But the situation was different now. First of all, the collapse had happened far too quickly. The Kingdom of Silverymoon had been completely unprepared, and much of its military-industrial stockpile had become Orcish spoils. At the same time, the fall of vast stretches of territory had severely wasted the Kingdom of Silverymoon's productive capacity.
The Kingdom of Silverymoon's vast eastern territories could no longer provide it with any support at all.
Moreover, Canlus's stab in the back had prevented the western territories of the Kingdom of Silverymoon from fully supporting Silverymoon. And now, with Silverymoon under siege by the Black Orcs, support from the west had been completely cut off.
Silverymoon could now rely only on its own reserves to hold out.
That was only because Silverymoon had always maintained a sense of crisis and kept ample stockpiles. Otherwise, it would not have lasted this long.
But now, without reinforcements, no matter how great the reserves were, they would eventually run dry. And many things simply could not be produced within the city itself.
Take arrows, for instance.
An arrow at least required steel, didn't it? Without steel, where would the arrowhead come from? Then there was the shaft. It could not be made from just any kind of wood—it had to be light, straight, and sufficiently hard. It also needed to be standardized, since military equipment was better when the specifications matched as closely as possible. Then there were the fletchings. They did not necessarily need actual feathers, but they still required suitable materials.
Under normal circumstances, these things meant nothing to the Kingdom of Silverymoon. But once they were confined to a single city, they became a problem. No city would keep such vast quantities of these materials in storage for no reason.
And that was only arrows.