*salute* "My Lord, it's time for me to go to the meeting"
*still looking at the Margrave* "You can go"
Vincent bow to Verduny then bow to Margrave Hematite and leave the tent
*serve the tea* "Lord Margrave, please relax yourself and drink your tea" *smile*
Edward serve new tea. Margrave Hematite drink the tea and relax a bit
"Let me ask first, how much your own troops that will participate on the war?" *drink the tea*
*look at Verduny* *hesitant* "After hearing the Ferosperous Kingdom strength, it seem I need to send half of all my soldiers. There will be around 6500 soldiers."
Margrave Hematite have more soldiers because he's continuously recruit new soldiers while Verduny rarely recruit any new soldiers.
*smirk* "It seem the amount of soldiers in Hematite are increasing. I reckon that last years there were only 6000 soldiers."
*proud* "Yes, I got lucky in new year and recruit more soldiers around 1000 soldiers. How about you, Your Excellency?" *stare at Verduny intensely*
Verduny quiet for awhile
*sip* "I don't have that much soldiers. I could only send around 1650 soldiers. And there will be only 115 magicians on them" *calm*
Margrave Hematite stand up because too shocked.
*shocked* "Your Excellency, Amethyst Dukedom have more than 3500 soldiers and there were a lot of magicians on it. Why are you only send 115 magician? No, why are you only send 1600 soldiers? Aren't that too few?" *disbelieved*
*glance at Margrave Hematite* "Please calm yourself, Margrave" *smile*
The Margrave sit back down. Verduny drink his tea again.
*sip* "Like I said before, I don't have too much soldiers. And about the magicians, almost all of them aren't ready yet to be in battlefield. So I only can provide that much." *smile*
*disbelieved* "..." *speechless*
Verduny glance at Edward and Edward nodding
*smile* "Now, please let me estimated our enemies powers. Ferosperous Kingdom have almost 20000 soldiers. If there is a war, it's expect that more than 18500 will be send to the battlefield. And if they're hiring mercenaries, then their power will be more than 30000 soldiers"
"How about us?" *Verduny ask indifferently*
*smile* "The Emperor will provide more or less 14000 soldiers, Lord Margrave will provide 6500 soldiers and my Lord will provide 1600 soldiers. Then there will be more or less 22000 soldiers" *smile with satisfaction*
*astonished* "The gaps in power were more than 5000 soldiers. It's too much. How should we cover the gap?" *panic*
*sip* "Don't worry Margrave, we'll win this war."
*panic* "But... But... There were more than 5000 different in our strengths" *panic*
*sip* "Victory on the war aren't determined by the number of soldiers but on the quality of the soldiers and the strategy. But if you are very concerned about the difference in their numbers, we can hire adventures or mercenaries too, you know?" *indifferently*
*wake a wide* "IMPOSSIBLE! This are our war, outsiders can't get involved in it" *staring intensely to Verduny*
*irritated* "How about this, you can ask the Emperor to add more in our troops?" *dark smile*
*get closer to Verduny* "Will he agree?" *glittering eyes*
*instantly reply* "NO!" *annoyed* *push Margrave to sit back* "Don't worry, like I said before. Victory in war aren't determined by the number of soldiers but on the quality of the soldiers and strategy. So if you train together with my soldiers here, there are still hope to win this war"
*sit back* "Really?" *disbelieved*
*sigh* "Yes" *indifferently*
"Then I should bring my soldiers here tomorrow" *high spirit*
*irritated* "Calm down, Margrave. The Prince Wedding are approaching. We can start train together the day after the Wedding day"
*standing* "It's decide then, I'll prepare my soldiers immediately"
*DASH*
The Margrave leave the tent in the blink of eyes.
"He is still energetic like in the past"
"That person are more than 45 years old but he act childish like a little kid." *annoyed*
*look at Verduny* *smile* "Aren't that good? It's rare too meet a person like him"
*sigh* "In the past he want me to marry his daughter that 2 years older than me. Even after I married Lydia, he's still pursuing me to marry that Lady. Until now, that daughter of him still didn't married yet." *irritated*
*astonished* "Really?" *disbelieved*
*indifferently* "Well, it's common for high rank nobles to have more than one wives. Anyway, where's today reports?" *look at Edward*
*salute* "Yes" *take out a bunch of documents from his storage ring*
Edward and Verduny work together in the tent.
Flashback when Vincent just arrived in the manor
Vincent just arrived at Amethyst Dukedom manor and planning to directly head to the meeting room
"Sir Vincent!"
Someone called Vincent, Vincent stopped and turn around.
"Do you need something, Sebastian?"
"Sir, the vassals have been waiting for quiet awhile and urgently to meet with you"
"I'll come there immediately"
Vincent head to meeting room.
*halt*
Vincent turn around.
*confused* "Something wrong, Sir?"
Vincent take out something from his storage ring and give it to Sebastian
"Sebastian, our Lord want you to send this letter to Second Prince immediately"
*salute* "Right away, Sir"
Vincent continue headed to the Meeting Room.
In the Meeting Room
All the Vassal have been waiting in the meeting room to start the meeting. Because they waiting too long, they started to bickering Vincent.
"Where's Sir Vincent? He said it himself that he want to continue the last time meeting today, but he didn't arrived yet. Did he look down on us just because he have higher position than us?"
"Remember the last meeting, he act really arrogant! He's still new but dare to act arrogant? How could the Duke let him be?"
"Don't bully him too much. He's still new here, he still need more training to perform his duty"
"If he still need more training he shouldn't become the Duke aide yet"
"Then what? Let you become the Duke aide? What a joke!" *chuckles*
"Heh, if you become the Duke aide. This Dukedom won't last for along time."
"How dare you look down on me?! I'm better than that new aide!"
"Yeah, yeah. Whatever you say."
"But still this Second aide it seem not as capable as Sir Edward, why did the Duke hire him?"
"How can he be compared to Sir Edward? Sir Edward has been trained in the palace before, he's nothing compared to Sir Edward!"
"Did you forget Sir Edward origin? He can't be compared with this new guy with unknow origin!"
"I heard that this Second Aide was abandoned by his family for some unknow reasons"
"Really? How could the Duke hire him?"
"How could I know? No one can understand what's in the Duke mind."
"But aren't Sir Edward was disown from his family too?"
"If that true, doesn't that mean the Duke employs abandoned children? He's like picking some stray dog in the street?" *laugh*
"No wonder they were so obedient to the Duke. They always said the Duke this, the Duke that, HEH whatever!"
"Hey, hey, you forgot one thing. The previous Duke was run away and left the current Duke alone. Isn't he an abandoned child himself?"
"Aren't that made this Dukedom an orphanage or something? What a joke!" *laugh*
"Stop that! You guys went too far!"
"It seem the Duke has decreasing as well as the Dukedom, proven by hiring someone not capable like the new aide in this crisis situation"
"Did that new guy do something to the Duke to made the Duke accept hiring him?"
"Was the Duke's reason for decreasing were him? It could be that second aide affected the Duke and made the Duke unable to make the right decision"
"It's possibility. Before the Duke hire him, the Dukedom were stable. But when the Duke hire him, the Dukedom gradually decreasing"
"All of you, stop your nonsense. If the Duke heard about this, you all will be dead"
"Heh, all of us know that the Duke hate to meet us. It's impossible for him to heard us, if he didn't come here, right?" *chuckles*
"That's right, even us were work hard for the Dukedom but the Duke hate us instead."
"That's because you're hypocrite persons, that's why the Duke don't want to met you"
"That just excuses, the Duke choose to meet beggars than meet us. It's humiliating!"
"That's true, how can we be compared to those dirt!"
"You!!! Don't you dare to..."
*BRAK!*
Vincent smash the door and come in calmly. All the Vassals get quiet.
*walk in* "My apologies for the long wait. I have been quiet busy lately."
All the Vassals unconsciously standing and come to his sense when Vincent sit down in his seat.
*sit down* *quiet for awhile* "Why all of you still standing? Aren't you tired? Do you want to standing during the whole meeting? Stop wasting time and sit down! We should hurry up start and finished the meeting! I still have a lot of works waiting" *firmly*
All of the Vassal flinching and sit back down on their own seats
"Hear this everyone! If the result from today meeting was still disappointing, I'll ask the Duke to attend the meeting himself as you want earlier. Aren't you complaining because the Duke didn't want to met you all?!" *menacing with murderous intent*
All the vassals get cold sweats.
"And please restraint yourself from badmouthing the Duke. He's the Lord that I serve, if you dare to badmouthing him again in the future, I don't know what will happen to you!" *menacing with murderous aura*
Unexpectedly Vincent heard the Vassals mockery. Now the atmosphere in the room get intense.
ns 15.158.61.16da2
