A piece of news that arrived the next day finally made the bewildered Nielsen and Mendieta understand where this turning point had come from.
The news was actually quite simple.
The Nozdormu Commercial United Kingdom had declared war on its northern neighbor, the Kachiton Duchy. In just three days, it had wiped out most of the duchy's army and captured the Grand Duke of Kachiton along with his family.
The Kachiton Duchy had ceased to exist.
The news shook everyone in the several countries in the southeastern Sains Continent.
Although the Kachiton Duchy was nominally only a duchy, its actual strength was no less than that of an ordinary kingdom.
Moreover, the Grand Duke of Kachiton had always been particularly willing to spend money maintaining his army. As a result, the Kachiton Duchy had long been known for its formidable fighting strength among those southeastern countries, and the others rarely dared provoke it.
Yet the Nozdormu Commercial United Kingdom had brazenly launched a war against the Kachiton Duchy and, astonishingly, destroyed it in just three days. This was beyond anyone's expectations.
After all, less than three years had passed since the Nozdormu Commercial United Kingdom had announced its founding.
The Thirteen Merchant Guilds under the Nozdormu Commercial United Kingdom had always been known for their considerable financial strength, which made the kingdom itself seem immensely wealthy.
But in everyone's understanding, wealth and strength were two entirely different things.
However rich the Nozdormu Commercial United Kingdom might be, and even with the Guards Corps previously maintained by each of the Thirteen Merchant Guilds, it was still a long way from establishing a proper Kingdom Army.
Yet this time, the Nozdormu Commercial United Kingdom had deployed only five thousand men assembled from the Guards Corps of five merchant guilds and easily crushed