Chapter 4 - 1-4
The Kingdom of Siddim. A land of gentle topography. A rich soil that nurtures greenery. Severe four seasons. It is a separate paradise of the north, protected by towering mountain ranges and deep forests. The capital, Malfa City, counts a population of one million.
That metropolis is exceptionally bustling today.
Carriages are in a congestion everywhere on the roads leading to the castle. Crowds of people overflow the streets, surging toward the castle. All the main gates of Malfa Castle are thrown wide open, and the congestion within the castle is tremendous. Marquises, bishops, abbots, margraves, and other nobles from across the entire kingdom have gathered. This sky-piercing giant castle was able to accommodate a vast number of people, numbering as many as one hundred and fifty thousand including the knights alone. Onlookers overflow the streets, and the special tents set up for them can be seen as far as the far bank of the Sharl River.
In the clear sky, the heraldic banners of various great houses, large and small, flutter.
In the keep of Malfa Castle, Swad Alish VII, wearing the crown, was surveying the surroundings alongside Queen Dravia. It was the Alish royal family, a single lineage that had reigned over the Siddim people for a thousand years. Though they had sometimes wielded the sword of rule, sometimes been used as tools of political strife, and were most often nothing more than symbolic ornaments, they were a royal house that had lasted a millennium. Their existence is divinized. A wedding is equivalent to a religious rite.
There was a group casting extremely irreverent gazes upon those living gods. The group was huddled around a table in the courtyard prepared for the VIPs.
"How is it?"
The one who asked was the Margrave of Ganlord, Anavis. He was a robust man with golden hair overflowing from a thick chest.
The men of the group, who looked up to Anavis as their leader, let their moist gazes crawl over Queen Dravia's body. Although their intentions were political, as long as they were men, it was inevitable that a certain amount of lust was mixed in.
The Queen, standing on the palace terrace, was a beautiful young girl with black hair as fresh as a peeled peach.
"She has fine hips," Carossa Count Necrat cut in. "At least four to six. At worst, she'll bear eight. She won't exceed ten."
Urgil Necrat was a slender man known for his razor-sharp intellect.
When he spoke, his bushy black mustache moved quite a bit.
"You know nothing of women."
Bishop Kofie said, his greasy bald head gleaming.
"What would a man of the cloth like you know?" Necrat's mustache laughed.
"Lineage."
The Bishop said, while biting into a chicken foot.
The lady who became the Queen of Siddim, Lady Dravia, hails from the Thora family, the supreme commanders of the royal army. For generations, the Thora family has been—
"Prolific. They easily bear about ten. They multiply like insects or something."
He explained, spraying things from his mouth.
"Bishop-dono," the blonde robust man, Anavis, made a displeased face. "Do not eat so ungracefully. You will get fat."
"This gentleman already has fat wrapped around his torso that even God could not save him from," teased Count Gilmond.
You're just as unsavable yourself, old man Gilmond, Necrat muttered in his heart. This old man had participated in this ceremony wearing armor. The number of attendants and squires he brought with him was two hundred, the most among the participants, and he had even made all two hundred of them appear in their full battle regalia. It was excessively anachronistic.
"Shouldn't you yourself refrain from alcohol a little?"
"You are the only one left who says such things to me, Necrat." The old man's finger flicked away a beer foam stuck to his gray beard. "I cannot help but drink. Because you will not let me go to war with Sedias Thora. Look, that girl of his has gone and married His Majesty."
"That fellow is the cancer of Siddim," the old noble expressed indignantly.
"You are being too loud."
Necrat looked at Anavis with a gloomy mood.
The Marquis turned back as if to respond. "But Necrat, just as Lord Gilmond says, at this rate, Siddim will only continue to be dominated by the Thora family."
"We are helpless," Necrat confessed. "Besides, the cancer of our kingdom is not the Thora family, but those Eber people."
"Gilma?" The bull-like Anavis made a bitter face.
The gathering fell into silence.
The Eber man, Count Corpes Gilma Rigardie, was a hired foreigner. He held control of the national administration as Prime Minister. The brilliance of Gilma's career had made it so. At a young age, he served in the court of the Pushan nation and, using the full extent of his ingenuity, established the Sarafan Dynasty. Eventually, he served as an ambassador to the Skesia and Gyua nations, and when he once returned to Eber territory, he received a request for a minister from the previous Siddim King, Yude II. Everyone among the various lords was struck with awe by his administration. There is no country among the five northern nations that does not have Gilma's connections. He is well-versed in the royalty and courts of every nation and carries influence. Any conflict that occurs in the north, he would likely settle with his skill. As long as Gilma Rigardie managed diplomacy, Sedias Thora tightened internal affairs, and His Majesty Swad Alish VII reigned above them, the peace of Siddim was as good as guaranteed. A peace with no openings to exploit.
To the members of the Anavis faction, who advocated for being anti-Thora, that was not pleasing.
They thought, There is no place for us at this table.
The banquet continued until night. The King and Queen would soon retire to their bedchambers.
The four of them had hardly moved from the courtyard table.
"It's not that we have no hand to play, but..."
Necrat's black mustache, illuminated by the torches, moved bushily.
The faces of Anavis, Gilmond, and Bishop Kofie each turned toward the Count.
"We poke the East."
"Kosa?" Anavis was the first to react.
"And what will we do by poking them? The Kosa people are strong." The old man Gilmond complained, shaking the plume on his helmet. "This is no good. No good. They are a ferocious and barbaric horse-riding people. The Great King Aframa, who once united the Kosa chieftains, invaded our Siddim extensively with his powerful cavalry. You surely haven't forgotten."
"I am aware, of course."
However, Necrat said that that was exactly why it was good.
The disaster caused by Great King Aframa's westward march was already something from about two hundred years ago.
The Kosa people were strong. They had a strength that kept the knights of Siddim at bay. They silently swept through southern Siddim like a black storm. A land of mountains of corpses and rivers of blood, a hell of shrieks and wails, covered half the country. On top of that, when they learned that a tribe of Kosa cavalry was coming from the east by crossing the Dwarf Mountains, all of Siddim turned pale. No, the entire north trembled.
However, there was no attack from the east, and the Kosa people who had battered southern Siddim eventually withdrew. This was because a Booma rebellion occurred in the south, and Great King Aframa prioritized its suppression. The Great King died suddenly in the south, and the Great King's empire collapsed. In the two hundred years since, Kosa has been preoccupied with civil wars, and currently, small tribes are scattered and contending, failing to form a nation. The disaster of the Kosa people had passed. Even so, Necrat said.
"The terror of the Kosa people is rooted in the sensibilities of the Siddim people."
It was a wound in the soul of the nation. The name Aframa is still used as an alias for a Great Demon King. The Great King's attack on Siddim was merely a period of less than half a year during the winter. The memory of that brief period is vivid, and even now, over two hundred years later, it clings to the hearts of the Siddim people.
"Look at this Malfa Castle," Necrat said enjoyably. "It is a manifestation of a defense instinct that could be called abnormal. Watchtowers like thorns growing from the earth, incomparably robust castle walls, a design as a fortress that ignores livability. There is no castle this sturdy."
Necrat said that all of this was the result of the fear of the Kosa people being fermented over two hundred years and manifesting in a distorted shape.
"What if the various Kosa tribes show signs of uniting again now? The memory of terror will be breathed back to life in Siddim. The whole country will surely tremble in fear. We can then grandly criticize the Thora family and Gilma Rigardie. We can say that you all are without a plan regarding the East."
"I don't quite follow," Margrave Anavis said in an unsettled voice. "In other words, you want to borrow the prestige of the Kosa people to oust the Thora family and those who are subordinate to them?"
"That is exactly it."
"But those Kosa fellows won't move exactly as we wish."
"That is where the ingenuity comes in, Paishal." Urgil Necrat smiled at the Marquis. "It would be troublesome if they formed a large alliance. We will work from within the north to ensure they only form small alliances. A rumor would suffice, saying that a king like Great King Aframa has appeared in the East. If we add some embellishments to that rumor, the rumor will swim on its own after that. We will ride the tide and continue to pose a great threat to the Thora family."
"You say 'work' so easily," the old Marquis Gilmond interjected. "Can such skillful things be done?"
"Well, it will be difficult. However, Bishop Kofie."
The one most suited for this kind of conspiracy was Bishop Kofie. Necrat believed that this man would surely become the next Bishop of Siddim.
The Bishop was scooping out scallops with an iron spatula, chewing them noisily in his mouth.
"I know merchants who trade with the southerners." The grease of the bald head reflected the elegant lights of the banquet. "Since the Kosa people collect tributes from southern cities, there are threads we can pull, albeit thin ones. Though it will require a great deal of money."
That money might be easily procured if the Church were shaken.
Bishop Kofie said that with a grin. Everyone here knew that performing magic to pull things out of nothing was the Bishop's specialty.
Anavis and the old Gilmond blinked their eyes.
"It's dangerous," Paishal Anavis said.
"I agree," Gilmond continued.
"What if we accidentally provoke them and they become a large force?"
"There is no guarantee they won't attack Siddim again."
"In that case—"
We will simply repel them, Necrat said nonchalantly.
"It will be different from two hundred years ago. Their tactics are still the same cavalry charges, but we have the royal army. We have Malfa Castle. Though, some construction will be necessary for mainland defense. For the time being, we will build a string of forts as a border fortification line connecting the cities of Tosha and Foron. It won't be Sedias Thora who deploys the troops, but us. Old man Gilmond, you shall grandly advance your own troops to the East."
"Are you taking over the East of Siddim?"
"That's right. Because the West is densely packed with the Thora family's clans, there is no room to enter. Paishal, you must bring the King into this. The support of the Alish royal family is absolutely, absolutely necessary."
The two Marquises blinked again and looked at each other.
"Heh heh heh. This is irresistible." The Bishop made a strange sound and set upon the shrimp on the table.
His bushy black mustache hid the corners of Necrat's smiling mouth.
The four of them indulged in secret discussions until late that night.