Chapter 611: Schemers
Translator: imperfectluck Editor: Kurisu
While Roland was busy dealing with his internal threat, the world still kept moving. When the fairies spread the information about the Holy War’s first major battlefield, this meant that the horns of war had started blowing. The entire world erupted in commotion.
“The Holy War’s first main battlefield will be in the elven kingdoms! It will be in the Moonwheel Capital!”
As the most professional information brokers in this world, the fairies weren’t the ones who leaked this information.
This information spread swiftly because the moment that Moon Elf Empress Afina received this information, not only did her heart almost stop working, she unhesitatingly asked the silver elves for a ceasefire, along with asking for reinforcements from all neighboring and allied countries.
Some people doubted or suspected the veracity of this information. However, the evidence was the moon elf dagger with the power of the Chaos Abyss within it. Additionally, when archmages proved that this ordinary weapon had already traveled through a dimensional door multiple times, the truth was placed in front of everyone.
“The person who obtained this information and told us to tell you is that Prince Roland. He even had a fight against Main G.o.d Donatis, and killed off two high-ranked devils for the sake of this matter. Lasnina, the Lord of Curses, and Salor the Berserk Slaughterer have both died.”
The fairies were quite generous with adding this additional information. Such important news made even the doubters into believers.
The news that Anslo was seriously injured had only recently spread before this information. At the time, even Anslo himself was confused why he had been attacked. No Main G.o.ds would fight each other without sufficient personal benefits involved. Anslo had kept an incredibly low profile after joining the Chaos Abyss, so why was he attacked for no apparent reason?
If the only attacker had been the Abyssal Prince Karwenz, someone whose thoughts were a mystery to everyone, that would still be understandable. However, Sophocles the Deceiver was mighty famous for being selfish to the extreme. Only tremendous benefits would possibly motivate Sophocles to attack another Main G.o.d.
Previously, all the moon elf strategists, mages, and n.o.bles had such a headache trying to figure out why Anslo had been attacked. Now, the answer had arrived. Instead of headache, now their hearts ached. It was said that some veteran family elders with several thousand years of inheritance had fainted on the spot upon hearing the news that came from Roland.
“Fate wants to destroy us moon elves… no, destroy the entire elf species?”
Communication between major countries was quite fast. Once all the Superior Elves started taking action, the elves received a flurry of responses from neighboring countries all within three days at the elven palace.
“Empress Rosemary from Auland and the Emperor of Bardi, respectively, received our amba.s.sadors. They sympathize with our plight, but both said that reinforcements would have to wait until they defeated their current enemies…”
As an important faction in the continent, the moon elves had emba.s.sies in all the major empires (how else were they supposed to scheme and spread chaos in the human kingdoms?), and the elves’ secret communication spells caused all the amba.s.sadors to swiftly take action. The first batch of responses would also likely come from the most important countries.
Auland and Bardi were relatively polite. At the very least, their higher-ups met with the amba.s.sadors, but their sincerity level was unknown. That was because these two countries were dealing with the Sea Tribe and Undead Emperors, respectively. It would likely take many years to “eliminate” their enemies and be able to reinforce other countries… So in this type of situation where it was known already that they wouldn’t be able to send reinforcements, of course it would be natural to respond politely to show how nice they were to their “allies”.
Empress Afina wasn’t counting on the mega empires Auland and Bardi to send reinforcements in the first place, as she also knew that these two countries were busy with their own enemies. She was focusing on the responses from the other major countries.
“San Antonio refused to meet with our amba.s.sador. They said that their emperor is currently busy making preparations for the hunting season, and won’t be able to meet our amba.s.sador for three months… The hunting season of this year just ended two months ago. Are those b.a.s.t.a.r.ds intending on preparing for an entire year!?”
This was already quite shameless, but there was another country that was even more shameless.
“The Suolo Federation says that this is an election year for them. Yep, even though the Holy War is upon them, they don’t intend to cancel their election. The parties that we support say that it’s fine to send reinforcements, but we will need to donate triple the usual amount in political contributions for them to take more than half of the parliamentary seats away from the dove factions. Only then will they be able to pa.s.s any aggressive plans…”
The Suolo Federation was an extreme rarity among the human mega empires as it was a federation with a parliamentary system. All the other countries had forever viewed the Suolo Federation’s political system as something truly weird. Now that war was upon everyone, they were still busy voting for new parliamentary members, which seemed even more mysterious.
“Isn’t it already the time of the Holy War? Why are their dove (peace-wanting) factions receiving so many votes?”
“Because their citizens don’t want war…”
“…Do they really think that war won’t come just because they don’t want war!? Are they just going to watch while others invade them, kill their family members and friends, and steal away their wealth!?”
Even the other human kingdoms couldn’t understand what the Suolo Federation was doing at this time, not to mention the elves.
However, it was unlikely that the parliamentary members that the elves supported would receive any political donations this time. Even if these parliamentary members successfully controlled more than half of their parliament, and proposed a war plan… one year would be considered fast for their parliament to debate, vote, and finally take action. The elves would be unable to wait for so long.
Previously, the Suolo Federation’s factional political party system had given the elves many chances to influence this country. The elves’ good image in this country could even help the politicians to receive votes. It could be said that out of every human country, the Suolo Federation was the friendliest towards the elves. But now, the elves who had endlessly praised the Suolo Federation’s “advanced political system” hated the Suolo Federation’s slow, gridlocked political system more than anything.
“Perhaps having a dictator is better in a time of war. At least only one sentence will be required to deal with a problem in that case…”
“Don’t be such an idiot. If a dictator is ruling another country, the entire country is his personal wealth. How are you supposed to fool him into paying a tremendous price for the sake of another country?”
As for the other mega empires’ responses?
The Emila Kingdom which had their Divine Sea Troops? This kingdom was in the southwesternmost archipelagos of Eich. These islands were far too away from the elven kingdoms. Although the Divine Sea Troops would indeed be quite powerful during naval battles, in land battles… The most important part was that the elves had no diplomatic relations.h.i.+p whatsoever with the Emila Kingdom. This was because these “barbarians who reek of the stench of fish” were the mortal enemies of the Suolo Federation, as well as because the Emila Kingdom was too far away to be interested in the overall political situation of the continent.
How about the Mage Country and the Cloud Tower? Indeed, this country was the one with the best conditions to send reinforcements. However, the best conditions didn’t mean the highest possibility. While archmages and the Cloud Tower could send reinforcements faster than anyone else, when considering the elves’ terrible relations.h.i.+p with the mages, the likelihood of support would be almost zero.
After all the mega empires used various excuses and reasons to reject the moon elves’ request for reinforcements, the moon elves still panicked even though this was all within expectations.
But despite all the bad news, there was still some good news. For instance, the silver elves agreed to a ceasefire with the moon elves, and were even willing to send reinforcements.
“What? The silver elves split into factions?”
“Yes, Your Majesty…”
But, more bad news arrived yet again the day right after the silver elves agreed to help the moon elves.
Unlike what Roland thought, the silver elves and moon elves’ internal conflict wasn’t completely faked. Anslo and the other Elf G.o.ds had planned it so that the victor in this war to determine the ruler of all elves would indeed become the new ruling elf species of all elves.
“It’s time for us elves to be unified in order to survive this catastrophe.”
What humans didn’t know was that the Superior Elves’ leaders had discussed and agreed to become unified… Fine, when considering how the wood elves only stayed as hermits in mountains and forests, and how dark elves had long been mortal enemies with all other elves, the only unification possible for determining a ruling elf species would still be between the moon elves and silver elves.
The fierce warrior silver elves and the wise moon elves both hoped to become the ruling elf species. Their supporting Elven G.o.ds also split off into factions. Although the elves’ internal war was 70% faked for outsiders to watch, 30% was real in order to determine what the ruling elf species would be.
In order not to lose too many elites before the Holy War, the Elven G.o.ds oversaw this war as both sides forbade all Superior Elves from partic.i.p.ating in the war. Elite elves from high-ranking families were also kept away from the battlefield. The end result was that mercenaries and ordinary elves fought to death while Superior Elves were only allowed to be commanders.
This internal war had lasted for seven or eight years already. Although the higher-ups on both sides had begun to intentionally reduce the scale of the warfare starting from the middle of the war, both sides had already suffered serious losses to their ordinary soldiers.
Now, the silver elves and moon elves suddenly arrived at a ceasefire. The silver elves even agreed to send reinforcements to support the moon elves. Perhaps this was indeed good for the sake of the entire elf species. Perhaps this could be explained by saying “the overall situation” and “for the sake of all elves”, but this would seem like a complete and utter betrayal to the ordinary elven soldiers fighting and risking their lives on the frontlines every day.
“What? He/she/they killed my friends and family, yet I still need to go there as their reinforcements? This isn’t even funny as a joke!”
This wasn’t the older times when the upper cla.s.s had complete rule over all society. While the Superior Elves were indeed the elven leaders thanks to their outstanding natural talents and historical inheritance, the fact that Superior Elves were even more lacking in fertility compared to ordinary elves meant that the Superior Elves were forced to give much power over to ordinary elves.
Thus, as time pa.s.sed, the Superior Elves were no longer superior in population and overall combat strength in any elven kingdom since long ago. However, in the elven kingdoms Elven G.o.ds still ruled and guided, the Superior Elves still remained as elven leaders.
The silver elves had now split into factions as a result of the announcement that silver elves would send reinforcements to the moon elves. The militaristic silver elves had originally kept excellent control over their army. However, the silver elf military officers were already quite filled with complaints about how the leading silver elves were all absent from this war. Now, not only had the silver elves directly agreed to peace with their former mortal enemies, the silver elf army was expected to go and save yesterday’s mortal enemy? No matter what, this seemed like a complete and utter betrayal to all ordinary silver elves.
“Our rulers have betrayed us!”
Not only did ordinary silver elves feel this way, many silver elf military officers related to powerful families were also unable to accept this reality. The young Superior Elf silver elf military officers had already been quite aggrieved with not being able to partic.i.p.ate in battle, as this meant they would be viewed as cowards in their militaristic society. So when the news of ceasefire and sending reinforcements was announced, these youngster Superior Elf officers directly took their personal armies and made a break from the leaders.
Without going into details about the process, this was truly internal chaos and enmity amongst the silver elves. But, in the end, the silver elf tribe leaders still had their authority. The silver elves eventually didn’t go to war against themselves, but they had now split into two completely opposing factions.
Only about 40-50% of the silver elves’ total military forces were willing to support the moon elves and go as reinforcements for the sake of all elves. The remaining portion, which included most silver elf commoners and young Superior Elves, all felt that it would be far better for the silver elves to immigrate and move far away from the upcoming battlefield in the Moonwheel Capital. They felt that it would be a good idea to retreat to the southwestern mountains.
This time, the overly scheming elves had shot themselves in the foot. Perhaps the G.o.d of Silver Elves knew that he had been too overboard before as he maintained a strange silence.
Perhaps this was because the G.o.d of Silver Elves was looking at things from a different angle. From the viewpoint of silver elves, this would likely be the “smart” choice as they wouldn’t lose out no matter if the moon elves won or lost the battle against the first demon wave in the Moonwheel Capital. And if the moon elves were entirely destroyed as a species, the silver elves would still survive this way.
When using the most vicious and cruel way of thinking to judge the silver elves, perhaps it was likely that they wanted all moon elves to die. In that case, the silver elves would become the only possible candidate for ruling elf species.
But, this was the worst news possible for Moon Elf Empress Afina. She felt as if she could hear the bells tolling for the total destruction of her species…