Building A Human Empire By Creating A Clan [EN]: Chapter 68

Creating a Retinue and Building a Human Empire Episode 70 (70/185)

Opening the Gate

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“You’re saying you still haven’t received a reply?”

Sister Rachel raised her voice.

She placed her hands on her hips and looked up at the fortress walls.

From atop the high walls, the lord shook his head and replied.

“W-well, yes. We haven’t received a response from the homeland yet.”

“Did you even send it? Did you notify Marquis Lösene that we would be passing through? How many more days do we have to wait?”

“Just a little longer… Please wait just a little longer.”

The lord avoided eye contact and refused to answer, cowed by Rachel’s shouting.

She glared at him, scoffed, and turned around.

She stomped towards me, her feet crunching on the damp earth after the rain.

“He’s lying. He’s deliberately stalling for time.”

“Probably waiting for reinforcements.”

I smoked my tobacco and looked up at the fortress walls.

My eyes met the man Rachel had just spoken to.

He licked his parched lips and his eyes darted around nervously.

He looked so obviously terrified that I couldn’t help but smile.

“Father—”

Rachel whispered.

“Don’t.”

I cut her off before she could finish her sentence.

“If you’re going to argue that we should punish them for lying and plotting, don’t.”

“But.”

“Rachel.”

She pouted.

I patted her and looked back.

The plains bordering the Oroko Great Plains and Germania.

There was a temporary encampment built on those plains a few days ago.

‘300 retinue members, 6,000 conscripts.’

The number of soldiers stationed at the encampment.

The army I had mobilized to head to Seodret.

On the other hand, the number of guards visible on the fortress walls was, at most, a few hundred.

Even their equipment didn’t look very good.

As Rachel said, if we pushed hard, they would surrender on their own, given the difference in strength.

“It would have been nice to bring more.”

Yet she clicked her tongue, saying that wasn’t enough.

“More? What would you do with more here?”

“Huh? Isn’t it obvious we’re going to fight? You’ve practically finished off Wallachia, so why not seize Germania while we’re at it—”

“No.”

I shook my head.

“Of course not. This time, the goal is different from when we visited Wallachia. We’ll avoid fighting as much as possible and return after handling things peacefully.”

“…Peacefully?”

She looked back and forth between the encampment and me.

Even Calliope tilted her head slightly.

To mobilize even more than when we captured Vlad and then say that.

No matter how you looked at it, the word ‘peaceful’ didn’t quite fit.

I chuckled.

“Why do you think people like Pasimea and Gerhard didn’t participate?”

Because there wouldn’t be a repeat of what happened when we visited Wallachia.

“Hmm…”

I finished smoking my tobacco.

I was now on the border of Germania.

Waiting in front of the fortress Germania had built on the border.

The reason, as you can see, was that we hadn’t received permission to pass.

‘They must be gathering their forces.’

The reason for the delay in permission was obvious.

Germania would know all about me.

Who I was and what I had done in Wallachia.

‘An illegitimate child, disowned by Seodret, conquers northern Wallachia, returns as a vassal, and mobilizes an army.’

Ah, really? Who would open their territory to someone like that?

At the very least, they needed the power to pressure me so I wouldn’t have any ulterior motives.

What if they let me into their territory defenselessly and I suddenly changed my mind?

That was why the lord was stalling, saying he hadn’t received a reply.

‘If it were Wallachia, I would have ignored the border and crossed it.’

I looked at the fortress again.

The fortress walls were truly high.

A height that even ten adult men standing on each other’s shoulders couldn’t reach.

The entire border was surrounded by walls of this height.

‘They’ve clearly marked the border like this, so ignoring it and crossing would mean war. There’s no need to fight already.’

Germania was a different kind of country than Wallachia.

Wallachia left its border with the Oroko Great Plains to nature.

What did the northern lords’ armies pass when they crossed into the Great Plains?

They merely crossed a river created by nature.

That was the boundary and border separating the Great Plains and Wallachia.

‘There’s a reason why Germania is often called an empire, even though it’s a kingdom.’

On the other hand, Germania had fortified its border.

Like building the Great Wall of China, the entire border was blocked by walls.

This was commonly called the Great Wall, and over generations, the Great Wall was divided into several areas, each guarded by a noble family.

‘The owner of this place is the Lösene Marquisate.’

The family of my former fiancée.

‘I’ve never met Marquis Lösene directly. In the previous timeline, I was active after he had passed away from old age. His only daughter inherited the family and was very active.’

I thought of her, whom I had met in the previous timeline.

‘She was quite a seasoned noble back then, but I wonder what she’s like now.’

I also wondered what she would think if she saw me after my regression.

The strange situation made me smile involuntarily.

Boo————

A horn sounded.

I stopped walking as I was returning to the encampment.

The sound was coming from beyond the fortress walls.

“They’ve arrived.”

The Lösene Marquis’s army had arrived.

The horn was announcing their arrival.

I couldn’t see them because of the fortress walls, but there must have been quite a few of them.

I had given them plenty of time to gather.

“Rachel.”

“Yes, Father.”

Rachel raised her right hand and twirled it around.

Thump— Thump—

The sound of drums, drowning out the horn, echoed through the encampment.

“Assemble!”

“Form ranks!”

The retinue formed a line at the front, followed by the conscripts.

The 6,000 conscripts were all former slaves.

They had all been selected and given short-term training under Rachel’s leadership.

【Lv. 4】

【Lv. 2】

【Lv. 3】

【Lv. 2】

The levels were terrible.

Many of them were worse than goblins.

The equipment was excellent because I had provided it myself.

However, the individual level was so low that even a novice mercenary would have difficulty dealing with them.

Even after selecting and training them from over 100,000 slaves, they were still slaves by birth, their foundations were weak, and they were just taking their first steps.

‘It’s amazing that they’ve grown this much.’

Except for a very few from the arena, they had never even held a sword before.

Before being selected by Rachel, their levels were the same as mine.

But now, even though their levels were low, they had risen.

They had grown this much through sweat and tears alone.

Knowing that, I felt proud of them.

‘It’s a pity.’

But at the same time, I felt a sense of pity.

Did they really train with their own will?

‘They’re just following because their master wants them to.’

These were the kind of slaves who were like dolls.

Born as slaves from birth, their very nature as humans had been broken.

Look at them, standing in orderly ranks, unmoving like stone statues.

Not a single one of them had any emotion on their face, only breathing evenly.

They were like dolls with hearts.

‘Even if you free them from slavery, it only frees them from the system.’

Their minds were still enslaved.

Even though they were told they were no longer slaves, they were still slaves.

‘That’s why Rachel chose them.’

To those who felt happiness by the existence of a master, felt happiness by following their master’s will, and felt anxiety every moment they didn’t serve their master.

Rachel had given them a master, Edar.

A belief in me as a means to forget the pain.

To serve me as their master and always believe they were serving me.

So that they wouldn’t feel the anxiety and pain caused by their twisted nature.

‘It’s like a painkiller.’

Since the pain couldn’t be cured, it was like giving highly addictive painkillers to those with incurable diseases to forget the pain.

‘Religion is the opiate of the masses, was it?’

I recalled a phrase.

‘The retinue members must hate her.’

Even if left alone, they would be loyal to me, their master.

But she added faith, making them revere me even more deeply.

How would it look to a retinue member with a different perspective than her?

‘It’s not that Rachel sees humans as tools.’

She also sees humans as equal to herself.

However, the problem is that she’s too nosy.

She believes that following me is a good thing, and that it’s her job to spread that good thing to those around her, which is where the problem lies.

‘I need to suppress her personality.’

Like fighting poison with poison.

But there’s a limit.

To prevent the poison from corrupting me.

I need to teach Rachel to restrain her personality.

‘That’s why she’s accompanying me on this journey.’

How will she react when she sees the Wolf God and those who follow that false god?

Will she be able to learn something?

I tilted my head and stroked my chin.

“Edar-nim.”

Calliope quietly called me.

She must have read my thoughts and become worried.

I smiled and reassured her.

“It’s nothing.”

“······.”

Calliope nodded.

Behind her, Rachel smiled in the same way.

“It seems like they’ve all arrived.”

While I was lost in thought, the fortress became busy.

Soldiers filled the empty spaces on the fortress walls one by one.

They weren’t the garrison troops who were holding spears in cheap clothes.

They were regular troops with proper equipment and discipline.

Flutter—

A flag was planted on the command post above the gate, the gatehouse.

The flag symbolizing the Lösene Marquisate fluttered in the wind.

The atmosphere of the fortress came alive, as if a battle was about to break out.

“Do you think they’re going to fight?”

“Well, they’ll avoid a full-scale war.”

“A full-scale war?”

I didn’t answer Rachel, who was tilting her head.

I took out a new cigarette, put it in my mouth, and looked at the gatehouse.

A woman came up to the gatehouse.

“——.”

“———.”

She spoke to the lord and then looked at me.

The haughty expression she had changed when her eyes met mine.

She narrowed her eyes and raised her right hand to slightly shield her vision.

As if her eyes were exposed to sunlight.

But that didn’t last long.

Soon, she lowered her hand, opened her eyes wide, and looked at me.

“······.”

I smiled and lightly bowed diagonally.

In response, she opened her mouth to say something to me,

“Edar!”

A man next to her shouted.

Rachel, who was lighting her cigarette, frowned.

“Who dares to call Father’s name so freely…”

I took a long drag of my cigarette and exhaled the smoke.

“Haral, is it? Haral Seodret.”

“Seodret?”

“The second son of Duke Seodret and Ibella.”

Ibella, the Duke of Seodret’s legal wife.

The second son of the woman who tried to kill me.

He’s three years younger than me, so if you really want to get technical, he’s my younger brother.

“Father’s younger brother?”

“Half-brother.”

“He doesn’t look anything like you.”

Rachel narrowed her eyes and examined him.

Ordinary build, ordinary features.

Blonde hair, blue eyes.

Baby fuzz mustache on his philtrum [the vertical groove between the base of the nose and the upper lip].

“Are you really brothers?”

“Maybe.”

I joked and laughed blandly.

It was natural that she couldn’t believe it.

I was quite tall, and my hair and eyes were all black.

There was not a single physical trait that he and I had in common.

“Unless the legal wife Ibella met another man, that guy and I are half-brothers. I look just like the Duke in his younger days.”

All sorts of rumors circulated just before I was exiled from the family.

Among the rumors was that I was the child of an outsider.

But no one would have actually believed it.

Even Ibella, who created the rumors, would have thought it was ridiculous.

‘Because the answer is in the portraits in the mansion.’

The portrait visible when passing through the entrance of the mansion and going up the central staircase in the hall.

The portrait depicted Duke Svein of Seodret in his younger days.

But if someone who didn’t know the Duke saw it, they would ask if it was a portrait of me.

I resembled the Duke’s appearance so much.

‘The rumors that I was the Duke’s seed or not were due to my abilities.’

What good is it if we look the same?

My abilities don’t even reach a speck of dust.

It was even more of a problem that my abilities were so poor even though we looked the same.

The Duke hated the incompetence of his son, who resembled him so much.

‘Because we looked so alike, disappointment turned into hatred.’

The hatred was quite great.

Even though I was an illegitimate child, I hadn’t really committed any crimes.

To the point where he would disown me, exile me, and even try to kill me through someone else.

“I don’t know why that guy is there.”

As far as I remember, he had no connection with the Lösene Marquisate?

“Edar!”

【Lv. 46】

Unlike me, Ibella’s children had talent.

Their talent was so high that you could ignore their appearance.

He had reached level 46 at just around twenty years old.

‘Even Duke Mazenkin, the strongest human in Wallachia, would be called a prodigy if he stood in front of that guy.’

Compared to Count Hugo, who had been reduced to a blood relative’s servant, he was 5 levels lower.

On the other hand, he was more than twenty years younger.

His talent was truly amazing.

‘So that’s why he’s so arrogant.’

“Edar! How dare a son of a whore ignore me!”

Rachel gnashed her teeth and glared at him.

“That impious bastard…!”

“It’s okay. There’s no need to get angry.”

I patted her and walked towards the gate.

“Long time no see, Haral.”

“Don’t call me by my name so freely! You lowly thing!”

“Then what should I call you? Brother?”

“Shut up! Who are you calling brother!”

When I asked in a gentle tone, he scowled.

“You think you have the same noble blood as me? Who are you lying to! If you had even a drop of the same blood as us, would Father have kicked you out?”

He raised his nose and shouted confidently.

“You should be grateful that I didn’t kill you on the spot! What face do you have to come back with! And leading an army!”

His face turned red as he spoke, as if anger was boiling over.

“Wallachia, that small country, you think you’re so great just because you used some power in that place! Before I punish your arrogance, immediately bow your head to the ground and grovel!”

“Well.”

I exhaled a long stream of cigarette smoke and said.

“I understand everything else, but I find it hard to understand the part about not receiving the seed [referring to the Duke’s bloodline].”

“What?”

“Brother. Shouldn’t you be more worried than me when you look at Father’s portrait?”

He trembled violently all over his body.

His face was as red as a bomb about to explode.

“Shut up!”

Unable to suppress the rising emotions, he snatched a soldier’s spear and threw it at me.

“······.”

Clang!

The spear, filled with murderous intent, flew towards me and stopped.

It stopped an inch in front of my chest, caught in Calliope’s hand.

“Edar-nim.”

Her thoughts surged fiercely, and her eyes turned cold.

Even though she had no expression, I read extreme anger.

I smiled and said.

“Yes, give it back.”

She grabbed the spear in reverse and threw it.

I didn’t see her hand go behind her shoulder.

Like a frame of a video being cut off in chunks.

I only saw the spear disappear from her hand.

“Kkeuaaaaaaak!”

A scream erupted after a moment.

The scream was, of course, from my younger brother, Haral.

It was impaled in his right hand, the one that threw the spear at me.

“Foolish thing.”

The soldiers in the gatehouse hurriedly surrounded him.

They were wary that Calliope might continue her attack.

The soldiers guarding on the fortress walls also nocked arrows on their bows.

Over a thousand arrowheads were aimed at me.

“If I wanted to occupy the fortress, I would have done it long ago. Do you think this one fortress will protect you? Do you think you’re looking down on us, that you’re really higher than us?”

I raised my clenched right hand.

At that moment, some of the surprised soldiers released their bows.

There were dozens of them out of thousands, and when dozens of arrows were aimed at me, other soldiers reflexively released their hands and shot arrows.

“Don’t shoot! Don’t shoot!”

The commander’s urgent cry was in vain.

Because countless arrows had already reached me.

“······.”

Calliope lowered her sword, which shone blue in the sunlight.

The arrows were shattered by her blade before they even reached me.

Countless arrows were scattered in front of me and her.

“Heueop······.”

Someone took a deep breath.

Her gaze swept over the fortress walls once.

Everyone who received her gaze trembled.

Then she sheathed her sword and stepped back behind me.

“Rachel.”

I smirked and sneered.

Rachel twirled her raised hand.

Thump! Thump!

The soldiers behind me made a sound by clashing their weapons.

The sound was sharper than the drums and louder than the drums.

The soldiers took a step forward each time they clashed their weapons.

Thump! Thump!

“Halt.”

The army stopped a few steps away from me.

I raised my right hand, spread it wide, and then clenched it tightly.

Bang—!

A blast rang out.

Bang, bang, kwaang—!

The explosions continued in succession.

It was the sound of the bronze cannons made by Pasimea.

Gunpowder that was detonated to make a loud noise without firing cannonballs.

“Magic! It’s magic!”

“Prepare for impact!”

The humans, who didn’t even know the existence of gunpowder, were shocked and cowered.

They thought that the sound would cause a great impact on the fortress walls.

But when there was no impact following the sound, they were confused.

They couldn’t feel even a speck of magic, but acrid smoke was spreading and they could hear a deafening roar, so they were confused and surprised, not knowing what to do, looking around, running, shouting, and increasing the chaos.

“Stop!”

The sound stopped abruptly at my shout.

Clashing weapons, firing cannons, everything stopped.

The chaotic and noisy fortress walls also stopped moving.

“Where did the momentum from before go?”

“······.”

“Why, where did the momentum from throwing spears and shooting arrows at me go, and only fear remains?”

In the silence, everyone’s eyes turned to me.

“Or did you realize it late? How pathetic you are. That one fortress, no matter how high and how many of you there are, will scatter like dust with one swing of a sword. That’s your level.”

I spread my arms to the sides and raised my voice.

“But if you still want war, then shoot! If you want to end your lives yourselves, then shoot! If not, open the gates and welcome us.”

Hesitation spread on the fortress walls.

The hesitation turned into a shout, then into a moment of silence.

And soon the gates opened, and the lord came out with his master.

Her master’s name was Yulia Lösene, my former fiancée.

She looked at me with eyes that couldn’t believe it.