[NR] A Kingdom’s Past Planning - Chapter 604 (Patreon)

A Kingdom’s Past Planning

Orveul Ryl, the current king of the Ryl kingdom, which had been in his family for the past five generations and over a thousand years was frowning at the map in front of him. “Can we trust the information?”

A man in black with a covered face, the kingdom’s greatest information analyst, spy, and general all around gossip shrugged. “Within the next 100 years, at least one of our neighbors in that direction will attack us. There is no doubt about this.”

King Ryl sighs, “Right as I’m about to pass on the crown to my heir. It took me until my great grandchildren to find a suitable one. Not the worst, but ruling a kingdom isn’t exactly a good source of levels after the first few decades. Though that is probably why they even planned this in the first place.”

One general speaks up, “Even without you being a military man, the buffs our military gets from you are substantial within our lands. The best time to attack has always been during transitions of power. As many of us have pleaded with you already, can you please hold off on stepping down until your heir is strong enough?”

Another general nods, “There is a reason most kingdoms have some old ancestor being the declared ruler, or at least wait as long as possible before stepping down.”

The king slams his fist on the table, “Most royalty manages to find their successor among their children or the extended royal family! I can’t help it that my damned father was paranoid to the point of slaying his entire extended family. I’m lucky to be alive! That fool even tried to curse me and while it didn’t fully stick, it isn’t my fault that I only had five children.

“I’m not going to sit on the throne a day longer than I have to. If it wasn’t for the fact that in the end, I am a good man, I would have left you all holding the bag those years back when we finally took down my father. Now help figure out how to solve this problem in a way that lets me get on with my life.”

The man in black shrugs, “It is a simple fact of life that they will come. The fact that we only have to worry about those coming from that quarter of the map is a blessing.”

The first general nods, “We represent the best opportunity for them to train the skills and levels of their army quickly and efficiently. You don’t level up your warlording skill if you don’t have a war to lord over. Except it also goes to waste if too many people end up dying as there are just as many war specific skills to work on for even the common foot soldiers.”

King Ryl, “I know that. More than one of you have privately taken me aside and explained such things. However, that didn’t change my plans then and won’t change them now. There has to be something we can build or deal we can strike that will protect us! While I don’t want to stay, I’m not going to leave my great grandchild hanging out to dry.”

A man from the treasury frowns, “Not only did your father leave us light on nobility, he also left us light on gold as well. Travellers from many surrounding kingdoms happily flocked here to take up his various quests. While it is now mostly believed to be a cover for paying assassins to take out the nobility, he could dig up dirt on, they still ended up with a significant portion of our gold. Then, of course, once the freely spending king was gone, they took that gold to our neighbors.”

The man in black sighs, “Which is probably directly linked to why this specific quadrant is up for attacking us. The guild of travellers who made out with the most gold were from that direction. Even if those kingdoms didn’t tax them at all, just their spending would inject enough money into their economy to raise an extra army or two.”

The king seethes, “Dont play with me! While I’m certainly lacking in social skills, I’m not inept. I survived my father because I was smart enough to avoid them so he didn’t feel threatened by me. Do you have a solution for this problem you’ve nicely wrapped up for me?”

The man in black shakes his head, “We don’t have the money to raise more troops or fortifications. They don’t care about trading with us since we don’t have any unique products. Even our allies aren’t going to come in and save the day because they only signed deals with you specifically. I won’t say anything against that since it happens more often than not, what with how power tends to work? Still, I can’t make a plan without something to work with.”

A woman here to represent the local independent merchants coughs, “Uh, since you don’t care about ruling the kingdom, can we become vassals?”

The king smiles, “Well, at least someone is capable of thinking about alternate solutions. Though sadly, that isn’t an option right now. The time for that was thirty years ago before I found my heir. At this point there are System enforced contracts between me and him preventing that. Which, as far as I understand it, is the norm to prevent exactly things like that happening. In particular, there are heavy rules in place to prevent someone just selling their kingdom to any of the travellers.”

The man in black nods, “By the System’s decree, they must earn if they want a kingdom.”

After that, a number of other officials made suggestions. None of them workable. The dire lack of funds being the biggest limitations. After all, as the man in black put it, “None of the good-hearted organizations will move for free because this isn’t going to be some murderous rampage or an attempt to conquer. They just want to run their armies through our land to pillage and gain experience.”

Though it was actually that which sparked an idea in one of them. The person in charge of agriculture frowns and tries to get the group’s attention. This takes a moment as by tradition, an actual farmer who has turned over their farm to their children is granted the position. So suffice it to say, he wasn’t exactly used to interrupting his fellows. In the end, though, they all quieted down and waited for what he had to say.

The old farmer gestures at the map, “Well now, far as I can see, the actual area they’re coming through is a bit tight. Not on a scale we can wall or some other nonsense. However, since they aren’t exactly our favorite neighbors, we’ve let a bit of a forest grow up there. Is it thick enough to claim more land from the wilds?”

The second general rolls his eyes, “It would take too long and a bit more land in-between us isn’t going to save us.”

The man in black, on the other hand, begins to smile. “No, that might just work. He wasn’t suggesting we try and get extra land between us. But I feel he should finish the thought since it is his idea.”

The farmer nods, “No amount of space will keep greed out. Whether we get that land or not is immaterial. After all, we don’t need to hold them off indefinitely. It just needs to be till the heir is a strong enough king. Which will admittedly take a while. However, the conquering of new land will take longer. During which those kingdoms won’t be able to easily get to us.

“Sure, they could send elites through the mountains, but that would defeat the purpose of it all, training the new soldiers. They try to walk right through an active land claim? The Deep Wilds are going to chew them up with only a few survivors.”

King Ryl smiles, “There we go! That plan should work and as one of the last major I’ll mandate as king, will certainly reflect well upon me. We might not have money right now, but what can be obtained from the Deep Wilds will help make up for things as well. Let’s get this planned out!”

From there it was only a few months before kingdom Ryl officially started their expansion attempt, within which Jason and friends are now located.