Chapter 73 - Seventy-Three ... The League of Twelve Cantons

Chapter 73: Chapter Seventy-Three ... The League of Twelve Cantons

Chapter Seventy-Three ... The League of Twelve Cantons

"Ohhh!"

"What! He drank that in one go!"

"Truly the lord! He can hold his drink, too. A true knight!"

Jan threw himself into their drinking customs. A culture of drinking freely, without formality, until everyone was drunk? That was something he knew well enough himself.

"My lord! Please accept a cup from me too!"

"Good! Pour away!"

"Thank you, my lord!"

In his past life, he had drunk with soldiers in the field and with emperors in their halls alike. A night like this held no terrors for him.

Before long, Jan had taken charge of the whole banquet.

"Now, watch closely. This is what soldiers call a plunge!"

Clack!

Splash.

Fizz, fizz, fizz!

He dropped a small cup of strong spirits straight into a tankard of foaming beer.

"Ohhh! What an extravagant drink!"

"A plunge?! I’ve never heard of it. What a fiery drink!"

"The world is spinning..."

"Ha ha! Pour! Drink!"

Of course, Agphiel, who had been watching all this, clutched his head with a look of disbelief.

"..."

"Ugh. I drank a lot."

As the banquet began to wind down, Jan quietly slipped away from the drinking. He had drunk so much that the smell of alcohol rose with every breath. If not for the blessing he had received from the Ruler of Life, he would surely have collapsed drunk long ago.

’Still, it was worth it.’

Leaning back in a chair, Jan slowly sorted out his thoughts.

The smiths’ guild turned out to be far less hostile to his workshops than he’d expected. When he thought about it, they dealt in high-end crafted goods.

Workshop-made goods would affect their ordinary wares, but precisely because of that, the high-end work the dwarves produced would only grow more valuable.

If anything, they were interested in the various devices made by the dwarves working under Jan.

Designs they had never seen before, ideas they had never seen before.

The smiths’ guild was fascinated by them. Using that as bait, Jan secured their promise of cooperation.

And once the problem with the smiths’ guild was settled, things with the merchant houses went smoothly, as a matter of course. The canton’s merchant houses agreed to take the goods produced in his workshops.

On top of that, the powerful figures of the canton pledged enormous sums in gratitude. For a single night of drinking, it had paid off handsomely.

He had assumed the banquet would wind up without further incident, but then...

"Er, my lord."

Jan looked up.

"The speaker of the canton council wishes to see you privately. Would you... grant me the honor of escorting you?"

"Oho?"

An unexpected invitation had arrived.

From the speaker of the canton council, no less.

As mentioned before, the canton was a gathering of dwarf clans handed down since the days of the old empire. So there was no clear hierarchy, but it was still a political power in its own right. However weak its order of rank, it needed someone to represent it.

And that was the speaker of the canton council, whom Jan was about to meet.

"May the faith bless you, most faithful lord! It is a pleasure to meet you, my lord."

The speaker of the canton council who greeted Jan was an elderly dwarf. With a long, flowing white beard, he was a man whose face was striking for its deep, crinkled wrinkles.

"I was surprised you called for me so suddenly, Speaker."

"Heh heh. My apologies, my lord. There’s something I wished to tell you quietly, so I arranged this private meeting."

’Oho?’

Something to tell him privately?

It had to be something secret. But what? Given the cantons’ long feud with the Skincus emperor, did he mean to warn Jan about him? Or perhaps to propose an alliance against the emperor? But what came out of the speaker’s mouth was entirely unexpected.

"You are on your way to the Papal See at its invitation, are you not, my lord?"

"I am."

The Papal See, out of nowhere? Hiding his bewilderment, Jan focused on what the dwarf was about to say.

"On the surface, I understand you were summoned to put down the heresy rampant in the south of the Kingdom of Hubner..."

The speaker glanced at Jan’s face once, then went on.

"But the canton’s envoy to the Papal See tells me that isn’t so, my lord."

"Hm? You mean it isn’t a crusade in the south?"

"No. It is a crusade... but its target isn’t the south, my lord."

What? What was this now? If the crusade wasn’t aimed at the south, then where on earth was it aimed?

Reading the bewilderment on Jan’s face, the speaker smiled and spoke slowly.

"The Kingdom of Hisevill. The Papal See’s target is the Kingdom of Hisevill, my lord."

Jan’s eyes narrowed sharply.

"The Papal See has already decided on excommunication. Even though the King of Hisevill’s house is the same as the Skincus emperor’s, there’s no stopping it this time."

"Hmm... So they’ll blind everyone with a southern crusade, then bring down the Kingdom of Hisevill while it’s off its guard?"

"Exactly, my lord. For that purpose, I understand the head of House Bohren, the greatest of the empire’s western princes, has been called to the Papal See. He’ll likely command the campaign."

"Ha ha. So the rest of us are just for show."

It was so absurd that Jan let out a hollow laugh. Things had changed this much? The war over the Hisevill succession was a great upheaval that only came after the Great Famine, and now it was happening this soon?

He could feel it clearly. The more he established himself in the south, the more tangled things kept getting.

’From here on, things will only grow more uncertain.’

Well, even in his past life, the world had rarely gone as anyone expected. It couldn’t be helped.

With that thought, Jan looked at the old dwarf and spoke.

"Well, that’s truly valuable information. But Speaker, why give it to me?"

The speaker of the canton council smiled as he answered.

"I wish to support you, my lord."

The System’s messages appeared before Jan.

[The League of Twelve Cantons wishes to support you. The League has long been under constant pressure from the emperor. Now that a powerful great lord has risen nearby, they mean to make use of you as their standard-bearer, just as the Papal See does.]

[Notice: The League of Twelve Cantons firmly believes in the devotion you have shown.]

[Notice: If you accept their offer, you can receive the support of the League of Twelve Cantons.]