Enlightened Empire

Chapter 385: Peace Terms

After the lords had been sufficiently intimidated, they finally agreed to formal peace talks, though the place didn’t really change. Normally, a grand peace deal like this would be negotiated in an equally grand place, but that really wasn’t an option right now.

First, the obvious place would be to negotiate in Puscanacra. It was the old capital of the south, and the center of the league of lords rebellion. Saqartu mansion in the center of the city was also grand enough to hold such a symbolically important meeting.

However, Corco didn’t want to stimulate the defenders further by moving his army into Mayu’s city. They were already humiliated enough. If he overdid it, his own allied lords might feel unhappy. Also, if the locals or his soldiers were to be rash, they could cause a bloodbath that would make ruling the region in the future far more difficult.

And of course, he wouldn’t go into the city without his army, since he hadn’t occupied the place yet. He wasn’t so naive to think that he could come back out alive in that case. As Fadelio had said: People loved assassinating him. Plus, the negotiations should be held on the territory of the winning side anyways.

While Saniya was the obvious second option, Corco was short on time. He still hadn’t dealt with Ogulno or the Arcavians in the east, and he still didn’t know how the defense of Ichilia’s forces in the north had gone. Still, he couldn’t leave the end of his war with the league of lords unresolved. The more factions he could force out of this messy war early, the better.

Thus, he decided to hold the peace talks right in his own army’s camp, to set the basic direction of the kingdom’s future. More thorough negotiations over the details would be held in Saniya once he had cleaned up the rest of this messy war.

He let Mayu simply bring a large table and a bunch of chairs out from his mansion, and then had them set up in the largest tent the army had brought. Thus, the two sides of the war were assembled inside a tent that was stuffy from the smoke of the braziers meant to hold back the cold outside. On one end sat Mayu, with the other two remaining southern lords on either side of him.

It was the rather meager remains of the mighty league of lords that once contained half the lords of the southern kingdom. In comparison, the other side looked far more impressive. Corco sat in front, with representatives of his seven allied lords slightly behind. Some of them had participated in the last battle as commanders, which had helped Corco out a great deal. Others weren’t great fighters and had stayed behind in observing or administrative roles. However,all of them had come along for these negotiations. They didn’t want to miss out when it came to distributing the spoils of war.

Still, every one of them respected the king’s position as their clear leader, which was why none of them sat quite at the same height as Corco.

The king could hardly prevent himself from a small smirk. It wasn’t just the power tripping that did it. After years of hard work, boxed into his own little estate and with little direct influence over what the other lords were doing, it looked like he could now, finally,grasp proper control of the entire southern kingdom. With central control, so many plans that were previously unfeasible suddenly became possible. Finally, he could influence and guide his people on a grander scale.

Though before the armistice was signed, he needed to find out what had happened to the rest of the league’s army. The war was still going on after all. If he lost to some surprise attack after all this smugness, people would make annoying plays with ‘tragic flaws’ and ‘hubris’ about him in the future. Thus, he had to prepare for the rest of the war first.

“Right, thank you all for coming to my ted talk. Now, is someone going to tell me where the rest of your guys are?” he asked. “I mean, we’re meant to negotiate with the league of lords. Three people isn’t much of a league, is it?”

Predictably, Mayu still wasn’t cooperating and only glowered in his direction. By now it had been an hour or so since the threat, so the idiot had already forgotten his humility from before. At least there were still some more members of the league left, so Corco didn’t have to rely on his petty cousin.

“King Corcopaca, we truly do not know where the rest of our men have gone, or the rest of our allies,” lord number one replied. “If the report of your servants is true, then three more members of the league should still be alive, together with at least ten thousand warriors. Though we do not know where they are. Truly.”

Before Corco could be equal measures of annoyed and dejected, lord number two chimed in.

“In fact, this lord’s position on the front line was on the right flank. During the battle, this lord spotted Lord Ogulno’s men leave towards the south-east, long before the end of the conflict. Since he was the first to retreat, him and the other remaining lords may have fled east towards Kapra, together with the rest of the routed troops.”

Oh good. That’s just the guy I wanted to get away with a giant army in tow.

Apart from the sarcasm, there wasn’t really anything Corco could do in the short term. Whether Ogulno was still eager to fight or not, he would go catch his uncle either way. That was the reason he had to finish up these peace talks quickly, to eliminate any potential danger to his kingdom once and for all. Luckily, he was in a position to force his opinion on others, so the peace terms wouldn’t take long to work out.

“Right, in that case, we’ll just assume that the three of you represent the league of lords in these negotiations. Does that seem appropriate to everyone here?”

Of course, all three lords on the other side agreed. The fewer they were and the more estates they could represent, the more power they had here. If Corco demanded to much, they could just give away stuff from the other lords. This way, they could reduce their own losses in the peace talks. Whether their temporary allies of the alliance would be annoyed by that really wouldn’t matter to them. The alliance was dead already, so to them, it was far more beneficial to play nice with the victor to their opposite.

“Good, good,” Corco clapped his hands, as the scribe to the side got ready to finally start recording the contents of the meeting. “So let’s start with the obvious. With the ratification of the ceasefire agreement, the league of lords will be dissolved.”

“Of course,” one of the lords said. “No one here was ever interested in permanently opposing the crown. This was only a temporary agreement to begin with, only to steer the kingdom in a productive direction.”

“Also, illegal,” Corco added. Flattery wouldn’t help the lords here, and neither would lies. “You broke the laws of the kingdom, leading a rebellion against your king. Whether that was permanent or temporary doesn’t matter. Neither do your intentions. You will publicly renounce your previous actions, and I mean publicly. As in: the entire noble society of Medala will hear about it from your own mouths, including the people in Arguna up north.”

Finally, the two lords around Mayu weren’t quite so submissive anymore. They both looked awkward, while their governor looked angry again. Maybe they considered it a slight to their pride, but Corco didn’t care. If he wanted to take control of their estates without making even more enemies, he needed to appear just in his actions.

“What, you don’t like that?” he sneered. “Everyone already knows what happened in the south, more or less. For the details, I can spread the message of your betrayal myself. I have plenty of printing presses, to print the truth on paper and then distribute them in the capital. I’m letting you do it yourselves to do you a favor. You get to decide what goes on the paper, and how your apology looks. This way, at least you get to put your own spin on it, and present yourselves in as good a light as possible, without twisting the truth. If you don’t want to take advantage of that chance, then I’ll feel free to form your public image for you.”

The lords looked at each other for a second before Mayu replied with a sigh.

“No, that won’t be necessary. We will comply with all requirements.”

Maybe he knew what Corco had planned, how he planned to use the apology as an excuse to take power of their estates, but there wasn’t much the governor could do about it either way. The rebellion of the league of lords was already known throughout the empire. He couldn’t very well pretend it didn’t happen and completely ruin the reputation of his house. That was a path Lord Rupilo had gone down, whose entire family had been destroyed because of his bad reputation.

In their current situation, the only way for these lords to make themselves look better was to pretend that others were responsible for the rebellion and that they were, at worst, followers. In the process of their public ‘apologies’, Corco was convinced that they would accuse each other, thus breaking up their little alliance for good. Once they were divided, dominating them would become easy. Satisfied with the progress so far, the king continued.

“Good, with the basic admission of guilt, we can move on to the meat and bones of the our peace deal. What do you think of those supervisors you sent toSaniya?”

A small smile rose on Corco’s face as the lords opposite him began to sweat.

“Of course, the supervisors have already done a thorough inspection of the workshops in Saniya and have found everything to be in order,” one of them said. “There is no need to keep them any longer.”

“And the damage they’ve caused during their searches?” the king pressed on.

“The damage needs to be compensated. That is only proper.”

“Good, good. I’ll be sending you a bill then.” Corco laughed and then acted as if he had just remembered something.“Oh, and on the topic of supervisors, I’ll be sending some supervision to oversee your estates for as long as the peace talks last.”

“Impossible! Our lands will not be controlled by outsiders!” Finally, Mayu jumped up and screamed with that familiar bravado, but Corco only smiled in return. At this point, his cousin no longer had the qualifications to even argue with his king.

“Really,” he replied in a calm tone. “Why won’t you allow supervisors then? I’ve allowed your supervision because I have nothing to hide, but you can’t allow the same in your place? So what are you hiding then?Do you want to start another rebellion?”

Immediately, the other two lords raised their hands in panic.

“King Corcopaca, House Taruka has nothing to hide and welcomes the help of the supervisors.”

“House Aquitayasi is the same, great King.”

It was an accusation that could completely kill their house if it were to stick. Thus, the two lords fell over each other to deny the accusations. This time, Mayu had nothing to say anymore.

“Very good.” Compared to the changing moods of his enemies, Corco’s face hadn’t changed once during the talks. “Also, this war made me realize that there are many conflicts still lingering in the southern kingdom. To prevent something like this from happening again, we will take this chance to resolve all regional territorial disputes between the estates once and for all.”

As Corco watched the faces of the three people in front of him change from panic to anger again, he could feel the wide grins of the people behind him. These lords had supported him from the start, when his victory hadn’t been guaranteed yet. Since they had helped him out so early, of course they would get the benefits to match their effort. Thus, Corco had long worked out a number of measures to do them some favors.

For one, they wouldn’t be forced into supervision and servitude like the other lords who had opposed him. After all, he still didn’t have enough administrators to control the entire kingdom by himself. These lords could still act as administrators on their estates, at least for the time being.

He had also planned to offload some of the lesser industries from Saniya, and the capitals of these lords would be the first places he would consider for relocation. Most importantly though, he would use this excuse of ‘resolving territorial disputes’ to take land from his enemies and hand it to his allies.

It was no surprise that the lords on the other side of the table were angry. Though of course, there wasn’t much the losers of the war could do, and Corco would make sure that they wouldn’t get a chance to plan their revenge in silence.

“Of course, we cannot only take,” the king thus said. “Although you have been defeated, we are still equal lords of the southern kingdom. Thus, to show our goodwill and guarantee the peace of the kingdom, the defeated league of lords will receive its own benefits. First, your titles and houses will be retained within the kingdom’s system. Second, every member of the league of lords will receive a free mansion in Saniya, which they are very encouraged to use all year round. In particular, the upcoming peace talks will be held in Saniya, so the lords will be escorted to stay there until the end of the talks.”

“Are we under house arrest?” Again, Mayu tried to sound angry, but it felt a lot less intense than before. Maybe he had finally understood his true position.

“Of course not,” Corco lied. “This is just a convenience provided by me to you for the peace talks. Also, it’ll reduce the distance we have to travel to visit each other. It’ll create a better, more harmonious kingdom, don’t you think? We are all southern lords, so we should stick together.”

Of course that was a lie, and everyone at the table knew it. Still, if these people knew what was good for them, they wouldn’t take a single step outside of Saniya in the future. With them far away from their homes and with Corco’s supervisors in charge of their estates, he would become the de facto ruler of these places. Thus, he would be able to finally take control and implement the many policies he had planned out for so long. After all this time, Corco finally had proper control over his own kingdom.