Steel and Sorrow: Rise of the Mercenary king-Chapter 971: Catching up(1)

The rhythmic rustle of parchment was the only sound in the Prince’s study, a dry counterpoint to the soft splash of wine as Alpheo refilled his cup. He leaned back into the shadows of his high-backed chair, watching Aron meticulously arrange the year-end reports across the oak table.

It had been months since Alpheo had sat in this room with his royal diplomat. To look at Aron was to look at a man who seemed untouched by the passage of time; his robes were as crisp, his posture as precise, and his demeanor as unruffled as the day Alpheo had departed for the North.

He felt as though the entire world had remained frozen in amber while he alone had been dragged through the fire and emerged out halved.

"Apologies for the wait, Your Grace," Aron finally spoke with a sharp huff of breath, pulling Alpheo back from the brink of his own thoughts. "As you requested, I have compiled the surveys of this final quarter. Where would your Grace like to begin this post-mortem?"

Alpheo gestured vaguely with his cup. "The order is yours, Aron. Give me the truth as you see it."

"Very well. I shall begin with the seed we planted earliest," Aron said, a flicker of professional pride crossing his face. "I am pleased to announce an unprecedented surge in the number of merchant guilds seeking the Crown’s blessing. Our registration has seen a staggering increase of 240% year-over-year. Even compared to the first quarter of this year, we are up 85%. It has been an auspicious year, if I may be so bold."

"I have yet to hear a lie from your lips, Aron, so if you call it auspicious, I shall believe it," Alpheo remarked, swirling the dark liquid in his glass. "What is the projected harvest in cold coin?"

"Next year, we anticipate a baseline revenue of 9,900 silverii, roughly 825 silverii per month," Aron replied, his voice devoid of false flattery. "The growth stems from a newfound, almost startling trust in the Crown. Our unblemished record with contracts and the visible stability of your reforms have allowed the merchant class to take our word at face value.The result of what usually would take decades only took eleven for us, Your grace"

"Good," Alpheo noted, his mind already beginning to weave the gold into a more complex pciture. " We shall double our efforts to court them then."

Aron paused, a puzzled expression touching his brow. "How so, Your Grace? We already offer ample privileges than in the entire continent."

"Not privileges, of that I granted enough. I want to offer services. You say our reputation is pristine? Then let us capitalize on that trust. Tell me, what is the single greatest anxiety of a merchant during a long trek across the plains?"

"Security, Your Grace?" Aron ventured.

"Precisely. Yarzat has become the beating heart of trade. I intend to build a state-sanctioned center for caravan protection. Finding loyal, capable men is half a merchant’s headache. I want the Crown to provide the cure and pocket the money in the meantime."

Aron blinked, his diplomatic mind racing to find the flaws. "I suppose the need is there. But if I may be so bold, Your Grace, how do you intend to compete with the established mercenary bands? The market is flooded with sellswords. Why would a merchant, who has likely already arrived with an escort, go out of his way to hire Crown-vetted men here? Changing guards mid-journey is a logistical nightmare and a redundant expense. Why would they bother?"

"Alongside the caravan protection, we will offer a suite of services that will make it a logistical sin to trust anyone else with their silver," Alpheo explained, "But let us be plain, Aron: this is as much a ploy as it is a project. We are going to need a place to put the influx of hard-men we expect to receive in the coming months."

He paused, noting the flicker of confusion that clouded Aron’s disciplined features.

He did not know what the prince was talking about.

"Did you forget already?" the Prince asked, his voice treading the line between amusement and confusion. "I am puzzled; it was your design, after all, to call the able-bodied from the far continents to our shores."

A bolt of realization struck the diplomat. The memory resurfaced, a proposal he had drafted three years ago, a theoretical solution to the shortage of families willing to settle in Yarzat, that he had assumed was buried under a mountain of more pressing concerns. It startled him that the Prince had not only kept the idea but had let it ferment.

"Are you looking to employ that scheme in the short term, Your Grace?" Aron asked, his posture stiffening.

"I see no reason to wait. You yourself cited the hurdle of the unknown, that the mountain tribes feared the crossing. What better way to bridge that fear than to bring the warriors first? Once the men are settled, once they have felt the weight of my coin and the warmth of our hearths, their families will follow across the sea. After all," Alpheo added, his gaze drifting toward the darkened window, "I recall being told that the weather on the other side of the water has turned decidedly... stormy."

Aron nodded meekly, the gravity of the statement settling in the room.

Neither of them had expected the Great Azanian Empire, a monolith that had stood unchanged for nearly a century, to fracture so violently. Who could have predicted such a swift fall? To the south, the Empire was being trampled by the horse-lords under a rising Great Khan; to the north, it was being picked apart by sea-scavengers who made mead of Azanian blood and meat of their flesh.

The once-fertile raiding grounds of the mountain tribes were now a desolate, scorched expanse stretching for fifty kilometers in every direction. The invaders on horseback were so thorough that any raider hoping to snatch a slave to sell to Yarzat would have to march for days across a graveyard, only to be hunted for sport by the Khan’s outriders. The old world was dying, and new ways had to be found or made.

Still Alpheo was in no position to speak, he was looking to make a new world in that continent himself after all... 𝚏𝗿𝗲𝐞𝚠𝕖𝐛𝗻𝗼𝐯𝕖𝚕.𝚌𝗼𝗺

"New ways to attract settlers are no longer a luxury; they are a necessity," Alpheo said, his voice ringing with a cold, practical finality. "I expect the developments across the sea will make our offer doable, yes?"

Aron began to rustle through his stack of parchments, his fingers moving with a frantic energy as he searched for the next set of data.

"A great deal has happened since Your Grace was last informed," he muttered, the papers scratching against the wood of the table like the claws of a bird.

"Let us start with the good news," Aron began, his fingers smoothing out a blueprint that smelled faintly of salt and pine. "The Lord Governor of Salthold, which by the record is a name that remains a mystery to us all, given they aren’t producers of salt, has finally signaled the completion of the deep-water harbor. They can now berth twenty ships of the line simultaneously."

Aron coughed, adjusting the paper "However, success breeds paranoia. The Governor is already petitioning for a total fortification of the city in stone. That presents a fork in our road: we either establish a massive logistical naval route to ship stone from the mainland, or we gamble on setting up local masonry works on-site. The choice, as always, rests with you, whetever or not you want the project to start."

"We shall grant it," Alpheo said, leaning back as he made a note about the strategic value of a fortified Salthold. "But the governor must learn of patience. Our stone is currently spoken for by the heartland projects. Inform him the naval route is a dream for another year, but we won’t leave him routless. We’ll send engineers and miners to scout the local crags. Surely there’s a quarry to be found in allied territory? If I recall my maps correctly, there were veins of silver and bronze somewhere in those mountains."

Alpheo’s eyes drifted upward, searching his mental library of geography. "Is that not the case?"

"Your memory serves you well, Your Grace," Aron replied, though his voice held a cautious, lingering note. "There are indeed rich deposits in those heights. However, they do not fall under the banner of the Chorsi, nor any other tribe currently pledged to the Great Confederation. They are held by hands far less friendly."

Alpheo’s eyelids batted, subtle tell of a man who realized he had overlooked a piece on the board. He had been so consumed by the blood and mud of the Fingers that the delicate tribal politics of the coast had slipped into the periphery.

After all with trouble at the heartland, colonial matters tended to be overshadowed

"The alliance," Alpheo murmured, his voice dropping into a more dangerous register. "How has the development of the Allied Confederation progressed in my absence? And how did the..." He paused, snapping his fingers as the name momentarily eluded him. "The enemies of the Chorsi. How did they answer our overtures? How many tribes have entered it?"