Chapter 803: Alliance of the Five Duchies (Three in One)

Bernie introduced the weapons to Abel, “These eight consecutive ballistas are for intimidating enemies. If the enemies aren’t scared, you can open the windows and show them how strong the skyship really is.”

In the original design, the skyship had only a total of four ballistas. Bernie decided to change that number to twenty-eight. He wanted Abel to have a vessel that could wage a small-sized war.

When they went into the operation room, Abel saw that half of the interior was decorated extravagantly. The room was split into two, the first half being a luxurious resting space and the other as the real operating room. The operation room was sealed tight with an iron door locked with a circle.

Bernie went to the front of the iron room. As he raised his sign card, the iron door opened on its own. Abel saw a circle at the center of the room, made from the forgery ingredients he created. Upon a closer look, he could see the middle of the circle had a circular prism that was flashing in white light.

It was a regular spirit. It couldn’t get more regular than that, but it still was quite costly on its own. Without being an official wizard, one wouldn’t even have the right to buy a spirit, let alone afford one.

Bernie said, “Before the skyship was even built, we trained this spirit to learn everything there is to know about maneuvering it. There are two ways of piloting the skyship: one is to command the spirit, and the other is to train someone to do it. Of course, the latter is going to take much longer.”

After demonstrating some of the basic instructions with his sign card, Bernie passed it to Abel.

“Skyship 01! I request to declare ownership.”

Abel spoke when Bernie invited him to, “I declare myself as the new owner of this vessel.”

“Understood. You will now be the owner of this vessel. Master, skyship 01 awaits your order.”

Bernie looked kind of sad, “She’s yours now. You know, I actually don’t feel like saying goodbye.”

Abel laughed, “Come on, you have seven, don’t you? Just make your own squad or whatnot.”

Bernie shook his head, “Nah, maintenance is too expensive. I’m only going to use it occasionally.”

Bernie had a point there. When Abel turned to the side of the room, he saw a ridiculous number of energy slots there. Each slot had one intermediate gemstone inside. There were a total of five hundred intermediate gemstones installed.

“How long can those last?” Able asked.

The skyship 01 spirit replied before Bernie did, “There is enough energy to travel for five more days, Master.”

Abel nodded in approval, “That’s one hundred intermediate gemstones a day. That’s not too expensive, actually.”

Bernie didn’t know what to say in reply to that statement. Still, it’s what Abel truly thought. Since the skyship was designed to utilize rules of physics, plenty of energy was saved for keeping it moving. That was not to say that one hundred intermediate gemstones were expensive, though. One hundred was about the same amount as a tribute for twenty wizards in total. If the plan was to keep it moving every day, then the duchy of Carmel would have a lot to spend one with its tax money.

Or that’s what Bernie was thinking, actually. Abel’s plan was something that’s completely different. He was thinking about converting the five hundred intermediate gemstones into top-level gemstones. That way, he would have no problem with supplying energy to the skyship for the next few decades.

At the other side of this room, there was a shelf. The top of the shelf had several pipes that extended to the room and an air pump elsewhere. The control circle was meant to draw energy from the energy pool, and once the energy was stored inside a shelf elsewhere, there would be a warmth circle and cold circle to convert the energy into hot and cold air. This way, the vessel could either ascend or descend at will.

Also, there were spell circles that were carved outside of the skyship. Some were defensive, while others were meant to neutralize air resistance. The ingredient that was used to make the air pump was very special. It was a kind of thread produced by earth silkworm. If there was a hole in the air pump, the thread would weave itself back if once a sufficient amount of energy was supplied.

Bernie spoke to Abel when the tour ended, “I’ll give you ownership to the other two ships. Once you’re ready, tell your men to board, and I’ll tell my crew to train them for the next three days.”

Abel thought about the people he could have to join in the skyship crew. There were some veterans that followed Lord Marshall all the way back. They were just official warriors, but since their loyalty was absolute, he could trust them to take control of skyship 02. For sky ship 03, he was going to let the tens of veterans in the Bennett Family do it.

There was still sky ship 01. He could let the death warriors from Abel Castle take control of it. The candidates were selected pretty quickly. After the crewmen received their training, the three skyships would be ready very quickly.

Three days later, the skyships were ready to be used. Of course, training members to pilot them would take a lot of time, but having the spirits to do automatic piloting would still suffice. Bernie and his fellow dwarves had done plenty to help them become familiar with these vessels.

Once the dwarves left, Abel decided to board on one of the skyships again. He went inside the operation room, which only he had permission to enter. After changing the intermediate gemstones into top-level gemstones, he made it so that even the captains he recruited had no right to enter into the operation room.

There were five hundred top-level gemstones in each of the skyships. As insane as that was, Abel decided to also install ten lightning spirals on each of the vessels’ bodies. There were ten lightning spirals and twenty-eight consecutive ballistas on each of the skyships. They were all capable of launching overwhelming physical and elemental attacks towards their enemies.

For the rest of the days, rigorous aerial training was conducted in the sky above Harvest City. The sphinx knights would also participate. Sometimes, they would roleplay, where they pretended to be enemies. Sometimes, they would do joint training so they could fight along with the skyships. The skyship was a new invention. There wasn’t much existing research, so a lot of the training methods had to be made from scratch.

……

In a small city near the Keyen Wizard Union, five kings gathered for a discussion. They were from the five duchies in the Kingdom of St. Ellis. The duchy of Carmel and the duchy of Keyen were excluded.

Head Commander Job of the duchy of Tex spoke, “Everyone, I think we all know the reason that we are here. We’re in dire times. Our people are starving. There is no back-up supply to get us past Winter in my beloved duchy, the duchy of Tex. Without a war, we cannot resolve the problem. We will have mass starvation.”

The duchy of Tex was the state that initiated this discussion. During the last invasion of the duchy of Keyen, Prince Derek and his twenty thousand knight army took most of the loot. It made the duchy of Tex become more desperate to seek control in its diplomatic affairs. In fact, they even knew that Prince Derek went to the duchy of Carmel before the invasion took place.

The duchy of Carmel had been supplying food to the Kingdom of St. Ellis, but it didn’t participate in any of the conflicts. This bold decision angered its four neighboring states, particularly the duchy of Tex. Of course, they all knew how terrifying the legendary Grandmaster Abel was, but on the international stage, personal charisma was not highly valued.

If there was something that these five duchies were worried about, it would be Abel’s allies. He had a good relationship with the dwarves and the elven city of Angstrom. Any prolonged conflict could lead the other races to come as reinforcements, and things could get very unstable at that point. Because of this, four of the duchies brought the duchy of Thunder into their coalition.

The timing they picked was just right. Ever since the duchy of Thunder left Neking City to the duchy of Carmel, things had continued to be bad from within. It was especially true when the food shortage happened. Neking City received quite some support from the duchy of Carmel, and that made even more citizens at home feel as though they should emigrate to the duchy of Carmel. It was bringing a revolution about, actually. The nobleman class never lacked food, but starvation was commonplace for the majority of the commoners.

They didn’t have the courage to challenge the duchy of Carmel on its own, so the duchy of Thunder was very grateful to receive an invitation from the other four duchies. This way, they could become a united force that was at least ten times stronger than the state that Abel ruled. Besides, the duchy of Carmel just had its new king. No matter how competent that new king was, there was only so much he could do to develop his state in a short period of time.

Head Commander Armand of the duchy of Larvid stood up, “The duchy of Larvid shares the same pain. We need a war that will bring us rewards. We need food and a lot of it.”

Head Commander Gershwin of the duchy of Laka spoke in confidence, “We think the same. If we join forces, no duchy will be able to match us.”

Head Commander Dobson of the duchy of Koror responded, “Our duchy will follow every decision made collectively. As allies, we will bear our responsibilities.”

Head Commander Ewell of the duchy of Thunder spoke hesitantly, “So you’re really going against the duchy of Carmel. Do any of you know how strong Abel really is?”

Head Commander Ewell saw Abel in person once before. He was with Wizard Dunn and Wizard Lorenzo, who were both advanced wizards that were well known across the Holy Continent.

Head Commander Job spoke, “From our intelligence agency, he is a beginner wizard with combat techniques that can match a head knight commander. He has a giant summon creature, a puppet, maybe, that is made entirely of metal. If you ask me, I don’t think he’s capable of winning an entire war by himself.”

As the leader of a powerful knight army, Head Commander Job trusted the power of the collective much more than the power of an individual. They had countless years of experience, and throughout the history of the Holy Continent, there hadn’t been any instances where a single summon creature had changed the outcome of a war.

Head Commander Ewell tried to remind them, “Our intelligence agency said that Abel went against the Orc Empire on his own during the great war. If they weren’t wrong, he has contributed plenty to lead the humans to victory.”

“Stop, stop!” Head Commander Job interrupted, “Who was there to watch it happen? We have plenty of our own inspectors interviewing the survivors, but no one has said the things that you just mentioned. All they said was that they saw Abel when the human knight army went to the frontline.”

Head Commander Job wasn’t going to believe that Abel was a hero. Rather, he just didn’t want to. The feeling was mutual for the other four duchies. Still, none of them wanted to attack the duchy of Carmel. They had plenty to worry about, and the last thing they wanted to do was to make an enemy with so many ridiculous records to his career.

Head Commander Dobson passed some documents to Head Commander Ewell, “Here, this is something that the Koror Intelligence Agency collected. According to them, they’ve spent a lot of money getting their hands on this.”

The duchy of Koror was located in the northern part of the duchy of Carmel. Due to years of dedication, many of its spies had been rooted all over the duchy of Carmel. That was until Abel became the new king. Abel was very interested in investing in his own intelligence force, and many spies from the other states paid a heavy price, especially the Harvest City region. Ever since the noblemen were all exiled, any newcomers were immediately identified by the locals. Because of this, they had to spend a lot of money infiltrating the area.

After many sacrifices, the Koror Intelligence Agency finally obtained a very precious piece of information. As it turned out, Harvest City was using a very special potion to help its crops grow. Also, ten or more granaries were built in the region, and all of them contained crops that were just harvested.

The four duchies didn’t want to make an enemy out of the duchy of Carmel, but they were desperate. They didn’t have enough food. People disregarded the nations that they should serve. Soon, there wouldn’t be enough food to feed the armies. Thousands would die. During a time like this, only a military invasion could resolve the issue of mass starvation. If they didn’t do anything, they would perish into history like the duchy of Keyen.

Anyways, the only concern for the four duchies was food. They didn’t care how strong Abel was. They didn’t care about the possibility of revenge. They didn’t even care if they would antagonize the dwarves and the elves. Head Commander Ewell understood as soon as he saw the documents. The four duchies had already made up their mind. It didn’t matter if the duchy of Thunder wasn’t going to join them. They just wanted to increase their success rate, regardless of the increment was.

The four representatives all looked towards Head Commander Ewell. They were waiting for his decision. If they managed to win against the duchy of Carmel, they could work together to prevent the Kingdom of St. Ellis from taking away all the loot like last time. The Kingdom of St. Ellis would only come to take from them if the price wasn’t too high. It wouldn’t want to lose so much that it wouldn’t have enough force to match the other two human empires.

Head Commander Ewell asked, “So how do you plan on fighting the wizards?”

The four of the representatives felt at ease. Since he was asking a question like this, it meant that he had already agreed to join in the invasion. Actually, before Head Commander Ewell agreed to come here, he was already granted the right to represent the king’s decision. He had the right to join forces if he thought that it would serve the best interest of the duchy of Thunder.

Head Commander Job spoke, “We’ll use up all the wizards in our duchies. If we win, we will survive. If not…”

The sentence ended right there, but everyone understood. If they failed, they would have to suffer the consequences for attacking the nation that a grandmaster blacksmith ruled. The dwarves would sanction all of them. All the wizards might just perish, and that was a very frightening thought, given what had already happened to the duchy of Keyen.

Head Commander Armand continued, “We cannot afford to lose this. When the war begins, all the intermediate wizards will use their “instantaneous movement” techniques to go straight towards Abel. Once he is dead, then the duchy of Carmel will be of no threat to us.”

Head Commander Ewell proposed a plan, “How about we lure him out, then? We’ll trap him with something, and once he’s caught, we’ll push on and finish him.”

“Impossible,” Head Commander Job raised his head, “Abel’s been hiding for two years. He hasn’t appeared in public for two years. How long do you think we should wait before he walks into that trap of yours?”

That shut Head Commander Ewell up. Even now, he couldn’t forget the look that he saw from Abel. It was the look of someone staring down at an ant. He was a head knight commander. It was five duchies against one. Still, he had a feeling that anyone who posed as enemies to Abel would be annihilated. Head Commander Job couldn’t understand this sentiment. He just continued to propose plans to assassinate Abel.

Head Commander Job continued, “I’ll wrap this up with something positive. From what I’ve heard, all the advanced wizards will be undergoing shutdown training during this period of time. Now that things have become so terrible in this world, they made sure that they would forbid themselves from making it any worse.”

Next up, they discussed how they should collide to bypass the intelligence network that the duchy of Carmel had. It wasn’t easy to have five duchies moving on the same page. They were all different in their locations, so it was guaranteed that there would be some discrepancy in terms of the time that they launched their forces.

After discussing amongst themselves, they decided that they would begin from the duchy of Thunder. They would start by invading Neking City. If they continued to go straight from there, they could make a forced entry by attacking two of the minor cities. It would be the fastest route for them to make ways into Harvest City.

The duchy of Thunder knew everything about Neking City. They’ had been controlling it for a very long time. When it was just ceded to the duchy of Carmel, there were still a lot of their intelligence officers that were working there. Needless to say, it was the easiest place for them to plan on an invasion.

……

The collaboration between the five duchies didn’t escape the eyes of the St. Ellis Intelligence Agency. Prince Derek received news instantly. He responded as soon as the duchy of Tex deployed out an army of three thousand knights, and the duchy of Tex was supposed to be the state that was the furthest away.

Of course, the duchy of Tex knew that this would happen. They could only try and move faster. Soon, the duchy of Larvid followed, sending three thousand knights of their own. Once the two armies joined, they then joined the six thousand that the duchy of Laka and the duchy of Koror deployed.

They had twelve thousand very quickly. Once this very frightening army went to the duchy of Thunder, their number would increase to fourteen thousand. There were fifteen or more head knight commanders, five intermediate wizards, and fifteen beginner wizards. Prince Derek knew the rough numbers, and he reported it to his father, King Ambrose, very quickly.

Prince Derek bowed, “Your Majesty, the duchy of Tex, Larvid, Laka, Koror, and Thunder are joining forces to attack the duchy of Carmel. Should we send out messengers to persuade them to stop?”

“Why are you asking?” King Ambrose said coldly, “We tried it last time already. You know, if we could use diplomacy to fix these things, we wouldn’t have to send out so many knights.”

Prince Derek persisted, “We’ll send out troops as reinforcements, then. Abel’s helped us before, Father.”

Kind Ambrose said solemnly, “You are the future king, Derek. Don’t let your emotions blind you. We are not as strong as we used to be. The five duchies are going after the duchy of Carmel for food. They must’ve thought about the possibility of us participating.”

“Still!” Prince Derek persuaded, “We’ll have to tell Abel in advance! We won’t help, but the least we can do is to tell him to prepare in advance!”

King Ambrose stood up in anger, “You fool! If we do that, how are we supposed to attack the five duchies? We can’t give ourselves away, do you understand?”

Prince Derek understood. King Ambrose was planning on securing their victory. He wasn’t planning on staying idle the whole time. From his understanding, the five duchies would lose plenty after they launched the invasion. If the Kingdom of St. Ellis wanted to help, they had to have the right timing or left with no loot to take.

Prince Derek was still a bit uncertain; however, “What should we do if the duchy of Carmel wins?”

King Ambrose said in a relaxed voice, “That’s a strange question, Son. We’ll help them eliminate their enemies. Haven’t we been friends with Abel from the very start?”

That statement chilled Prince Derek. He didn’t want to say it out loud, but he didn’t think that the Kingdom of St. Ellis would continue to have the same good relationship as the duchy of Carmel after this. King Ambrose refused to help due to his self-interest. No matter how wrong that decision could be, only the king would have the power to decide.

There was an enormous knight army marching forward at the crossing border between the duchy of Thunder and Neking City. Behind them were wizards that were sitting inside carriages, and even further back was the supply team.

The march was very long, especially for the duchy of Tex and the duchy of Larvid. To get to the duchy of Carmel, they had to first travel across the duchy of Keyen, the duchy of Laka, and the duchy of Koror. If they wanted to make it to the duchy of Thunder, they needed a supply team.

Since the wizards were also participating this time, they needed even more supplies. And no, the wizards weren’t veterans that were used to stationing at Miracle City. They were wizards that relied on tributes that were paid to them from the duchies, and the lives they lived were not so different from noblemen.

With five knight armies joined together, only one person could be the leader. The greater the number, the more important it was to have a singular officer to keep things under control. Head Commander Job of the duchy of Tex was elected to be that person. Due to his experience and a record of having almost no failures in his military career, he was chosen to be the commander officer of this army of fourteen thousand.

“Fellow knights! I know that your families are starving! Today, we are here to build an army of knights, and for what? For food, that’s what! Our goal is Harvest City. There is a lot of food there enough to feed our families for the next several years. As I stand here, I will now make a promise to all of you. Whoever participates in this war, they will be the first to have the right to decide where the food should be distributed.”

Head Commander Job shouted as he took out his knight’s big sword, “For our duchies! For our families!”

“For our duchies!”

“For our families!”

As the knights chanted these words, they marched into Neking City and stepped into the duchy of Carmel.