Chapter 694: Great tidings (1)
The southern princedoms, much like the city-states of old Hellas, were never truly at peace. While full-scale wars were rare, there was always at least one border burning, one feud reignited, one castle exchanging hands in the smoke of conflict. Warfare in the South had become more a tradition than an exception, an endless game of shifting alliances and brief campaigns, waged not to destroy, but to negotiate from a stronger position when profit no longer favored the sword.
It was precisely this climate of fractured ambition that made the region so unpredictable, and Alpheo knew it well. The chessboard of the South was crowded with self-interested players, and in a land where war was routine, his conquest would not go unnoticed.
He expected reaction. In fact, he expected many, and none of them favorable.
No prince would look kindly on what he had done. The total annexation of Herculia was not merely a military victory; it was a rupture in the unspoken rules of their endless game. It shattered the precedent, and where once war had meant gains measured in villages or vassals, Alpheo had claimed an entire realm. That made him dangerous.
Still, he knew they would not unite, not yet. The South had never been good at unity. Pride and rivalry would keep them from forming a true coalition until at least he became dangerous enough.
But Yarzat, would now be an unwelcome presence in every southern court, a shadow lurking behind every throne. The other princes would see it as a warning or as a provocation.
In the long term, Alpheo had not just inherited Herculia.He had inherited a region of enemies watching him with wary eyes and sharpening their knives.
Much like France in the 19th century, Alpheo will have to face a political climate hostile to his state.
Where the shadow of a coalition will always loom above him.
He knew the danger that it could have on his state, one just needed to ask Napoleon IV.
But that was a concern for the future. For now, across the conqueror princedom, the only prevailing mood was one of unrestrained elation.
The message from the frontlines had traveled fast, galloping from outposts to cities, from cities to hamlets, carried by heralds whose voices were hoarse from proclaiming it: the Herculeian royal family had fallen. The ancient line had been broken, and with it the rise of the Veloni-isha upon the lands of Herculia.