Chapter 92 The Bigger Picture
"Your Majesty, there are several discrepancies in the report," Addison began, her tone measured but firm. "We still don’t know the true motive behind these rogue attacks, but I don’t believe they are as simple as mere starvation or a shift in hunting grounds due to food scarcity."
"Moreover, we haven’t detected any unusual movement from the vampires since they withdrew their forces from the frontlines. There’s no evidence to suggest they’re orchestrating these rogue attacks or deliberately pushing them toward our border packs. That possibility, while not impossible, seems unsupported for now."
"But more importantly, I believe we must stop looking at each incident in isolation. There are too many ’coincidences’ occurring within our territory: a severe drought in the south, a locust infestation ravaging the west, a spreading plague in the north, and now these increasingly frequent rogue incursions at the borders."
"When viewed together, doesn’t it strike you as suspicious, Your Majesty?" Addison pressed gently, meeting her father’s gaze. "These are not isolated misfortunes. A drought, for example, could be an early sign of an El Niño event. If that’s the case, we could be facing 9 to 12 months of extreme heat and water shortages. The consequences would be devastating—crop failures, livestock deaths, wildlife migration, and ultimately, famine for half our population."
She paused, letting the weight of her words settle. "I believe we need to treat these events not as scattered incidents, but as interconnected signs of a larger, more dangerous scheme."
And that wasn’t the only issue. The plague in the north posed a serious threat—not just to that region, but to the entire domain. If it spread, it could cripple their forces and destabilize their hold over the northern territories.
But that wasn’t what worried Addison the most.
What truly concerned her was the timing. Everything was happening too conveniently: a drought in the south, a locust infestation in the west, a plague in the north, and now rogue attacks at the borders. El Niño might be a natural disaster, yes—but what if someone was deliberately using it as a smokescreen? What if a faction, another race, or a hidden enemy was exploiting the chaos to destabilize the kingdom further?
The rogue attacks, in particular, felt off. Too frequent. Too coordinated. It didn’t look like aimless desperation—it felt like a calculated disruption. Addison couldn’t shake the feeling that someone was pulling strings from the shadows, escalating these events to weaken their defenses.