“Your majesty,” Johan began, “if we managed to prepare an army large enough to hold the goblins back by ourselves, then future generations will sing your praises for all eternity. But I must warn you. Goblins aren’t a foe that can be taken lightly. We will not be able to create a strong enough army. This, I can guarantee.”

  Varre raised an eyebrow. “Huh. I thought you didn’t believe the goblins would ever make it here.”

  The treasurer grimaced. “I still don’t, to be completely honest. No army has ever crossed the Gomera Forest. The only ones who managed it are small bands of powerful adventurers and even they take a massive gamble each time!”

  “Then what do you suggest?” the king asked, “are the goblins a threat or not.”

  “They are!” Johan barked out, a little louder than he intended to, “of course they are. If they ever make it here, it would be absolutely catastrophic. But the odds of that are low,” he sighed, “I just don’t want us wasting exorbitant amounts of money chasing ghosts.

  “No matter how much money we spend, it will make little difference in the end. The goblins will ravage the countryside in the months it will take for reinforcements to arrive. We won’t stop them, whether we send two, or five, or even ten thousand against them. That’s a fact.

  “We could empty our entire treasury on hiring thousands of soldiers and mercenaries, but can we predict exactly when the enemy will arrive? If we’re wrong, then we’ll run out of cash before the war even begins. And if we’re too cautious, then the men won’t be ready in time. The goblins will burn through the kingdom while we’re still waiting on equipment to arrive.”

  “I’m not saying we should break the bank on this single issue,” Varre argued, “I’m aware that this is a threat that may never come to pass. But you know that I didn’t create this army to fight goblins alone. They are meant to defend the kingdoms from all threats.

  “We agreed on two thousand men before and this is the number we are working towards. I see no reason to increase it. At least not yet. For now, we will continue to monitor the situation in the Elven kingdoms. However, if there’s anything easy and cheap that we could do to better prepare the army we have today, I’d like to hear it.”

  “We still don’t know how the soldiers should fight, your majesty,” Hakon spoke up, “we could choose their gear to be better suited against goblins.”

  “That’s not a bad idea,” the king nodded slowly, “I’ll admit, I know little about our enemy. Tell me, how do they fight exactly?”

  “If you’re curious your majesty, I recommend reading through the tomes I provided,” Marna said, gesturing at the books laid out on the table, “but I don’t think this is something we should discuss here. We need experienced generals. Or scholars, who’ve studied the Goblin Wars.”

  “Or adventurers,” Elvira chimed in, “their libraries are rather extensive. And they often travel to other nations. I’m sure they know people who personally thought against those monsters.”

  “Fair enough,” Varre conceded, “ I suppose we can’t have a proper war meeting without my head commander. In that case, Benjamin, could you please arrange this?”

  “Certainly, your majesty,” the chamberlain nodded.

  “Anastasia, I want you to work with Elvira. Continue talking to Sofia, that elven mystic in Ashbourne. Maintain good relations with the elves and try to learn anything you can about their war,”

  “Of course,” the chancellor inclined her head, before smiling at the Court Mage.

  “Alright then,” the king rubbed his hands, “we’ve got the most pressing matter out of the way. What else shall we discuss today? I have been gone for quite a while.”

  “Your majesty, if I may. I’d like to start with your proposed land reform,” Johan leaned forward in his seat.

  “If you’ve come to argue against it, I think it’s a little late,” Varre pointed out.

  “I know,” the treasurer paused to wipe his glasses, “I’ve done the estimates together with the Head Merchant, and we’ve come to the conclusion that it shouldn’t be… catastrophic.”

  “I see you have a very optimistic mindset,” the king smirked.

  Johan raised his hands defensively. “Please don’t misunderstand, your majesty. It is my job to be cautious with your finances. Many of your predecessors failed by emptying their coffers on well-intentioned projects that were too ambitious and I’d simply like to avoid that.”

  “Hmm… you do have a point,” Varre replied, “then tell me. What did your estimates show exactly.”

  “It’s hard to calculate the exact results. No one has attempted anything like this before. At least not at this scale,” the treasurer explained, “I cannot be sure if it will have any tangible benefit, or if it will end up at an overall loss of productivity in the end, but I do not expect a famine. The soil is still the same as it was, and the magistrates are still in their positions. If it turns out that the experiment is a failure and that the peasants laze about too much, the officials will act before they risk a crop failure. They’ll force the serfs to work again or threaten to take back their land. After all, the fields still belong to you. They have that authority.”

  “If it helps, I disagreed with him,” Head Merchant Lester spoke up, “I don’t have as much experience with agriculture as the treasurer, but I’ve been around in the trading world long enough to learn a simple truth. People work better when they deal benefits both sides. It’s always like this. As long as the peasants understand that, and they will, they will turn a profit.”

  “I’ve already seen the results firsthand. Your orders arrived at Lindridge right before we left,” the king said, “it was a smart idea to have the heralds act so strict.”

  This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

  “I’ll admit, that was all Johan,” Lester gestured at the other advisor.

  The treasurer awkwardly cleared his throat. “I may not always agree with all your ideas your majesty, but I will carry out your orders as best I can. I do sincerely hope you’ll succeed.”

  Varre smiled back and nodded at the man. He could appreciate this sentiment.

  “What about the nobility?” Marna asked, “do any of them have complains about the reform?”

  “Not from what I’ve seen,” Alderman Nilo replied, “I’ve spoken to a few of them. Quietly. To be honest, most don’t think it’s a good idea. Some even secretly ridicule it. But at the end of the day, it’s your land Varre, and you can do whatever you want with it. It’s just unorthodox.”

  “So no one is worried that we’re planning to ban the ownership of serfs or something?” Johan inquired.

  “No?” Nilo raised his eyebrow, “now that is a ridiculous idea. Why would you even think that?” he paused then turned to Varre with a shocked expression, “you aren’t thinking about that right? The land still belongs to you and the peasants will be tied to their land, right?”

  “For now,” the king winked back, “I mean it’s not like they’re never allowed to leave their villages right? They must be able to marry people from other settlements. There’s no way the hamlets I’ve seen would be able to maintain their population otherwise.”

  “Well, that’s different,” the alderman said, “of course they’re allowed to travel to other towns and villages to sell their goods, or visit their relatives. They’re just not allowed to move permanently. At least not without their lord’s permission.”

  “And what if there’s too many mouths to feed in a single place? Can’t the people move to the cities and look for work there?” Varre suggested.

  “The lord will usually allow that,” Nilo explained, “that’s where many townsfolk come from already. Or he’ll offer to have them moved to another one of his villages that needs more workers.”

  “I suppose that’s fine then,” the king nodded.

  “Now, I’ve also heard rumors that some nobles were intrigued by your ideas,” the alderman added, “few are willing to take the risk and try it out themselves, but they’ll be watching you with interest. If it works, they’ll probably switch too.”

  Varre smiled. “You’ll see. Soon we’ll have a bigger surplus of food than ever before.”

  “If you’re right, I’m sure you’ll have no problem finding things to spend it on,” the treasurer joked.

  “Speaking of expensive projects, I also have something to report,” Elvira said, “during our recent expedition to Lindridge, I continued to work on the plan to teach magic to commoners.”

  “Right, the new magical academy,” Varre recalled, “have you come up with a curriculum yet?”

  “Yes,” the Court Mage replied, “you really stressed the importance of communication wizards. It’s not a very prestigious position, so there’s never enough volunteers, but it’s still an incredible opportunity for a commoner. Besides, we have the Archmage’s blessing.”

  “The two mages we’ve used so far were extremely helpful. If we can have more, then we might be able to station them close to the borders. Then we’ll have early warning of any incoming goblin attack,” the king theorized, “how long will their training take? And how many do you want to prepare?”

  “I think sixty candidates would be a good starting point. Enough to set up a large network and we should have no problems finding candidates,” Elvira grimaced slightly, “but if you’re hoping to use them soon it could be an issue. It takes years to educate a wizard. Of any kind. I suppose if we limit their training to just communication magic it could be a little faster, but I still expect it to take several years.”

  “The sooner the better. We still don’t know how the elven war will play out. Maybe it will continue for decades. Maybe months. Maybe our friends will even win and push the goblins back. Regardless, I’ll feel a lot safer with a cadre of wizards under my command,” Varre replied, “is there any way we could speed it up?”

  The Court Mage tapped her fingers on the table, considering her options. “Well, I suppose we could try to find people who already had some magical training and simply didn’t finish.”

  “You mean people who failed or were kicked out?” the king asked.

  Elvira shook her head. “All prospective wizards are nobles, but not all nobles are cut from the same cloth. Education is expensive, your majesty. Some families send out one of their children to learn at the capital, but then a bad harvest comes along, their financial situation worsens, and they are forced to return home. People like that would have a major head start over commoners though.”

  Varre scratched his chin. “It doesn’t sound easy. First, we’d need to find them. Somewhere. I also imagine it would be harder to make a consistent curriculum for them. They’d all need to start at different levels, depending on how far along they got before leaving.”

  “They are still aristocrats, your majesty. And I am a senior mage at the guild,” she slightly puffed her chest forward, “I can search through our records. Once I know their name and household, it will only be a matter of delivering a letter. As for the curriculum… I had another idea.

  “If timing is of the essence, we could limit their education even more. Kadmos would never allow us to teach them combat magic, so I’ve already gone ahead and scrapped that, but if we really wanted to stretch things, we could use our experienced communication wizards as conduits.”

  “It could be worth trying,” the king replied, “we could give them more generalist classes later, but I’d like to get them up to speed first. How would it work exactly?”

  “One of the main difficulties of this magic field is the search for a target,” Elvira explained, “the wizard needs to send out his aura through large distances and seek out the relevant recipient. It is a difficult, time consuming process, especially if the other person isn’t prepared to receive a message. But it made a lot easier when the recipient is aware of the attempt and ready.

  “We already have two experienced wizards that we’ve used before. In fact, I plan to hire them on as full time teachers. I’m sure that the guild will be chafing at the prospect of losing them, but we’ll sort that out later.

  “Once our two experts start teaching their students, they could attune their aura to each other. It would be much easier to seek out a familiar target, especially if our teachers would be staying in the same place. Like say at the academy. This way, we would only need to teach the youngsters how to seek out these two specific signals and send it out to the same exact location. If we’re really in a rush, we don’t even need to teach them how to receive messages back,” she spoke with excitement.

  The king nodded along with the explanation. “And how long would that take?”

  “If we really congest it, I believe we could get it down to a few months. Especially on those who already had some magical training beforehand.”

  “Good. Then I’d like you to start with that,” Varre smiled, “we can always expand their education later.”

  “There was one other idea I’ve had,” Elvira slowly said, playing nervously with her hair, “do you remember our last conversation with the archmage?”

  “Mostly. He agreed to have us build this academy and train communication mages, right?”

  “He was in such a good mood that he agreed to one more thing. Now, these people are powerful, wealthy, and respected, so we had to limit it down to low level apprentices only, but Kadmos did accept having us training healers and alchemists,” the Court Mage awkwardly giggled.

  “Ah yes. I remember that. What’s the problem?”

  “Well… after spending so much time with Sofia and learning her methods... and we’ve got this whole war coming. Maybe, you know? I uh… I was thinking of switching that to training real, professional healers. A whole second course. Sixty more students,” she smiled nervously, “what do you think? The archmage might not like it.”

  “I think, that’s an excellent idea,” Varre grinned, “I guess we’ll need to see Kadmos again. If we must be ready for war, we'll need as many medics as we can get.”

  And he's always up for new ideas!