POV

The emperor of the Rostok empire.

"Your majesty, the Kildaraians and the Lombardians have intervened on the side of the Karamn empire and have declared war on us." said the foreign minister

"I expected the Kildarians to declare war but why did the Lombardians also declare war on us." I asked him in an angry tone.

"Your majesty, the Kildarians probably had a deal with Charles the third so that in exchange for supporting him to the throne he has to support them against us. Charles the third also needs some prestige to secure his throne and get rid of his political enemies. This is the best choice for him to win the hearts of the people and gain some prestige as we are their hated enemies." he said.

"What is the kingdom of Mainz doing, do they have any plan to conduct an offensive into the Karaman empire. If they do coordinate with them to kill the Karaman empire once and for all."

"Your majesty, the Mainz don't look like they have any plan to conduct an offensive. They probably want to bide their time and make us do the hardwork. They are mobilizing some troops but they don't have any intention of using them." said the minister of war.

The king of Mainz is quite cunning. He probably expected that the Kildarians to declare war on us and wanted to use us as cannon fodder. Thats what I would have done in his place. He might also have another plan to conquer some other terriotory.

"We have a bigger problem in our hands. All our combat plan relied on getting supplies from the southern fleet. Now that the Kildarians have joined, we can't transport supplies from the ocean due to their superior navy. Transporting using land is extremely ineffecient and will result in us not having enough weapons to fight. We will have to buy it from the kingdom of Mainz. They have a river transporting all of their supplies to the border and it looks like they were expecting this to happen. They have a lot of weapons and supplies stockpiled ready to sell to us." He said with distaste.

"What is the cost of the weapons they have." I asked the minister of finance.

"Your majesty, their weapons cost around 125 rubles each. Our weapons cost around 150 rubles each so it is cheaper to buy weapons from them."

This is quite embarassing, buying weapons from another country is cheaper than ours even though we have cheaper labor and more raw materials. And that is not factoring the transportation costs, the weapons we have will cost around 175 rubles if we do that. The main reason for this is the corruption in the army and the bureaucracy. They buy more expensive weapons even though they are of lower quality. I will have to cleanse this some time.

"Talk to the kingdom of Mainz and secure some contracts from them to buy weapons. Make sure there aren't any additional conditions in the contract. Start the attack on Karaman empire."d