by Hyougetsu
We had an unbroken supply line from the capital so Prince Woroy knew we wouldn’t be running out of food any time soon. Since he couldn’t wait us out or wear us down with attrition, his plan was likely to wait until Prince Ivan came to relieve him. Eleora glanced outside and lapsed into thought.
“We’ve spread our men out pretty thin to encircle the lake, meaning we’re susceptible to an attack from behind. Even if the enemy sends only a few reinforcements, it’ll be enough to sow chaos among our ranks. And there’s no doubt Woroy’ll sortie with his army if that happens.”
Our army hadn’t grown in size at all since we’d begun our siege. Prince Ashley’s allies, West Rolmund’s nobles, seemed content to wait and see how the battle progressed. Thanks to Eleora joining his cause, his allies didn’t abandon him, but they weren’t fully committed to him either. It was because of this that Prince Ashley was having such a hard time. Borsche placed a chip that symbolized soldiers on a section of the map and muttered, “It’ll be difficult to repel enemy reinforcements while also maintaining this encirclement. Especially since our soldiers aren’t very coordinated.”
Unlike the imperial army, the troops belonging to various noble lords hadn’t modernized. Their command structure was different from that of Prince Ashley’s core army, and trying to give multiple orders at once to any of them led to confusion and chaos. Lacy, who was also present at the meeting, started absently playing with the chip markers and muttered, “Can we just ignore this castle and keep marching north?”
Borsche, Eleora, and I all exchanged glances. They both signaled to me; it seemed explaining was my job. Sighing, I said simply, “If we stop surrounding this castle, Prince Woroy will be able to march straight onto the capital. If we leave enough troops behind to prevent him from doing that, we won’t have an army large enough to continue our invasion.”
Smiling wryly, Eleora added gently, “It’s both a strategic and a tactical mistake to do that. Soldiers in marching formation are susceptible to attack. If we try to march past the castle, Woroy could send his troops out to wreak havoc on our lines.”
“Haah... I see.”
I couldn’t tell if Lacy understood that explanation or not. She looked confused for a moment, but then she clapped her hands together and said, “So basically we’re stuck in place, right? Wow, Prince Woroy’s amazing.”
So she gets it after all. Now that it’d come to this, the only way to break this deadlock was by working outside of the battlefield. The time had finally come for me to act.
“Alright, let’s go with the plan I came up with before. I have no idea if it’ll work or not, but it’s the best a werewolf like me can come up with.”
Lacy cocked her head at me as she made a complicated geometric shape with the spare chip markers.
“Are you going to transform and fight?”
I shook my head.
“Nah. It’s impossible to topple a castle this big through brute force alone. I’ve got a different idea.”
Grinning, I turned to Kite—who was acting as this meeting’s secretary—and patted his shoulder.
“I’ve got work for you, Kite.”
“Again!?”
Hey, being a vice-commander’s tough.
I had Eleora’s army set up a checkpoint a few kilometers north of Creech Castle. It wasn’t much, just a simple enclosure protected by a small fence. But Eleora’s flags were flying everywhere from it, making it stand out. Which was exactly what we needed. Two days later, it did its job.
“Oh, there’s the whistle.”
I looked up from my paperwork. I’d holed up in the checkpoint’s hut to get some administrative work done. As expected, Prince Woroy had fallen for the trap.
“Alright Kite, let’s go.”
I followed the sound of the whistle to a nearby forest, where I met up with Monza’s squad.
“Hah, that was a piece of cake. Oh, I didn’t kill anyone, by the way.”
A man who looked like a priest lay unconscious at Monza’s feet.
“He ran into the forest the moment he saw the checkpoint, so it was easy to tell he was the one. And of course, tracking him down was a piece of cake.”
Monza was a master of stealth, so the man had probably been knocked out without ever realizing what hit him. Just in case, I cast sleeping magic on him too. He’d be stuck in Non-REM sleep for at least an hour or so now. At least he’d wake up refreshed.
“Even if he tried to sneak past the checkpoint, Kite’s magic would have seen right through them. He was doomed no matter what he did. Anyway, Kite, you’re up.”
Sighing, Kite squatted down next to the man. He placed a hand on his back and muttered a short incantation. He cast a few spells, investigating various parts of the man’s body. He then looked up and said, “This guy’s a Doneiks’ spy. Also, his left sleeve is slightly heavier than his right sleeve.”
I patted his sleeve and felt something hard inside it. It was impossible to tell there was anything different about it from the outside, and you couldn’t see any pockets anywhere. It was probably a double-layered pocket sewn directly into the sleeve.
“They’re probably his orders. Kite.”
“Yeah, yeah.”
There was an epoch magic spell that allowed the caster to read the contents of a book or letter without opening it. It seemed extremely handy so I’d tried to learn it too, but it was harder than it seemed. Kite cast it on the priest and read the letter in his sleeve.
“It’s a letter from Prince Ivan to Prince Woroy. It says, ‘Of the two cows causing us grief, one should be easy to slaughter. Would you like to come partake of its meat?’ There’s some more past that, but that’s the main thing.”
Monza cocked her head.
“What’s that supposed to mean? I don’t get it.”
I didn’t get it either. Kite turned to Monza and said, “They’ve replaced key words with code words so that if the message is intercepted it can’t be deciphered. This code is pretty simple, though.”
Kite was used to deciphering codes like these. Epoch magic was capable of giving him useful hints, and he was a pro cryptanalyst anyway. After a few seconds of staring intently at the man’s sleeve, Kite turned back to me and said, “Rolmund often uses ‘beef’ to refer to an influential supporter, so if we carry the metaphor into a military context they’re probably referring to reinforcements. I’m guessing each ‘cow’ refers to ten thousand men.”
“Haah...I see.”
Monza nodded in understanding. I nodded as well.
“I’m guessing Prince Woroy asked for twenty thousand in reinforcements, and Prince Ivan is saying the first ten thousand is already ready. And he’s asking if he should send them over first. He likely had his secretary write this, it doesn’t look like his handwriting. As far as I can tell, this spy doesn’t have any knowledge of what the letter says either.”
“Man, you really are amazing.”
“You have to be at least this good to get a job as an official Senate investigator. Too bad they treat all their skilled workers like trash.”
You’re still holding a grudge about that? I turned the information Kite had deciphered in my mind.
“We’ll be in trouble if they send ten thousand over right now. It’d be best if Prince Woroy never reads this message. Monza, take care of it.”
“Aye aye, boss.”
She untied a string on the priest’s sleeve and took the letter out of his pocket. Normally confidential letters like these were sealed with wax, but Prince Ivan had probably foregone the seal to make the letter even thinner and harder to spot.
“Alright, let’s slip him a fake. Kite, write one up for me.”
“Please stop making me do everything!”
Too bad, I know you’re a skilled forger. Now get to work. Had it been written by Prince Ivan himself, Kite would have had a hard time forging his handwriting, but making a letter look like it was written by a generic secretary was a lot easier. Grumbling to himself, Kite opened up his b
ag. He pulled out some ink bottles, a piece of paper, and a few different kinds of pens. Using his epoch magic to aid him, he picked out the pen that was closest to the one the original letter had been written with.
“Umm, I think this quill pen is closest...and the ink’s black with a bit of blue pigment in it. The paper’s...expensive parchment made from sheepskin...specifically the white sheep North Rolmund is famous for. Oh yeah, what do you want the letter to say?”
“Tell him it’ll take a bit longer to send the reinforcements over. Make it sound as curt as possible. I want Prince Woroy to be worried.”
“You’re evil, Veight.”
“I mean I’m not human, so...”
I shrugged my shoulders and Monza chuckled. Once the fake was done, Monza skillfully sewed it back into the priest’s sleeve. We didn’t want him thinking even the slightest thing was off, so she used the same thread his clothes were made of. Chances were the deception would work. To be absolutely sure though, Kite placed magical wards on the priest’s clothes and the letter, so that even if the priest knew epoch magic, he wouldn’t be able to sense anything out of the ordinary.
“Alright, this should be good enough. Even if he uses magic to peek into the past, he won’t see anything.”
All that was left was to make sure he woke up where he’d lost consciousness and be out of sight when he did. We couldn’t do anything to stop him from realizing he’d passed out, so hopefully he wouldn’t find that part too strange. I should figure out a better way to do this next time.
“Anyway, I guess this proves our encirclement has holes in it.”
In this world, everything was pitch dark on nights when the moon wasn’t out. That meant it was hard to keep an eye on things, and this spy obviously knew some way to slip in and out of the castle without being noticed by our troops. I should have Monza tail him to find out how he does it. I decided to leave the rest to Monza’s squad and go back to my hut. I still had a ton of paperwork waiting for me.
“Good work, Monza. Keep it up.”
“Aye aye, boss.”
I waved to Monza, who gave me a lazy salute, and headed back to the checkpoint with Kite. On the way back Kite muttered, “Hey, Veight?”
“Yeah?”
“Isn’t this a kind of...boring plan?”
You don’t have to put it like that.
“I’m not good at large-scale warfare. I don’t have the skills to properly command an army this big.”
I’d learned the basics of strategy and tactics when I’d first started in the demon army. But commanding an army this large was best left in the hands of those trained for it. An average person like me wasn’t fit to lead. Which was why I’d decided to leave commanding to the commanders while I did what I could from the shadows.
“It’s fine, sometimes a boring plan is what you need. We’re both boring vice-commanders after all.”
“I won’t deny that I’m boring, but I’m your vice-commander.”
“Yeah, and I’m the Demon Lord’s vice-commander.”
We continued bantering with each other as we slipped under the checkpoint’s gate.
Thanks to my sabotage efforts, Prince Ivan had yet to send reinforcements. However, Prince Woroy was expecting them, so the perceived lack of communication on Prince Ivan’s part was driving a wedge between their relationship. I continued intercepting all messages between them, stopping Prince Woroy’s requests for reinforcements and Prince Ivan’s letters asking when he should send them. Prince Ivan was wondering why Prince Woroy kept saying no to the reinforcements he was offering while Prince Woroy was wondering why Prince Ivan wasn’t sending him any.
While it sounded like I had them dancing in the palm of my hand, in truth, coming up with convincing letters for both sides was pretty hard. If I made even one strange remark, they’d realize their messages were being intercepted.
I was walking a dangerous tightrope here.
On top of that, the actual act of replacing letters with fakes wasn’t easy either. And there was always the worry I’d let a messenger slip through. If I had, it meant Prince Woroy and Prince Ivan already knew I was doctoring messages and could probably tell which were real. To be honest, I had no idea how effective my misinformation campaign was. However, I was at least able to get a good grasp of what routes Prince Woroy’s spies were using to get in and out of the castle without being caught by my encirclement. Furthermore, I’d memorized all their scents, so ambushing them was easy. The hard part was making sure they didn’t notice we’d swapped the messages in their sleeves. I’d tried various things like having Hamaam’s squad sneak into their inn rooms while they slept and swapping the letters out then, or having Lacy distract them with illusions while Monza did a switch. I was so shorthanded that I’d even enlisted Parker’s help. Our counterspy maneuvers took a lot of work.
“There’s a necromancy spell that can drain the life force of others. Normally necromancers use it on themselves to gain a glimpse into the world of death, but...I could use it on the spies to make them anemic, and then pretend to come to their aid. It’s not a bad... Veight, are you listening?”
“You can’t use that multiple times, so it’s not a good permanent solution. You can use it for now, but you need to come up with another idea soon.”
“You sure work people like slaves... Well, I’ll think of something within the next six letters or so.”
I knew I could count on my fellow disciple. Incidentally, most of Prince Ivan’s letters were saying things like “Are you lacking in any supplies?” or “Make sure to give your men time to rest and relax.” or “I’m sorry for forcing you to hold the castle. I’m proud to have such a caring and loyal brother.”
Though Prince Woroy and Prince Ivan were polar opposites in terms of personality, they were obviously close. I hadn’t had any siblings in my past life or this one, so I was a little jealous. Of course, all of those messages were encoded, but Kite was able to decipher all of them.
“I wonder why it is that people in positions of power all think up the same codes?”
Kite shook his head with a sigh as he looked down at the latest letter. He’d seen a lot in his time, and apparently most of them were encoded the same way. Cryptology hadn’t really taken off in this world, so it wasn’t surprising that Kite could decode most things. Especially considering he was observant, a master of epoch magic, and a trained analyst. Furthermore, he was being backed up by werewolves, who were all masters of stealth and tracking. I was confident that the demon lord’s side had the edge when it came to this information war. It pained me to drive these two brothers apart, but this was war.
Now then, how should I forge this one. As I was pondering how to word my next forgery, we made our way back to Eleora’s main camp. We found her listening to a report from one of her men.
“Lord Veight, perfect timing. The messenger we sent to Woroy just returned.”
“Messenger? Were you asking them to surrender?”
Eleora smirked.
“You’re trying to drive those two brothers apart, right? I thought I’d help you out.”
It took me a second, but I figured out what Eleora meant.
“Prince Ivan will start to worry if he sees his brother is negotiating with you, huh?”
“Indeed. Woroy’s already shown he’s fond of you. I’m sure Ivan’s already afraid he might try to make a deal with you.”
It was a pretty straightforward plan, but with how suspicious Rolmundians were of each other, it would probably still be effective.
Soon enough, Prince Ivan sent a letter asking, “You’ve been negotiating quite often with Eleora. Did something happen?” I naturally replaced the letter with a forgery, removing the question entirely. Since Prince Woroy didn’t even know his brother was suspicious, he didn’t offer any explanation for his actions in his next message. I let that one go through without alteration and Prince Ivan replied with a sterner message asking Prince Woroy to explain himself. I replaced that one with a forgery a
s well.
Again, Prince Ivan asked, “What are you negotiating with Eleora and Lord Veight? I trust your judgment; I just want to know what your plans are.” I grinned as I watched how Prince Ivan’s doubts grew by the day. As with all of his letters, I replaced it with a forgery.
“These two brothers really are close, aren’t they?” Kite muttered as he looked through the latest message. I nodded.
“To be honest with you, I feel guilty about doing this. But if Prince Ivan and Prince Woroy remain united, we won’t be able to win this war.”
Of course, Eleora and Prince Ashley had their own alliance, but theirs was a temporary pact made out of necessity, not trust. If I wanted to win, I needed to ignore my conscience and rip these two brothers apart. Fortunately, Prince Ivan was already beginning to worry Eleora had somehow convinced Prince Woroy to stop fighting. On the other hand, Prince Woroy was starting to panic as more time passed and reinforcements from his brother still weren’t here.
* * * *
—Prince Ivan’s Worries—
After considering our resources, I write down the best plan I can think of. Of course, resources mean more than just horses and funds. People and time are also valuable resources. And right now, I’m lacking in the most valuable resource of all, time.
Working for too long drains me of my stamina. But there are plenty of duties, like war councils and troop inspections, that cannot go ahead without me. Fortunately, my reliable brother Woroy is fighting on the front lines for me. Though it’s rather shameful that I, the older brother, am sitting safely in my castle while he fights on my behalf. If I could, I would have entrusted the rearguard to him and led the vanguard myself. As it is, right now my brother is surrounded by enemies and waiting for reinforcements. At least I hope he is.
But even if he is, I’m having a hard time sending them.
