I: Pillage
THE village of Nest was located in southern Eyland near the border with the country of Dorssen. With the war with Farune close at hand, this place too was filled with tension, but most of the villagers were optimistic.
“Don’t worry, Eyland will win for sure! The king of Farune is a heinous criminal who raided the Theocracy of Mauve on the back of a dragon and kidnapped a saint. That’s why the whole world has joined forces to fight him. This is a holy war to rescue the saint!”
“Even Vulcan, our old enemy, and Kiel, that place with all those amazing wizards, are fighting on our side. There’s no way we’ll lose!”
“From what I hear, those Farunian warriors called the Hundred eat monster meat and slurp up their blood. It’s transformed them into disgusting creatures themselves. Our village will have to help out if we’re going to defeat them!”
These were the sorts of statements that made up the majority opinion. The villagers believed Farune was an evil empire—partly because of Eylish propaganda—and they were ready to spare no effort in fighting against it.
However…
“Give us every piece of food in this village!”
A squad of Eylish soldiers had come to the village out of nowhere and immediately started making violent and forceful demands.
“I don’t know if we can give it all away,” said the mayor of the village. “Do you need food supplies for the war with Farune? If so, we won’t hesitate to help as much as we can.” Although the mayor was disconcerted, he strove to settle things peaceably if possible.
“No, that’s not what I meant,” said the leader of the squad. “Just bring out all your food. If you don’t listen to me, you might as well set fire to your village now.” Despite the look of anguish on his face, he did nothing to soften his uncompromising stance.
“We can’t! If we give you all our food, we’ll die!” the mayor yelped.
“You’ll die either way! If that demonic Farunian army comes, we’ll all die! We have to do anything we can to hurt them, no matter how small!”
This helped the mayor grasp what the Eylish army’s intentions were. Basically, they were planning to put pressure on the Farunians by making it impossible to obtain provisions in Eylish territory. However, the first ones to feel the squeeze would be them, the commoners. It made it impossible to tell whether Eyland or Farune were the bad guys.
“Is the king of Eyland commanding us to lie down and die?!” the mayor shouted in spite of himself.
“There is one way to survive,” the officer said after a short pause. “Beg the Farunians. Get provisions from them. That will be your fight!” He had to have known how self-serving this suggestion was, but this plan was the only way for Eyland to win. “And if you choose to defy us—” He raised a hand, and the soldiers around him held up torches.
The soldiers looked just as anguished as the officer. This wasn’t what they wanted to do; they were all just reluctantly obeying their superiors’ orders. The mayor understood this, and it only deepened his feelings of helplessness.
“All right,” the mayor finally said. “We’ll give you our food.”
He obeyed the officer’s orders and instructed the villagers to bring all of their food to him. There were some who brought only a meager amount and were then harshly rebuked by the soldiers, who subsequently barged into their homes and ransacked them for anything edible. The squads that had been ordered to carry out the scorched-earth policy had been told in no uncertain terms to thoroughly collect every last bit of food.
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“YOUR Majesty, the Eylish army has begun to withdraw!”
It was midday, and after one thing and another with Maria that morning, I was at my wits’ end. I had only just entered the tent that served as headquarters for my most important vassals when Captain Chrom of the Black Knights made his report.
I paused. “Why?”
“It seems that Your Majesty’s various stratagems have borne fruit.”
Stratagems? What’s that supposed to mean? Is he talking about Frau and Keely going off on their own and destroying Kiel? Or Sheila capturing Thracia, the capital of Vulcan, for some reason, even though I sent her to the country for diplomatic negotiations?
I hadn’t planned either of those things. They had done it all without my permission. If anything, they should have been punished for disobeying orders.
I had wanted Frau and Keely to take care of the Magedom’s army, so why had they attacked the country itself? Actually, whatever else the case may have been, there was no way they should even have been able to destroy an entire country with just the Mages’ Guild and the monster army anyway. Anyone should have been able to see that.
I wished they wouldn’t act like all these abnormalities were some kind of big victory.
As for Sheila, I had only assigned around ten guards to her, so how had she managed to occupy Vulcan’s capital? Where in the world had a rebel army with three thousand soldiers come from? I was so baffled I could hardly think about anything else. Maybe Sheila’s family had been preparing for a coup for a while. There was no way they could have raised such a large force out of nowhere otherwise. Maybe they had actually taken advantage of Sheila because she was now a princess of Farune. That was definitely a troubling idea. I was disappointed to hear people say that it had all been my scheme.
But still, a withdrawal? Hm… That isn’t good. There are some people here who tend to get carried away when that sort of thing happens.
I had hoped the Vulcanians would give us a good fight, and that maybe we could end things with a draw.
“Zero, I believe we ought to pursue and thoroughly smash them!”
An overexcited Ogma immediately proposed that we chase after the Eylish army. His expression was frenzied, like a hunting dog that had hit upon its prey. He was so full of energy that he seemed ready to go running after the retreating soldiers at any moment.
“I shall defeat one thousand enemy soldiers myself and line up their heads before Your Majesty!” he added.
Does he think that I’m a malevolent god that demands sacrifices or something? Who cares, just let them run away, if that’s what they want. You know, if we can finish this without a war, that’s really the best outcome.
“Pursuit won’t be necessary,” I declared.
Come to think of it, maybe all of this is happening because I never make myself clear. From now on, I’ll make sure to put everything into words, out loud.
“We shouldn’t engage in useless fights,” I said clearly. “We’ll head for Eyland’s capital at a slow pace.”
I actually wanted to go back to Farune right away, but as you might expect, it would have been hard to leave without negotiating a ceasefire first. There was always the possibility that our opponents might come back and try to start a war again later, plus I couldn’t behave too weakly in front of my subordinates. I had to apply pressure by advancing slowly, and get the Eylish to propose peace themselves.
“Slowly, sir?” Ogma asked, displeased. He was so raring to fight that he could hardly sit still.
“That’s right, slowly,” I replied. “War is about more than just fighting.”
We also had to deal with Vulcan, the capital of which we had carelessly occupied, and I wanted to avoid a war on two fronts. As for the Vulcanian army that had come to us, Frau and the other mages were sure to act as a roadblock against them, but I still had to watch the situation and adapt as needed. If we advanced too quickly into Eyland, we would get too far away from Vulcan and be unable to respond in an emergency.
For the time being, I wanted to make peace with Eyland without getting into an all-out fight with them, all while staying vigilant against Vulcan’s movements. International conflicts ought to be resolved diplomatically first of all, with war only as a last resort. The military was best used to apply pressure and make threats as another component of diplomacy. Getting into a war every time there was an issue would just make us lose manpower and strength as a country.
Though for some reason, Farune only keeps expanding and getting stronger through war…