Chen Heng became quite pessimistic towards Olivia"s hopes.
Over the past ten years, the n.o.bles had become weaker, but so had Olivia and the royal family"s power.
Even though suppressing n.o.bles and confiscating their territory seemed like a good idea, this was under the precondition that Olivia could quickly turn those new territories into her own power.
However, from how Chen Heng saw it, Olivia had been incredibly lacking in this regard.
She had indeed devoured a lot of territory, but she had not set up a good system for ruling. She had just done the same as before, sending the n.o.bles on her side to manage those territories.
Even though those n.o.bles were on Olivia"s side, they were not rulers of their own territories, so they lacked management skills and could not compare to the original rulers.
She had essentially chased away the original rulers and found new rulers for the territories.
Nothing much had changed, and the new rulers of those territories would not necessarily work hard at developing those territories.
Perhaps the previous rulers were cruel or ruthless, but they still cared for and protected their territories as much as they could.
After all, this was their territory and property, and within it, everything belonged to them.
Everyone treated their own property with care and would not allow themselves to be threatened.
As such, they would build their own armies to defend their territories. Even though sometimes they would oppress their subjects a bit, they would not push them too far.
However, this was not the case for the rulers that Olivia put in place.
They had the same authority as previous rulers, but this territory did not belong to them but Olivia.
Adding on the fact that there were no supervisory systems in place, as time pa.s.sed, those new rulers became more and more tyrannical.
This was not their own territory, so they did not have to think about the future; all they had to do was to keep things under control
Moreover, even if Olivia knew about their actions, she would not say much.
After all, the people of this world did not care much for the commoners.
As long as they could provide Olivia with enough money and crops regularly, they would satisfy her.
As for how these things came about?
Who cared?
However, as time went on, it was evident what would happen.
In these newly-obtained territories, once any rebellions happened, these people not only would not be power that supported Olivia but would also instead cause even more instability.
With just a small push, even more rebellions could arise.
As for Olivia"s own territories and the royal family"s territories, because of Olivia"s long-term neglect, even though they retained their power from before, facing the combined armies of many n.o.bles, it would be difficult for them to defend.
Things were not as good as they were in the past.
Back when Olivia had just ascended to the throne and become the Queen, the vast majority of n.o.bles were willing to follow her commands.
However, after ten or so years of oppression from Olivia, there were very few n.o.bles who were willing to stand on the side of the royal family.
It would already be good if the n.o.bles chose to remain neutral.
As such, the current situation for Olivia was extremely unfavorable.
Of course, even though it was unfavorable, it did not mean that she had no chance.
If Chen Heng were Olivia, he would definitely write an apology letter and give out the territory she had taken in the past to n.o.bles without territory. This would gather some power for her and give her some precious time.
After gaining territory, no matter how unwilling those people were, they would want to protect their territory. As such, they would have to fight against the rebelling army and fight for Olivia.
With those people, Olivia would be able to obtain precious time and gather her army.
Now, it was time to see what Olivia would decide.
Standing there, Chen Heng"s expression was calm as he thought to himself.
Time gradually pa.s.sed, and as the two sides fought, a few more months pa.s.sed.
After those two months, the status quo once again changed.
Just as Chen Heng had expected, in response to the rebelling army"s attack, Olivia"s response was incredibly slow, and bad news continuously came back from important battlefields.
Wherever the rebelling army went, an uprising would immediately happen there, making it easy for the rebelling army to take over the territory.
Under such circ.u.mstances, Olivia made yet another stupid decision.
She gave the order for rulers near the rebelling army to engage the rebelling army in battle, but no one responded.
This was to be expected.
After Olivia"s rule over the past ten or so years, most of the rulers did not have much goodwill towards her anymore. For them to remain neutral was already quite good; they naturally would not fight on Olivia"s behalf and risk their resources and lives.
However, Olivia"s response was extremely ferocious.
Seeing that the rulers did not obey, she was infuriated and gave the order for those rulers" relatives in the Kutu Royal City to all be killed.
Olivia"s intention was to use this to threaten rulers who disobeyed to see what the outcome of disobedience was, but the consequences were horrifying.
Once this news was spread, the rulers who had remained neutral were enraged and led their armies to rebel.
Soon, the rebelling army became even more powerful, causing almost all of the southern side to fall.
In the blink of an eye, nearly half of the Kutu Princ.i.p.ality had disappeared from Olivia"s hands.
Facing this situation, Olivia once again reacted slowly, and it was said that she even coughed up blood and fell unconscious.
It seemed that things really were over for her.
It was spring and the weather was quite fresh and cool. Even the northern side, which was usually quite cold, had decent weather recently.
Within Sordar City, Chen Heng once again received news from the Kutu Royal City.
This time, the news did not come from his people,but from the palace.
Sitting in the hall, Chen Heng silently read through the letter in his hand before putting it aside and remaining silent.
"What happened?" Sitting nearby, looking at the silent Chen Heng, Krudo could not help but ask.
Over the past ten or so years, Krudo had inherited his family"s t.i.tle and become a Baron.
However, his relations.h.i.+p with Chen Heng was still just as close. In fact, he had officially expressed his loyalty to Chen Heng and had become one of Chen Heng"s subordinates.
This was not strange—as Chen Heng had risen up, Sordar had become the star of the northern side. Many families had sent people, expressing that they were willing to follow Chen Heng.
Krudo was one of them.