Permanent Occupation (3)
Some two hundred years ago, the lizardmen had lost their war against the demons and fled into the Subterranean World. Ever since, they had counted the days until they could return to the surface, relying on the power of the Magma Dragon Ogmarr.
That was exactly why I had chosen Ulkard's Lair as our destination. The lair held a passage connecting to the world below, after all.
Shhh—! Shiiik—!
Kruluk! Kachak!
The passage echoed with the hissing breath of the lizardmen. Even knowing they were allies, the knights couldn't quite relax — I could tell from how tightly they gripped their scabbards, hard enough to draw blood.
Could you blame them? Scaled brutes nearly two meters tall, hissing like serpents, were genuinely unsettling to look at.
But through my Tongue-Comprehension Art, the lizardmen's hissing translated into something rather different.
"Whoa, so this is the surface."
"Idiot, this is a cave. The surface is farther ahead."
"I'm starving. Anyone got leftover jerky?"
"Whoa, a human knight! I've gotta brag to the guys back at the spawning pools!"
The lizardmen were utterly fascinated by humans. A race they'd assumed could only ever be demon slaves had built itself a proper nation — and even fielded a military force this strong.
I led them out of Ulkard's Lair, and roughly two thousand warriors lined up before it.
"We are the Drakka-Rashu. Chosen from each generation as its finest warriors."
Zaktar said it with unmistakable pride. Drakka-Rashu meant "Glory of the Dragon" — presumably a name dedicated to Ruby, their new god.
Incidentally, Ruby was still wandering around Zaktar's kingdom. The diplomatic delegation had long since returned, but the subterranean world was her homeland, and she was busy awakening new powers of her own, so I'd decided to leave her be for the time being.
"By the way, you've grown even bigger since I last saw you."
Zaktar's physique was truly something else. He looked for all the world like a giant crocodile walking on two legs. He hadn't been this large when I first met him.
"Because I became king."
"You got bigger because you became king?"
Zaktar nodded.
"Every being inevitably grows into the strength and stature befitting its station. Is it not natural that I, the king, should be larger than I was as captain of the royal guard?"
A question flashed through my mind like lightning.
"Then did King Ksilak shrink, since he's no longer king?"
"Of course. Ksilak now stands barely as tall as my waist. Every being bears a body that matches its rank. That is why the dragon, the greatest of all beings, is so immense. If anything, you're the strange one. How can you be that strong while standing barely as tall as my tail?"
"Let's just say... among us humans, size and skill don't necessarily go hand in hand."
Suddenly I felt Kalman's gaze prickling against my skin. What are you two getting so worked up about? it seemed to say. I cast the Tongue-Comprehension Art on him as well.
"Introduce yourselves. You'll be fighting on the same front, after all."
"I am Zaktar, young warrior. In our tongue, the name means 'one who upholds the sacred.'"
"It means king, Kalman."
"...It means king?"
Kalman's eyebrows rose.
"Kalman, a swordsman."
He bowed his head politely. It was a modest introduction to the point of absurdity — though his position was admittedly ambiguous. He was no longer one of the Seven Pillars of the Empire, and 'Sword Duke' was nothing more than a nickname others had given him.
So I tidied it up for him.
"Commander of the expedition, and the strongest swordsman in our domain."
"...Humans are hard to figure out. This one's bulk and strength are in perfect proportion."
Zaktar seemed genuinely impressed by Kalman's imposing frame.
After the introductions, we began setting up camp in the courtyard before the lair. The wishes of the lair's actual owner, Ulkaard, were cleanly ignored in the process. She'd be watching everything anyway.
The humans pitched their tents on dry ground; the lizardmen wove nests from waterweeds. Demon scouts kept spying on us from a distance. Not that it mattered. This was a Black Dragon's land — what exactly did they think they could do?
Once the camp was complete, we gathered in one place for a council.
"They will have realized it by now. That you intend to claim this land permanently," Kalman said. "But the demon nobles nearby have already been defeated by your knights, so I judge they have no meaningful forces left."
"Agreed. The problem is pushing farther north from here."
I picked up a pen and drew a crumpled circle on the map.
"Zaktar, this is the land we must reclaim. In our tongue, we call it Lester."
The essence of this expedition was land-grabbing, plain and simple. If two different races were to cooperate peacefully, we had to draw the line of who owned what from the very start. Otherwise, conflict was an absolute guarantee.
"This land belonged to your people?"
Zaktar glanced back at his warriors, then gave an order.
"Bring the Revelation."
The Revelation?
Two lizardmen carried over a thick, squarely hewn stone slab, its surface densely engraved with lizardman script. They set it down with a heavy thud and began to read it aloud in their characteristic hissing speech.
"O you who breathe the rough breath, O you who drink the cold water, this record holds the yearning of the fate granted unto you. This land is not yours, and the marsh beneath your feet belongs to another.
The sky shall bleed red, and the thorns of the earth shall bloom beneath your soles. Remember, O descendants of Drakka: we must return to the land we left, to the shadow of the sun. There lies Drakka-Haskal — the great resting place of our ancestors, the promised land stained with the blood of our kin."
"Drakka-Haskal," Zaktar rumbled. "The land the Revelation points to. Our ancestors enjoyed a thousand years of glory there. Every one of our people yearns to reclaim it."
So it was the territory of the old lizardman kingdom. The question was where, exactly, it lay.
The lizardman scribes brought out more slabs, wrestled with the metaphor-laden passages for a long while, and finally derived a single border line.
"Mark it here for me."
The location Zaktar indicated lay to the northeast of the city of Lester. It was a vast expanse — nearly a third of the entire duchy — but land we could afford to concede. If the Revelation was accurate, it would be full of the swamps the lizardmen favored.
There was, however, one area where the County of Lester overlapped with the 'Promised Land.' An expanse large enough to hold a city with room to spare.
"What will you do about this overlapping land?" Kalman asked. Zaktar and I exchanged a glance.
"That place—"
"That place—"
We opened our mouths at the same moment, then looked at each other again.
"Go ahead, Iden."
Zaktar ceded the floor.
"What if we made it a symbol of friendship between our two peoples? A neutral city, open to all who come and go."
"That is exactly what I was about to say."
Zaktar grinned, baring his long fangs.
The moment we left Ulkaard's territory, we were ambushed. It was the first proper, fully formed army we had faced.
But our lineup consisted of the Steel Guard — the strongest knight order in the duchy — and the Drakka-Rashu, the strongest warrior band of the lizardmen. We slaughtered the demon army, quite literally.
The entertaining part was the subtle contest of pride unfolding between the two races.
"Heads up, you lot! You are the face of His Grace the Duke. Don't you dare look pathetic out there!"
"We are the descendants of Drakka. Fight like your size demands it!"
"Any man who fights worse than a human goes to bed hungry!"
The two groups competed furiously to rack up battle honors, and in the process, the innocent monsters in between dropped like flies.
"Your Grace, the lizardmen serve a dragon, so strictly speaking, are they not heretics?"
"How should I know? Blessings upon you!"
Even the priests caught the fever. Barely two months into the joint campaign, we had secured territory the size of an entire barony. That was when I left the front and returned to the ducal residence. With new land acquired, it was time to fight a different battle — the one against paperwork.
"Your Grace."
Treasurer Opils arrived at my office to deliver his report.
"The trade fleet from Sirakos has made three visits. Each fleet numbered fifty ships."
"Fifty?"
I tilted my head.
"The contract clearly said thirty."
"A message from King Birgir II."
Opils cleared his throat and lowered his voice.
"'Little Brother, surely this much satisfies you?'"
"..."
Typical. I'd seen it on my way back — the faces of the domain's commoners blooming with smiles. Well, of course. What did expanding territory mean to them? Putting food on the table today was what mattered.
"Merchants from the Zaktar Kingdom have also visited twice. Livestock and food supplies have been delivered, so we should hold out comfortably through the second half of the year."
"That's a weight off my shoulders."
I leaned back in my chair and let out a long breath.
Only a weight off my shoulders, mind you — not a solution. There was still a mountain of problems waiting to be handled. The greatest of them was that our very survival depended on imported food.
"What of the plan to build farms in the Subterranean World?"
"Yes, Your Grace. Sir Laszlo is striving to draw upon the energy of the dragon veins. He has driven roughly three hundred Oradium stakes so far."
Hang in there, my disciple. Though I suppose it's only fair that I'm not the only one suffering.
The next agenda item was how to fill the newly acquired land. However much territory you expand, it's just an empty lot if no one lives there.
If relations between the duchy and the imperial court had been good, adventurous souls from across the Empire would have flocked to us — but with the state of the times, we couldn't accept imperial subjects.
To solve this, I summoned the infamous pirate duo with three million on their heads: Loki and Raghas.
"You called, Your Grace!"
"What's the business, then?"
Loki saluted crisply; Raghas saluted like a wet rag. Come to think of it, the pairing worked well — a stickler of an officer so upright it was almost comical, and his conveniently loose right hand to balance him out.
"You were fighting to rebuild your kingdom, weren't you? Picking off imperial merchant ships exclusively."
"That is correct."
"Are there many who wish to see Alkaraz restored?"
"I... cannot say there are many. The royal line has ended, so we lost our rallying point. But because discrimination against us runs so deep, more and more people become outlaws like I did, or abandon their homeland and drift."
"If the royal line has ended, how did you plan to rebuild the kingdom?"
"Honestly, Your Grace, I hadn't thought that far. The stronger feeling was simply that I wanted to show the world the Alkaraz people had not been broken."
Loki's voice was thick with suppressed fury. I didn't know what it felt like to lose a country, but it must have been bad indeed to drive him to this.
"The truth is, I'm thinking of taking in refugees from Alkaraz in our newly settled lands."
"...Truly, Your Grace?"
Loki's eyes trembled.
"I promise equal treatment. Land and citizenship for all."
I laced my fingers together and spoke leisurely.
"On one condition — that you swear loyalty to me."