Chương 1286: 1316 - The Rhea Campaign Begins

Five million men and women. Twenty thousand giants—almost as many giants as existed in total back before Leon had given them land and support. Arks enough to carry all of them. More than a hundred thousand Ulta suits. Several times as many MALLs. The sight of it from the window of the Southern Talon's most secure meeting room took Leon's breath away. Such a concentration of force, even when he could see it with his own eyes, was simply difficult to properly fathom.

The choked skies, the filled mustering grounds, the mass of man and metal that were about to conquer in his name— kill in his name—were so profound that Leon could do nothing but stare even as the highest officers in his military briefed him on the state of readiness.

"… issue of food. If these planes aren't taken, then the push will come to a quick end as we devour our reserves…" Leon closed his eyes for a moment, glad to have other people around who could manage logistics for him. Feeding a city of five million was difficult enough without that 'city' being broken up into five pieces and moving throughout the universe.

As things were, supply lines were going to stretch, but the fleets that were to follow these advance forces to garrison and secure the conquests were going to have to ferry a tremendous amount of food.

Even if the planes that were conquered could give the conquering fleets food, resupply would still have to flow from Artorion, replenishing strategic materials that might be used to repair arks, munitions developed by Leon's enchanters and alchemists, and fresh troops, while any wounded that dedicated healer arks couldn't handle would have to be brought back to Artorion. In short, it took multiple armies just to maintain an army, especially when carrying out expeditionary missions.

As Leon stared out over the southern plain, Valeria appeared by his side, drawing his attention. She hadn't come over to stare at the assembled forces, however; rather, when Leon turned, he found himself staring into her sapphire eyes, a look of utmost seriousness on her face, but with a hint of amusement glittering in her gaze.

"Quite the sight," she stated.

"It is," he whispered before turning back to the meeting, understanding the gentle rebuke for what it was. In truth, he didn't believe that he was needed for this meeting, aside from the simple fact of hearing the force's readiness level. The legions were in the process of being loaded into their transports, while the ark crews were already on board. The vast camps being left behind were going to be dismantled as the fleets that followed this grand armada would assemble further north, closer to the Lion's Portal.

Since there wasn't much left to organize or inspect, at least on his end, he was just here to listen to the officers confirm their objectives and state their readiness levels. His eyes first found Anzu. His brother was smiling confidently, leaning back in his chair in a relaxed posture with his arms crossed. His stark white hair was cut short, while the shining armor he wore, which Leon had personally forged for him, gleamed in the room's light.

He was ready for war, and after serving as one of Leon's commanders for so many years, Leon believed that Anzu had more than earned his confidence. Marcus, in contrast, looked more nervous—or at least, he was leaning forward in his seat, studying the three-dimensional map of the Great Strand of Rhea as if he hadn't already memorized it. Over the past decade, Leon had flooded the Great Strand with scouts.

Most were of a more conventional variety, but civilian arks had started coming out of Demetrion arkyards, allowing him to surreptitiously deploy merchants into the Great Strand. These merchants would seek out populated planes, and given their occupation, be accepted more readily by those on those planes, giving them access that his official scouts might not have.

These efforts had borne considerable fruit; most of their knowledge of the Great Strand of Rhea was still at some level out of date, with their maps coming from ancient Thunderbird Clan navigation wisps, and some of their more contemporary intel coming from Icarius and Heaven's Eye, but it wasn't until the scouts and later merchants were sent out that Leon started getting a better idea of what lay in their immediate path in Rhea. And Marcus seemed most preoccupied with his job.

Given how long it had been since he'd last been in a command position, Leon could sympathize. He had numerous inhabited planes in his path, with some rising to the level of being intraplanar powers unto themselves. He was commanding a vast fleet, however, and had reached the eleventh-tier quickly after resuming his duties as one of Leon's Paladins.

One of the powers in his way was led by an eleventh-tier mage, though one unaffiliated with any Nexus powers, but Leon fully trusted his old friend to surmount this threat by either military or diplomatic means. Alix struck something of a balance between Anzu's confidence and Marcus' anxiety. She was taking her job seriously, but she was also one of Leon's most experienced commanders, and that experience lent her considerable confidence.

It also helped, Leon figured, that she was given perhaps the easiest of the available routes, with no post-Apotheosis mages—at least, as far as they knew—in her way. The final of the five commanders was present, too, and he struck an intimidating figure. Leon had expected Menander to swagger in, anticipation or confidence oozing from his every pore. Instead, he stood by the map instead of sitting, while the Lions who'd accompanied him remained silent and professional.

No smile crossed Menander's lips, nor did he interrupt anyone regardless of rank as the final briefing proceeded. Leon returning to the briefing attracted some attention, but with a look, he ordered them to continue without addressing his brief disconnect.

"Task Force Kyros?" the Jaguar asked, his eyes turning to Anzu.

"We're ready," Anzu reported calmly. Leon's eyes flickered to the map. The five Task Forces within the great armada would proceed along their designated routes, snaking through the Great Strand of Rhea in the same general direction: toward Basileus Lorgos' territory. These routes would serve as safe corridors that other, smaller fleets would range from in the future, taking the territory between the corridors.

Estimates had it that Leon could reach Lorgos' territory within the century, but actually seizing all the planes between him and Lorgos would take millennia. There were simply too many, and too few of them were populated, which complicated supply lines. This campaign was only designed to get about a quarter of the way to Lorgos' most far-flung planes, but even that threatened to stretch their supply lines if conquered planes rebelled. Anzu's route took him through one of the more populated regions.

Three eleventh-tier mages held territory along his route, one of whom possessing the status of Nexus Lord. Leon had been conflicted about how to deal with that Lord, especially since he wasn't a Storm Lord, but in the end, he'd given Anzu orders to take his territory, and not to kill him if he could avoid it. The Lord, after all, was a Gale Lord, and Leon thought that he'd attracted enough attention from Esmerelda as it was. The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.

"Task Force Aetos?" the Jaguar continued, his eyes turning to Alix.

"Ready," Alix flatly stated, her sparkling eyes giving away the emotions that her tone didn't. Her gaze briefly swept across Clear Day, the fully healed tau giving her a nod of respect in turn. Clear had thrown himself into his job in the past decade, seeking out many of the powers that the scouts and merchants reported were at least somewhat amenable to Leon's suzerainty, and negotiating agreements with them.

He and the robust Diplomatic Corps that he'd built had ensured that almost twenty percent of the inhabited planes over this leg of the conquest were primed to be either annexed or vassalized the moment Leon's arks appeared over their planes. The only reason he believed that the number wasn't higher was that so many of the planes along their path weren't even united across their own planes, let alone were Void-capable. Without that unity, negotiating with the inhabitants was made prohibitively difficult.

The appearance of Leon's Task Forces, however, was likely to encourage negotiation, at least.

"Task Force Torfinn?" The Jaguar glanced at Menander. Stoically, the Lion replied, "We are ready. And when we are done, let none doubt that the Tribes are ready and capable servants of our King." Leon blinked, something clicking in his head.

'That's it, then, isn't it? The whole point that he's here…' He made a mental note to meet with the Tribal elders more often. He frequently toured his lands, but he rarely stayed in any place for long.

'That should change…' The Tribes were powerful, largely autonomous parts of his Kingdom—they did what he told them, but they had their own identities and traditions, and he was wary of stepping on their toes too much. Much of his effort in building his Kingdom had been to ensure that he wasn't entirely dependent on them for his power, but he now wondered if he'd gone too far, if perhaps the Tribes weren't feeling a little resentful at being sidelined…

'It would explain Menander seeking to prove himself…'

"Task Force Alexander?" It was now Marcus' turn to feel the weight of the Jaguar's gaze.

"Ready and eager," Marcus replied, his voice steady despite his apparent nervousness. Alexander was given one of the harder routes, though the difficulty here was more of a consequence of the strand's stellography rather than the powers in his way—Marcus was to lead his Task Force through large swathes of apparently depopulated planar clusters, setting up operating bases and listening posts.

The populated clusters that he had to deal with were fewer than those that the others had to deal with, but they were larger, if more distant from each other. There could be many reasons why there were larger stretches of depopulated planes, but the scouts had seen signs of civilization on many of these planes that were long gone, and Leon doubted that the people who had once lived on those planes had just upped and left for no reason at all.

For that reason alone, he considered Marcus' route to be the most unpredictable. That depopulation could mean nothing, or it could mean a lot.

"Task Force Niko—" The Jaguar's voice hitched just long enough for Leon—and others, he was sure—to notice, but the moment passed without comment.

"—Nikolaos?" The Jaguar did his best to pretend that nothing was wrong, but Leon knew that wasn't the case. Nikolaos, the old Jaguar Tribe elder that had been one of Leon's first and most vocal supporters while he was building support among the Ten Tribes to become King, had died recently, having failed to ascend to the tenth-tier and extend his life. To Leon's understanding, he hadn't tried that hard, having already been old when Leon first arrived on Kataigida.

He had been ready to go and departed the land of the living content with all that he'd seen accomplished. His loss was still keenly felt, however, and not just in the Jaguar Tribe.

"We are ready," Valeria stated, her voice coming out almost muted in the heavy quiet that fell after the Jaguar's inquiry.

"That is all of the Task Forces," the Jaguar stated, his composure returning lightning-quick.

"My King, I am pleased to report that we are ready." Melancholy settled bone deep within Leon. Anxiety was there, to be sure, but he was struck that in this final moment, he was most taken by the fact that he wasn't going to see these people again for a long time. Friends, family, gone while he remained in the Nexus. It shouldn't have been that different from all the other times he'd been separated from them, but this still felt different.

It may have been his imagination, but he got the impression that everyone else was feeling the same way. Not just the commanders of his Task Forces, though they were feeling it too, but everyone. They all had people they were leaving behind—even Menander, despite his decision to bring his harem with him. Gaius was remaining behind, though he and Alix had at least had children, and Perdiccas, one of their grandchildren, was going with Alix.

Marcus had gotten together with Helen fairly soon after asking Leon to become his Paladin again, though they weren't married, nor did they have children. Helen, however, was remaining in Artorion, as she, in her own words, 'belonged as far away from the battlefield as possible'. And, of course, Valeria and Anzu were leaving him and the rest of his family behind. Millions of others were doing the same thing, leaving behind friends and family for the glory and power of his Kingdom—and he wasn't doing the same thing.

He was remaining behind. The Jaguar seemed to commiserate with him, as did Anshu, his Marshall and High Admiral both remaining behind. Iron-Striker, silent throughout most of the meeting, met Leon's gaze, that same melancholy and anxiety that Leon felt reflected in his eyes. Yet, Leon also saw a degree of excitement and anticipation, two emotions that also lay within him. And in that moment, he knew what he wanted to say to mark the occasion.

"Thousands of years ago, the Thunderbird Clan stretched across the universe, and many were sheltered beneath our wings. For these thousands of years, the territories that once enjoyed this shelter have been left to their own devices, the planes abandoned or fought over like carrion. Many of you are from the Ten Tribes—the homes of your Ancestors were, as Minos was, lost to us.

"Today, we take the greatest step that we have taken so far in restoring all that has been lost! Even venturing to the Nexus for the first time will pale in comparison to what will be accomplished in the days, weeks, and years ahead!

"Chaos has reigned in the Great Strand of Rhea. Today, we begin the process of returning it to order! We will bring peace and stability back to this chaotic region of the universe! And with that, glory and honor upon ourselves, our Ancestors, and our comrades-in-arms!

"All of you know your jobs, and you were chosen for this campaign by me, personally! I have full confidence that you are the right people to do this, and I know that you will bring me victory! Go now, and prove me right!" The room erupted in stomping and shouting as everyone made their support for his words known. So powerful was their support that they seemed to shake all of Artorion. The melancholic atmosphere was banished, and in its place was confidence and electric excitement.

They were as ready as they could be. It was time to begin.

For nearly a decade, he had watched this insignificant portal into the Nexus. It had been fortified, though not to a proper degree, and while arks occasionally flew patrols around it, none had yet so much as caught a whiff of his presence. It was, after all, almost insultingly easy to fade into the background when the brilliant surface of the Nexus was at one's back. Nothing of note had happened during these years, almost to the point where he questioned his orders.

After all, when compared with the civilized parts of the universe—those ruled by Ocean Lords loyal to the Great Lord's teachings—this part of the Nexus was a backwater. But he stayed, keeping watch over this portal just in case something happened. Though his Lord had been careful not to give him too much information, he knew who he was spying on, and that he wasn't alone in such vigil.

His brothers-in-arms were performing much the same duties as he was, watching over the territory of the latest fool to try and lay claim to the Thunderbird's legacy within the Storm Lands. He enjoyed the protection of Princess Miuna, but that didn't necessarily mean he was untouchable… On a day that seemed like any other, something happened: arks began appearing from the portal, greater in number and armament than just about any he'd seen in his long vigil.

This was no patrol; this was an invasion force, and it was quite large. Hidden within the light of the Nexus, he sent a message to his Lord. It seemed that Leon Raime was moving a considerable number of troops out of his territory…