Ouroboros Record ~Circus of Oubeniel~

Chapter 63: Like Military Boots 1 (2)

Volden. This was the land that bordered the St. Gallen territory of Erebus Rohtlehrgen across the mountain range. The elevation of the mountain range was somewhat lower than other regions. Perhaps it would be possible to launch a surprise attack by crossing the mountains from there.

Of course, such was not an easy decision.

Crossing the mountains was not without its dangers. There was a risk of losing soldiers due to accidents during the march, as well as risking battle with monsters. In addition, it was difficult for horses to traverse the terrain there, affecting their supply lines.

But the allure of taking Arquell by surprise was very difficult to resist. After all, St. Gallen had no little time to spare. In a war where food was scarce, it was understandable that they would rely on surprise, where a single blow would be decisive.

Then a general made one suggestion.

"......In the war fifty years ago, where did their defeated soldiers escape to?"

The war in which St. Gallen captured the western half of the Erebus Rohtlehrgen. In the early stages of the war, the Arquell side lost their leaders and lost their ability to organise resistance. Naturally, the St. Gallen side tried to extend the damage of the war by encircling the enemy. In spite of this, many of the enemy forces fled the battlefield and they failed to trap them. This was despite the enemies losing their commanders. In addition, they had a blockade set up in the Allemande area assuming it would be the most natural escape route.

Did the enemy forces cross the mountains to escape Erebus Rohtlehrgen into Volden?

Fifty years ago, there was political turmoil, including the purge of aristocrats who had acted arbitrarily causing the war, and so, the investigation of how the enemy soldiers escaped remained a mystery. After the war, the country shifted to a policy of reconciliation and peace, and refrained from harping on the past.

With the suggestion of crossing the mountains, a secret survey of the mountain range was conducted, and a startling fact was discovered. To their surprise, a pathway that was narrowly acceptable for an army was found. Of course, as was usual in the mountains, monsters existed, but their strength was not high. They could be easily fought off by a well-stocked army. The defeated soldiers of half a century ago must have taken this road to escape and return home. Now, on the other hand, they could use it to attack Volden the Kingdom of Arquell.

Thus the decision was made to launch a surprise attack on Volden.

After crossing the mountains, the army would blitz the cities around there and establish a base. They would gather food and wait for winter to pass. When the snow melts in spring, they would extend their assault to various parts of Arquell, cutting off the roads and inflicting economic damage. The invasion force will be small in numbers in order to quickly launch a surprise attack through the rugged terrain. In order to support them, the main body of the St. Gallen army would advance toward Allemande. If the enemy tried to rescue Volden, they would attack the thinly defended Allemande, and if they tried to reinforce Allemande, the surprise troops would continue to gouge at their flank. With these attacks, St. Gallen could make a favourable deal with Arquell, asking for reparations and other beneficial conditions. This pincer attack strategy would threaten the Kingdom of Arquell in earnest.

That was their plan. They kept it confidential and it seemed that it stayed confidential the whole was what St. Gallen thought.

However, there was a man in Arquell that was aware of their plan. Not only that, he had long foresaw and envisioned the "next war" with St. Gallen to begin like this and had prepared for it.

George Henry Lavallee, Marquis of the Kingdom of Arquell. The former leader of the centralist faction. He was also the man who was supposed to have been promoting the policy of reconciliation between the two countries. He must have also been one of the defeated soldiers that crossed the mountains in that war 50 years ago.

"Arghhh, damn this and that! What on earth is everybody doing? This is now a time of crisis!"

Count Langogne growled as he pounded his fist on the table in anger. He had driven Linus to insanity, and thus had driven Lavallee from his position as the leader of the faction, but he had been stunned by the news of the war. He hurriedly began to prepare for war, but was met with a series of setbacks from the start.

The first thing that was necessary in a war was an army. For ordinary nobles, they would recruit soldiers from their domain, and then combine them with their vassals to form an army. However, Langogne, who belonged to the centralist faction, could not apply such a method. His family, which has been a high-ranking courtier for many generations, possessed a much smaller territory than other feudal lords of the same rank. The only people who belonged to the centralist faction who could secure enough troops on their own was Chambery, who had recently defected to the decentralist faction, and that damned Lavallee, who was now out of the capital. He still held a large piece of territory.

So, how does a noble like Count Langogne go about gathering the strength to enter the war? It was obvious. If he couldnt prepare it on his own, he would have to recruit an army from elsewhere.

He would have to hire mercenaries. Experts ready for hire with money. Unlike adventurers who slayed monsters, these were traders who exchanged human lives for money. They were bandits who knew nothing of chivalry and had little sense of loyalty, but they were one of the few sources of strength for the land-poor nobility.

However, it costs a lot of money to gather a large number of mercenaries enough to keep a presence in the army and to be able to claim credit for any merits. Enough money to destroy a Counts fortunes in a single battle.

In order to prevent that from happening, Count Langogne would have to get a loan from a moneylender to finance the war. But he could not do that.

"You merchants! You money-grubbing bastards with the stench of coins on your fingers! Look at the feet of this Count Langogne!"

The reality was that there were difficulties at fundraising.

When he asked merchants for loans, they were either reluctant to lend him the amount at once or quoted an unusually high interest rate. Ironically, this was due to the fact that Count Langogne was an upright noble in his own right. He avoided expensive purchases and strictly refrained from borrowing money unnecessarily. As for art, he preferred the works of young artists who had the potential but had not yet budded, rather than the already renowned artists. The fact that many of them came into the limelight as a result of this was also his hope, but this is not the point.

Because of this, he had not been able to build a trusting relationship with the merchants. The moneylenders have no idea how much to lend, and if they did so, how much he could eventually repay. This made it impossible to promise large loans.

Nevertheless, if he had opened his treasury chest and negotiated earnestly, he might have been able to win a certain level of trust even in a short period of time. But again, his aristocratic spirit got in the way.

Count Langogne was a genuine noble. He believed that it was natural for a noble to be served by a commoner, and on the contrary, he believed that it was impossible for a noble to bow down to a commoner. And if a noble did bow towards a commoner, then he would be no noble in his eyes. In other words, he was not the kind of person who could make concessions to commoners such as merchants.

If it had been Tullius Oubeniel, he would have bowed without hesitation. He would have bowed as long as it would have gotten him the money and the things he wanted. After all, he was a man who had been making money by selling self-made potions since he was a child. He knew from experience that if he was negotiating with a merchant, that would be one of the options he would choose. In the first place, he was an abnormal noble who believed that the class system should not be blindly followed.

Linus Oubeniel, whom he had gotten rid of the other day, would have other options open to him. That unfortunate young man had a large territory and was skilled at administration and planning projects. Instead of bowing for help, he could prepare any number of materials to make the negotiations more favourable, such as addressing the inadequacies of his offered terms or offering the other party an opportunity to a business venture in his territory. If it was about the notoriety of his brother then there was nothing else he could do.