Chp.16: High royal general Carrion

In a room there was a man. With this sentence one could begin many stories, mainly stories of assassinations, crimes and conspiracies. Especially if the room of that story was particularly dark, dingy, or run down. However, this wasn't the case. The room in question was extremely clean and well kept, and was brightly lit from a large window in the central wall near the roof. The acrid smell of lime showed that the construction of that place had recently been completed, and in fact there was almost no furniture inside, except for a chair that had surely been brought there only because the man wanted to sit on it, and not because it was meant to be part of the furniture.

The man was sitting on it, looking down on a book he held in his hands. His fingers barely touched the pages, as if afraid to ruin them. The book was very well written, with all the pages filled with decorations and symbols, and the cover was extraordinarily beautiful. The man read it in religious silence, but his mouth moved as if he were repeating the words he read.

Suddenly the door opened, and a soldier entered. The man just looked up from the book and said with an angry tone: "I asked not to be disturbed"

"Pardon me, high royal general Carrion" the soldier replied kneeling. "But our spies have just returned. They say they have important news"

The man was silent for a moment, then stood up and turned to face the soldier, revealing a handsome, clean-shaven face, a slightly pointed nose, green eyes, and well-groomed hair. "Go and tell them to wait for me in the main hall, and to prepare a very detailed report. I will reach them immediately"

"Yes sir" the soldier replied as he immediately left the room.

Carrion was alone again and looked back at the book, which was still open in his hands. He finished reading the pages that were open, then closed it, revealing the refined cover that read the name Entairidion, the sacred text of the goddess Heloisa. Carrion stared at the letters as if he was admiring a treasure, then he looked up at the great window. "If my spies have finally returned, then something is afoot… Eternal Heloisa, I will soon cleanse this land of the evil that infests it, and bring true peace. These great lands will be filled with virtuous men and women who will follow your sacred dictates and will appeal to your divine protection, while the nefarious peoples who appeal to false and lying gods will be swept away and enslaved as they deserve. I ask your forgiveness for my arrogance and selfishness, but please support me in this sacred enterprise of mine, as you have always done in all my adventures, and permit me to bear your noble name on this sinner-infested land!"

Nothing happened, but a smile crept onto Carrion's face as he watched the light filter through the window. With extreme care, he placed the sacred text in a box placed on his belt, which he had had built years before so as never to be separated from the word of the goddess. After that he finally left the room, and as soon as he was out he was hit by the sunlight.

The place where he was was a fortress. Or rather, what would one day become a fortress. At the moment only a few pieces, such as the room he had been in until a few moments before, had been completed. Even if the central body, the warehouses, part of the towers and the first external wall were already almost finished, there was still much to be built to make that fortress truly impregnable. Carrion watched smugly as the thousands of workers, especially tigermen, who were carrying the stones and piling them on top of each other.

That land where it was at the moment was called Kalbeck Plain, and it was the old territory of the tigermen people. It was an immense prairie rich in animals and resources, where the tigermen lived divided into three distinct cities and numerous villages. The territory was so rich that adjacent peoples, especially bearmen and lionmen, had often entered into conflicts for the purpose of conquering it, but had each time been repulsed.

While the beastmen were united into a single nation formerly known as the Baudonia City Alliance (now known as the Province of Baudonia), that nation was by no means united. It wasn't like the nations of humans, orderly and where everyone had their place. No, things were quite different among the beastmen. The only rule that prevailed in the Baudonia City Alliance was that, in case of war, everyone should unite on a common front; but in times of peace, then conflict reigned between the various cities, even between those of the same peoples. There was rarely a year where at least two cities hadn't fought each other. Each beastmen people tried to grab the best resources and territories and subjugate the others, and the law of the strongest was the only valid one. This was favored by their gods, many of whom promoted battle as their sole reason for existence. Carrion despised them for this, not only because they worshiped such cruel gods, but also because by doing so they wasted an infinite number of resources that could have been used in other ways. While humans strove to improve living conditions for all, beastmen crushed the weak and worshiped the strong. All those resources that could have been used to build something useful, to improve civilization, were wasted in battles. All those extraordinary and deserving people who could have formed a strong army if they had united, were just fighting each other. And all those people continuously impoverished by the war, all those orphaned children, all those widows... nobody considered them. The law of the strongest was the only valid one.

Carrion was disgusted by such brutality and ignorance. If the beastmen instead of wasting time in useless conflicts had put their forces into something useful, the Baudonia City Alliance could have developed into a great power in a few years, perhaps even greater than the Jurao Kingdom. Their resource-rich territory would have favored trade and its easily defensible location would have allowed it to hold out against foreign invasions, and the numerous beastmen warriors could have formed a sizable army. It was annoying for Carrion to see so much potential wasted like that. His allies were right in saying that the beastmen were too feisty and unpredictable to assimilate into the realm. Unfortunately his king couldn't see that. This was normal: King Marcus was a good ruler, as he had often demonstrated, and aimed at improving the living conditions of his subjects. But sometimes such idealism couldn't be applied; if they had continued with his plan, the beastmen would almost certainly have revolted as soon as the eastern empires attacked, causing a disaster. But Carrion would soon make up for that mistake.

The first part of his plan had already been largely completed. Having taken control of the three most favorable territories, namely that of the lizardmen in the north, that of the tigermen in the center and that of the lionmen in the south, he had begun the construction of three enormous fortresses, which united the river Kotenka and several bastions of minor size, they would have formed an impassable wall for the empires of the east. A complex system of infrastructures, roads and bridges scattered throughout the Province of Baudonia would have allowed the armies to move quickly, avoiding any possibility of siege. Thanks to the forced labor he had imposed on the lizardmen, tigermen and lionmen, this project was already well advanced; even if paid human workers with normal working hours had suddenly taken over, everything would have been finished within a few years. In a single stroke, therefore, Carrion had created a titanic work of defense and at the same time he had punished the peoples who most opposed the conquest by the Jurao Kingdom, thus demonstrating to everyone what happened if one opposed his will. In this way, he could easily control the whole territory without risking the beastmen trying to escape or revealing to anyone the true situation in which they lived. The few who had tried to do so were quickly eliminated. Now, everything was ready for the second phase of his plan, which was a revolt; after having ascertained that the flight and the appeal to the king were useless, anyone who possessed a minimum sense of belonging towards his people would have decided to resort to arms. For this Carrion had deliberately let many prisoners escape: he hoped that they would prepare a revolt, which he obviously would have crushed without problems. And finally it seemed that this purpose was ready to come true.

Carrion quickly reached a door that would allow him access to what was now the meeting room; while the keep was not finished yet, many of its areas were already functional, and so Carrion and his subordinates used them. Once he was inside, he found himself facing a long table set horizontally in relation to the door. On one side were seated four people, with a central chair left empty; on the other there were three individuals who immediately knelt down as soon as they saw him. Carrion immediately recognized them as his spies; he walked over to the empty chair and sat down on it, and then he said: "Speak. What do you have to tell me?"

The tallest spy spoke: "High royal general, we have been able to verify the existence of a beastmen army of at least a thousand soldiers, which is currently moving through the Province of Baudonia"

Carrion's eyes narrowed with pleasure. What he wished had happened: the battle was finally upon them. "Are they headed here?" he asked, already expecting an affirmative answer.

The spy nodded. "Yes, sir. Unfortunately we have not been able to correctly identify their location. The path this army is following is full of canyons, jagged terrain and rocks, and it has therefore been impossible for us to keep an eye on them properly. However, thank you to the few sightings that we have been able to make and to the testimonies of some merchants and adventurers, we have traced their path and have established that they are heading towards the Arapaina Gorge"

Carrion's frown turned a little annoyed. The Arapaina Gorge was a very impervious territory: it was a long canyon where, however, the land rose in a westerly direction and descended in an easterly direction. Considering their current route, the rebel army aimed to position themselves on the elevated point, from which it would be easier to fight.

Unlike him, the four generals sitting beside him didn't seem concerned. "Even so, we can defeat them with minimal losses. A thousand soldiers against our army is practically nothing!" one of them said.

"You should wait to tell such things. What is their current position?" Carrion asked.

"The last time we saw them, three days ago, they were near the Tamur Valley" the spy amswered.

"Which means they'll be at Arapaina Gorge in just two weeks. In this short period of time, we can muster barely five thousand soldiers. While we're still in the majority, we're not enough to guarantee a landslide victory" Carrion said reflectively.

"We could just postpone the battle. Position a small number of soldiers to defend the Gorge, and gather more" another general proposed.

Carrion shook his head. "The Arapaina Gorge is extremely unfavorable territory. If we give this enemy army time to organize themselves, they will be able to place archers and mages on top of the rock pillars, dig ditches, muddy the ground to prevent us from climbing, and even build fortifications. If they succeed in doing this, even this small army could become problematic and force us to several weeks of battles and to gather more and more troops. In the long term, this will allow the rebellion of further hotbeds of revolt. This isn't our intent. If we want them our plan comes true, then we must crush the enemy with a single battle"

Carrion's intent wasn't certainly to start a full-scale rebellion. If so, it would have been very difficult to suppress it and hundreds if not thousands of soldiers might have died. If things had gotten really bad, some parts of the Province of Baudonia could even proclaim themselves independent. Therefore, the uprising had to be crushed right away. Carrion planned to eliminate the rebels that he himself had created in a single battle, immortalize everything using magic and then use this material as evidence to demonstrate the impossibility of managing the territory peacefully; his friends in the noble faction would do the rest and the king would in the end authorize him to take drastic action, just as he wanted. At that point, he could legally enslave the beastmen and repopulate the Province of Baudonia with humans. He hadn't expected the rebels to have a strategist smart enough to not only choose the Arapaina Gorge as their battlefield, but also move their army through a route where it would be difficult to identify them until it was too late.

Everything would have been easier if he could have intervened in person, since with his divine power he could have wiped out the rebels in an instant, but he didn't want to do it. His intent was to show the king how dangerous the rebels were. Had he eliminated them without major problems, he would have proved nothing but that he was good enough to run the Province of Baudonia. Therefore, officially he at the time of the battle would have been away, and only his army would have acted. But with the position of the battle that the rebels had chosen, things got complicated. Unfortunately, too, it would have been impossible to intercept them before they reached the Gorge: not only was their route somewhat unknown, but mustering enough soldiers and moving them so far in time was an unthinkable undertaking. However, he was still in control of the situation. "General Yvon, how many men can you muster by tonight?"

"Four hundred, sir. Maybe even five hundred if I act immediately" replied the person in question.

Carrion nodded slightly. "Gather these men and leave tomorrow morning for Arapaina Gorge. Once there, go to the west side and find a hiding place, and wait for our enemy to arrive and for the battle to begin. Then attack them from the rear. Even if you are outnumbered , with us attacking from the other side you can easily cause unrest among their ranks, allowing the rest of the army to eliminate them"

Although four hundred men couldn't do much against a thousand, if they attacked by surprise they could drive the enemy army against his men, who could easily eliminate them. Such a pincer move, even in a difficult environment like the Arapaina Gorge, would have been enough to eliminate them. This would probably cost him a few more soldiers than expected, but it was a sacrifice worth making. "Is there anything else I need to know?" he asked the spy.

The man nodded. "A detail, sir. We have been able to confirm the presence of a young dragon in the enemy ranks. Given his appearance, we believe he is the one who escaped from the capital four months ago"

Carrion's eyes flashed. "Mh. Now I understand who the mysterious strategist is" he murmured, since he was aware of how intelligent dragons were. That could be an unexpected opportunity.

Dragons were the spawn of evil. They were creatures devoted only to destruction and selfishness, and didn't disdain to eat even their own kind. There was a reason the gods had caused their downfall. Carrion remembered when he had found that dragon, a year and four months ago, next to the dead body of the hydra: he wanted to kill him, as it would have been right to do, but Hara had stopped him. Now he could correct that mistake and put that dragon out of the way before he could grow to adulthood and bring doom and misery upon the world. "I understand" he said. "Go and keep trying to track down the enemy army, or at least make sure it keeps going in the same direction"

The spies nodded and immediately left the room, followed by General Yvon. Carrion looked at the three remaining generals. "All of you, gather and arm as many troops as possible. We will leave for the Arapaina Gorge within a week. Hopefully, in two weeks we will crush these rebels, and finally the king will see for himself that these beastmen deserve only the slavery!"

The three generals nodded, smiling proudly. All of them had full confidence in their victory. Soon, the Province of Baudonia would finally be rid of the infesting beastmen, and true peace would officially be achieved.