“Many thanks,” Mahkfa said with a deep bow. With that, his business was concluded and he departed from the castle with Bamba at his side, hurrying along back toward Paradille.
○
“A combined force to strike at Missian…” Shakhma muttered to himself in his chambers after Mahkfa had left.
Missian is certainly a troublesome and dangerous presence on the continent. Ansel in particular is liable to become its next target.
Shakhma was convinced that when Missian inevitably chose to invade its next duchy, Ansel would be the first in line. Missian shared borders with three duchies in total: Seitz, Paradille, and Ansel. Seitz was already under Missian rule, and while it was possible that Missian would cross through its territory to invade its neighbor Scheutz, the conventional move would be to conquer the duchies surrounding Missian first. And, faced with a choice between Ansel and Paradille, Ansel was unmistakably the more appealing target.
Paradille’s central location meant that any of the other duchies could choose to invade it. As such, even if Missian managed to conquer Paradille, they would find themselves having to defend it over and over, likely exhausting their resources in the process. Paradille also lacked an impressive population or any major agricultural output, meaning there would be very little to do with any land that Missian was able to conquer.
Ansel, on the other hand, boasted a large population and was abundant with natural resources. Conquering it would provide no end of benefits, and would require far less caution when it came to the surrounding duchies. Moreover, while Ansel was one of the larger duchies in the empire and while Shakhma was effectively in control of its affairs, it was plagued by constant factional infighting between its nobles and could hardly function as a monolith. To put it plainly, Ansel was poorly equipped to fend off an invasion. Missian could hardly have asked for a more promising target.
The Imperial Family has never faced a greater crisis. Even those fools who never listen to a word I say will have to see reason and join the fight this time, Shakhma thought, picturing not the other duchies but rather the factions within Ansel that spurned his attempts to influence them.
Many of Ansel’s nobles were dissatisfied with Shakhma holding such a position of power, but many of those same nobles were loyal toward the emperor himself. They would know that keeping up their petty resistance toward the chancellor could spell doom for the emperor, under the current circumstances. Shakhma believed that they would have no choice but to obey him.
A combined force to subdue Missian. If all goes well then not only will our most dangerous neighbor be removed from the equation, I’ll also have the perfect opportunity to dispose of all those who oppose me, Shakhma thought with a sneering grin.
Every war had its casualties, and if certain less cooperative nobles refused to accept a dangerous order, Shakhma would have a convenient excuse to rid himself of them for good. He was a man driven first and foremost by self-interest, working not for the sake of Ansel’s future, but rather to bolster his own power and influence.
We’ll see if the dukes offer us any soldiers, though. I suppose stranger things have happened. No harm in having His Majesty write the letter himself, at the very least.
With little to lose, Shakhma went off to pay his emperor a visit at once.
○
The capital of Canshiep, Ryaptar, lay near the ocean on the northernmost tip of the continent of Summerforth. The climate in Summerforth was broadly mild, and Canshiep wasn’t the sort of perpetually frigid land that its far-northern location might lead one to expect, but its capital in particular was the coldest place on the continent. Castle Ryaptar stood within that capital city, and on that castle’s highest floor, a meeting was taking place around a round table.
“Letters have arrived from Paradille and His Majesty the Emperor. They have informed us that they intend to assemble an army with which to punish Missian for its misdeeds, and have requested that we of Canshiep contribute to that effort.”
The first person to speak was none other than the Duke of Canshiep himself, Towak Umungas. He was an older man of nearly sixty, and the scars that peppered his face spoke of the many battles he’d been through in his time. His sturdy, muscular build, meanwhile, spoke of how little of his strength he’d lost in his old age.
“We’re rejecting them, I’m sure. Why in the name of decency would we ever agree to such a thing, honestly? We have enough on our plate with the pirates as is,” said Yaado Umungas. He was twenty years old, and was the fifth of Towak’s five sons. He had long, black hair that complimented his handsome features, but something about his expression gave the impression that he was a bit of an imbecile. Anyone who got that impression would soon find it validated─he was not a smart man by any means. Still, his skills in sword fighting, horsemanship, and other martial pursuits were indisputable, and had led him to become Canshiep’s greatest general.
“Silence, fool,” Towak’s eldest son, Kai, snapped.
“F-Fool?! You don’t have to be that harsh!” Yaado whimpered.
Kai was a sharp-eyed and remarkably inexpressive man of thirty-five. He looked as straitlaced and stubborn as they came, and at the moment, he was considered to be the leading contender for the seat of duke when his father eventually passed.
“Missian will become a threat to us in the future, like it or not,” said Kai. “The only reason they aren’t a higher priority is because they’re located so far away from us. At the moment, it’s unclear whether or not they’re worthy of our attention. We need more information.”
“Okay, but they’re only asking for us to go to a meeting, right? Isn’t that the perfect chance to get a bunch of information about Missian from the other duchies?” asked Towak’s fourth son, Otto. Otto was a kind-looking man with a soft, gentle manner of speech, and at twenty-four years of age, he was still quite young.
“True─they have not requested us to dispatch troops, as of yet. It could be a worthwhile chance to learn more about the state of things,” Kai admitted.
“Of course, it could also be a trap that Ansel and Paradille are working to set together,” Otto noted.
“Hey, can I, uhh, leave?” a new voice piped up, cutting into the brothers’ exchange. “I was sorta in the middle of working on a new weapon I’m developing, so…”
The new participant in the meeting was the duke’s third son, Noin, who was slumped listlessly over on the table. He had scruffy, unkempt hair, and his outfit was just as ragged. His slender build hinted that he got no exercise whatsoever, and his pallid skin suggested that he went outside just as infrequently. Noin’s passion lay in researching and developing weaponry, a calling that he spent the bulk of his day-to-day life fully occupied by. He was emphatically not passionate when it came to this sort of meeting, and was the sort of person who would sooner hide away in his room to do research than join in on a conference. Since his brother Kai was in charge of funding that research, however, it hadn’t been hard for him to threaten Noin into making an appearance. For all his foibles, Noin was a remarkable craftsman─most of Canshiep’s recent inventions were his original designs.
“No. Stay till the end,” snapped Kai. “Have you no pride as a member of House Umungas?!”
“Okaaay,” Noin droned listlessly.
Kai heaved a sigh. His criticism had clearly not done its job. “In any case, it’s true that we can’t dismiss the possibility that this is a trap, in which case we cannot afford to send our father. I should go in his stead. They won’t have the right to complain about us speaking through a representative, considering their own circumstances.”
“Well, sending you is not any better than sending Father, is it? You’re the heir, Kai,” said Otto. “If one of us has to go, wouldn’t I be the best choice? I may only be the fourth son, but I am still the son of the duke.”
“By that standard, Louvert would be the most rational choice,” Kai said before pausing. “Speaking of whom…Father, where is Louvert?” he asked. Louvert, incidentally, was the second son of House Umungas.
Towak, who had been sitting with his arms crossed and listening in silence as the brothers debated, spoke up once more. “Louvert left some time ago to deal with a pressing issue in the south. I imagine he’ll be back before long,” he said.
“I see,” said Kai. “What do you say, Father? How do you believe we should approach this request?”
“If an army is to be formed in opposition to Missian, then that army’s leader will, of course, be the emperor─and I’ve no desire to be a dog of the empire. Never again,” said Towak.
“You’re opposed, then?” asked Kai.
Towak shook his head. “Not opposed, no. We have ample motive to stand against Missian…and if Semplar is to be put up for grabs, we must be the duchy that claims it.”
“Semplar…” Kai muttered. “That would be Missian’s largest port city, would it not?”
“It would. Large as our fair Ryaptar may be, Semplar is a city to rival it─and while Ryaptar lies in the far north, Semplar rests in the far south. If we were to claim it and establish a trade route between the two cities, unfathomable profit would await.”
“I see. However, a direct trade route seems unfeasible. Scheutz is our ally, for the time being, but our ships would need to pass through Seitzan waters as well,” Kai said as he consulted a map.
“We would, of course, do well to conquer a number of Seitzan ports as well, but that would hardly be a challenge. The Seitzan fleet is no worthy foe of the mighty armada of Canshiep. We’ll brush them aside with ease.”
Canshiep was the maritime powerhouse of Summerforth, its fleet putting those of the other duchies to shame. A large island lay to the north of the duchy, which pirates had infested and declared to be a rogue nation called Sektar. Canshiep had been forced to build up a powerful navy in order to counteract the threat that the pirates posed. Not only was that navy formidable in terms of numbers, its vessels were also superior in a technological sense. They were the best ships around when it came to both speed and cargo capacity. That was why claiming Semplar posed such incredible potential for Canshiep in particular.
“Hmm─but the airship makes this tricky, huh?” Otto said with a worried frown. “Nothing we can do to fight back against an attack from the sky.”
“And learning more of that risk is another reason why it would be for the best to participate in these talks,” said Towak.