Elden: Ring of Calamity

Chapter 174
"Your Highness, the financial statement for February has been prepared, please have a look."

In the study room, Aegis placed a stack of paper as thick as a dictionary on Lucia's desk.

Lucia was pondering the details of the fusion of Claw of Destruction and Destined Death, and suddenly raised her head in shock from the vibration of the tabletop, and said in a daze, "Why are there so many?"

"Your Highness," Aegis bowed slightly, "This month, Rodel has more than [-] nobles who have placed orders with our military factories in the East China Sea Islands. A batch of new orders have been added, and the cumulative number of weapons and equipment they ordered this month has exceeded the sum of last winter."

"On the other hand, the magic instrument factory and mechanical processing factory we opened in the capital also received an order from Lienia. The person who contacted us was Professor Miriam from Rhea Lucaria College. The reason for the order It was used to assist the border guards of the Kalia Dynasty to guard against the gangs of thieves wandering in the Southern Lienia area. However, because the amount of the order was beyond common sense, and the price was a bit abnormally high, the temple contacted His Royal Highness Lakad. The Kalia Royal Chamber of Commerce in charge, but the other party didn’t know about it.”

Lucia flicked through the report and paused slightly, "So, under the guise of Kalia, the academy bypassed the royal family and made a large order far from the supermarket price, buying the magic items and machinery that they are best at producing. Creation—is it to show us favor?"

Eggers nodded and said: "Our guess is roughly the same. In addition, they probably still have some intentions to test the degree of intimacy between His Highness and the three Highnesses of Kalia. After all, apart from the value of the order itself, all the procedures of the academy go There’s nothing wrong with it on the surface.”

"If we turn a blind eye and close our eyes, and don't contact Kalia at all, we will take advantage of it quietly. On the contrary, if Kalia receives our information, it will be enough to prove that His Highness and Kalia The relationship between Asia and Asia is difficult to shake, and some small calculations in their hearts may have to be overthrown and start over."

"The analysis is good." Lucia tapped her knuckles on the table lightly, frowned and said, "The academy has become more and more restless recently. Do you really think that after Queen Renara became seriously ill, there would be no one in the Kalia royal family?" ?”

After pondering for a moment, he asked again: "Is there any recent movement of the Cuckoo Knights?"

"No," Agnes replied, "Since Shuangxian Classroom invited their deputy head, Viscount Kiri, to visit the academy in the middle of last year, the two parties have not had further contact, and Kalia should have been keeping an eye on this matter. , there is no possibility that our intelligence network will miss the opponent's movements."

That’s right—Lucia calculated that it was just over a year since Queen Full Moon was seriously ill and unable to handle the affairs of state, and the time when the Academy dared to really rebel and put the Queen under house arrest in the Great Library of Rhea Lucaria should be far behind the Broken War. In the later period, otherwise, the three demigods of Kalia in their prime would be there, let alone a magic academy, and even the Golden Dynasty would not dare to touch the queen.

It's just that the legendary "Broken Star War" has yet to be seen. In the eyes of outsiders, Lataen, Lakad, and Lani are just three young demigods who need time to grow up, and they don't constitute a deterrent at all.

In this era, the mere title of "half-god" can't scare people. Although the battle in the Serrant Arena back then let the world see how terrifying a demi-god like Lucia is, it also revealed that among the demi-gods there was also Greco. The fact that this kind of waste is not enough.

In terms of the academy's hundreds of years of background, it is not surprising that Queen Kalia was seriously ill and the demigod was still young. No one has seen the gold content of sealing the stars by one's own power. It is also normal to be able to challenge the demigod.

Judging from the experience of the previous life, the academy at this moment is only in the stage of cautiously testing the attitudes of all parties, and it is still far away from triggering civil strife in Kalia.

However, having said that, the current situation is not without doubts. Looking at the analysis of the situation in the Western Territory by the Temple Information Network on a few pages in Lucia's hand, she always felt that something was wrong, but she couldn't remember it for a while.

After contemplating for a moment, seeing that he was still at a loss, Lucia no longer insisted, and instead turned his attention to the order list of the Golden Dynasty. Most of the surnames that appeared in it were New Party nobles from the Western Expeditionary Corps.

He rubbed his brows and asked, "If I remember correctly, more than half of the fiefdoms of these families are in the northern border, and they are all military nobles who actually control the army?"

"Yes, the three companies that ordered the most weapons this time - Earl Nelen, Earl Helia, and Viscount Levy are all military nobles whose fiefs are located north of Lord Fortress. Most of the garrison troops in the Yatan area are dispatched by the dynasty, and these three families also undertake the responsibility of defending the territory and securing the frontier, and each maintains no less than 2000 elite private soldiers."

"The Nelen family ordered 20 armor-piercing dragon arrows and three thousand sets of spare strings for bows and crossbows. It is also the dragon arrow and the spare string, plus the first aid kit for wounded soldiers we just launched."

Lucia and his party reviewed the purchase orders submitted by a group of military nobles, and they already had some understanding in their hearts.

For more than ten years, the Ancient Dragon Dynasty has always been the country that exported the most metal ore materials among the three dynasties. This type of rare material is unique to Sky City, but the Dynasty itself lacks sufficient processing and production capacity after the Taboo War.

When the Storm Dynasty was still alive, the Ancient Dragon Dynasty always transported raw materials, and the industrial system of Stonewell City manufactured all kinds of weapons and equipment for Sky City.In the golden age, it can only become a model of exporting a large amount of raw materials to the capital Rodel, and then importing processed products in reverse.

Until the past two years, Sister Lance has been working hard in the East China Sea Islands, and finally built more than ten military factories on the basis of the old craftsman group of the Ancient Dragon Temple. According to the factory design idea of ​​the previous life, several magic instrument factories and machinery processing factories were built accordingly, forming a complete set of military production system.

Since then, the ancient dragon dynasty has gradually reduced its material export share, and switched to exporting weapons and equipment such as dragon scale knives, armor-piercing dragon arrows mixed with dragon scale powder, and heavy armor made of stormy sea cold iron.

Of course, this change is equivalent to taking food from the mouth of the Golden Dynasty, and it is inevitable to be resisted and rejected by the Rodel nobles.

But after Lucia fully took over the Ancient Dragon Temple, relying on the god-man and his own stronger strength, he was more unscrupulous than Lance Shanks back then. Seeing that there were no support from the two His Majesties and Prince Godwin behind them, all the gold nobles could only lay down their flags and let Lucia seize the market.

In the final analysis, Lucia has already figured out Queen Malika's attitude of allowing these demigods to grow barbarously and freely, and even the stronger her own strength, the more gratified that majesty will be, and Radagon's thoughts are all on On top of the battle with Queen Malika, Prince Godwin cherished his feathers and would never intervene because of such a trivial matter, so he could let go.

After two years, the military industrial chain of the Gulong Dynasty had already established a firm foothold in Rodel. As time went by, some gold nobles had to succumb to the better quality of equipment in Sky City and began to purchase large quantities of weapons produced in the East China Sea Islands. Especially the sturdy and durable dragon scale knife is the most popular.

Compared with the dragon scale knife made of ancient dragon scales that is quite rare in Sky City, the version Lucia exported to the Golden Dynasty is just a youthful low-profile version made of the old scales of the next flying dragon. There are already many gold nobles with abundant financial resources who have placed large orders to deploy their own family's private troops with dragon scale knives.

However, this order is obviously a bit abnormal.

Since the Marquis of Osarion replaced Calvin Duoris as the guard of the northern border two years ago, in order to repay his colleagues in the new party who supported him as the guard, this person gave up a considerable part of the military dispatching power and local defense power in the northern border. The right to levy taxes along the trade routes was distributed to other New Party nobles in the north.

In other words, the Yiying family in the order list in his hand is a considerable part of the important military pillars of the Golden Dynasty in the northern border.

These families have changed their previous preference for equipment such as dragon scale knives, and instead changed their procurement direction to war consumables such as armor-piercing dragon arrows, spare strings for bows and crossbows, and first-aid kits for wounded soldiers, and they will only be equipped when militias are recruited on a large scale. Hair armor, there is one and only one possibility——

They are preparing for war, and they are preparing for a tragic battle that is likely to be protracted and run out of ammunition and food.

Lucia couldn't help looking at the vast and desolate extreme northern ice field on the map in the study room. Due to the fact that the road was too far away and blocked by the Lode cliff, the information network of the Ancient Dragon Temple had not been able to extend there.

At this moment, it has been less than three years since Duoris wiped out the Northern Territory. In the land where the fire of revenge has never been extinguished, it seems that another storm of unprecedented scale is brewing.

"If there are similar orders in the future, we will accept them all," Lucia instructed Eggerkiss, "Whether it is the academy or the Golden Dynasty, since they are rushing to send money, we have no reason not to accept it. The East China Sea Islands The construction of the building is still waiting for money.”

"In addition, find out what happened in the northern border as soon as possible, and pay attention to the intelligence of the western border as usual. Keep an eye on the magicians under the hood who are full of bad ideas. If there is any abnormality, report to me directly at any time."

"Yes, Your Highness."

(End of this chapter)