A knight was still a knight, after all.
He probably had never actually experienced a territorial war,
yet his fundamentals were far too solid.
Was he capable?
Or was he not?
He truly was a man I could not figure out.
&
In any case, thanks to him, I was able to catch my breath a little.
“Young Master! May we use some of the remaining materials!?”
When I turned my head, the technicians had already gathered near the storehouse.
Wondering what was going on, I went over,
only to find them rummaging through the materials, saying they would try making something useful for the territorial war.
“Not siege equipment. Make something that can be used right away even on flat ground.”
“Ha! Of course!”
“Kahaha, how long has it been since we got to build without worrying about materials!”
“Use it all up! When else are we going to get a chance like this if not now? Wahaha!! This is going to be fun!”
...
For a moment, I felt as though I had brought in a swarm of money-eating pests,
but I forced the thought away.
At the very least, those people were thinking first about making what had popped into their heads,
rather than fearing the situation we were in.
That was not a bad thing.
We had done most of what needed to be done immediately.
What we needed now were eyes and feet that could quickly read the movements of the opposing territory.
It would have been nice if we had a mobile scouting unit,
but there was no way we possessed such troops.
In the end, there was only one thing we could do first.
Send a reply.
Naturally, it was a refusal.
***
[The Signal Family’s Reply to the Hallsen Family’s Notice]
- The Brennan Territory has confirmed the notice sent by the Lubant Territory.
However, the water system flowing down from the Asterus Mountains is not the private property of any single territory, and one cannot claim rights over the entire waterway merely because one has managed part of the upper reaches.
The Brennan Territory has only lawfully maintained waterways and expanded agriculture within its own lands, and it cannot acknowledge either the damages or the management rights claimed by the Lubant Territory.
Accordingly, we refuse all demands made by the Lubant Territory: payment of shared costs, recognition of approval authority, and readjustment of waterways.
Should the Lubant Territory use this as a pretext to tamper without authorization with the sluice gates, embankments, or water facilities of the Brennan Territory, we will regard it as a clear act of infringement and take all necessary measures in response.
The Brennan Territory does not desire unnecessary conflict.
However, neither do we intend to submit to coercion and threats. -
We had made our position clear as well.
Ordinarily, we would have phrased it a little more gently.
We might have tried to placate them,
or proposed a trade,
or left room to breathe by suggesting we seek judgment from the royal family.
But there was no point.
They were going to attack us anyway.
So there was no need to act weak.
“Young Master!”
Butler Albert hurried inside.
“A letter has arrived from Belmardian. It is addressed to you, Young Master.”
Aileen.
I wondered if she had heard the news.
I immediately broke the seal.
[I heard what happened. If you need it at any time, use the card I gave you. If you’re worried because Lucevalt might be behind them, truly, don’t be. A war with them would be welcome, if anything.
Oh, and I personally looked into the Bedberiu Territory. Nothing special came up, but it feels as though the trail was sharply cut off midway. I can’t be certain, but there does seem to be a possibility that someone made contact with them. So be careful.]
As expected, she knew I would not use that card.
Even so, I was grateful, even if they were empty words.
But what came next bothered me.
The possibility that someone might have intervened in the movements of the Bedberiu Territory.
What if that someone was the Old Dynasty?
If so, was Aileen truly unrelated?
Or...
I cut my thoughts off there.
That was not what mattered right now.
Even if the Old Dynasty was behind the Hallsen Family’s current actions as well,
it was not as if I could use this situation right now to trace their tracks in reverse.
They were not an opponent my hands could reach in the first place.
For now, I had to focus on the Hallsen Family,
and watch how they moved.
Only after seeing their next move
would the justification we could seize become clear.
***
It was only a few days after we sent the reply.
I was running toward the outer castle gate with Father.
Shouts could be heard from afar.
And the moment we arrived near the gate, the smell of blood struck my nose first.
Several injured soldiers and sluice workers were sitting collapsed on the ground, breathing raggedly.
One man’s shoulder had been torn open,
and another’s face was covered in blood.
“What happened!”
At Father’s shout, one soldier barely lifted his head.
“The, the embankment... was attacked.”
At those words, the air changed.
The embankment facility we managed.
In the end, the Hallsen Family had attacked first.
We had been watching the situation as closely as we could, yet the fact that they had struck before word even reached us meant that a knight had moved on the other side.
“Those bastards truly...”
Father’s face visibly hardened.
We immediately held an operational meeting with Miles.
As soon as Miles entered, he threw off his wet cloak and looked down at the map.
“Miles, in your view, how should we move?”
At my question, Miles tapped the table a couple of times with his finger.
“Is there any other move after it’s been taken from us? We strike back.”
“...”
“We have to reclaim the embankment. It won’t be easy, though. They obviously took it after preparing for it.”
He swept his gaze over the map once, then added,
“The one fortunate thing is that they only have one knight too, so I can tie him down. In the end, what matters will be you, Young Master, and the soldiers.”
Concern settled heavily over Father’s face.
“You intend to move yourself? No. It’s too dangerous.”
“Father. If I don’t move, we really will lose the embankment.”
“It would be better to just pay them!”
I understood Father’s feelings.
He had never experienced a territorial war,
nor combat.
Of course he would be afraid.
“Please don’t worry too much. I’m not that weak.”
Father knew that I had trained without rest.
He had also seen how my body had changed recently.
Even so, that did not erase the fear he had as a father.
After catching my breath for a moment, I spoke in a lower voice.
“Do you think it’ll end if we block them with money now?”
“...”
“Once they start receiving it, next time they’ll want something bigger. They’ll plant their people here, extend their reach, and in the end, they’ll strip everything away while leaving our territory ours in name only.”
Father could not say anything.
I took one step further.
“Risel won’t be safe either.”
At those words, Father’s face went cold in an instant.
“When that time comes, you will be the first to take up the sword, Father. And you will truly want to kill them all. But... by then, it will be too late.”
“...”
After a long silence, Father squeezed his eyes shut and breathed out roughly.
“Yes. You are right. If we avoid this because we are afraid now, we will only invite a greater calamity.”
He smiled bitterly.
“I truly regret it. I have lived far too complacently.”
I gripped Father’s shoulder.
“It isn’t your fault, Father. That was the era we lived in. And now we must face the fact that it is no longer so. We must look ahead.”
Father looked at me as if surprised.
“Haha, yes. Right now, you are better than I am.”
It could not be helped.
I had experience.
“And.”
I pulled the map closer.
“I have an idea.”
Miles’s eyes narrowed slightly,
and Father looked at me in silence as well.
With my finger, I pointed in turn to the upper and lower reaches on the map.
Then, slowly,
I began explaining the board I had envisioned.
At that moment, the air in the room changed once more.
This time, not into fear,
but into the tension just before action.
***
Miles and I,
along with twenty soldiers, were moving under cover of darkness.
“Young Master.”
“What?”
“How are you so calm?”
Miles asked, glancing at me.
“Usually, when someone enters a situation like this for the first time, even if they pretend to be fine on the outside, their breathing changes first.”
“I’m young and thoughtless, so maybe it hasn’t sunk in yet.”
“People like that can’t judge themselves so objectively.”
Annoying.
He really was sharp about these things too.
I let out a faint laugh.
“Then maybe I’m a genius.”
“Haha. Yes. Either a genius or a madman.”
Miles laughed lightly, then added calmly,
“Still, the former seems more likely.”
“Oh. Are you acknowledging me?”
“If someone doesn’t waver in their first territorial war and makes a plan the moment he sees the board, what would you call that if not genius?”
A genius.
It was laughable.
To think I would hear something like that.
It was really something worth living to see.
No.
Something worth living again to see.
An hour passed like that.
Miles had now arrived at a place overlooking the embankment facility.
Miles raised his hand to stop the soldiers,
then lowered his body and cast his gaze forward.
The situation at the embankment entered his eyes clearly.
The sluice gate that should have been open was closed.
They had deliberately blocked it.
If they blocked the waterway like that, there would be no damage immediately,
but as time passed, the moisture would begin draining from our paddies.
After only a few days, even the condition of the soil would be affected.
We had to reclaim it quickly.
There were roughly forty soldiers guarding it.
And among them was a knight.
“That’s a lot.”
Miles muttered in a low voice.
On our side, the soldiers we had been able to draft immediately numbered twenty.
We thought they would not attack the territory itself, but we still had to leave some behind for defense, just in case.
These were not numbers for a head-on clash.
Miles looked back at the soldiers.
“Listen carefully. We have no intention of charging them head-on.”
The soldiers’ gazes all fixed on Miles at once.
“We hit and run. Keep shaking them, keep splitting them up, and when you see an opening, pretend you’re tearing off a bite. We have to make it so those bastards can’t recklessly rush at us. So there’s no need to be needlessly brave, and no need to be afraid either. Understood?”
“Y-yes, sir.”
“Hoo... hoo...”
They answered, but tension remained plainly on the soldiers’ faces.
The spears in their hands were trembling visibly.
Miles swept his gaze over those faces,
then spoke this time in a lower, firmer voice.
“But remember one thing. Don’t run just because you think you’re going to die.”
“...”
“The moment you run, the comrade beside you dies in your place. And as everything collapses, every one of your comrades may die because of you. If you want to become that kind of bastard, then by all means, run.”
The soldiers’ expressions hardened.
The eyes that had been focused first on their own lives until just a moment ago
slowly began turning toward the people beside them.
At the looks they exchanged, telling one another not to worry, Miles smiled faintly.
“And don’t worry.”
He drew his sword.
Shing.
The sound of the blade sliding free rang out unusually cold.
“Because I’m here.”
And Miles rose without hesitation.
He was the first to reveal himself from the grass.
Steps that showed no fear at all.
Seeing those steps and his back, the soldiers also began to rise one by one, gritting their teeth.
The moment Miles and the soldiers revealed themselves,
the Hallsen soldiers guarding the embankment reacted immediately.
“Enemy!”
“It’s the Brennan bastards!”
“Take up arms!”
In an instant, torches shook,
spearpoints rose,
and curses and shouts tangled together.
The fight between the Brennan Territory and the Lubant Territory
had finally begun like that.
But.
The person who should have been there was not.
There was no sign of Rayon.