Chapter Twenty Five

Olivia

Olivia was dreading her planned communication with the Chancellor. They had managed to send a decent amount of blood river flowers back, but frankly the amount that was demanded of them was ridiculous. Olivia had tried everything to improve yield, even going to Adrian and asking if he had any suggestions. Unfortunately, as far as she could tell they were already harvesting as many flowers as they could reasonably expect to. Of course, knowing that did not stop her from being nervous.

Olivia double checked to make sure she had every number the Chancellor might ask for in the conversation. She had the number of blood river flowers memorized of course, the number of monster cores harvested, and the number of fallen adventurers. If she needed any other numbers she’d just have to find them from her cheat sheet quickly.

Once she was sure that everything was in place she sat down at her desk and called the Chancellor. He picked up almost immediately and skipped all pleasantries when he started the conversation

“Did you harvest the requested amount of blood river flowers?”

Olivia grit her teeth. She’d been hoping to ease her way into this one.

“No sir. Despite our best efforts we were only able to harvest around half of the requested amount. We did manage to get a number of other resources that”

The chancellor cut her off

“The other resources aren’t important. I thought I told you that failure wasn’t an option for the flowers.”

Olivia bit back her anger and forced herself to reply calmly

“Sir, Just because you say failure isn’t an option doesn’t mean we can’t fail. We followed all standard guidelines for harvesting from an untamed dungeon and that is the most flowers we could get.”

The Chancellor knew she was right, but knowing that wasn’t going to stop the prince from breathing down his neck.

“Fine. If that is the case what do you need to get the number of flowers we requested?”

Olivia thought for a moment

“What I need to be sure of that is to have a fully tame dungeon or have the dungeon increase in size enough that we can safely send in two teams at once. Barring either of these exceptionally unlikely options the best we can do is get closer to your requested number. The thing that would help the most with that is second tier adventurers. The dungeon has started to produce beasts with mana cores so we should be able to send them in now. Other things that would help but to a lesser extent are a trainer for the guild, tools for adventurers to stay in the dungeon overnight, and a top tier healer instead of the average ones we have here.”

The chancellor sneered as he replied

“Oh, you only need second tier adventurers and a top tier healer? Why don’t I just go ahead and send you a magic lamp while I’m at it? That way you can just ask for whatever you want and not waste money on communication crystals.”

Olivia tightened her hand into a fist but still made sure to put on a sweet voice as she replied

“I’m sorry sir but I don’t know any better way. If you can overcome decades of conventional wisdom and think of a cheaper way to improve harvest from an untrained dungeon then please tell me and I will be happy to institute it.”

Olivia heard some rapid scribbling before the Chancellor replied.

“I can’t seem to think of anything for now. I will get as close to the resources you asked for as I can, but come next month you better have results to show for it.”

As soon as he said that crystal turned dark as the call came to an end. Olivia leaned back in her chair and thought “I certainly deserve a drink after that call” before getting up and heading to the bar.

Chancellor Harry Alexander Philip IV

The Chancellor cursed as he ended the call. He’d been hoping for better news. Now he had to give the prince two pieces of bad news back to back. He tried to arrange a meeting with the prince quickly so he could get it over with, but was unable to get one for a week. During that time he did two things. The first was sending off the next supply ship with all the resources he could stuff on it. The second was to try and think of the best way to break the bad news to the Prince.

When the time came for their meeting the chancellor walked into the meeting with the prince and all his planned speech out the window as the Prince looked down on him and said

“This better be important.”

The Chancellors chin quivered and he took a deep breath

“Your Highness, I’m afraid I have bad news. The settlement wasn’t able to harvest the number of blood river flowers that you requested. I have done my best to remedy the problem by sending extra supplies last week but I am not sure it will be enough.”

The prince frowned and the Chancellor felt a shiver go down his spine

“I thought you said I just had to provide my name and a few resources and everything would go fine. What's the point of having you if I have to do everything myself.”

The Chancellor gulped

“I assure you your majesty that this request falls into that category. If you just lend me a group of tier two adventurers then we should be able to get the number of flowers that you requested.”

The prince laughed

“You think I would be satisfied with just that number? I thought we were on the same page but obviously I was underestimating your intelligence. My strategy for the war needs a large supply. I expect production to double before the end of the year.”

There was the sound of the chancellor's chair scraping against the marble floor as he got up in what was probably his most athletic motion in months and exclaimed.

“But but, your majesty, that's impossible. Unless you can tame the dungeon or make it grow exponentially it is simply impossible to get that many flowers. No matter what you say I can’t do it.”

The Prince gave a dismissive wave of his hand and said

“I’ll empty out every prison west of the great divide. Just take the prisoners to the dungeon and kill them inside. That should increase the size of the dungeon.”

Squeaking was the only sound in the room as the Chancellor thought about how to phrase his next sentence to the Prince

“Um, Your Highness. That actually brings me to another piece of bad news. One of my aides turned out to be a spy. I caught him meeting with an agent from the Sanguine empire. After extracting as much information from him as I can it seems he told them that I was the one supplying the flowers you’ve been using to assassinate their mages, but not which settlement they were coming from. If I start to do something as obvious as transport thousands of prisoners to the settlement they will surely figure out where it is and attack the dungeon, the supply ships, or both.”

An oppressive feeling pervaded the room as the Prince frowned and rhythmically tapped his fingers on the desk while he thought.

“Fine. I will gather up two teams of tier two adventurers before the end of the month. I want you to send them over on the normal supply ship, have them tame the dungeon, and get back before anyone has time to exploit any problems moving them might cause.”

The prince’s eyes sharpened as he stared the Chancellor down

“If you can’t even manage to conquer a new dungeon with those resources then I will have to rethink our current arrangement. Now go start preparing.”

The Chancellor bowed as gracefully as someone his weight could and then fled the Prince’s palace to figure out how to tame the dungeon.

General Cassius

General Cassius; Leader of the Sanguine empire’s greatest army, sat and carefully listened to his aides report

“We figured out how they are assassinating our mages. One of our spies informed us that their Chancellor of expansion”

He paused and looked over the sheet he was holding

“one Harry Alexander Philip IV has found a renewable supply of blood river flowers. He has teamed up with their second prince to use the flowers for their benefit. We believe that the assasination of our mages is either a prelude to them declaring war, or them acting as mercenaries for profit. We do have a number of enemies after all.”

General Cassius nodded

“Good work finding that out. Prep a squad and send them to eradicate the source. I don’t want a single blade of grass left standing if they can manage it.”

The aide responded

“Unfortunately the spy that gave us this information was not able to figure out where they are getting the flowers. Sending the information was a considerable risk and we haven’t heard from him since. We are currently operating under the belief that his cover was blown and he has been caught and executed.”

General Cassius started rattling out orders

“Get every spy we have working on finding out the source of those flowers. Our war effort is crippled until we stop it. In the meantime I want you to deliver orders for all our mages to retreat from the front lines for now. Make sure to do it quietly to try and buy us a little time. I also want you to have a squad ready to go once we find the information. Every day that passes is another potential casualty. Lastly arrange for any of the spies remaining family to receive his pension.”

The aide saluted and rushed out of the room. Once he was gone general Cassius pulled out a communication crystal and delivered a short message to the emperor himself.

“Our enemies have started to gather strategic supplies. I believe it is time for us to prepare for a full scale war.”