5 (9)

Fred’s strength lay in cavalry. Within his domain, horses could be produced because his second city, Hamil, possessed abundant pasture.

With a vast, naturally spreading steppe and grass that grew at an abnormal rate compared to other regions, wild horses roamed near Hamil even without special management.

Even if Louis purchased five hundred heads, the number he could raise would be minuscule compared to the land Hamil held.

With the resources supplied by Hamil, Fred maintained roughly two thousand cavalry with excellent mobility. If Fred had one shortcoming, it was siege capability.

‘He won’t be able to refuse.’

That would be Louis’s final card to hold back. He would try every other method; if none worked, he planned to sell catapults to Fred in exchange for horses.

Of course, selling catapults would make Fred stronger than now. Could Louis beat a Fred whose offensive balance was complete?

‘If I can just perfect my order of battle…’

This was the decisive reason Louis was intent on buying horses even by pushing it. He believed war was about harmony. In simple terms: spearmen could take down cavalry; cavalry were very strong against archers; and archers could corner spearmen.

If one added the variable of terrain on top of that, the outcome became impossible to foresee even a step ahead.

‘I’m no Sword Expert like my brother, so I have to use my head to the fullest.’

Above all, he had the Civilization System. If he bought time, other avenues would surely open.

The door opened and an attendant came in.

“Young Master. Lord Fred asks that you join his morning training.”

Morning training. Training included sparring as well. Louis knew Fred had done this even longer than Louis had been at it lately.

‘What I do is on a different level.’

He had heard they trained the whole morning—simple runs, sparring, plus basic command drills and horsemanship.

‘He’s a Sword Expert.’

He himself had only reached Swordsmanship 3; the gap in stamina and skill was on an entirely different plane.

In other words, if he went, he would certainly be humiliated.

If he refused, he would be mocked as girlish; if he went, he would be crushed under sheer difference in ability.

With negotiations looming, such a situation was very bad. Louis was a city’s Consul, after all.

‘The contest of wills has already begun.’

A foe on a different plane than a bookish mage.

“I refuse.”

“……Then will you remain here?”

“No. I’ll train in the morning as well—but with my own soldiers.”

In a short span Louis found the optimal answer. The serious negotiation would likely come at dinner; until then, he had to carry himself so he could stand on equal footing.

“Understood.”

Morning. While Fred was loosening up, an attendant conveyed Louis’s answer.

‘Hm. His temperament has changed since the old days.’

Fred felt complicated. As a child, Louis would have trained with him in the morning without any formality.

‘We can’t be as we were when we were young.’

It had in fact been five years since he had seen Louis’s face after being appointed a legion by their father. Not that he was soft enough to hand things to his brother. If Father died at this moment, Fred was confident he could end the civil war in a flash. In that case, he could hardly spare his brothers; that was the cleanest way. Thus, Louis’s behavior now looked to Fred like a struggle to survive.

Natural, in a way, for both of them—but Fred could not hide a gloomy feeling.

‘I should focus on training.’

Training blew worries away. Rule was a more tiring occupation than one might think.

“Doing it separately isn’t bad either.”

That afternoon, Louis was reviewing city data when Hansen came through the door.

Few inspired as much confidence as Hansen, with his prior experience serving as this city’s administrator.

Seeing Louis look at him, Hansen felt envy—what on earth went on inside this man’s head?

The moment they arrived, Louis had surveyed the city and instructed Hansen to examine the situation, saying something seemed off.

Hansen had gone out and confirmed Louis’s intuition was right—he didn’t know how Louis checked things faster than someone who had actually lived here.

“Your expectation was correct, Young Master. Dissatisfaction is rising quite a bit.”

“Why?”

“Prohibition. It seems to have been implemented recently.”

Prohibition. Louis thought it a very on-brand choice for his brother.

‘So happiness fell because of prohibition…’

Still, it wasn’t information that helped much in the here and now.

“Young Master, in my humble view, Fred won’t sell a single horse. Shall we go straight to Marquis Gangpireu instead?”

From the start, Hansen had advised that negotiating with Fred was a waste of time—because he knew Fred’s disposition better than anyone from having served under him.

“I don’t think I can fill the whole quantity with him either.”

‘He won’t sell even one.’

Hansen sighed, but a subordinate’s duty was to follow once the young master had decided.

Louis had expected the negotiating stage to be the evening meal, but in the late afternoon Fred suddenly invited him to hunt, and Louis joined.

Louis took Hansen and urged his horse toward Fred’s hunting grounds, arriving shortly.

‘So that’s Louis…’

Jodan was the administrator Fred had come to trust of late. In truth, most city affairs were handled by Jodan; Fred was a valiant lord, but not particularly good at city management.

He studied Louis closely. Newly risen as he was, Jodan had only heard rumors; it was his first time seeing Louis in person. With no preconceptions, he looked and was impressed.

‘If he becomes an enemy, Louis may be more threatening to Lord Fred than Pierre.’

Jodan knew how hard a city Proia was to grow: no river, half its workable land wetlands, and monsters rampant in that terrain—no one knew that better.

Because Jodan was from Proia. Serving there as administrator, he had suffered countless frustrations; in the end he had chosen to leave home and join a new faction, and that choice had not been wrong.

“You’re here.”

As he returned Fred’s greeting, Louis weighed whether to speak to the point at once or delay it.

‘If I can open a deal while saving the catapult card, that’s best.’

Since both knew the situation too well for empty pleasantries, Louis decided to go straight to the point.

No one understood better than he that the longer time passed, the more initiative lay with the one who held it. If you wanted something from someone, it was efficient to bring up the main point at once.

Walking side by side at the fore as they entered the forest, Louis spoke.

“If you sell me horses, I’ll supply my sugar to you—and you alone.”

Silence. After a moment, Fred spoke.

“I need sugar, but even if you increase supply, I don’t see what’s particularly good for me. But tell me, Louis—why are you fixated on horses?”

“Cavalry.”

Louis answered frankly. Both Jodan and Hansen, following behind, were startled.

‘That’s a dangerous thing to say…’

They were, in a sense, in enemy territory. Hansen watched Fred’s face.

But Fred laughed heartily.

He loved honest talk best.

“Louis, I wish you were my full brother.”

Louis immediately played his next move: building an alliance.

“Not just sugar—I want a military alliance as well.”

That would whet anyone’s appetite. Sugar was extremely popular with citizens and could energize a city overall; a military alliance would greatly help isolate Pierre.

Watching, Jodan added,

“It’s a good offer. If we receive a monopoly on sugar, the citizens will be pleased. And frankly, Young Master Louis is the better partner than Young Master Pierre.”

If civil war broke out, it would quickly turn into a three-way melee.

In the broader frame it was a three-sided war—but there was no way Marquis Gangpireu would sit still.

Fred looked at Jodan. Since even the trusted Jodan spoke thus, he couldn’t help pondering. He had the strongest army, but the worst scenario he might face was three-on-one.

‘Can I save the catapult card…?’

Louis waited for Fred’s answer with anticipation.

“I still don’t think so. You’ve been frank with your terms, so I’ll be frank with mine. Even just maintaining my cavalry with my own horses is tight. There’s disease in Hamil.”

‘So be it.’

“I’ll pay correspondingly. Let’s trade.”

Fred frowned.

“I said I have no intention to trade—”

“I’ll add a term. I’ll make catapults for you.”

Fred, about to shout in irritation, cut himself off. No one knew better than he that siege engines were his one weakness.

Maintaining cavalry was important, yes, but he had the most cavalry already. It wasn’t that he lacked horses to use; he merely had none to spare for sale. It took only seconds for Louis’s offer to convert his annoyance into desire.

“Louis, you… don’t have any siege engines on hand.”

“I said I’ll make them for you.”

“You have the craftsmen?”

More surprises. Fred had just misheard Louis as saying he would sell siege engines; now, to make them? With the surveillance net spread over Proia, it was astonishing that Louis had acquired craftsmen under the noses of himself and Pierre.

Jodan let out a sigh of relief. He had thought sugar plus a military alliance were good enough terms—yet there was an even bigger prize behind them. Chastising his own lack of foresight, he spoke in an excited voice.

“Lord Fred. You should make the deal.”

Urged more strongly than a few seconds ago, Fred saw the terms were clearly favorable—and consented at last.

He had held to a principle of not engaging in military trade with someone who would be an enemy to come—but Louis became his first exception.

“……Not all of them. Two hundred heads only.”

Was Louis really taking a loss? Had Fred known of the Civilization System, he would never have accepted Louis’s proposal—but in this world, Louis alone knew of the System.

Louis smiled inwardly at the notification he hadn’t seen in a while.

The most astonished—indeed, nearly shocked—was Hansen.

‘When did he procure such craftsmen…?’

He had thought he saw through every internal matter of the city, yet the cards Louis threw down in negotiation were not merely bold but shocking.

To be honest, Hansen had been planning to betray Louis when the timing suited him—but in this moment, the impulse vanished, an instinct he could not deny.