Civil War – Christine Daquiten (1)
The battle ended with Mirbeau’s soldiers losing their will to fight and fleeing or surrendering after seeing their lord acting prisoner.
The most unfair face in the world that Mirbeau’s second son showed just before he fainted was very impressive.
Actually, I feel unfair too.
Even before my regression, I thought I was an idiot.
As the only heir to the ‘Blue Knight’, the strongest in the kingdom, I have been subject to all kinds of expectations since I was young, but I was defeated by a commoner at the knight’s festival, the first stage to showcase my skills, and was reduced to the disgrace of a nobleman.
The enraged marquis made Gaston, the winner, a knight, but imprisoned him in the estate with me under the pretext of being my guard knight.
When I think of how I timidly wasted my time thinking I was an idiot until the marquis died and I had no choice but to stand on the front lines myself…
I just shook my head and watched the soldiers picking up the casualties and prisoners. I found the captain who had previously commanded the Aquitaine army.
From the looks of it, it doesn’t seem like he’s even a knight.
I asked them not to send important greetings, but I think this is a bit too much for an ally.
“This is Pierre de Lafayette, the Young Marquis. Are you in charge?”
“I meet the Young Marquis of Lafayette. I’m sorry, but that’s not true. Please wait a moment.”
“hmm?”
The captain bowed to me and approached a carriage that looked like it was for nobles, unlike the other carts. He told me inside and opened the door.
Wasn’t that brought here as a trick?
While I was thinking that, I froze when I saw a woman in a light dress getting out of the carriage.
“Uh…”
The woman got off the carriage on her own feet, ignoring the captain’s outstretched hand, and while holding a pistol with both hands that did not match her dress, she glanced around, frowned, and covered her mouth with her hand.
Why on earth is she here?
The time I was in a daze was short.
Perhaps she soon got used to the bloody smell, she lowered her hand and when we made eye contact, she handed the pistol to the captain and turned towards me.
A woman with black hair and dark eyes lightly lifts the hem of her dress and bows slightly.
“Greetings from Christine D’Aquitaine, daughter of the Count of Aquitaine. “It’s been a while since I saw you, Marquis So.”
My fiancee, who was sick before returning, is facing me.
“Greetings from Pierre de Lafayette, son of the Marquis de Lafayette. Long time no see, Young….”
“Woo!”
My words were cut off by the sound of vomiting from a woman who appeared to be a maid who got off the carriage after her.
No, what on earth is this?
Christine glanced at her maid with an awkward expression for a moment, then quickly corrected her expression and opened her mouth with an elegant smile.
“If you don’t mind, may I ask you to explain what this situation is?”
…I’m a bit curious about that too.
–
As always, I publicly requested the County of Aquitaine to purchase supplies, but dispatched a separate messenger to tell them that an attack was expected, so they should strengthen their defenses but not send any important personnel.
Although he did not see the messenger’s return in order to meet the time, Jeon Seo-gu also confirmed that he had delivered it to the count’s family before heading out.
It can be interpreted that the County of Aquitaine acted passively due to concerns about loss of power, as the defense of the escort procession was so weak that the request was worthless.
If the goods were properly transported to the marquis’ territory, it can be argued that the marquis is responsible even if the goods cannot be protected afterwards.
However, it is strange that the person responsible for that dangerous procession is Christine.
If I didn’t get it right in time or lost the battle, she could have been taken prisoner, or worse, killed or injured in battle.
At the very least, if she was embarrassed by the attack or jumped out of the carriage in panic, I wouldn’t have been able to fight properly to protect her.
What if a fiancée from an ally family came as the person in charge of the commercial business requested by the marquis, but she was attacked by the marquis’ territory and it went wrong…
Just imagining it sends shivers down my spine.
After listening to my explanation, Christine was lost in thought for a while with a serious expression on her face, and then said just one word.
“I hope the messenger returns safely to the marquis’ residence.”
And after returning to the marquis’ residence after escorting her superiors, I received a report that the messenger had not returned.
–
The marquis’s living room.
Damien de Mirbeau had a red face and his mouth was trembling.
“Transfer the taxation rights of three villages for 10 years?”
Christine responded by nodding her head coolly at him.
“yes. If you do so, we will provide not only the ransom and compensation owed by the Count Mirbeau to the Marquis de Lafayette, but also the military supplies to be sent to Count Mirbeau at the front. “Lump sum payment.”
I leisurely savored my coffee while watching Damien squirm.
Well, it smells good because it was brought in through the Aquitaine.
“Don’t say nonsense! “If it’s a 10-year tax right, it will be several times that much!”
In response to Damien’s struggles, Christine took a leisurely sip of coffee as if she were imitating me and put it down on the table with a loud bang.
“Lord Mirbeau. This news probably hasn’t reached Count Mirbeau yet. “Not yet.”
Christine, who spoke with a very deliberate interruption, soon added with an extremely elegant smile.
“But what would happen if you found out that the prince you trusted and entrusted your territory to took all his knights and troops and did something he didn’t ask you to do, and was taken prisoner and had to return from the front to pay the ransom rather than procure military funds?”
“That…”
Christine continued speaking slowly as she watched Damien’s pupils shake mercilessly.
“The honorable Count can’t bear the stigma of being called a kinslayer, so please pay the ransom. However, the wrath of His Highness the Second Prince that the count will incur as a result, and the waste of all the goods consumed in the civil war… I am worried that I will later hear news that the Duke has experienced something ‘unfortunate’. … Sincerely.”
…Your face looks really worried.
Christine looked at Damien, who was now completely bloodshot and unable to speak, and was in awe.
“As someone who is not a successor, I also understand the Duke’s position well. Of course the right to tax is important, but it doesn’t belong to the public anyway, right? For now. However, if you accept my proposal as the acting lord, the Duke will first send military funds to the Count to buy time and have a chance to somehow make up for this.”
In the end, Damien answered with a rotting face.
“Now, just give me a moment. “I will think about it.”
“Of course, Lord Mirbeau. But keep in mind, time is money. “It is a tax right that will be returned after 10 years anyway, and depending on the public’s choice, the person who receives it may also become the public.”
Damien left the parlor following the guidance of the valet and watchman with a look on his face that had lost his soul.
“As you can see, it happened like this, Marquis So. If Prince Mirbeau accepts, the ransom and compensation will be sent by the Count of Aquitaine.”
…Maybe that person has no choice but to accept it.
I clicked my tongue and answered Christine.
“All right. Originally, I promised to share a portion of the ransom and compensation we would receive for the risks borne by the Count of Aquitaine, but…”
Christine replied with a self-deprecating smile.
“I wasn’t told that part, and I benefited from being involved in this matter, so I’ll make it up to you like it never happened.”
With that, she sipped her coffee in silence and looked at me.
After an exchange of searching glances and a fairly long silence.
Christine bowed her head to me.
“I’m sorry, Marquis So. “The engagement will be broken off.”
I sighed.
What she said on the way back in the carriage.
-I hope the messenger returns safely to the marquis’ residence.
After thinking about that statement, I came to the same conclusion.
The messenger clearly delivered my secret letter to the count’s family. After that, Jeon Seo-gu was also sent.
However, rather than increasing the number of guards at the top, the Count of Aquitaine sent only a small number of guards and even sent Christine as the person in charge.
“…The Count has never received a secret letter, and is the Marquis’ decree claiming responsibility for putting you and the merchant in danger?”
Christine saw my reaction and her eyes lit up.
“…I didn’t expect you to understand it so quickly.”
I thought for a while, but when I saw her reaction, I realized I was wrong.
Before returning. A few months from now, Christine passed away.
I thought that when she became ill, her marriage alliance with the Aquitaine family was naturally broken.
But now, sitting in front of me, she looks very smart and healthy.
He doesn’t seem like a person who would die suddenly and prematurely.
Maybe she was murdered rather than sick.
What I planned this time was to give them a reason to get rid of her without doing anything, or even to break off the engagement with the marquis.
“Lady, I thought the two families had quite the same interests…”
The Marquis de Lafayette is a family of ‘blue knights’ who rose from being just knights to show off their overwhelming inaction.
The Counts of Aquitaine are a family of merchants from the city, and were created by buying a title from a fallen nobleman after making a huge amount of money.
Both are families alienated from the mainstream so-called pure-blooded high-ranking nobles in central politics.
Lafayette of force, Aquitaine of plutocracy. We are allies who complement each other, so my engagement with Christine was decided when we were both very young.
“It used to be like that. “We operate a lot of upper echelons, and we always have to have a good number of guards following us, and we don’t have enough knights, so the alliance with the marquis has been a strong support.”
Christine sighed a little as she said that and then added.
“But what about now? We have kept our alliance obligations for the past three years since the civil war broke out and have been steadily providing military funds and supplies to your family, but the army that the marquis is proud of is busy participating in the civil war in the north. In fact, Yeongji and we are in the background.”
indeed. Am I being overly optimistic just because it is a blood alliance that has been going on for quite some time?
After a moment of silence, Christine slowly opened her mouth.
“…I thought my engagement with the marquis might be broken off. But I didn’t know that I would be used as a card to destroy it.”
Christine’s tone when she said that was casual.
However, the sadness and anger she could not hide was clearly visible on her face.
I was wondering what to do to comfort her, but then stopped.
How can I, who grew up as the only heir, understand how she feels?
Plus, I was feeling pretty discouraged.
3 years of civil war. In order to maintain the war, the lords plundered each other’s territories and undermined each other’s strength. Meanwhile, the city’s wealthy merchants gradually became independent by lending money or purchasing autonomy from the lords who lacked military funds.
Nowadays, even high-ranking nobles cannot arbitrarily exert influence on the city.
In the end, at the end of the civil war, the national power was completely destroyed, and the royal family and nobles, who had no money to spare, even invaded wealthy cities, and a revolution broke out. Right now, the key figures in the revolution are wealthy people from cities.
The origins of Raphael Balian, the commander-in-chief of the revolutionary army, are unclear, but considering that, unlike nobles, he was skilled in warfare using gunpowder weapons, it is highly likely that he was from a city that relied on gunpowder weapons instead of knights or wizards.
The Aquitaine family, which rose from city merchants to nobility, naturally has deep ties to many cities, and its extensive trade network also means an information network. They can serve as a point of connection with city forces.
So, the Count of Aquitaine played a very important role in the plan I made…
“…I feel quite dirty.”
After a long period of silence, the un-noble words she spoke expressed my feelings.
“Even if the heir to the family was not my mother but another woman’s child, I tried to be a good older sister to that child. “I tried to be very nice to the countess.”
Christine, who had said that, smiled self-deprecatingly.
“I had no complaints about the arranged marriage. “I really had no intention of aiming for the earldom, and I only managed the upper chamber and assisted my father with the thought of serving my family until I got married.”
She is the daughter of a deceased former countess, and the current heir is the son of his second wife. Of course, there is quite a difference in age.
Even when I was timidly confined to the estate, I felt that she was capable after only a few meetings, and that she had enough influence to manage the top of the family.
It would be no wonder that Count So’s mother and her followers regarded her as a threat.
“Before leaving, I smiled at the child and said I would buy him a gift from the Marquis. … I never even imagined being stabbed in the back like this.”
The moment I heard that, I made up my mind.
What did you come back for?
I have information that I couldn’t normally know.
Can’t use Aquitaine? Then why not just make Aquitaine usable?
“Lady Aquitaine.”
I made a suggestion while looking at Christine, who was filled with self-destruction.
“Let’s form an alliance.”
“…The betrothal alliance between the marquis and the count will be broken?”
“So let’s make a new one. Not the marquis and the count, but us. “I will be your strength.”
In just a moment, the self-destruction was washed away from Christine’s face.
“The engagement will be broken and I am not the heir to the family. What does the Little Marquis need?”
She said she had no intention of aiming for the Countess of Aquitaine.
But regardless of her will, they regarded her as an enemy.
“A Countess who will help me with the influence of the Aquitaine family.”
When Christine heard what I said, many emotions instantly flashed through her eyes.
But in the end.
At the end, what appeared at the corner of her mouth was a bright, almost poisonous smile.
“This wasn’t the gift I wanted to buy for my cute little brother.”
?
