WeTried Translations

Translator: Nemui

Editor: Nemui

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◈ Friedrich's Battlefield

Chapter 168: The Loser's Present and Future

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While a splendid banquet was being held in the royal castle of the Edelstein royal family, in Saint-Victoire, the royal capital of the Kingdom of Arelia, at the castle of the Arelia royal family...

"That concludes the report on the current situation."

The one who said this before her lord in the conference room was Countess Cecilia Fargier, general of the Arelian Royal Army. Beside her stood Count Patrick Villeneuve, who was likewise one of the king's close aides in military affairs.

"Thank you for your work... At last, the core units of the Royal Army have recovered to some extent."

"In terms of scale, I believe that is as Your Majesty says. As for quality, due to our own inadequacy, they are still in the midst of rebuilding."

After hearing the report on the rebuilding of the Royal Army, King Samuel spoke with relief, and Cecilia answered with a solemn expression.

The elites of the Arelian Royal Army had suffered enormous damage in the previous decisive battle against the Kingdom of Edelstein. Their rebuilding could not be achieved in a single year.

The Armor of the King, the guards of the Arelia royal family. Their numbers had been halved and replacements added, but as they were a unit responsible for guarding the royal castle and protecting the royal family, unsuitable personnel could not be added carelessly. Their size remained at about seven hundred.

Then there were the units protecting the royal capital and royal domain. They too had been half destroyed, and although newly recruited soldiers from the royal domain had filled the authorized strength of two thousand, their quality had fallen sharply. They were no longer worthy of being called an elite unit.

Incidentally, the subordinates of Marquis Robert Montesquieu, who had died in battle during the decisive battle, had been incorporated into these two units as precious fighting strength that could still be relied upon. Their number was only a few hundred in total.

Including these core units, the Royal Army in the Loire region, mainly overseen by Cecilia, had also somewhat reduced its strength and numbered about three thousand in total.

Altogether, a little under six thousand troops were the forces the current Arelia royal family could rely on.

What remained were the Royal Army troops stationed in various regions, but due to the royal family's financial difficulties, their scale had been reduced to the bare minimum needed for public order, about six thousand in total. Worse, their actual composition was second-line troops recruited from conquered lands and stationed in other conquered lands. In terms of loyalty, they could not be trusted very much. As an exception, the units stationed in the Novakia and Muret regions seemed to be held together fairly well by Marquis Angelo Mosetti, but their operation and maintenance depended on his efforts.

This was the current state of the Arelian Royal Army, which had once possessed a great army of twenty thousand, including several thousand elites.

"For the royal family, it is fortunate that you have been able to gather even a certain number. The fact that the Kingdom of Arelia has been able to maintain peace for this first year is surely due to the efforts of you soldiers."

The one who spoke beside Samuel was Emmanuel Arelia, the kingdom's chancellor and Samuel's uncle.

"You honor me, Your Highness."

"We are merely fulfilling our duties as loyal retainers of the royal family."

Cecilia bowed, and Patrick spoke beside her.

"All that remains is to achieve the reindependence of each conquered land peacefully, but... that itself is difficult. The hardest problem has been left for last."

"Your Majesty. That is simply how the world is."

Samuel's conduct and tone had become far more kingly over the past year. At his words, Emmanuel replied with a wry smile. Samuel too smiled wryly at the words of his closest aide and uncle.

The current territory could no longer be maintained. That was the conclusion the Arelia royal family had reached. In fact, in each conquered land that had once been an independent country, momentum toward reindependence was gradually rising in response to the royal family's weakening.

Therefore, Samuel was holding discussions behind the scenes about reindependence with the former ruling classes of each conquered land, beginning with their old sovereign houses.

By reviewing expenditures, including reducing the size of the Royal Army, he would secure the reparations to be paid to the Kingdom of Edelstein. Meanwhile, through negotiation, he would make each conquered land believe they could regain independence without shedding blood, and while shrinking the garrisons, he would maintain public order. Then, within a few years, he would allow each country to become independent peacefully and coexist with them thereafter. That was Samuel's aim.

That said, when a country became independent, complex negotiations were necessary in politics, military affairs, and the economy. Also, if they were made independent too quickly, the royal family's tax revenue would plummet, and payment of reparations would stall.

The Arelia royal family and the former ruling classes of each conquered land. While receiving support from his uncle, Samuel patiently advanced these difficult negotiations, in which various motives were tangled together. This steady and solid method was the rule of the king named Samuel.

Some parts of these negotiations were showing steady progress, but other parts were difficult, and the outlook there was dark.

"...The problems are still the Muret region and the Caruna region."

Thinking of the two regions where peaceful reindependence was extremely doubtful, Samuel made a subtle expression.

"Are there signs of unrest after all?"

"Yes. I do not believe any conspicuous movement will emerge immediately, but tensions are gradually rising. It is a situation where we cannot lower our guard."

Emmanuel was the one who nodded with a difficult expression in response to Patrick's question. As chancellor, Emmanuel had the most detailed grasp of foreign affairs, including information gathering, among those present.

In the reigns of the king before last, Gilbert, and the previous king, Childebert, the Kingdom of Arelia had conquered seven countries in total. First was the southern Kingdom of Caruna, their old enemy, which Gilbert conquered first. Next came the small southwestern Grand Duchy of Faro. After the generational change, Childebert inherited his father's invasion plans and conquered two small western countries in succession, then the Kingdom of Loire and the Kingdom of Muret. Last came the Kingdom of Novakia.

Of these, the three western and southwestern regions had originally been small countries, and negotiations were proceeding positively toward peaceful reindependence. The policy based on Emmanuel's proposal, in which the old ruling classes of each conquered land would form marriage ties with the Arelia royal family and its close relatives, was also proving effective. Even after each region became independent, there remained room to coexist as friendly neighboring countries. As for the Novakia region, because its conquest had been recent, peaceful reindependence was the easiest there. The current situation was that negotiations over conditions were being advanced little by little, and the optimal timing for independence was being explored while taking into consideration the circumstances of House Novakia, whose postwar wounds had not yet fully healed.

On the other hand, it was doubtful whether peaceful reindependence could be achieved in the Muret and Caruna regions.

In the Muret region, the old royal family showed a positive attitude toward negotiations, but its ability to rally support had declined. In particular, the northern nobles of the Muret region, who had resisted Arelia's invasion to the very end and even waged guerrilla warfare in the mountains, were commonly known as the mountain nobles. Rumors said they were completely ignoring the old royal family's wishes and plotting armed reindependence, intending to expand their territories in the confusion.

The Caruna region was dangerous in a different way.

To begin with, the event that had driven the king before last, Gilbert, to attempt hegemony was the repeated border violations by the Kingdom of Caruna and the accompanying looting and violence in villages and cities. With a population of about four hundred fifty thousand, the Kingdom of Caruna was not especially large. However, because it lay in the south of the western continent and possessed multiple port cities, it was wealthy. Combined with its people, who were naturally assertive, Caruna had been a terrifying existence for the Kingdom of Arelia, which at the time was by no means a strong country. At the same time, for the Arelia royal family, it was a hated enemy that trampled their land and harmed their people.

That was why, after Gilbert conquered the Kingdom of Caruna, his reprisals were severe. The relatives of the Caruna royal family were all killed down to distant kin, and both nobles and commoners were oppressed. Until Childebert's generation, the Caruna region was the most coldly treated of the conquered lands and was ruled with harsh tyranny.

For that reason, many Carunans hated the Arelia royal family. Now, nearly fifty years after the conquest, most Carunans saw themselves not as those who oppressed Arelia, but as those oppressed by Arelia.

It was at the beginning of this year that the Arelia royal family obtained information that some Carunans were whispering that now might be the time to raise a banner of rebellion against them. There were still no concrete signs of revolt, but there was no doubt that tension was slowly rising.

For the Arelia royal family, the best move would be to install as the new king of Caruna someone friendly to the royal family, a Carunan noble who had maneuvered well after the conquest and built blood ties with the royal house, then make Caruna peacefully independent. But whether things would proceed so conveniently remained unclear.

"In any case, the greatest deterrent is still military power. While advancing the rebuilding of the Royal Army, I would also like Lord Fargier to prepare as much of an immediate response posture as possible."

"By your will. I will devote all my strength to the task."

Cecilia immediately nodded at Samuel's words.

Incidentally, the reindependence of the Loire region was not currently being considered. The reason lay in how the Loire region had lost when it was conquered.

The king of Loire who had ruled during its final years of independence was precisely what one would call an incompetent monarch. Furthermore, his consort, the queen, failed to understand the country's difficulties and spent her days holding lavish banquets, while the spoiled twin prince and princess behaved tyrannically within the court.

The nobles had continued to serve out of obligation to the previous king, who had been deeply affectionate toward his retainers and subjects. But even they could not continue to feel loyalty toward this royal family.

At the time, Loire had failed in every aspect of domestic administration, and in the border conflict with the Kingdom of Edelstein, it had committed one blunder after another. Cecilia, then a rising soldier, had fought well tactically to cover the king's strategic failures. Under those circumstances, the foolish king went even further and launched a reckless two-front war by challenging the Kingdom of Arelia to the west as well. As expected, it failed.

An inept ruler who imitated his father and stepped onto the stage of great war, clumsy command, a historic defeat, and the retainers and subjects who became its victims. The foolish king was abandoned by nobles, conscripted commoners, and the soldiers of the Royal Army alike, and finally died on the battlefield at the border. The surviving queen, prince, and princess called for thorough resistance, but when they committed the outrageous act of murdering the king's cousin's family, close relatives of the royal house who had tried to remonstrate with them, by calling them traitors, it became the final trigger. The nobles who raised the banner of rebellion handed them over to Childebert as proof of surrender and submission to the Arelia royal family.

Because the dead foolish king had repeatedly provoked Childebert during the war, the royal family members handed over were all beheaded in retaliation, and the direct bloodline of the Loire royal family ended.

Among the Loire nobles, there were several who had inherited the blood of that royal family strongly, but neither they nor the noble houses backing them wanted to draw the obvious short straw of ruling the war-weary Loire region as an independent country.

Cecilia was technically a distant relative of the old Loire royal family, but her position was now far too close to the Arelia royal family, so she was never raised as a figurehead. As for Cecilia herself, she intended to devote the rest of her life to serving Samuel, the child of Childebert, who had valued her and granted her wishes.

In addition to those circumstances, the newly crowned King Samuel was ruling well, so at present the Loire region had no reason to become independent and no momentum toward doing so. This was the only example among the conquered lands of the Kingdom of Arelia.

"If that is the end of the reports, let us conclude the meeting. My lords, I ask for your continued efforts."

At the king's words, the three bowed, and the meeting concerning the kingdom's military affairs came to an end.

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