Wizard: This witcher is neglecting his duties.

Chapter 318 The Prelude to the Civil War

Time flies at Aretusa Academy; more than a month has passed in the blink of an eye.

During this period, aside from occasionally cheating on Triss with the incredibly attractive Principal Margarita a few times, Wayne spent most of his time studying magic and secretly copying magic books in the library.

Because of his close relationship with Margarita, Wayne had access to almost all the books in the library. Except for those forbidden books, he could freely browse any book he wanted without supervision.

The promise with the witch Lani is now half fulfilled.

Of course, Lord Wayne wasn't the kind of person who liked to get something for nothing. Having taken such a big advantage, he had to give something in return.

Following in-depth discussions with the current principal, Ms. Margarita, and with her support, the Wayne Chamber of Commerce will replace the previous suppliers providing materials to the college and establish a branch office in Bridgehead, near Aretusa College.

Not only will it provide some security services for the female students in the academy, but it will also supply the academy with more goods from all over the world.

To show his sincerity, the Chamber of Commerce offered the college preferential prices, guaranteeing not only the quality but also a more comprehensive selection of goods than before.

Of course, this is a win-win policy, not only does the Chamber of Commerce make contributions, but the Academy will also provide a lot of support to the Wayne Chamber of Commerce.

One of the most important points is that the female students in the academy will be employed by the merchant guild, using the knowledge they learn at school to provide magical services for the Wayne Merchant Guild.

Although these students have limited abilities, not everyone can become an elite sorceress like Triss or Yennefer.

However, as magic apprentices with spellcasting abilities, they can still do things that ordinary people cannot.

For example, they can use magic divination, magic communication, spirit communication rituals, magic rituals, and even teleportation to a limited extent.

In such a barbaric and backward medieval world, even a magic apprentice could play a significant role in certain situations, making him worthy of being courted by the merchant guild.

Moreover, after these female sorceresses graduate, not every one of them will be able to become a royal advisor; most of them will still have to engage in other undesirable jobs.

If we can build good relationships with them during their apprenticeship, they will be more easily useful to the Wayne Merchant Guild after they graduate.

This is a sure-fire way to make money.

During this month, Wayne lived a rather leisurely life, almost oblivious to the world around him, focusing solely on studying classical texts.

However, the attention of the entire northern kingdoms was drawn by an unexpected war.

A month ago, Count Kahn's defeat led to half of the Kingdom of Cordwin falling into the hands of King Demavi of Aden, something the other northern kings could have foreseen.

However, just half a month later, while Demavia was gloating over looting the spoils of war and dealing with the chaos in the southern part of the Kingdom of Cordwin, a powerful army in black suddenly crossed the Pontal River, swiftly defeated the garrisons of several cities in the Kingdom of Aden, defeated several high nobles, and occupied those cities.

The speed was so fast that almost no one could react in time.

By the time Demavi received the news, nearly a third of Aden's territory had fallen into the hands of this army, plunging the entire country into chaos.

What shocked Demacia and the other northern kings even more was that the army was far larger than they had imagined.

Just like this time when the Aden army marched on Cordwin, the battle between the two great powers was already the largest war in the north in recent years.

However, both sides had only a few thousand troops, and almost half of them were farmers who had been hastily recruited, with only a few thousand being truly elite soldiers.

The amount of food consumed during wartime is unimaginable for ordinary farmers. This scale of army was the norm in the Middle Ages. After all, most farmers in the world could barely feed themselves after paying taxes, let alone support a large number of soldiers.

Aside from noble lords who could afford to support a group of full-time soldiers and knights, probably only some wealthy merchants could afford to keep guards as a form of protection.

Even kings find it difficult to raise an army of over a thousand men in a short period of time; it takes half a month or even a month of mobilization to achieve this.

However, this army that crossed the river from the south not only possessed superior weapons and equipment, but also had a larger number of soldiers than most people had imagined.

Judging from the reports from the scouts alone, this army has more than 40,000 soldiers, far exceeding the total number of soldiers in the Kingdom of Aden at this time, and by more than double, almost a numerical crushing victory.

Even if King Demavie didn't need to regroup his troops and could immediately set off from Cordwin back to Aden, given the disparity in their strength, it would be impossible for them to defeat this southern army and reclaim their territory.

In an instant, King Demavia's excitement vanished, and he was completely dumbfounded.

He racked his brains but still couldn't figure out why this suddenly appearing army would attack Aden. And because it happened so suddenly, he still didn't know which country this army came from or what power it belonged to. He had only heard that it came from the south, but he wasn't sure which kingdom in the south it was.

Although the northern kingdoms are constantly at war due to territorial disputes and various conflicts frequently arise, most of them are minor skirmishes that are not worth mentioning.

Moreover, most of these kings were short-sighted, focusing only on their own small territory and at most paying attention to other neighboring countries. They knew very little about the southern kingdoms and basically paid no attention to them.

So it wasn't just King Demavie who was bewildered this time. Apart from a few kings who had trade relations with the southern kingdoms, most of the rulers in the north were completely clueless about the origin of this army. They could only immediately send out a large number of scouts and use all their connections to investigate the origin of this army.

However, Lord Wayne, who was far away on Thaned Isle, was not among these people.

Several years ago, he, like the elven sorceress Francesca, began to lay out plans in the Southern Kingdom, establishing many trade routes and planting many intelligence agents. Although they could not be said to have connections everywhere, they were still able to investigate some major events that occurred in the Southern Kingdom.

Originally, the two estimated that the Civil War would not break out for several more years, so they did not focus their attention on it.

However, to Wayne's surprise, for some unknown reason, the usurper, who was clearly not fully prepared, suddenly began mobilizing his army a month ago, thus beginning the Civil War.

Moreover, this southern emperor, who successfully seized the throne after a military officer's rebellion, was indeed quite shrewd.

Taking advantage of King Demavi's expedition to Aden, and with the enemy army away and the country vulnerable, they achieved considerable success with almost no effort.

This set a good precedent for the Civil War.

(End of this chapter)