close.’

It was a bit risky, but even with just one turn left, Louis was calm. He had two or three ways to fix the finances; it was just a matter of choosing.

Excluding those unable to work, the city’s population of 4 was allocated as follows: 0.5 to the army, 3 to agriculture, and 0.5 to the sugar tile.

With 0.5 population working sugar, the tile yielded 1 gold per turn.

‘First, I’ll pull some citizens off agriculture.’

If he filled the sugar tile’s worker cap of 1, gold would rise by +2.

Food output would drop, but by reallocating citizens, the sugar tile would yield +3 gold per turn.

That would cut maintenance from -4 to -1.

‘That would let me scrape by for three turns.’

Those three turns would be the time to seriously boost the finances.

To sell the Forest Wurm carcass, he would need auctions or negotiation; if time was too tight, he would be forced into a bad sale.

Louis spoke to the attendant waiting outside.

“We need to send a pigeon to the Mage Tower.”

The girl replied,

“…Yes. I’ll inform the clerk.”

---

The next day, at the drill yard.

Louis took up his sword.

‘I need regular sword training now.’

From this battle, Louis felt keenly the need to improve himself.

You could never predict a battle perfectly.

In an emergency, there might be no one to rely on.