Recaps

The Two Rivers Legion recovered its strength in Vorka City and prepared for a counterattack while awaiting news from the sea. Meanwhile, the Vela Navy assembled its combined fleet, and Viscount Sonanda learned that Sodoma’s steam-powered supply fleet was expected to arrive soon.

• The Two Rivers Legion trained auxiliary soldiers from among the captured Xister Kingdom laborers, many of whom joined Vorka City’s defense voluntarily.
• Victor decided the legion was nearly ready to counterattack and planned to wait a few more days for news from the sea.
• The Vela Navy gathered near a rocky island, with the fleets of the Great Oak, Golden Sunflower, and Iron Birch families forming most of its force.
• Viscount Sonanda asked Sodoma when his supply fleet would arrive, and Sodoma estimated it would reach them within two hours.
• Sodoma explained that the supply fleet carried fuel and materials to extend the Steam Gunships’ endurance in the coming battle.

Viscount Sonanda welcomed the Golden Sunflower Family’s supply fleet, which would let its steam gunships remain at sea longer. The fleet, commanded by Blox, arrived two days ahead of schedule after a smooth voyage on newly built steamships.

• Viscount Sonanda and the naval officers agreed that dedicated fuel transports would extend the steam gunships’ time at sea.
• A lookout spotted smoke on the horizon, and the fleet’s Golden Sunflower Crest confirmed it was the supply fleet.
• Blox cheered his crew for reaching the main force two days early and promised to recommend them for commendations.
• At Songsea City, Director Mubula showed Blox the newly built Blue Lake Bay and assigned shipyard experts to accompany the fleet.
• Blox led the steamship fleet south, stopping at Sunset City to replenish supplies before continuing without mechanical problems.

Blox rendezvoused with the Vela Navy and delivered the Arms Factory’s high-explosive shells and other supplies to Sodoma’s Steam Gunship fleet. With the fleet replenished and reassured that its fuel and range problems could be fixed, Sodoma prepared for battle as the Vela Navy sailed south to intercept an Xister Kingdom supply fleet.

• Blox reunited with the Vela Navy and brought Sodoma aboard the Blue Lake Bay to show him four hundred crates of cargo.
• Sodoma opened a crate, recognized the high-explosive shells, and arranged to transfer them carefully to his gunships.
• Sodoma’s fleet took on shells, food, water, and fuel, restoring its supplies to full strength.
• Sodoma learned that improved engines and oil-based fuel could increase the Steam Gunships’ range and allow existing engines to be retrofitted.
• The Vela Navy sailed south to intercept an Xister Kingdom supply fleet and draw out the enemy’s combined fleet for a decisive battle.

Apprentice engineer Ete joined the Blue Lake Bay hoping to earn a place in the navy and eventually become a noble. After witnessing the brutality of a naval battle, he turned down his senior apprentice’s offer to return to the shipyard and kept pursuing his ambition.

• Ete left the shipyard to work as an apprentice engineer aboard the Blue Lake Bay, hoping to transfer into the navy’s Steam Gunship fleet.
• The Vela Navy defeated the Xister Kingdom’s supply fleet, sinking most of its ships and capturing troop transports without massacring their soldiers.
• Ete watched the battle’s wreckage and casualties, became terrified, and reconsidered the dangers of his ambitions.
• Ete’s senior apprentice urged him to return to the shipyard or pursue a safer career, but Ete refused the offer the next morning.

After a sudden storm halted the naval battle, Ete earned a place in Sodoma's Two Rivers County Navy by repairing a disabled steam gunship. The storm cut off the Xister Kingdom's army in the East Sea Alliance from support and retreat, prompting Alex and Victor to launch the next phase of operations.

• A sudden storm forced the Vela Navy and the combined fleet of the Xister Kingdom and the East Sea Alliance to abandon their battle and flee the raging waters.
• Ete carried spare parts to a disabled steam gunship and repaired its cooling-water circulation system, restoring its power so it could escape the storm.
• Baron Sodoma invited Ete to join the navy as an engineer and technical adviser, requiring him to continue serving in the war.
• Viscount Sonanda learned that the storm would last at least half a month and block the sea route between the Xister Kingdom and the East Sea Alliance.
• The Vela Navy reported that the Xister Kingdom's army across the sea could receive no support or retreat, and Alex and Victor ordered all Vela Army forces to begin the next phase of operations.

The Two Rivers Legion retook Vorka City’s outer districts after artillery-triggered mutinies devastated the Xister Kingdom siege army, cutting off the kingdom’s main force inside the encirclement. Prince Yonitsa and Marquis Kayo struggled to find a way to save their trapped troops as the Vela Army pressed its offensive.

• The Vela Army used Artillery to break through the Xister Kingdom’s defensive line, forcing Prince Yonitsa to order a retreat and consider pulling troops from the siege of Vorka City.
• The Two Rivers Legion attacked the Xister Kingdom camps outside Vorka City at night, while artillery bombardment sparked a mutiny that crippled eight of the ten besieging legions.
• Victor held back the Two Rivers Legion’s soldiers and used Catapults and Artillery to disrupt camps not yet affected by the mutiny before launching a counterattack the next morning.
• The Two intact Xister Kingdom legions retreated toward the eastern coast, and the Two Rivers Legion reclaimed Vorka City’s outer city and captured nearly sixty thousand prisoners and thirty thousand laborers.
• Victor informed Alex of the victory, leaving the Vela Army to focus on the encircled Xister Kingdom forces without outside reinforcements.
• Prince Yonitsa and Marquis Kayo joined forces to seek a way out, but they lacked reliable intelligence on Vorka City and feared the main army would soon be defeated.

After the Vela Army gained momentum, the Xister Kingdom Army’s defenses collapsed, and its leaders failed to secure help from the East Sea Alliance. Prince Yonitsa abandoned his first ceasefire offer and went to Alex to surrender, leaving surrender negotiations about to begin.

• Alex informed the Vela Legions of the victory at Vorka City, and the Vela Army launched a fierce offensive against the Xister Kingdom Army.
• Prince Yonitsa and Marquis Kayo approved withdrawals as Xister forces suffered repeated defeats and retreated to a shortened defensive line.
• Prince Yonitsa requested aid from the East Sea Alliance, but the alliance did not respond and the Noble Council suppressed the request.
• Prince Yonitsa and Marquis Kayo sent an envoy to seek a ceasefire, but Alex rejected the terms that would let the Xister Kingdom Army simply leave.
• Prince Yonitsa personally led guards to Alex’s headquarters to surrender, and Alex agreed to hold surrender negotiations.

Alex and Prince Yonitsa negotiated a ceasefire and an eight-hundred-thousand-gold ransom as the Xister Kingdom’s defeat became clear. The armies halted operations while the Vela forces strengthened their position and the negotiations awaited approval from the Xister Kingdom homeland.

• Alex sent two legions to reinforce Victor at Vorka City while Prince Yonitsa and Alex began negotiating the surrender of the encircled Xister Kingdom Army.
• Alex initially demanded three million gold coins, but after nearly ten days of bargaining, he agreed to an eight-hundred-thousand-gold ransom and the return of captured Xister soldiers and their equipment.
• The Vorka City Front Army grew to six legions, recaptured three coastal counties, and drove the remaining Xister Kingdom troops into their last county.
• The Xister Kingdom Navy commander seized the East Sea Alliance Fleet’s commanders and ships, and Prince Yonitsa used the captured fleet as leverage in the negotiations.
• Prince Yonitsa sent the agreement to the Xister Kingdom homeland for approval and stayed at the Vela Army headquarters as a hostage while both armies observed a ceasefire.
• Alex released Stanley’s four Raine legions to reinforce the main battlefield, while Viscount Sonanda kept the Vela Navy near the Xister Kingdom Navy to monitor it.

The Xister Kingdom accepted defeat and agreed to surrender its army and fleet to Vela, bringing the Battle for Vorka City to a close. As Xister forces prepared to return home, the Vela Navy struggled to find enough personnel to control the ships handed over.

• The King of Xister offered 500,000 gold coins and ordered Prince Yonicha to return the Xister Kingdom Army to its homeland quickly.
• Prince Yonicha offered to surrender the army and its weapons in exchange for a swift return home, and Alex accepted the terms.
• Alex reported the agreement, then presided over the smooth surrender ceremony with Prince Yonitsa and Marquis Kayo as Vela collected the Xister soldiers’ weapons.
• The Xister forces on the East Sea Alliance coast surrendered, and Victor ordered them to withdraw after handing over the settlements they controlled.
• The Xister naval fleet handed its ships and personnel to the Vela Navy, which struggled to assign enough sailors to control them.

After the Xister Kingdom surrendered, Alex joined the Raine Kingdom’s counteroffensive and helped drive the East Sea Alliance back to Stone Mountain City. As the Second Battle of Stone Mountain City began, Alex arrived with ten Vela Legions and joined Earl Stanley’s preparations to capture the city.

• Victor oversaw the Xister Kingdom Army’s withdrawal, prisoners, and summer harvest while Alex marched with ten Vela Legions to the main front.
• Earl Stanley launched a counteroffensive, and the Raine Legions encircled and destroyed six East Sea Alliance legions as Alex blocked Count Valbi’s relief forces.
• Count Valbi withdrew to Stone Mountain City and assembled thirty legions to defend it against the Raine-Vela Allied Army.
• Earl Stanley urgently asked Alex to bring the Vela Army to Stone Mountain City, and Alex also requested that Victor send the Two Rivers Legion’s Artillery Corps.
• Alex arrived near Stone Mountain City three days later, where Earl Stanley and Duke Barick welcomed him and convened a war council.

Earl Stanley outlined the strategic importance of Stone Mountain City and explained how the allied forces could break through the East Sea Alliance’s defensive line. The chapter left the commanders preparing to consider an attack on the weaker western defenses rather than assaulting the city directly.

• Senior commanders and nobles from the Ryan and Vela armies gathered in the conference tent and greeted one another.
• Earl Stanley entered, and the commanders rose to salute him despite Duke Barick occupying the place of honor.
• After Duke Barick’s speech, Earl Stanley presented the battle plan and described Stone Mountain City’s position and defenses.
• Earl Stanley explained that the allies could bypass Stone Mountain City by breaking through a weaker section of the defensive line to its west.

Earl Stanley explained his plan to draw the East Sea Alliance’s forces toward Stone Mountain City while a trusted mole inside its defenses caused chaos. He asked Alex and the Vela Army to intensify their assault, but Alex demanded greater rewards if they captured the city.

• A Raine Kingdom commander questioned how the coalition could breach the East Sea Alliance’s heavily defended line, and Earl Stanley explained that attacks on Stone Mountain City would draw enemy troops away from other positions.
• Alex offered the Vela Legion and the Two Rivers Legion’s Artillery Corps for the siege, and Earl Stanley assigned the legions their positions and orders.
• After the meeting, Duke Barick revealed that a noble commanding a legion on the defensive line’s right flank had contacted the Raine Kingdom but could not yet control his troops.
• Earl Stanley and Duke Barick said they trusted the mole because he had sent his two sons and the core of his family’s wealth to the Raine Kingdom.
• Earl Stanley asked Alex and the Vela Army to put heavy pressure on Stone Mountain City so the East Sea Alliance would move troops there, and Alex demanded better compensation if his forces captured it.
• Earl Stanley promised that if Alex took Stone Mountain City through his own strength, he would receive the battle’s highest honors and could present terms to the king.

Alex secured Duke Barick and Earl Stanley's commitment to advocate for the Vela Nobles' reward if they captured Stone Mountain City. Afterward, he explained to Edmund that supporting the Vela Nobles also strengthened Duke Barick's bid for the throne.

• Alex agreed that the Vela Army would launch its planned all-out offensive and draw enemy forces toward Stone Mountain City.
• Alex required Duke Barick and Earl Stanley to fight for recognition of the Vela Nobles' achievement if the city fell, and they accepted his conditions.
• Edmund admitted to Alex that confronting Duke Barick had made him nervous, despite the success of their negotiations.
• Alex told Edmund that Duke Barick supported their reward claim because the Vela Nobles' favor could help him secure the throne.

The Raine–Vela Allied Army launched attacks along the entire Stone Mountain City defensive line, drawing East Sea Alliance reserves away from weak sectors. At Stone Mountain City, Vela forces used the Two Rivers Legion’s Flowering Shells to devastate the defenders’ Catapults, prompting East Sea Alliance commanders to fear the city was the enemy’s main target and call for reinforcements.

• Three days after preparations began, the Raine–Vela Allied Army attacked the East Sea Alliance’s defensive line from east to west and forced it to commit reserve legions to threatened sectors.
• The allied army began bombarding Stone Mountain City with thousands of Catapults, and the defenders returned fire with their own siege weapons.
• The Two Rivers Legion’s Flowering Shells destroyed many of the defenders’ Catapults after their positions were exposed.
• East Sea Alliance troops sent to destroy the new weapon were ambushed, and the defenders identified the attackers as Vela Noble Legions.
• Earl Valbi and the other East Sea Alliance commanders learned that Victor’s private army might be present and agreed to alert the city’s units and request reinforcements.

Count Valbi initially refused to commit the Reserve Force to Stone Mountain City, but the Vela armies’ strength, weapons, and tactics inflicted mounting losses on the defenders. As the East Sea Alliance’s troops began to buckle, Valbi ordered three reserve legions to the city.

• Count Valbi rejected the Noble Legion commander’s request to bring in the Reserve Force, trusting Stone Mountain City’s defenses and keeping the reserve available for other threats.
• Over several days, more Vela forces gathered before the city, and Count Valbi estimated they had brought at least ten legions.
• Count Valbi saw that Vela’s heavily armored soldiers were far stronger than he had expected, while the Vela nobles’ growing standing armies had benefited from military reforms and wartime spoils.
• Stone Mountain City’s defenders suffered more than twice the casualties of the Vela forces as the enemy’s superior tactics and weapons wore them down.
• Count Valbi ordered the Reserve Force to send three legions to Stone Mountain City.

The defenders of Stone Mountain City retook a small fortress at great cost, while Alex explained that he was trying to lure them out because the city’s walls could not be breached by artillery or tunnels. The fighting settled into a stalemate as Raine’s use of civilian laborers as cannon fodder sparked uprisings in its occupied territories.

• Count Valbi sent more than ten thousand troops to retake a small fortress, and Vela withdrew its surviving garrison after a day and night of fighting.
• Alex explained that he had allowed the defenders to retake the fortress to encourage them to leave Stone Mountain City and fight in the open, since its walls could not be breached.
• After renewed Vela attacks exhausted the defenders, Count Valbi committed the Reserve Force’s last two legions, restoring a stalemate around Stone Mountain City.
• The Raine Kingdom drove nearly two hundred thousand civilian laborers into assaults on the East Sea Alliance’s defensive line, where they were killed in less than a week.
• Peasants in Raine-occupied territories fled or resisted the roundup units, and large-scale clashes and uprisings broke out.

Riots in the Raine Kingdom’s occupied territories weakened the Allied Army’s assault, but Count Valbi and the East Sea Alliance Noble Council split over whether to attack. The council’s defiance disrupted the front and kept Valbi from expanding the unrest behind enemy lines.

• Alex ordered his troops to hold off their attack as Earl Stanley sent reserve Vela Legions to suppress riots in the occupied territories, easing the Raine Kingdom’s assault.
• East Sea Alliance spies reported the enemy’s troop withdrawals, and the Noble Council urged an advance, but Count Valbi vetoed the plan and ordered the troops to rest.
• The dispute deepened into a rift between Count Valbi and the council’s Pro-War Faction, whose members questioned his fitness to lead.
• The Noble Council recalled several legions and cut supplies to the front without Count Valbi’s approval, then ignored his demand that the troops return.
• Count Valbi abandoned his plan to send spies and scattered troops behind enemy lines because the conflict with the Noble Council consumed his attention.

The Raine Kingdom crushed the uprising in its occupied territory and returned to the front with a larger, more determined force, putting the East Sea Alliance Defense Line under severe pressure. Earl Valbi learned that an uprising in Vela-occupied territory had forced Vela to withdraw troops from Stone Mountain City, and discovered that Marquis Golden Sunflower’s crackdown on underworld groups had sparked it.

• The Raine Kingdom suppressed the farmers’ uprising, executed tens of thousands, and forced nearly 200,000 captured men into its army by holding their families.
• Earl Stanley resumed his assault on the East Sea Alliance Defense Line, while Earl Valbi struggled to plug gaps left by the Noble Council’s withdrawn legions and weak second-line formations.
• The assault on Stone Mountain City suddenly weakened, and rumors spread that an uprising had broken out in Vela-occupied territory.
• A report from the East Sea Alliance Spy Organization confirmed that the Vela uprising involved underworld groups, landowners, and hidden East Sea Alliance forces, explaining Vela’s troop withdrawal.
• Earl Valbi learned that Marquis Golden Sunflower’s crackdown on prostitution, gambling, loan-sharking, smuggling, and criminal groups had triggered the uprising.

Alex and Victor used growing riots in the Vela-occupied territory to make the East Sea Alliance believe Vela troops were leaving Stone Mountain City. The chapter ended with Count Valbi and the East Sea Nobility officers receiving the misleading intelligence and considering their next move.

• Alex proposed using the unrest to lure the East Sea Alliance's troops out of Stone Mountain City and sent Victor a plan by telegraph.
• Victor loosened surveillance of the Social Vitality Groups and let the riots spread while keeping key cities and rural areas secure.
• The rebels obtained weapons and armor, and some began seeking authority from the Vela Nobles.
• Vela troops appeared to leave the front in batches, but they regrouped and hid nearby.
• Alex made it seem that three legions had withdrawn, and the East Sea Alliance's Spy Organization reported this to Count Valbi and the East Sea Nobility officers.

Earl Valbi led a night attack against Alex’s Vela Army, but Alex’s trap cost Stone Mountain City nearly forty thousand elite troops. As the East Sea Alliance’s western defense line collapsed under betrayal and a Raine assault, Santos arrived claiming he could help Alex capture Stone Mountain City’s walls.

• After spies confirmed Vela’s apparent troop movements, Earl Valbi prepared to attack, while Alex detected the preparations and arranged rotating watches across several camps.
• Earl Valbi led nearly sixty thousand soldiers out of Stone Mountain City at night, dividing them into four groups to attack from three directions.
• Alex’s Iron Birch Legion held Earl Valbi’s force while other Vela troops surrounded the remaining groups, leaving nearly forty thousand East Sea Alliance soldiers dead or captured.
• Earl Valbi retreated to the Thirteen Cities, fell ill with rage, and left Stone Mountain City’s weakened garrison to defend its walls.
• On Earl Stanley’s orders, a legion inside the East Sea Alliance turned on its allies, helping Raine forces break through the western defense line.
• As Alex worried that the Raine army might take the credit before Stone Mountain City fell, Santos arrived and offered a way to capture its walls.

Santos revealed Victor's plan to take Stone Mountain City's walls, and Alex agreed to rely on it so the city could be captured before Ryan's army broke through the East Sea Alliance's defenses. That night, Santos's troops attacked with heavily armored soldiers who climbed the walls by hand despite the defenders' attacks.

• Santos told Alex that the plan to capture Stone Mountain City's walls came from Victor.
• Alex agreed to the plan after Santos assured him it could work if follow-up troops arrived in time.
• Santos's troops attacked a section of Stone Mountain City's walls that night.
• The defenders found that arrows barely affected the heavily armored soldiers at the front of the assault.
• The armored soldiers climbed the walls with their bare hands and kept climbing even after logs and stones struck them.

Alex's Vela Army captured most of Stone Mountain City after transformed soldiers broke through its walls, while the defenders surrendered and Count Valbi gave himself up. The eastern and western defenses had both been breached, leaving the East Sea Alliance's defensive line close to collapse.

• Transformed soldiers in the Vela Army overwhelmed the defenders on Stone Mountain City's wall, and Alex ordered a general assault after seeing their signal.
• The Vela Army poured into Stone Mountain City, where the defenders fled or surrendered as Count Valbi lay bedridden.
• By the next day, the Vela Army controlled most of the city and captured nearly two hundred thousand prisoners as nearby fortresses fell.
• Alex's troops fought the defenders in the city lord's residence until its elite soldiers surrendered and Count Valbi emerged, ill but alert.
• Count Valbi asked Alex to spare his men and said a traitor had helped bring down the defensive line; Alex learned the count had received the news through the Alliance's secret agents.

After capturing Stone Mountain City, the Raine–Vela Allied Army encircled the East Sea Alliance’s defensive line and secured the northern Red River Plain. The Second Battle of Stone Mountain City ended in a decisive allied victory, leaving most East Sea Alliance forces captured or destroyed.

• Alex told his subordinates to care for Count Valbi and have army doctors examine him, hoping to preserve his health and influence among the East Sea Alliance’s nobles.
• The Raine and Vela armies broke through both ends of the defensive line and moved to encircle its center.
• Confused and surrounded East Sea Alliance troops surrendered in large numbers after nobles and commanders who had already yielded urged them to lay down their weapons.
• Within six days of Stone Mountain City’s capture, the allied army controlled the defensive line and the northern Red River Plain, while most East Sea Alliance legions there were wiped out.

After crushing the East Sea Alliance’s main forces, the Allied Army paused to recover while the alliance’s nobles split into warring factions. As the civil war grew increasingly brutal and threatened to devastate the lands the Raine Kingdom intended to claim, Duke Barick and Earl Stanley ordered the Allied Army to intervene.

• The Allied Army counted more than twenty-four defeated or captured East Sea Alliance legions and decided to rest and replenish its troops before marching south.
• After news of the defeat spread, East Sea nobles split into rival factions, and the Noble Council fractured without electing a new Council Speaker.
• Neutral nobles sent surrender envoys to the Allied Army, and Duke Barick welcomed them while ordering them to provide troops against the remaining resisters.
• Diehard nobles attacked the domains of those who surrendered, and fighting spread into a civil war across the East Sea Alliance.
• As rival armies looted and massacred civilians, Earl Stanley and Duke Barick consulted Alex and others, then ordered the Allied Army to end its rest and intervene.

After the Allied Army defeated the East Sea Alliance’s main forces, Earl Stanley ordered a three-month campaign to suppress the remaining Noble Armies, which devastated the region and its commercial cities. The campaign stalled against fortified noble castles until Victor proposed using naval guns.

• Earl Stanley ordered the Allied Army to disperse by legion and destroy any East Sea Alliance army that had not surrendered.
• The Allied Army fought for three months to quell the fighting, suffering heavy losses and failing to save many noble territories.
• The East Sea Alliance’s Noble Armies burned and looted their own lands, then withdrew into fortified castles to resist the Allied Army.
• The Allied Army struggled to besiege the castles with field Artillery and found that leaving them intact allowed the nobles to attack its supply lines and occupied territories.
• Victor proposed using naval guns to destroy the fortified noble armies.