In the Southern Province of Newman, in the study of Viscount Sebastian René Predal, his most trusted chancellor and his maternal uncle's cousin, Luther Sebastian, was looking over the compiled information.
Luther was a gigantic giant suffering from gigantism. He stood more than eight feet tall—over two and a half meters.
When Luther was young, his immense height had earned him outstanding battle records and honors on the battlefield. But after he turned thirty, his body no longer had room to keep growing.
The factors promoting his growth were still at work, so every bone in his body hurt unbearably. His fingers, toes, nose, and earlobes had all grown grotesquely large.
Every day, he could only leave the house with the help of several servants. He was a desperate struggler trapped in a hothouse of pain, so he always approached problems from the most pessimistic angle.
Viscount Predal believed that before considering victory, one had to consider defeat. Thus, his cousin with gigantism had become his chief chancellor and most important adviser.
Just as Ergons had expected, his incarnation as Evoy had given the viscount a tremendous shock. Moreover, the four girls had basically told him everything they knew.
The viscount had learned that, in some impoverished backwater county on the northern frontier, there was actually a knight capable of commanding someone who could cross more than a thousand miles in an instant.
Then there was what that person had said about comrades—people who shared the same ideals and strove toward the same goal could call one another comrades. That meant they clearly had an organization.
With so many women and children being looted in every major war, with the strong oppressing the weak somewhere on this continent every day, why had this organization saved the four of them instead of anyone else?
There had to be something they wanted from him.
The other party had left in an instant. During the second half of the night, the viscount's court knights had searched practically every inn and lodging house in the city, yet they had not found the slightest trace of information left behind by that Evoy.
The more this happened, the more interested he became in the organization, and the more curious he was about the knight on the frontier. As noble as she was, she still had times when she needed help—but how had she become entangled with someone of that level?
"Viscount, we currently have nothing particularly useful. I suggest sending someone specifically to investigate. At the same time, we should respond to changing circumstances without changing our own position. On the surface, we should do nothing."
Tewain Village, afternoon.
After two days of rest, more and more people who wanted to profit from the war were gathering, now that this Private War had been made public.
The Baron finally arrived late as well. His arrival brought not only more vassals and followers, but also failed to set the troops marching as Ergons had imagined.
What was the meaning of valuing speed in warfare? How was this supposed to count as a surprise attack?
None of that happened. The Baron had never intended to launch a sneak attack. From the moment he had blown the matter up, he had wanted to seize the moral high ground and then attack the enemy openly and legitimately.
Earlier, Ergons had worried that among all these vassals and war profiteers, there might be enemy spies who would leak their plans.
However, the Baron simply organized a Military Council on the second day after his arrival. They did not merely discuss the main directions in which they intended to launch attacks.
He also loudly attributed the attack on Tervain Village to the neighboring territory, using it as a new point of condemnation.
He argued that sirens and pirates were both creatures of the sea, while Maxitu had traveled all the way from Gaudy City, the capital of the countship. It had originally been headed for the neighboring territory, but had suddenly changed course.
Moreover, it had passed through many places without stopping, traveling by day and lodging by night as it headed straight for Tervain Village. Something must have gone wrong in the neighboring territory.
Ergons believed that the Baron must have had a way of knowing what had happened that night, so he had taken the initiative to ask for his guidance as a gesture of closeness.
Unexpectedly, this had become a topic of discussion the next day.
Their method of warfare was also far too brazen. The Baron had actually made him serve as his scribe and write a letter of challenge.
He had been copying Sir Davis Tevalin's original handwriting—the terrible handwriting inherited from him. Fortunately, there was still no such thing as elaborate cursive, and practically everyone's handwriting was equally awful...
But Ergons suspected that this might be a deliberate trap, something that could be produced at any time as evidence that he was not Sir Davis Tevalin.
Fortunately, Elisa and William had given him the original manuscript of Sir Davis's letter. He had practiced for a long time, so a few simple sentences should not be a problem.
The Baron had told him to write, and the more he wrote, the more he suspected that this was a joke.
Wars between nobles were far too childish. The Baron had written down all the key points of every attack he had previously planned, even clearly stating what kind of siege equipment he was bringing and how many people would operate it.
He had also warmly invited the other side to respond to this righteous war—for example, by arraying their forces beneath the viscount's main castle and having knights face knights.
In Ergons's impression, wars were not supposed to be like this. Yet the Baron claimed that this was exactly how a Private War worked, and that everything had to maintain a most basic level of decorum.
At a time like this, a public war between nations was unlikely, because the several countries on the same continent were all in a period of truce. The vast majority of conflicts were Private Wars between lords.
A Private War was a means of resolving a contradiction or conflict without causing a large number of battle casualties.
"Isn't this just children playing house?"
Ergons seemed to remember his childhood, when he had held Ultraman and Optimus Prime while fighting a war against the Barbie dolls and Balala the Fairies on the other side.
The real reason the two of them had started fighting was that they could never settle whether Ultraman was stronger or the Fairy Wand.
Each side had been proclaiming its own view within its own domain. No wonder they had ended up fighting.
But this was a battle between territories, armies, and knights!
Could it really be this childish?
It could.
The Baron's army advanced all the way to the viscount's main castle in the neighboring territory without encountering any obstruction whatsoever.
Cortes Viscount Garcia had actually left the city to meet the Baron when they arrived...
Ergons was in the formation and watched with his own eyes as the two nobles, like two shrews, stood more than five meters apart, hurled the most vicious insults at each other, and spat at one another!
He truly felt as if he were standing bewildered in the wind, and he had even come to believe in what he had considered the most ridiculous setting in the game.
That was the fact that, after establishing an engineering camp and beginning to build siege equipment, one could still call out the opposing lord and meet him in person.
Weren't they afraid of being pinned to death by a crossbow bolt?
They could even call him out to meet once every day until they were ready to besiege the city. Moreover, unless your strength was overwhelmingly inferior—for example, attacking a city defended by hundreds of people with only a dozen or so men—
the opposing side would not send anyone to harass the construction of your siege equipment.
Before you continue