[MLV] 46. Tense Standoff (Patreon)

A/N

Friday's chapter is here now! Hope you all enjoy it!

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To Alicia’s surprise, the soldiers’ reaction to the news was completely different from what she imagined.

She expected outrage, indignation, and righteous anger coming from them, but instead, the assembled Vaelrin soldiers listened silently to Lucille’s speech about what was happening. Most just nodded along, some whispered with each other, but, by and large, the soldiers simply had faces full of resignation and acceptance, the same reaction they had when they saw the hanged men for the first time earlier.

The way they reacted was deeply concerning to Alicia. It was as if they were already conditioned to accept this kind of mistreatment as something normal.

They barely even had a positive reaction this time about the princess’s promises to protect and reward them, as she adamantly declared that she was going to do everything to defend their honor and innocence. This time, the thrill of victory against impossible odds had already disappeared for them to listen to flowery words.

Now was the time of reality rushing back.

While Alicia was very angry about this, that the day that should have been spent celebrating their victory, where the soldiers could finally rest and have a good meal before their next battle, was ruined, she couldn’t exactly do much about it. For now, she simply coordinated with Lucille at helping them set up camp outside of Florimont.

The only silver lining for now was the fact that the imperial army was on the march. Instead of staying put in Florimont, columns of soldiers exited the city to continue their offensive. It was a good sign, Lucille told Alicia. It meant that at the very least, the army didn’t consider them an immediate threat and wouldn't attack them.

That didn’t mean, however, that the fate of the soldiers improved fully. It only meant that for now, Lucille managed to buy them time until she could personally give her older brother a talking to. It wasn’t enough of a resolution at all for Alicia, but, as of now, she had no choice but to keep trusting Lucille’s words that she was going to resolve this peacefully long-term.

A sigh left her as she took a break at their camp.

Sitting on a log placed in front of a fireplace, Alicia idly threw sticks at the fire as Lorraine cooked something for Lucille.

“Hmph, they still haven’t sent us the supplies I demanded,” Lucille huffed as she looked at the fire as well. “I hope they’re not taking too long on purpose.”

“...Lady Lucille,” Lorraine spoke up from the side, a frown on her face. “I still feel like you’re flying too close to the sun right now. You know the war minister holds absolute power right now in the rest of the country. What if our camp gets locked into an actual fight before we’re ready?”

“The more we wait, the more he’ll consolidate power around himself. We can’t afford to sit still.”

Lucille smiled faintly.

“I know that all of you have doubts in my plans, but I can see that we have an upper hand over that bastard brother of mine because of his massive blunder here. And I intend to take it. For all of Alsatia.”

Lorraine shook her head. Then, she handed the cubes of salt pork she cut up and fried on a pan to Lucille. The princess turned to Alicia with a smile and asked, “You want some?”

“Sure,” Alicia nodded.

The three of them shared the quick meal. It was a very basic dish, as Lorraine simply took salt pork, washed it a bit, cut it into small cubes, and fried it on its own fat. Technically, Alicia could just go teleport to Lucille’s residence to fetch them some proper food, but Lucille didn’t bother to ask. Probably because it would be highly out of touch to eat something more than what the Vaelrin soldiers with them were eating.

Even so, something had to be done with their supply situation.

“Alright…” Alicia turned serious. “By tomorrow, we’ll run out of everything we can eat or drink. We need to move.”

“I’ve been thinking of summoning Remarque to fetch food, but he’s still recovering,” Lucille said. Then, she shook her head. “But even if he wasn’t, I demanded a steady supply of rations from Pierre, and I don’t intend to back off from that. I’m going to raise hell if supplies aren’t sent here.”

“So you plan to only resupply from your residence as a last resort?”

“Essentially. If we suddenly have supplies, then that old fart will just go, ‘Oh, but Her Highness seems capable of feeding those troops.’ I can’t let that happen. These soldiers joined the army. The army must take care of them. I have to remain steadfast on the principle that this country’s army will feed the soldiers it recruits to its ranks.”

“At this rate though, you two will just have another spat tomorrow.”

“We’ll see.”

For a while, the trio continued waiting at the camp for news.

Finally, an hour before people went to sleep, a lieutenant from the army arrived on horseback at the camp. The officer was human and appeared rather clueless about the goings-on, or he was trying to act ignorant, because he was very respectful and agreeable while talking to Lucille. The officer told them that they should send a few dozen Vaelrin soldiers to Florimont to move supplies to their camp.

Then, he left the camp without incident. Alicia and Lucille were therefore left with the task of trying to assemble a supply gathering group.

“Well, at least he was true with his word,” Alicia murmured to Lucille.

“I suppose he isn’t that dishonorable. Still, we can’t be too comfortable about this. Can you keep watch of the group I’ll send?” Lucille asked.

“Of course. I was planning to do that anyway.”

Within a few minutes, a small party of Vaelrin soldiers was formed by Lucille and Antonio, with Antonio being the one picking most of the people who would take supplies. Since he knew that Lucille and Lorraine were going to stay behind, Antonio decided to pick the strongest among them to go to the city.

All in all, around three dozen Vaelrin soldiers were assigned to this gathering party. Knowing that they would be the ones to get first dibs on supplies raised their morale a bit. However, there was still a sense of unease about the fact that they were going to the regular army’s camp, who wanted to arrest them earlier.

Soon, the troops marched out straight to Florimont, with Alicia following them closely behind, all while using her magic to keep herself mostly out of sight.

Activity in Florimont had largely died down. On the streets, there were still soldiers drinking around, playing cards, or practicing with their weapons, but many were already asleep. Alicia found that comforting. While there were some human soldiers on the ground giving the Vaelrin soldiers dirty looks, they went with their business and ignored them.

Then, she began hearing things.

“Demons. Tch,” a lone soldier spat on the road as he walked past by, his cold blue eyes glancing back at the group of Vaelrin soldiers momentarily.

“How the hell did even they get the princess’s attention? Didn’t know she’s the type to worry about filth,” another soldier remarked to a soldier beside him, covering his nose as if he smelled something bad.

Alicia curled her fist.

The worst thing she heard, however, was from a group of human soldiers who were smoking, practically glaring at the column of Vaelrin soldiers. One of them grumbled angrily that because of the Vaelrin soldiers, now, they were the ones in trouble, something about a rumored list.

The officers are making a list?

She looked back at the group of soldiers as one of them scoffed.

A list for what?

The rest of their trip went on normally. They reached the supply depot, which was simply a former bakery turned into a kitchen. The people who manned the kitchen didn’t say many words to the gathering party, as crates and barrels of food, water, and other supplies were handed to them.

At least, until one of the human soldiers guarding the kitchen raised his voice.

“Can’t you walk faster?!” the soldier asked. “Filthy demon.”

The Vaelrin soldier who got shouted at stared blankly at the human soldier as he held the crate in his hand tightly. Then, he turned back and walked away. That triggered the human soldier further. Before Alicia knew it, a fight broke out. Vaelrin soldiers quickly lowered whatever they were carrying to break up the fight, then other human soldiers joined in on the squabble to defend the man who started everything, escalating things.

It was like a powder keg already primed to explode, finally detonating.

There were shouts and screaming, fists flying to faces, and people kicking those who got knocked down. A few human soldiers had batons in their hands, and so they began bashing people’s faces and heads with them. But the Vaelrin soldiers, who were physically stronger on average, quickly gained the upper hand.

Alicia intervened as quickly as she could. Using her magic to cast barrier spells, people stopped being able to attack and hit each other, and it became an almost comical scene as both sides still stubbornly insisted on hitting back one last time.

“Stop!” Alicia shouted as she revealed herself, her voice cutting through the noise. “The princess will hear of this!” She turned to one of the shocked clerks manning the kitchen. “You there! Give me a list of the names of these people. We’re not going to overlook this!”

“Who the fuck are you?!” One of the human soldiers shouted after he stood up, face half beaten. “Are you seriously taking their side?!”

“So? Why does that matter?”

“Shit, I remember her. She’s not lying. She’s with the princess.” Another soldier approached the angry guy to hold him back, whispering to him. “We gotta run. I think we fucked up.”

The soldier grumbled, averting Alicia’s eyes, and began to walk away.

On the other side, the Vaelrin soldiers began picking up what they were supposed to carry and walked away as well, clearly using the distraction Alicia created as an opportunity to escape.

The group of human soldiers seemed to have the same idea, as they too began skedaddling out of the scene. Not a single one of them wanted to confront her, now that they knew she was with the princess. But Alicia wasn’t having it. Using her barrier spell again, she blocked their escape routes.

Then, she went to the still speechless clerk in the kitchen, asked for a paper and a fountain pen, and got to work forcefully asking for people’s names. Not a single human soldier had the guts to say no to her. Once she was done, she returned alone to the camp, intending to talk to Lucille quickly.

Now, she was sure of it. She had to get the people who wanted to escape this hellhole out, one by one.

Lev, an imp, tried his best to fix his jaw.

Earlier, while they were gathering supplies at the city, a bunch of assholes tried beating up one of them, so they got into a ridiculous street fight in the middle of the night. During the fight, Lev was hit on the face by someone wielding a club. While he did manage to tackle the dipshit afterward and give him a few punches on the face before a strange barrier stopped all of them, it didn’t change the fact that his gums were bleeding, and one of his teeth flew to god knows where.

Fucking hell… I shouldn’t have volunteered.

He planted his forehead on his hand as he tried to stifle the pain and move his jaw a bit to maybe snap it back in place. Luckily, he heard a small pop, but it hurt like hell before he was able to move his jaw correctly again. Even so, his muscles ached and were sore, and moving them was painful, but at least they would easily heal soon.

“Here’s your share,” Lev’s squadmate said with a smile, holding a bowl of soup. Lev, however, shook his head and raised his hand.

“Later,” Lev said. “I don’t want to eat yet.”

“It’s going to get cold.”

“Don’t care.”

“Aight. If you say so.”

His squadmate walked away and poured the soup back onto the cooking pot they carried with them. As for Lev, he stood up and walked at the edge of the camp, hoping to catch some fresh air. It was already night, and it was cold.

He stared at the sky, his mind a bit turbulent because of everything that was happening. They had a very long fight since last week, desperately trying their best to hold the line against all odds and survive, all for Alsatia. Yet, in exchange, he was being branded as a deserter or a mutineer for it and even had his face punched.

What did I even do wrong to deserve this?

The moon flying high above didn’t answer him. He wanted to scream at it, asking it why exactly he was born in a land that hated him so much. But he knew heaven wouldn’t answer, so he lowered his head and sighed.

“Well… I guess I’ll just hope that the princess succeeds.”

The fact that they had someone of royal blood on their side, and best of all, she was the elf who was meant to become the empress one day, was a bright sliver of hope in Lev’s mind. As far as he knew, the empress or emperor was the most powerful person of the land. While he wasn’t fully sure if her intentions were true, what he did know was that if she was telling the truth about granting them rights, one day they would be recognized as true proper Alsatians, and that it would happen.

All he had to do was to remain strong until then. He was used to this mistreatment anyway, he reminded himself. Even so, it hurt a lot, Lev thought, but he knew better than to dwell in bad thoughts. His life was already miserable. If he stopped believing in the princess’s words, he’d be even more miserable.

For a while, he just walked around the edge of the camp aimlessly, utterly bored out of his mind.

Suddenly, a strange mist covered everything around him. Lev was immediately on guard, frantically looking around in horror, as he tried to figure out what was happening. But then a voice called out to him.

“Calm down.”

The human woman who was with the princess appeared in front of him. Alice, he remembered. His eyes narrowed, unsure what her intentions were. Still, he did not make any overt moves to attack her, as she did save them earlier from the scuffle.

“You must be Corporal Lev, aren’t you?” Alice asked.

“Yes?”

“Apologies if all of this is so sudden, but I need to talk to you.”

All of a sudden, the woman’s body began to change before his eyes. Black hair turned to silver, human ears turned into something resembling elven ears, and many more. Before he knew it, he thought he was standing in front of a literal goddess. He instinctively took a step back, not comprehending what was happening.

“W-what—?”

“My real name is Alicia,” the woman said, her face determined. “And like you, I’m Vaelrin too.”

It took a while for the soldier in front of Alicia to calm down and listen to her.

After talking to Lucille earlier, the princess agreed that it would be fine for Alicia to begin work on evacuating people out of this stressful situation straight into her homeland. Of course, there were a lot of problems in that plan. First of all, Alicia’s true identity would be revealed, so she couldn’t just do it in front of everyone.

But, when Alicia revealed that she had a ‘memory altering’ spell to Lucille, the princess agreed that it would be fine to use it on any soldier who might refuse her offer, so she could just talk to them one by one and evacuate people who wished to leave.

This was going to be tiresome, as Alicia would have to essentially talk and explain things privately to every one of them, but she was determined to do so. After explaining that she was an aristocrat from Vael who wished to improve her homeland and that she could bring him there, where he would be safer, she smiled at Lev.

“So,” Alicia said. “Are you coming with me?”

The soldier was visibly troubled by all of this.

“...First of all,” Lev started. “Vael still exists?”

“Of course, yes. It’s in a bad shape, but we’re slowly making progress,” Alicia repeated her earlier explanation.

“...I see,” the soldier thought about Alicia’s offer for a bit. But then, he shook his head. “I’m sorry. I can’t. Even if I want to, I have family here. If I go with you, I’ll be a deserter, and I’ll just pass the problem to them.”

The soldier bowed his head a bit.

“Thank you, Lady Vampire, but I can’t go.”

“I can bring your family too.”

The soldier’s eyes froze as he looked up at her.

“It’s going to be tricky,” Alicia added. “But I should be able to do this, with your assistance, of course.”

“But what about my comrades? I can’t just leave my buddies behind.”

“I’m giving this offer to everyone. If they want to go to Vael too, you’ll be with them.”

The soldier gulped. The offer must be very enticing now to him. Alicia wished that he’d accept. At least she wouldn’t have to use the crown on the first guy she talked to. To her relief, the soldier nodded.

“Alright,” his face turned serious. “Get me out of this hellhole.”

A smile formed on Alicia’s face.

Finally, some progress.

Then, she took Lev’s hand and teleported to Vael.

It was now morning.

Alicia walked around the camp, having spent the night using the darkness as cover for her evacuations. So far, she managed to get around fifty soldiers straight to Vael. For now, they were going to have to wait until the situation here was resolved and Alicia could take their families to Vael as well.

Unfortunately, roughly one third of the soldiers she talked to refused to go with her. Most of them had the same reasons. Because they couldn’t speak Vaelrin, because they didn’t believe that Vael was being ‘fixed,’ because they thought Vael was destroyed and she was lying, and the most common one was that they didn’t want to become true deserters or mutineers and that they would never abandon their brothers who would choose to stay as well.

It was deeply infuriating, but Alicia didn’t argue with them. She wasn’t one of them, so she wasn’t going to force them. If they cared about their comrades in other units still fighting hard, who wouldn’t be evacuated like them, then why should she force them? Them choosing to stay here was their prerogative. Her only goal was to give them an exit.

At the very least, the burden on her heart was being lifted bit by bit. Lyra, Vittorio, Moshan, and everyone else in Orevogorsk accepted the soldiers warmly last night. Of course, there was the problem that they literally couldn’t talk to each other because her subjects spoke common Vaelrin and the soldiers here spoke Alsatian, but nothing bad should happen just yet.

She also lucked out that Maxim spoke broken Alsatian, so he could interpret things between the denizens of Orevogorsk and the soldier refugees. So in the end, things were looking up.

But, for the camp, morale only dipped further. Lucille already explained earlier that the people who suddenly disappeared probably fled and deserted. While that might be troublesome since Pierre and the war minister could use that as proof that there were deserters and mutineers here, Lucille reassured Alicia that this was actually good, as those who remained would be people proven to be steadfast soldiers of Alsatia who refused the temptation of fleeing even under pressure.

Still, it depressed a lot of the soldiers that Alicia hadn’t talked to or had forgotten their talk with her, as they knew that some of their comrades broke and ran away. Some of the more vocal ones were even furious that some of their brothers cowardly fled them when they should meet this problem head-on together.

Most, however, simply carried on with their lives. The average soldier of the Demon Brigades was tough and resilient. 

They had to be.

But Alicia wasn’t going to let those who were already close to their breaking point continue with the tough act if she could save them. And so, throughout the morning, she continued her work ambushing lone soldiers and talking to them one by one, though, at a significantly slower rate than before.

A few hours later, she was speaking again to another soldier. But this time, the man had a significantly different reaction than everyone else.

“No,” the soldier, who was in his late forties, curled his fist. “Absolutely not! I will not leave this land, vampire.”

Alicia was taken aback. She didn’t have someone refuse her so firmly before.

“If you’re truly from Vael, then instead, I must ask you, will you join us?”

“Join you?”

“Yes. If you’re truly fighting to see a better world for Vaelrin like me, then you will not snatch us from here. You will instead join us, under Vael Invicta.”

Alicia frowned. This must have been one of the people Lucille had talked about earlier.

“You mean, the rebel group?” Alicia asked.

“Yes. We are the only ones who carry on the fight for our lands,” the man declared, his tone sure and firm. “For any Vaelrin to flee the land his ancestors lived, toiled for, and died for is a betrayal to our race. I will not leave. I still have much to do. Once I’m done fighting for elven dogs, I will rejoin Vael Invicta and recruit people to the cause.”

“I… I see,” Alicia sighed. This guy didn’t sound like someone who would be convinced by her words.

“What about you?” The man asked. “Are you going to join us? That should be the question here! If you’re truly powerful, then you should stay here and fight with us—”

Before he could finish blabbering more nonsense, Alicia summoned her crown and wiped his mind off. It was a quick process, and before he came back to his senses, Alicia already disappeared, and the soldier continued on with whatever he was doing beforehand, though he was mildly disoriented for a while.

She felt a twinge of guilt as the crown faded, remembering Kullervo’s words. What she was doing was different. It had to be. But she could see how it could be a slippery slope. The power just made everything so convenient, and she hadn’t even unlocked half of it yet. She could only imagine what she’d be able to do with the full power of the crown.

Then, she thought of the idea of someone else getting the same power. Someone with a deeper grudge or weaker resolve. Someone like Vittorio with the crown, even if he had good intentions for Vael… She couldn’t let the power continue.

It’s for the greater good, she told herself.

Using the crown too much wasn’t good, but letting her secret out would be worse. It wasn’t just her life she had to worry about. She led a budding nation. If the Alsatians found out that Vael was reorganizing too soon… Well, it was best not to think about it. Alicia needed to make alliances and preparations for a peaceful rise, and for that, her identity could not be revealed.

She glanced back at where she had left the soldier, thinking about what he said. About Vael Invicta. His resolve was laudable, but she could already feel an oncoming headache. If a group of violent Vaelrin rebels started causing problems in Alsatia while she was trying to make peace, it could only go poorly.

I’m going to need to deal with that too, aren’t I?

All this time, she thought Alsatia was going to be her golden goose—a land full of wonder and opportunity that she could bring back to her homeland. Unfortunately for her, it seemed to be a headache generator instead.

Even so, Alicia continued steadfastly on her mission.

She was going to get the people who wished to leave out of Alsatia, and she was going to make sure that the princess’s plan to save those who stayed was going to work.

There would be victory no matter what.