Chapter 208.1

Volume 3: Chapter 208 – The Map Drawn by the Tacticians (1/2)

The forces of Germion Kingdom that had gathered at the western region started advancing west at the behest of the king.

To the goblins that was an act of war from a great nation, and word of it was immediately brought before Pale Symphoria, who has received the divine protection of the goddess of vengeance. It was for this reason that she used the remnants of the Elks Clan to create a net of intelligence gatherers in the east and the south. With them, even if Pale herself might be in the western capital, she knew everything about the enemy armies, down to the food they ate.

As such, it came as no surprise to her that Germion Kingdom chose to attack. The Red King had driven the Goblin King out of the lands of the Old Ashunasan Alliance, and although the Kushain Believers continued to hole up within Cultidian yet, they were basically out of the game. As such, to Germion Kingdom, this was the same as breaking free from the yokes of the southern region that once bound them.

The rising giant to the east, the Holy Shushunu Kingdom, was Germion Kingdom’s ally, but it was a shaky relationship at best. Based on the movements of the various countries, it was likely that Germion Kingdom had made a contract with the Red King. Finally, it has been reported that the northern bandits have been dealt with.

From the results brought by the Storm Knight’s successor, it could be said that Lili Aureya, a descendant of the tribe of cursed swords, was not an incompetent person. The fame of the warrior maiden whose red hair fluttered in the snowy battlefield of the north spread far and wide throughout the region. In fact, she was well known even in the capital.

She who had been bestowed by King Ashtal the Vashinant as proof of her status as holy knight was not looked so favorably upon in the kingdom, but now her name dazzled brightly as a young holy knight. And the kingdom itself which was surrounded by three forces when the goblins conquered the west now only had one enemy left.

Compared to their situation, the goblins were clearly suffering.

Germion Kingdom, which boasted a powerful army, threatened them from the east, while a great country was trying to give birth to itself in the south, consisting of Elrain Kingdom, Pena, Tortoki, and even a portion of the former Kushain Believers’ territory. Within that was Pale’s sworn enemy, the Red King.

It was a country that could be equivalent to two Germion Kingdoms, although a part of its territory was indeed a desert, but even then their wealth could no doubt match the Holy Shushunu Kingdom’s.

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With the charisma of Archduke Brandika Rual Fatina holding them together, various great people have gathered around him including Carlion the genius tactician, Grave the Old Enchanter, Saldin the Vanguard Commander, Cell the Sword Dancer, and Shunrai the Scimitar Swordsman. As guild leader to a coalition of many clans, Archduke Brandika’s position even within Elrain Kingdom was firm.

To make things even better, his engagement with Queen Rashka was announced just a few days ago, and Pena itself has declared that they would be working with the Red King. Even though the Red King had grown so quickly in such a short period of time, the various surrounding countries had no choice but to allow them to rise.

The Red King may have spent 10 years in the east building their foundations, but that meant little when within a span of one year they were able to turn themselves into a force that could compete with a giant like the Holy Shushunu Kingdom. It was a feat that would’ve surely been laughed off otherwise as nothing more than foolery. Even if the people saying it were the very same ones who took over the free cities. It was the sort of feat that would surely be the first and the last of its kind.

Well, at the very least, such a thing has never been done before in history. The map of the kingdom drawn by the genius tactician dazzled as brilliantly with glory as it flowed with blood.

“And that’s precisely why I can see their weakness.”

Pale smiled coldly as her thoughts overlapped with the map before her.

The Red King was putting all of its efforts into intelligence. It was to the point that even Pale found it difficult to gather information about them.

Pale’s thoughts brought her to King Ashtal of Germion Kingdom.

What was his next move?

Queen Raksha’s engagement was bound to have an effect on the surrounding countries.

Was King Ashtal at ease because he’s formed an alliance with the Red King? Or perhaps he feels more threatened than ever?

Pale believed it was surely the latter, for the holy knights who participated in the battle would have surely informed the king of the events that transpired in it.

King Ashtal was not particularly brilliant, but it was precisely because of that that he should have realized that the Red King grew due to the genius tactician manipulating enemies and allies alike to fight each other and profit off of them. And once he realizes that a delicious prey has already been conveniently placed before him – What else but the goblins? His bitter enemies. – he would’ve surely shuddered in fright.

King Ashtal’s achievements may not seem much compared to the genius tactician’s or the Red King’s, but his record could be described as consistent. That was the sort of man King Ashtal was, Pale believed.

Tl Note: Changed the theme again. Still minimal, but with a warmer white and some margins. By the way, the theme you guys keep saying is broken was actually the ‘new’ theme last time. It barely had any CSS, so it looked ‘broken’. The new theme is Susty by Jack Lenox.

A dark mode has now been installed. Due to the way the caching works, you might get pages that are cached as dark mode or normal mode, so you’ll just have to turn it back off or on. Fortunately, the button is placed right underneath the title, so it shouldn’t be too much of an inconvenience.

Also, for those suggesting to make dark theme default, there are more bright-theme users than you think. They’re just quiet, but the moment I make the default theme dark, they’ll come out of the woodworks like a swarm of angry bees. I know since I’ve already tried it twice.

Also, a sort of old change, but I didn’t mention it, but we changed to disqus for the comments, so the server doesn’t need to manage it anymore and we can free up resources. It works perfectly well with the themes as long as you set your theme before scrolling all the way down, which is going to be the case for pretty much everyone.

So in conclusion, the site lag has been fixed and you shouldn’t get much resource limit warnings anymore. You’ll still get them at certain times when the site is doing some self care, but not as much as before. Not even close. Dark mode has been implemented. There are margins now and the white is now warmer. There are still some things that need to be readded like chatango (probably just gonna switch to discord) and the logo, but the site is basically back to shape.

Now, we can focus on translating. This is the third regular release this week, but it’s a little short, so I’ll post another one, and then I’ll work on the extra chapters or parts if too long.