For a moment, silence ruled, no one taking the opportunity to speak. The situation was too complicated, too risky.
It looked like I had to take the lead. “Liam, what’s the situation with our metal reserves, and what’s our current production capabilities for melee weaponry?”
Liam looked surprised. “Are we going to focus on the melee weapons?”
“We have to,” I answered. “Cannons are useful, but they consume resources aggressively. We don’t have the capability to equip all those towns on short notice. Mana-alloy weapons are the better choice.”
He stopped for a moment. “If we mobilize everyone to melee weapon production, we should be able to push the production numbers to a hundred thousand daily,” he said. “But, the mana density of the weapons wouldn’t be too high, and the durability will be suspect as well.”
“That has to be enough,” I said. “Split the production into two tiers, and try to produce a high-quality weapon for every fifty low-quality ones. Arming the elites appropriately will be helpful as well.”
Liam nodded. “Should I leave to oversee it?” he asked.
“Do you have anything critical about the other topics?” I asked. He shook his head. “Then, go and oversee the production. The sooner we retool our production lines, the better.”
“What’s next?” I asked.
“We need to decide the minimum number that we are going to keep to defend ourselves,” Harold added. “We should keep at least seventy percent of our power at home. The heretics or Drakka might use it as an opportunity to attack us again.”
Maria interrupted, her gaze sharp. “Defending the town is essential, but if we let every other settlement collapse, we’ll be left surrounded, while all around us, the dungeon breaks would trigger bigger and bigger monster waves. We can’t be shortsighted.”
“We can’t overextend either,” Harold countered. “Drakkans are waiting for an opportunity to attack us, and they proved they are not above cooperating with those heretics. We have to keep the elites in town.”
Eleanor, who had been listening quietly, spoke next. “No, we should do the exact opposite. We should send the elites out, and keep the novices in here. That solves both issues.”
“What do you mean?” Maria asked. “It doesn’t make sense.”
Eleanor looked at me, and I nodded, encouraging her to explain. “We can’t let anyone below level fifty explore the area. The dungeon breaks are too dangerous in the wild. Only by sending teams strong enough to resist the beasts, we could assure their success.”
“But, that would weaken our defenses too much,” Harold replied.
“Only for a day or two,” Eleanor replied. “Each passing day, stronger monsters will attack us, and the defenders will level up faster and faster. Our forces will recover soon, and until then, we have the necessary reserves to hold on against an attack.”
That launched a brief yet heated argument about the specifics, including the ideal number of elites that would be assigned to each town, dungeon patrol teams, and several other critical questions.
“A good plan,” I approved once the discussion settled. Neither Harold nor Maria looked too happy with the compromise, but they were also not strictly against it. The best we could do under the restrictions.
“Good,” Eleanor said, and she stood up. “By your leave, I’ll go and deal with organizing the teams, my king,” she declared. I nodded, absolutely hating the seriousness of her tone when she referred to my title. She left.
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I looked around the table. “What’s the next part?” I asked.
“The logistics of food delivery,” Terry replied. “With the sudden rise of the levels, the food requirements will jump as well. Especially once they lose most of the farms to the beasts. Their reserves won’t hold for long.”
“Do we have the necessary reserves to sappy them?” I asked.
Rebecca answered. “We do, but the delivery will be a challenge,” she said. “Weapons are one thing, but to supply multiple towns … even the steam cars won’t be enough.”
“For the moment, let’s load the cars with vitality-dense food, making the most out of the limited space. It should keep them going for a few days.”
“Then what?” Rosie asked.
I sighed. “I don’t know. Maybe we could try to expand the paths through dungeons. Or, maybe we could try to install railroads that could reach away. Either way, it’s not urgent. It’ll depend on…” I started, then passed for a moment, the weight of the words I was about to say hitting me hard. “It’ll depend on how many towns could survive after the disaster.”
For a moment, everyone fell silent. It was easy to get lost in the details, but the enormity of the challenge we were facing was suffocating.
Maria leaned forward. “True. Trade alone won’t work if they’re overrun in days. We should focus on developing their combat capabilities, and hope that their higher leveled farmers could sustain them..”
“Maybe we should just annex the willing towns, and move them closer. Trying to create safe zones,” Terry offered.
Spencer, his notebook clutched to his chest, spoke hesitantly. “If we annex them, we’ll stretch our logistic chain even thinner. We don’t know how bad things would get. Do we want to make such a commitment?”
Logan, usually quiet, finally raised his voice. “What about the cities?”
All eyes turned to him.
“We can’t ignore Drakka and Asterion forever,” he continued calmly. “They’re still the regional powers. Maybe this is the moment to approach them, not as subordinates, but as equals. They need us. Doesn’t it give us leverage?.”
Rosie replied. “In theory, yes. The problem is that we suspect Drakka of supporting the heretics in the first place. Maybe not their leaders, but at least one or two legion commanders.”
“Are we sure?” Terry asked. “Because we have a lot riding on that assumption.”
“We don’t have any direct evidence,” Rosie replied. “But, analyzing everything together, it explains a lot, including why Drakka suddenly started their merciless warfare, and why they tried to destroy us in the process. They didn’t want us to stabilize the region while they were keeping Asterion occupied.”
Maria frowned. “That means we have an even bigger target on our backs.”
“It doesn’t change anything,” I cut in. “We will still save everyone we can.”
Maria nodded, realizing that her line of argument was going in a dangerous direction.”
Rosie replied. “It’s not too bad. Even if Drakka wins, their victory wouldn’t be without cost, and they will still suffer from the regional chaos. We will have a window, one that should last longer than a month.”
“A month,” I said, nodding. “We can do a lot in a month.” Including a way to enable Ascension. Previously, it was a lesser priority due to our lack of high-level dungeons. But, with the number of corrupted monsters increasing, leveling would get easier and easier.
We could do a lot if we could mass-produce ascended soldiers.
“We have our strategic direction,” I declared. “All that remains is the tactical distribution.”
Rosie nodded. “We await our orders, my king,” she declared.
“Maria, you need to be ready to respond to any disaster in your movement range. I’ll handle the protection of the town, playing to my mana regeneration. Harold will handle the defense organization. Rosie, you’re responsible for keeping an eye on the war.”
Then, I turned to my students. ”Jessica will handle scouting the possible dungeon breaks, to see if we could prevent them from occurring near us. Logan, you’ll be on standby, to respond to monster waves and dungeon crises as necessary. Rebecca, you will be responsible for expanding the farms, both in the dungeon and outside. We have to increase our food production. Terry will be responsible for overseeing the whole team, and support as necessary.”
“How about me, sir,” Spencer asked, looking tense.
“I want you to continue working on your spell archive project,” I replied. He looked dissatisfied. “That project is too critical for our long-term survival. You have to keep going,” I declared, my tone too sharp to broker no argument. “Wars are won by not what you had when you start them, but what you can use at the end of it. We need to understand spellcasting if we ever to defeat Drakka and the rest.”
He nodded, though reluctant.
“Perfect,” I declared as I stood up. “You all have your tasks. Now, go save the world.”
But, when everyone left, I collapsed back to my seat, wondering how many people I had just condemned to death. I wanted to close my eyes and lose myself in the depression, but I stood soon after.
Time was not a luxury we could afford.