224 The Coalition Army
[It’s true]
[Then you can’t take part in the upcoming fights]
[Who said?]
[Aren’t you prevented from taking part in the quests?]
[Dude… Taking part is something, and causing chaos is another]
He paused for a long five minutes, seemingly chatting with his paragon. Fang was smart. He would guess partially what I was seeking here.
[So you want to form this army and go to hit that central region in the West, right?]
[Bingo]
[But what if you can’t claim anything there? Won’t that end up with great losses for you?]
Expected! He or his paragon or both must have guessed my current plans.
[Contracts exist to solve such issues]
[The same way of payment then?]
[I’ll retain my right to claim one fifth of the region we conquer] I sent to him, [According to my choice, anything I select will fall under my control after the end of quest four]
[Twenty percent? Hmm… That leaves eighty percent unclaimed]
[I’ll trade these with training camps from the two of you]
[You plan to bring that stinky brat with you?]
[I told you already, I’m aiming to form a coalition army]
[Can’t the two of us just do it?]
I thought about it already. It would be possible indeed, yet too risky.
[The damage we’ll get will be heavy, besides the gains will surely be lower]
[I understand] he seemed to know how to weigh the risks of this operation, [I’ll prepare myself to move out in two days. The next quest will start in seven days, but more players will be there if we delayed to this extent]
[More players?]
[I heard Dragons aren’t the only race interested in this empty zone]
[Berserkers are with us]
[Don’t group the entire race in one basket. Wryly is just a recently promoted archlord, with no prestige or weigh in the world of archlords of his race]
I got what he wanted to say here. It seemed other archlords of the Berserkers didn’t put Wryly in their eyes at all.
[That’s also true about Selvators?]
[It’s true about any race]
So a big fight was destined to happen. If so then…
[Is it better to be the early forces to be there?]
[What do you mean?] ρꪖꪕᦔꪖꪕꪫꪣꫀꪶ
[You said that the dragon archlords plan to take over this area by the end of quest three, right?]
[It’s true]
[Then it’s better to let the weaklings fight first, exhaust their forces before we step in]
[Hmm… But this might also be the same plan of these dragons. Don’t forget that having castles and emblems will help any defensive forces]
[I know, but we don’t have enough forces to contend against them]
[Who said?]
[You] I sent before adding, [You just told me that many forces will be in play in that region. Even in your race, you won’t be the only one fighting to dominate there. So that means less forces and lots of enemies]
[I got your point but I recommend against delaying too much]
[Don’t worry] I said, [We’ll hit there before the third quest starts]
[Five days then?]
[Let’s meet by then] I sent before adding, [as for the rest of the cities and regions nearby, we can start taking these by now]
[I see… I’ll send a contract over then]
I knew waiting too long would be risky as going too early. I had to time our arrival right. The best would be just before the start of the third quest.
Third quest would set loose lots of monsters in swarms at all cities and towns. If we tried to march through this quest, we would face great trouble fighting those monster herds.
So the best way was to have a safe path made out of cities and towns under our control, linking that central region with here. This would make our forces more secure.
Other races would also know that. So they would rashly try to control that region early on. I wouldn’t hurry and let them fight among themselves first, then finally appear with a grand army and divide that region with those dragons.
Then the entire third quest would turn from a fight against monsters into a fight between the two forces of us.
Plus there was also another reason behind my decision; that chick’s forces.
Her forces were already in that region. I’d ask her to come and plan the movement of her forces on the map before giving out orders.
They had to control regions closer to my side, so when I arrived, we would work together easily to control more regions.
Of course she wasn’t considered part of my forces, yet I never thought about giving the conquered regions to her without a contract.
And from what I knew about her, she wouldn’t agree to sign such a contract easily. If she agreed, then she would solve a big issue for me. Trusting these regions to humans was much better than other races.
But if she refused, then I’d only have to trust my share with Selvators and Berserkers by contracts.
As I was lost in my thoughts, the contract came. I read it carefully before signing it. By this, my deal with Fang was done smoothly.
I sent it to Wryly and explained the situation briefly to him. As expected! Once he knew there was a big fight going to happen against monsters and other races, he was excited to jump in.
But the question he asked made me pause my negotiations for him. I had to return to Fang to solve this matter before anything else.
[What about this eighty percent of land? How will we share it between my people and Fang’s?] that was what Wryly asked.
From what I knew about Fang, that dude would simply prefer to let things go with a strength rule. The more capable would take more than the other one.
Of course this would make sense, but for Wryly he wouldn’t settle on that. As for me, the last thing I’d hoped to see was an internal fight and skirmishes between the forces of my allied coalition army.
I had to solve this problem with an idea that would serve both sides’ interests and also mine.