TGS - Chapter 179

Chapter 179: Luring the Enemy

As Prince Kaimon of Kasnie stepped out of the cabin where Horst was imprisoned, the look of smug satisfaction, ease, and contempt on his face dissipated.

He furrowed his brow tightly and began to scrutinize the letter again, as if trying to see through its contents to discern Romuer's true intentions.

The letter's contents were not complex. The gist was that Romuer was willing to find a suitable opportunity to leave the city and defect to Kasnie. Because Solancia's other generals—including his own uncle—had abandoned Horst, only Romuer was willing to come forward, hoping to save his father's life.

Prince Kaimon was a rather suspicious person.

In Kaimon's view, Romuer's reason for defecting was logical and reasonable. Having fallen from Crown Prince to rock bottom, whether to save his father's life or out of dissatisfaction with the Solancian Princess's suppression, he had sufficient motive to side with Kasnie.

But, what if it was a feigned surrender? Military deception was by no means rare in warfare. If he were to trust someone rashly, the resulting losses would be difficult to estimate.

Therefore, Kaimon put on an impromptu performance in front of Horst, pretending to believe Romuer's sincerity on the spot while observing Horst's reaction.

A father would surely know his son best. Kaimon thought he might be able to discern some clues from Horst's attitude. Unfortunately, while Horst was useless at everything else, his acting was first-rate. He looked completely like someone who had survived a disaster and was clinging to a sliver of hope, revealing nothing unusual.

Even so, Kaimon did not let down his guard.

He sought out his maternal aunt, who was a priestess of the Goddess of the Mind, wanting to request a divine oracle.

The priestess was very reluctant to disturb the goddess for such a "trivial matter" and said with considerable impatience, "He's just the fallen former Crown Prince of Solancia, with no military achievements or power. What use is someone like him, even if he defects? Kaimon, must you ask the Goddess Perseus to grant an oracle for even such a small thing?"

Kaimon explained, "Romuer's status is special. According to news from the city, his uncle Taz is still the commander of that Bananna army corps. He would surely know more than the spies we've painstakingly planted. In my opinion, letting Romuer stay in the Solancian army could be of greater use."

The priestess raised her eyebrows. "You want him to stay in the Solancian army and pass information to us?"

Kaimon nodded. "That's right. The matter is of great importance. It would be more reassuring to request an oracle."

The priestess thought for a moment and agreed.

In Kasnie, the position of priest was not usually hereditary, but the priestess of the Goddess of the Mind was an exception.

A thousand years ago, Solancia destroyed its final rival, the Nibet City-State.

It was a brutal battle. A great flood destroyed military installations and caused countless casualties among the people of Nibet.

Some survivors remained in their homeland and integrated into Solancian civilization, while another group carefully crossed Gebra, which had already formed the rudiments of a civilization at the time, and sailed across the sea to the Kasnie Peninsula, where they settled.

These followers of Perseus integrated with the local indigenous people. Drawing from the culture of the survivors and fugitives, the culture and beliefs of the Kasnie people developed rapidly, eventually forming the Kasnie pantheon. This allowed the Goddess of the Mind, who had been on the verge of fading away, to be re-established as one of Kasnie's major deities.

And this clan of the priestesses of the Goddess of the Mind were descendants of that group of Nibet people. Some of them were now indistinguishable from the native Kasnie people, while others preserved the customs of their ancestors, but they all considered themselves Kasnie people from the bottom of their hearts.

Nibet had long been destroyed, never to be restored.

But in this generation, the sister of the priestess of the Goddess of the Mind became queen and gave birth to a prince who believed in Perseus—that is, Kaimon.

He was ambitious, brokering a collaboration with the Sanur Tribe, only to abandon them after achieving his goal.

He sounded the horn for the kingdom to declare war on Solancia, establishing a connection with the Goddess of the Mind through his priestess aunt—or rather, receiving one-way communication—which he regarded as the most accurate of oracles.

Whether Kaimon first prayed for an oracle, or Perseus first sent down her will, perhaps only they themselves knew.

This was far from the first time Kaimon had requested an oracle.

With the prayer ritual conducted by his aunt as a backdrop, the Kasnie prince knelt on both knees, held the secret letter high, and muttered to himself.

"I ask you to examine it, I ask you to test it, O Goddess who governs all feelings of the heart and soul, what are the true intentions of the person who wrote these words?"

"Is it trustworthy? Not entirely trustworthy? Completely untrustworthy?"

Three paper balls were placed before Kaimon, each representing one of the three possibilities.

Above the warship, Perseus silently rose, preparing to sense the emotions imbued in the secret letter.

The Beast God said boredly, "The human prince is asking for an oracle again? Perseus, you're far too concerned with human affairs."

The God of Mountains and Rivers, however, said, "This is a good thing, at least for us."

Her transparent divine power sensed the emotions the writer had left on the paper: chaotic and complex, but the strongest emotions were determination, an urgent desire to save a close relative, and guilt.

Such emotions were easy to understand. Despite feeling guilty, the writer was still willing to pay any price to save Horst. Compared to the latter, the feeling of guilt was weaker.

There was no malice—if the other party was feigning defection, it would be impossible for there to be no malice.

Perseus opened her eyes. Her divine power nudged the paper balls in front of Kaimon, moving the ones representing "trustworthy" and "not entirely trustworthy" slightly forward. The "trustworthy" one was moved further ahead, signifying that Romuer was more trustworthy.

Paying no mind to the Kasnie prince below, who was lost in thought and making his decision, Perseus looked at the Beast God.

The Beast God propped himself up, saying warily, "What are you looking at me for!"

Perseus said faintly, "Next, it will be your turn to be concerned with human affairs."

The Beast God: "? What does this have to do with me?"

Perseus just continued to smile, which made the Beast God take half a step back and wisely choose to shut his mouth.

That day, a rat with a reply tied to its leg slipped off the warship, scurried ashore along the lowered gangplank, and its small, grayish-black figure darted into the bushes, quickly disappearing from sight.

"My shadow is participating, it has nothing to do with me," said the Beast God, who had been forced to send out his shadow in the form of a rat to deliver the letter, trying to save face.

Perseus ignored him.

After giving the oracle, the subsequent events of this matter had nothing to do with the Goddess of the Mind. Even if she established a connection with humans, Perseus was still a god.

Unless a mortal actively and earnestly pleaded for help, she generally didn't care how humans planned their strategies or fought their battles.

However, Lotus was different.

The Kasnie god's shadow had no divine power, but under the special attention of a deity who controlled the divine authority of nature, the wind, the earth, and the river faithfully relayed information, leaving the rat's trail completely exposed.

"It seems the Kasnie people didn't notice," Lotus said, watching the rat scurry purposefully in the direction of Surinia. "Perhaps the Goddess of the Mind didn't interfere, or perhaps she did participate but didn't expose the illusion Nierde arranged."

The God of Wisdom, Nierde, stood to one side and said in a low voice, "If it were Adia, we would have been more certain."

Adia was better at forging emotions related to instinct, while the God of Wisdom could only dull the Goddess of the Mind's perception of Romuer's rationality; he was not as skilled at amplifying emotions.

However, Perseus would not use her full power to sense such a "trivial matter," so the illusion Nierde created was sufficient to fool her.

When Lotus returned to the Princess's side, Alyuin was holding Kaimon's reply to Romuer. Her thick, dark eyelashes were half-lowered, and her golden eyes moved slightly as she read the words on the paper.

Lotus: "What did he write?"

The Princess tapped the corner of the table with her knuckles. "Kaimon wants Romuer to stay here and wait for his instructions. He also made a point of mentioning Horst, saying he is being treated well."

"Just as you thought?"

"Just as I thought."

As the fallen former Crown Prince, Romuer himself was of little value, but his uncle Taz was still the commander of the Bananna army corps.

Someone like Kaimon, even knowing that Taz had participated in Horst's plot to murder the former king, would be certain that Alyuin would choose to quiet the matter, pardon and continue to employ Taz, and not take precautions against him in her military arrangements. After all, Taz was the only naval commander available to Solancia at the moment, and Kasnie's warships were advancing menacingly.

In this way, the intelligence Romuer could access would not be insignificant.

If he could persuade Taz to defect to Kasnie, his value would be even greater.

Leaving Romuer behind would maximize their gains.

Of course, Kaimon wouldn't blindly trust Romuer's intelligence from the start. He would need some less important information as a transition before he could feel at ease trusting any major news Romuer sent.

And this "less important information" was already prepared.

They were just waiting for the next step: to pass it on through Romuer's hands.

Alyuin took Lotus's right hand, which was hanging at her side, in both of her own. She placed it against her cheek, stroking it gently, her tone as placid as if she were discussing the day's weather.

Following her movement, Lotus gently touched the Princess's cheek. "If Kaimon, or rather Perseus, discovers a flaw..."

"Then we will simply have to fight them conventionally," Alyuin said lightly.

It sounded easy, as if everything was under control, but in reality, it involved considerable risk.

Unless absolutely necessary, no one would willingly resort to a risky maneuver, but Kasnie was indeed a formidable opponent.

Kasnie's military force was vast, and they had the most advanced warships of the time as transport, continuously delivering soldiers and supplies.

Their fleet could navigate the Yilu River unimpeded. Those warships might not be suitable for sieging cities, but they possessed extreme mobility.

If the Solancian army stubbornly defended Surinia, leading the enemy to confirm it was a hard target, they would most likely choose to bypass the city, completely control the waterways, conquer other cities, and finally return to besiege the City of the Sun God.

At that point, Solancia would instead find itself in a passive and isolated position.

Before such a situation could arise, it was best to first find a way to wear down their largest and most expensive military assets—the warships that carried soldiers and archers.

Under normal circumstances, it would be impossible to destroy a large number of warships at once. It would only make the enemy more vigilant and render the task of destroying the fleet even more difficult.

Conveniently, Kaimon's act of capturing Horst and using him to threaten Romuer and Taz provided a ready-made motive for defection.

Now, it remained to be seen if this deception could be carried through to the end.

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