Chapter 121 - Negotiations (Patreon)

Note : Chapter 123 and 124 have been written and added to the queue !

Chapter 121

Red Sands Desert, Principality of Rebirth.

In flight over the outskirts of the City of Rebirth.

"What in the mother of all the Gods' name is that?!?" Blurted out Amelia as she gazed through the binoculars.

"Exactly what I was worried about, general. Heavy tarkian artillery." Said the captain of the Magnificence. "Naval gun. Don't recognize the model, but probably one of the older ones. They're decomissioning their Hermione-class dreadnoughts, it might be one of their refurbished main guns. Two hundred fifty millimeters in caliber, at least."

"How dangerous is it?"

"If it's smoothbore with cannonballs?" He shrugged. "Anything hit by it is going to have a very bad day. But this kind of weapon won't do too much damage to infantry, even in tight formations, although it'll prevent you from setting camp nearby. If it's rifled and has shells? It will even give my ship a run for its money. And you do not want to know what it will do to marching infantry units."

Amelia grimaced as she played with the zoom of the binoculars. She was having trouble compensating for the movement of the airship, and it was starting to get slightly dizzying, but she needed to take a closer look.

"Wait…that mesa…It's one with the dungeon in it, isn't it?"

"Seems so, why?"

"They must have some balls to put it there."

"Wouldn't be the first time someone builds on top of a dungeon ma'am."

"Yes, but…that's the only structure except the entrances." There was a huge entrance in there as well. The lookouts had reported some major activity there early one, but it had stopped before they were able to take a closer look. It probably lead up to the artillery piece, but still…something didn't sit right with her. She had mental alarms going off about something, and it kept bothering her.

Chief among them…

"What do you think about the artillery on the walls?" Continued the general.

"That…is something that weirds me out. Some of it is clearly Tarkian. The rest? I have no clue. They look like Lorisian guns, but the dwarves simply don't make cannon like that. If nothing else, they're usually lower on the ground so they can more easily reload them. And the artillery crew appear to be in full armor. Whatever they're wearing, looking at them is like gazing at mirrors. Covered head to toe in metal. Can't make out much more than that at this distance however. The howitzers are even stranger however."

"Howitzers?"

"Third line of defense."

Amelia swung the binoculars around, and swore viciously.

"The Tarkians didn't bring them 'gifts', that's enough damned weaponry to field a whole army!"

"With all due respect ma'am, those aren't Tarkians."

Amelia lowered the binoculars, turning towards the captain.

"What?"

"They're not Tarkians. I've been fighting the Hegemony for over half a century ma'am, even if only on and off. And I can guarantee you, those aren't Tarkian weapons. The design, the barrel length…it's all wrong. They always built all of their artillery in two variants: field and siege. The former is small, light and mobile. Made to follow their infantry and tanks around, giving them fire support wherever they go. The latter are giant sons of bitches made to level city blocks. Those are neither. Some kind of weird middle ground."

"Experimental weaponry?"

"Doubt so. We'd have heard about it by now. Besides, the Hegemony is focusing on producing as many weapons as it can, not inventing new stuff right now. They're already struggling with just making what they already know. They're not about to add to that pile!" He spat on the ground. "Especially not when their artillery already works so well against us!"

Amelia nodded grimly. 'Trench warfare' was a way of waging war the Republic had to learn the hard way against the Hegemony. And it was one they were deeply unsuited for. Magic and numbers could make up for a lot, even the lack of tanks or fast firing guns, but rolling bombardments from artillery you couldn't even see, much less fire back at, not to mention having to fight dug in machineguns, was something else altogether.

"Alright then. I'll defer to your expertise in this case captain." She sighed. "Do you have any suggestions with how to deal with…that thing?"

"Well, we pretty much have to kill it. Its range has to be insane, even if its smoothbore, and we simply cannot setup camp within said range. There's no cover to hide from the airships, and if they can see us, they sure as hell serve as spotters and give the gun corrections for bombardment. It would take most of a day marching through the wasteland to reach the town from outside its range, at least, and, well…"

"Our troops would be exhausted and under fire most of the time. Can you take it?"

The captain fiddled with his beret, the symbol of an Elkisian skyfleet officer. His was emblazoned with gold, of course, as befitted his status, but it was surprisingly utilitarian besides that. It also looked worn, badly, and Amelia had to remind herself that he'd been captain for longer than she'd been alive, and only blocked from promotion to flag rank by his virulent stance against some of the senate's stances, and his Far Reach ancestry.

"If we pull every ship? Yes. But it'll be one hell of a battle ma'am. We will lose vessels. And we'll have to come from an angle. We simply cannot afford to engage the docking tower alongside that abomination. And we'll be able to dodge the largest concentration of field guns that way."

"Agreed." Amelia looked at the distant town with her naked eyes, barely making out the silvery dot of the massive siege gun. "Draw up an attack plan. I'll try to come up with a diversion. Provided that they don't accept my offer for their surrender."

"Aye aye ma'am!"

*****

"They seem to be hesitating." Said Anders, before taking another bite of his sandwhich.

"Wouldn't you too, if you had just come in expecting a small dungeon town and found a wall of guns?" Said Allya as she looked through the binoculars.

They were currently on top of the tower serving as their center of operations. They'd installed some chairs and tables, and were busy having lunch. They'd already arranged for everyone manning the defenses to be cycled off and have some time to eat, and they'd figured that should apply to them as well. Besides, Allya was starting to go stirr crazy in the closed and reinforced command room. She was used at being at the forefront of battle, not buried inside a bunker!

"I mean, my first reaction would probably be to reevaluate my life's choices." Said Crystal after she swallowed her own bite.

Allya had seen the dungeon core staring longingly at the food, and realized a bit belatedly that Crystal might actually like some food, and called for a sandwhich to be prepared to her preferences. Whatever else the dungeon core might be, she obviously was a cheese enthusiast and a big eater. She hadn't even understood half of the stuff Crystal had listed!

Still, she appeared more than happy with it, and had been demolishing her sandwhich with methodical efficiency.

"They made their choice a loooong time ago. But these airships piss me off. I hate allowing them to gather intel like that."

"At least we got most of the golems out of sight before they arrived."

Allya nodded. The advantage of having the fortifications have a network of covered trenches and abbatises that covered such a gigantic perimeter was that there was a lot of places to hide infantry. Which meant that right now there was a solid twelve thousand golems awaiting the signal to march out of their hidey hole and give the Republic a fight they'd remember. The remaining four thousand were still in Crystal's dungeon, serving as a central reserve force, should anything unexpected happen.

"That's something, yes." She blinked as a soldier arrived, briefly conversed with Anders, and left. The commander frowned, and turned towards them.

"Milady, honored dungeon. Apparently…they're sending a soldier under a flag of truce?"

Allya and Crystal exchanged a look. The Republic had never bothered to negotiate before. But then again, those had been cover operations…

"Well, send them in then. Just make sure to search them very thoroughly before hand. And double the guard. I don't care about their dignity, if you have to strip them to make sure they haven't hidden a bomb inside their armor do it."

"Yes milady! Right away!"

*****

"They have accepted our offer ma'am." Said the lieutenant as she stood at attention in Amelia's tent. She looked a bit disheveled, but otherwise fine, which was a minor surprise. Given how much trouble the Republic had given the town, Amelia had honestly expected the guards to be a little rougher with her envoy. Which was why she'd sent the tough as boots former NCO.

"Good, good! I assume the adventurers guild guaranteed the safety of the meeting?"

"Yes. As well as the WMC."

Amelia froze.

"The WMC? They have a WMC representative?"

"Yes ma'am, and…ma'am, is it normal that they have a golem army?"

For a second Amelia didn't process what she'd just heard. Then…

"THEY WHAT?!?"

*****

Holy shit we are so fucked. Thought the general as she watched the delegation moving towards her, her soldiers formed in perfect ranks to allow them through.

The reason for her current depressing thoughts was that only about half of the delegation was made out of regular soldiers. The other half was a group of heavily armed golems.

The dungeon's golems.

And at their head was a woman that fit every description she'd read about the dungeon's final boss. Furthermore when she'd read the sealed letter accepting the meeting, one of the signatories was 'Crystal, dungeon core of the Dungeon Factory'.

"Greetings! Baroness, honored dungeon." She said as the delegation finally reached her. "It is a…surprise to see you here."

"You invited us over, general." Said the baroness as she stepped forth, and Amelia had to mentally recenter herself. That woman's appearance was just all kinds of wrong. She was dressed like an elite assassin, yet carried herself like a queen. It was jarring, to say the least, and she exhuded a command aura with the ease of long practice. Knight-Valiant indeed. "If you did not wish this invitation to be accepted, you should not have extended it."

"I was more referring to lady Crystal, baroness."

The dungeon boss tilted her head, and the general hid a shiver. There was something…faintly wrong in those eyes. Like if there were two people instead of one. And one of them was as cold blooded as arctic ice. Was the boss still in there studying her? That was a horrifying thought, to say the least. But as soon as it had appeared, the sensation vanished.

"I am present as lady Allya's military ally, and thus your enemy."

"Military ally?" Amelia couldn't -quite- keep the consternation out of her voice.

"Yes. After you and your…Republic." Crystal almost spat out the word like it caused her physical pain to say out loud. "Almost murdered my advisor and forced me to trigger the self destruct on my dungeon, I decided to take more proactive measures in order to ensure my safety and that of those I love."

"But, the UDC-"

"No longer has jurisdiction over me. They refused to intervene and punish your country as it so richly deserved, and so I broke away from them."

"You gave up on their protection?"

"What protection? You people almost kidnapped me! Twice! If they won't bother lifting a finger to protect me from that, then I will be no part of this joke of an organization."

"We didn't attempt to-"

"General." The dungeon core's voice was perfectly calm, but something in the tone set the general on edge. There was that cold lurking in her eyes again. "I care little for your justifications and plead of innocence. So save us the bother, and…entertain our 'delusions', if you will, if only for the purpose of our conversation."

"Of course. If you will step inside then, so we can begin the negotiations proper."

"That would be for the best." Answered Allya, and Amelia rose a mental eyebrow. The baroness was…afraid of the dungeon core? She hid it very well, but something was slipping through. That was interesting. And supremely concerning. "Lead the way, general."

"Of course. Follow me please."