Chapter 277

Red Sands Desert, Duchy of Sarth

City of Darthar

Rice Garmilvant, Count of Darthar and so called 'gatekeeper of the desert', gazed at the army marching through the city gates below.

He'd heard from Allya and Pyn that it taken them two weeks to make their first journey from Rebirth to Darthar, as well trained adventurers that specialized in mobility.

Crystal's army had done it in a week and half. While dragging heavy artillery through a damned desert, complete with dune fields.

That said it all about his title. The true gatekeeper was marching at the head of her army, holding a parade the likes of which Darthar hadn't seen since it's conquest by the Kingdom, a hundred and fifty years ago, putting an end to centuries of squabbling and internicine warfare.

There was a parallel there, though this time the army marched in as saviors, not conquerors. Not that Allya, and lady Crystal, wouldn't get the city.

That…worried him. He had the horrifying impression that he had witnessed something he shouldn't have during Allya's negotiations with the duke, and it terrified him. Allya had been nothing if not courteous, and so had Crystal, besides her, ah, 'talk' relating to her daughter, but still…

He was the count of a trade city, isolated by the sands from most problems, even the politics of the kingdom but a distant worry. Now he was caught between people talking about changing the fate of the very world like if they were discussing what types of biscuit to serve with the tea!

Rice sighed. Well, at least his position was secure. It seemed that when Allya and lady Crystal promised something, they meant it.

Which reminded him about the announcement. He'd better make his way to bazaar, where the area had been rigged for a city wide announcement, and all the stalls cleared. Because once the parade was done, they would declare the city's transfer to the Principality of Rebirth, the new tariffs…and the imminent arrival of the secondary dungeon core.

That one had surprised him. There was no way Crystal had gotten it this early. That meant…that meant the first one had been hidden, and unveiled when it came to taking Erakis. That seemed crazy, but hell, it's not like lady Crystal had any problem managing without it.

He sighed, and walked away from the battlements. Time to address his people.

*****

"I think they're going to start having deaths from all the partying." Said Ghost as she looked at the holographic screen, showing the wild party once more taking hold of Darthar.

Alexandra just waved from her current position, which was flopped on the couch with all the beauty and grace of a sack of potatoes. She'd missed loafing around like that, and no one else could see her in her other self's ever changing simulation.

"Let them be, they need to let off some steam."

"I can understand releasing some pressure but this isn't a locomotive anymore, we're approaching the levels of a power plant."

"That's…a bit of a tortured metaphor."

"Bite me. Anyway, seems they received the news well."

"More than well, actually. They're ecstatic. It's not every day your desert town, who was always barely about habitable levels of mana, gets its own dungeon."

"They had to have seen it coming though."

"Not…necessarily. Erakis made military sense, we'd never hold it without one hell of a forward base. But no one expected the duke of Sarth to just give us Darthar, and there was no pressing strategic need to give it a branch office."

"At least not from a frontier Principality perspective."

Alexandra nodded.

"Yep. When seen from our perspective-"

"Which is trying to build a pocket empire."

"True. Well, yeah, then it makes perfect sense. We're consolidating control of the trade route, and forming a core. Just like what the First Empress did."

"Right. Seems she subscribed to the same school of thought."

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"Great minds think alike, and all that."

"Stop sucking us off." The apparition sighed. "Alright, so, you wanted an update?"

"Yep. On the simulations, actually."

"You do realize your captive archmage hasn't even woken up from her coma yet, right?"

"I know, I know. But still, I'd like everything to be ready by then."

"Well, I've been working on a few options."

"Sure, show them."

"Better get up, I'm not moving the furniture."

Alexandra sighed, and through an effort of will worth of songs and ballads, dragged herself up from the couch. She gave Ghost a mock glare, who simply rolled her eyes, and snapped her fingers.

Suddenly they were somewhere else. A training ground, below an imposing castle.

Alexandra whistled.

"Fancy." She looked at the fortress before them. "Any inspiration?"

"I wanted to go with chateau Chenonceau, but the river was a pain in the ass to program. So, Roquetaillade."

"So the poster boy."

"Hey, can't go wrong with the classics. Anyway, this'll do for some training."

"Anything will, but sure."

Ghost snapped her fingers, and they were somewhere else.

Alexandra smiled as she took in the area.

"Oh, that's good." It looked like a stereotypical mage hideout, at the top of some forlorn tower, with the cat and amenities, but it also included every bit of equipment they had. Runelaying tables, enchantment workshops. "Cozy too."

"I actually use it from time to time. Beats staring at holographic screens all day long."

"Uh huh. Don't show it to Emilia, or she'll made us build it for real."

"Sure." Ghost snapped her fingers again, and-

Alexandra's eyebrows rose at the new space.

"A torture dungeon? Really?" The Earth-born tilted her head as Ghost began swearing profusely, and took a closer look at all the equipment. "Wait, that's not-"

They were in a new place before she could complete her sentence. But it was too late.

She turned towards her blushing other self, with a grin on her face so wide it threatened to split it in half.

"Oh oh oh. What do we have here?" Alexandra's grin got even wider as Ghost looked away. "And you had the gall to tease me!"

"W-Well you deserved it, alright!"

"You know I'm never letting this go right?"

"You know I could coach Emilia in our private stuff. Show her that room, give her ideas…"

Alexandra gasped.

"You wouldn't dare!"

"I would."

They glared at each other.

"Truce?" Proposed the dungeon core.

"Truce. If only to avoid our Mutually Assured Destruction."

"Agreed."

There was a few seconds of awkward silence, before Ghost cleared her throat.

"Let's complete the visit, shall we?"

"Let's."

*****

Allya sighed as she collapsed onto her bed in Darthar's palace.

"Fuck…Me…"

"I'd take you up on that, but I'm as drained as you are." Said Pyn as she flopped by her side, and Allya chuckled.

"Yeah you would…I'm really starting to hate ceremonies."

Pyn nodded, and they simply laid there.

The day's events had been just flat out exhausting. The announcement with the Count had been relatively mild, but then there had been the official changing of the flags, the vassalage transfer ceremony, all the paperwork and pomp with the World Mage Court…at least that part had been smooth. Suspiciously well timed or not, their friend there had helped smooth things over remarkably quickly, both during the negotiations and with the actual transfer.

Then had come the congratulations from all over the Kingdom, the parts that remained loyal or neutral at least, and a lot of speculation. Now she had every noble trying to find out what her intentions were.

After all, with the transfer of Erakis she'd become the first person to expand the Kingdom by conquest for over a century and a half, since Darthar was invaded, actually. But now she controlled the entire trade route, including two towns and a major city, all three of which had or shortly would have a dungeon of some sort. While the branch offices weren't technically full dungeons nor had all the economic benefits…on paper, she had gone from a promising noble to arguably the second most powerful person in the entire Kingdom.

What worried her is that she had started getting hints from some nobles that maybe she should become the most powerful person.

That was the eventual goal…in a way. She didn't care about taking over the fractured, dysfunctional kingdom, but Alexandra was intent on unifying the entire damned continent if she had to. She could hide behind 'contingency plans' all she liked, but it was becoming clear that would be their medium term goal. The New Republic was going to be in dire need of rebuilding once they won the war, doubly so if the senate massacred the population with their brands, and that would allow them to step in, with advanced technology and a history of friendship and benevolent assistance.

The Kingdom in and of itself would fold through sheer necessity. But she didn't want it to happen now, and neither did Alexandra. Economic inevitability was the name of the game in this case, not political maneuvering. Their majesties would eventually swear loyalty to a new Empire because economics dictated it, not because of a political coup.

Thus in the meantime, she'd need to quash the whispers that she should declare herself queen. Not only because she wasn't going to stab their majesties in the back, the duke of Sarth was right, she refused to repay loyalty with betrayal, but also because it would be too soon and destroy the legitimacy and…inevitability she was building up. She had had been a rising star since the expedition arrived, slowly but surely steam rolling everything across her path. That sentiment was a huge factor as to why the loyalists were starting to gain heart, and many of the neutral nobles in the civil war considering joining their majesties. Hell, it was part of why the duke of Sarth had offered Darthar.

It also affected the civilians as well. She was getting a ton of private investments, as even the most conservative of merchant smelled profit and lots of it. That was good, because as fat as her coffers were, her internal industrial capacity, if you discounted Alexandra, was massively underdeveloped. Having money was nice, but without factories to use it you had to rely on imports, and that meant civilian contacts. Ironically, what with Darthar now being part of her domain, her imports were now technically only from the Republic, at least until the first ships made it from Sarth, now that the siege was lifted. No one had even dared stir up trouble in Erakis because the merchants were making a killing, and the town was growing exponentially, thanks to the branch office and the insane economic opportunities that kept being stacked up.

Hell, she'd even received some missives from Gorromar's ministry of trade, and Pyn was negotiating a deal where, in exchange for docking towers and industrial assistance, they'd establish a trade route to get the city state the raw materials it desperately needed, now that Sunrise had gutted its workforce for the war effort and the Republic was on their way to doing the same. She'd have loved to do a deal with the Hegemony as well, but the province of Eternity was becoming one hell of an obstacle. Not because the local government didn't want to help, but because the UDC and its base would almost certainly make an ill advised move if they tried.

Not that something wasn't bound to happen, sooner or later. Tark was whipping itself into a fury over the Republic's use of the slave brands, and the Far Reach had just experienced the mother of all punitive expeditions, with no less than six raider bands annihilated and the border lined with their heads on pikes. That was…a bit too convenient, and she was starting to maneuver behind the scenes to see if she could get all sides to do a conference and maybe an alliance rather than all try to dig into the Republic and end up fighting one another.

After all, they were all on the same side, more or less. And if the Order was trying to plunge the entire continent into total war…well, maybe that conference would short circuit their efforts.

Unfortunately, the Order wasn't all they had to worry about now.

Allya sighed loudly.

"What is it?" Said Pyn.

"Nothing, just…thinking of the threats arrayed against us."

"Yeah…there's a lot, isn't there?"

"There are." Not that she would dare enumerate them here. She believed Alexandra when she said the cabin onboard the Dusk Blade was secure, if it hadn't been they'd be dead already, but she wasn't going to take chances in the palace.

Especially when the Church was involved.

She felt the bed shift, and suddenly Pyn was straddling her waist.

"Let me take your mind off of things honey…we can worry about other things tomorrow."

"Weren't you too exhausted?"

"I caught my breath. Besides, I can't have you feeling all depressed, now can I?"

"Can't argue with that."

"Good." The elf leaned forward, and her fiancée's worries melted away as they kissed.

The rest of the world could wait until tomorrow.