Liv had sent a secret letter to the Estuary Governor but had yet to receive a reply.
Currently, she was in the General Affairs Office of the Shipbuilding Bureau, continuously drafting various possibilities.
Liv had requested her subordinates to explain the techniques and patterns of navigating the Great River.
Afterward, she had sought out professional books to read.
Finally, she reached a conclusion.
If the supplies obtained at the Great River’s estuary were sufficient, the fleet could potentially enter the heart of the kingdom’s inland waters with only two or three resupplies, even while sailing upstream without wind.
Furthermore, the drafts of the inland gunboats and transport ships were not particularly deep.
It was now late summer, and the meltwater from the snow-capped mountains was surging and powerful.
The water level of the Great River was at its deepest point.
Under these conditions, their navigation might not even require trackmen for towing.
Though it felt somewhat like circular reasoning, the fact that they did not need trackmen indeed suggested that this was a covert operation.
There was a high probability that the Republic was not simply transporting goods for the Frostweave Kingdom.
This was an attack.
On the other hand, clues regarding the Mount Domiloty, a capital ship, interfered with Liv’s judgment.
It was an old capital ship with a three-tier gun deck that had recently undergone non-destructive maintenance.
It had also taken on an unusually large amount of supplies.
If this capital ship wanted to sail upstream, it would be no simple matter.
Trackmen, barges, and even manual dredging of the riverbed would likely be necessary.
‘Could it be that the Republic isn’t planning to attack the Frostweave Kingdom?’
Liv spread out a map.
Judging by the fleet’s endurance, if they headed west, where would they attack?
Would they attack the Kingdom of Camelot?
If so, was it logical?
Was it necessary?
Liv knew about the previous intimidation tactics against Camelot.
That operation had been handled by Emilia herself, with the goal of domestic damage control—quelling the public’s fear after the Garden Street shelling by redirecting their hatred outward.
‘Could this also be to eliminate the people’s fear of the Frostweave Kingdom?’
It seemed unlikely—highly unlikely.
Relations with the Frostweave Kingdom were already strained; why would they simultaneously antagonize the Kingdom of Camelot?
It was simply irrational.
Through Prince Jagiellon’s speeches, her own reading, and the bedtime stories Tess told her, Liv knew the history.
During the roaring “Great Reclamation” movement of the past, the Kingdom of Camelot had launched a counteroffensive against the Eternal Dynasty.
The knights of Camelot, mocked by the Elves as “beggar knights,” had been left destitute by blockades.
Unable to meticulously maintain their gear, they had emerged from the depths of the Stretching Mountains — which ran from north to south — wearing tattered armor and cloth.
They began to contest the lands on the eastern side of the mountains, inch by inch, against the Elven colonial army.
From the foothills of the mountains to the alluvial plains, from the crisscrossing hills to the endless dense forests, pieces of land were reclaimed and granted to the meritorious knights and military nobles.
But sometimes, a Marcher Lord on the front lines might be killed during an overnight counterattack by the Elven army, his entire family slaughtered within their castle.
That movement had lasted for 1,000 years.
In the end, the warriors who liberated the ancestral lands of the Frostweave Kingdom were actually minor nobles or second sons of the Kingdom of Camelot who had no inheritance rights.
The current King Wadyslaw and Prince Jagiellon were descended from those great families who had been granted land during the founding of the Frostweave Kingdom.
However, just as the Great River flows and its course changes, the current Kingdom of Camelot and the Frostweave Kingdom were no longer so close.
In fact, there was a certain amount of animosity between them.
A deceased king of Camelot had once tried to interfere with the election of the king by the Sejm, attempting to install his own younger brother as the King of the Frostweave Kingdom.
That had been a major incident.
The original Piast Dynasty lost the throne because of it and eventually saw its bloodline end.
The younger brother, serving as king, was unable to establish a stable dynasty; it lasted for only three generations.
Shortly after his grandson took the throne, the regime was overthrown.
The Kazimierz Dynasty rose as new nobility and has continued to this day.
But the Kazimierz Dynasty felt no gratitude for the “help” of the Camelot Dynasty; instead, they began to distance themselves from the Kingdom of Camelot.
Therefore, Liv believed that Domenico would never truly attack the Kingdom of Camelot.
All things considered, having eliminated every impossibility, the Republic’s final target was almost certainly locked in.
As she thought of this, more than half of the truth had been unraveled.
The remaining small piece of the puzzle was why Tess and Julia were keeping it from her.
Logically, the Republic’s military operations had nothing to do with her.
As the Queen of the Elves, Liv would not be in an awkward or ambiguous position because of this action.
‘So, why? What is the role of Julia and Tess in this operation?’
Julia was the Vice Commander of the Home Fleet, directly assisting Emilia.
This meant she would definitely have access to the core of the plan.
In other words, even the most minute details of the plan had likely been scrutinized or drafted by her hand.
She did not want Liv to know.
Tess, in fact, held the channel of communication with the actual wielder of power—her mother, the Regent—while Liv had no way to communicate with the Regent directly.
At the very least, if Liv wrote a letter in her capacity as Queen, she would receive a respectful but bureaucratic response.
Tess, however, could have heart-to-heart conversations with her mother.
She also did not want Liv to know.
This meant that the Republic and the Kingdom of Elves might have already reached an agreement on this matter—an agreement that went deep.
And the result of this collusion was something Julia and Tess were unwilling to let her know.
‘Why are they unwilling to let me know?’
Liv could not understand it at all, but based on her trust in Tess and Julia, she deduced another possibility.
Not letting her know was their way of protecting her.
It might be to protect her safety, or perhaps to protect her heart.
‘Yes, protecting my heart.’
They didn’t want her to cry or break down, as had happened frequently in the past.
If that was the case, this matter might be very dark indeed.
The worst-case scenario Liv could speculate was that the Elves were going to send legions to assist the Republic in its attack, or perhaps the Elves would even serve as the main force.
This would completely violate the series of peace treaties signed when the Eternal Dynasty was defeated.
The entire continent would once again view the Elves as a fundamental threat.
But this was also highly irrational.
The Regent was certainly not stupid enough to let the Elves become the target of public criticism once again.
Thinking of this, Liv’s head throbbed painfully.
She tapped her forehead and swallowed large gulps of hot tea.
At this point, Liv understood the good intentions of Tess and Julia.
Their desire to keep her in the dark was not intended to harm her.
If that was the case, she would temporarily label this “very dark result” as a placeholder, much like filling in a blank.
It was enough just to know the situation existed.
She would leave the rest to time.
Liv’s investigation had reached a temporary stopping point.
The conclusion she reached was that the Republic would dispatch an expeditionary force composed of the Republic Guard and mercenaries.
They might even send civilians to the battlefield to launch a surprise attack on the Kingdom’s territory to relieve pressure from the north.
And the Kingdom of Elves would likely be implicated in the matter.
Premium Chapter
Login to buy access to this Chapter.