Dungeon of Niflheim

352 Chapter 352: The preparations required for war

“Leo” Douglas uttered his son’s name with a dominant tone, his aura wrapping around his son’s body with great finesse, pressuring only him.

Leo shivered and felt a powerful a heavy weight upon his body, filling it with fear and pushing for him to submit. The young noble clenched his teeth hard and held his ground. He knew he acted a little wrong, but he would not kneel. Showing a fierce and determined expression he glared at his father, his entire body tense as he resisted his father’s pressure.

“Hoh.” Ryuu, Bastion and Frost all raised their brows, finding Leo’s defiance impressive. Douglas really wasn’t holding back with his aura, fully intending to put his wayward son in his place. Leo was but an E-rank fighter, far from even contemplating the notion of aura yet here he was refusing to submit, bravely facing down the giant powerhouse that was his old man. It was quite impressive considering his level of strength and young age.

Cassandra looked at her son briefly, pride was in her eyes before she sent another knowing look to her husband. Douglas kept the pressure up for another few seconds before showing a wild smile and laughing.

“Hahahahaha that’s a good look Leo, I think this is the first time you’ve ever been able to completely endure my aura without backing off. Your training seems to be going well, Colonel Hamon must see a lot of potential in you hahaha.” The intimidating aura that was coming from Douglas vanished like a puff of smoke, instantly releasing Leo from its pressure. His laughter swiftly altered the atmosphere into one with friendly connotations.

Douglas was no longer mad towards Leo, his work with the military not only resulted in greater efficiency in that sector, swiftly shoring up the town’s defences but his son’s aggregate power seems to have increased. He couldn’t help but feel proud as well as nostalgic, he remembered himself doing a very similar action at Leo’s age. Avoiding the dull paperwork and governing work at all costs, ditching it on his old man and mother, hell he even roped Adam into his shenanigans on occasion.

The red alert had been enacted, the stampede would be here shortly and likely far more powerful than normal, it wasn’t time to hold grudges between family members. They needed to be of one mind if they were to survive this.

Leo was left flabbergasted by his father’s joyful mood, he rubbed his eyes and scrapped out imaginary wax from his ears as if he couldn’t believe what he was seeing and hearing. He then turned to his mother who replied with a gentle smile as if she knew that Douglas would act in such a way before re-engaging with Luna who was just as surprised.

“Leo” Douglas spoke his son’s name once again, there was no threating dominance in his tone but there was weight behind it. He was speaking as a noble right now. Leo sharply straightened his back at attention and faced his father.

.....

“Leo the red alert has been enacted, that means all hands must be on deck...do you understand?”

“....Yes father” Leo felt a pang of guilt in his heart before he replied.

“Good, you will be taking over the territory in the future and need to learn all aspects involved in being a ruler.” Douglas then looked over at Luna, his son’s fiancé, and future lady of the house. “As do you Luna, Furano will someday be left in your care, you need to be ready.”

Luna shivered in response before nodding her head strongly.

“The two of you if you want don’t need to return and live in the manor, you’re both adults and I can understand your frustrations but from this moment forward there will be no ducking our calls do you understand?” Douglas spoke with powerful authority, not accepting refusal. He and Cassandra needed to be in constant contact with them so as direct them in preparing the territory. They’d had their rest period and fun times with the military now it was time to do the legwork behind the scenes.

The two young adults looked at one another before replying. “We understand.”

“Good we’ll start once dinner is over.” Douglas’s then suddenly showed an evil smirk that stretched from ear to ear. “I’ve got a mountain of paperwork on my desk that needs to be completed before morning, you’ll start with that.”

“Ugh!” Leo’s lips twitched and his face turned pale. His father really was quite petty. Though he sounded like he forgave them and was going to move on it was clear that he was going to throwing unsuspecting jabs whenever he got the chance.

Cassandra, Ryuu, Bastion, Frost and of course Douglas all laughed out loud as though mocking the young couple. The next few days were not going to be easy for them, even Ryuu seemed as though he was going to be rather strict towards his young daughter, something that seemed impossible for the super doting father.

Cassandra had given her consent for such a punishment. Ditching her calls, if they weren’t in a red alert status nor preparing for the monster stampede it wouldn’t have ended there. She likely would have marched to wherever Leo was hiding out and dragged him back by the ears.

Dinner was served a few minutes later, bringing everyone’s moods back up and filling those who were exhausted with energy. Alcohol was served but only Frost and Maya partook. While the red alert was enacted Douglas and the rest refused to drink, it dulled the mind, something that needed to be focused in such times.

Douglas spoke a little more about how they dealt with the constant waves of monsters as well as about the red alert system, inspiring Frost greatly.

It wasn’t just the soldiers and adventurers that would be hard at work during the stampede no it was all manner of people and professions. Cooks would be required to prepare hearty meals to keep up the strength of those in battle. Tailors, armourers, and weapon smiths were required to make on site repairs and provide equipment and weaponry through the entire stampede.

Healers and doctors would also need to be on call to deal with any injuries as would artificers who would be required to repair any magic devices such as the barrier devices that would be used in emergencies to save a portion of the battlefield.

And perhaps most of all would be Grisham’s dismantling crew. Them along with adventures and soldiers would have to routinely remove the dead monsters that were strewn across the battlefield. This prevented pile ups that the horde could use to reach over the northern wall as well as prevented disease and infection from spreading plus the smell of decay was anything but pleasant. Having to fight with such an odour encapsulating the town would bring down anyone’s mood.

This gruesome and heavily labour intensive job was not only necessary for these reasons, but it was also key to Furano’s survival in regards to profit as well as food. With the monster stampede in place, outside farming as well as regular trading comes to a halt. Meaning they have to rely upon the town’s reserves for grain and vegetables, but the people of the North require meat to survive due to their diet. The thousands upon thousands of monster corpses brought on by the stampede thus provide for the town’s much needed food supply.

Grisham and his team work at full pace throughout the stampede, dismantling and carving up the corpses in their workshops to provide sustenance for the citizens as well as store the skins, fur, bones, and other materials that the town would then sell once the disaster was over. If they waited until the stampede was over not only would Furano be seriously food deprived the materials would have rotten becoming pretty much scrap with no selling value.

The dismantling team was heavily expanded and geared up when Douglas began taking control of the territory as he realised that it was this sector that determined whether or not this disaster was a boon or a detriment to the territory.

Frost was greatly impressed as well as blown away, war was such a massive and complicated thing that not only involved soldiers but also the civilians in fact they may even play a larger role in the grand scheme of things. Thankfully however Frost didn’t have quite so many drawbacks in long sieges. The corpses could easily be absorbed by the dungeon core, swiftly returning the battlefield to its freshest state. Hell he could even have the dungeon separate the useless parts from the sellable stuff, basically performing Grisham and his team’s job.

The dungeon however wasn’t perfect, though this system was super quick a fair amount of the materials would be lost. At least 20% less material would be produced in comparison to someone doing it by hand, a sort of tax for using the super speed method.

During regular times it would be more efficient for either Frost or his deft monsters to handle dismantling but when the quantity surpassed the labour i.e. during the monster stampede such a system would be a god send. Frost would really get the chance to test the limits of such a system as well as see how much his dungeon vault dimension could actually store.