Chapter 16 – Under Budget, Ahead of Schedule

The tundra above Guguo was a ferocious beast. Men entered and returned either as beast or bone. Today, it had swallowed a team of twelve cultivator students and spat out bones. Ambushed from all sides, impaled by spear and horn, torn by axe and tooth, crushed by hammer and hoof.

Golthus tore his axe out of the cultivator’s chest, the blood staining the brown fur on his legs. He felt his hairs stand up and sniffed the air. From the south, ten dots appearing in the sky. Cultivators riding swords. Ten… twenty… fourty… sixty four. Grandmasters, not one of a lesser rank. He picked out the colours in their clothes, at least a dozen sects had come together. He turned to one of the lesser goatmen who was wiping his spear down. “Go warn pack master. This hunt may be our last.”

“Recruitment report.” All eyes in the war-room turned Sara upon Arascus’ words. The woman took a deep breath, didn’t even open her report and started to recall from memory. She had changed, from the girl who wore dresses and had her hair down to now donning a suit like the rest of them with her black hair tied back. Those eyes had grown sharper too.

“The Rancais branches are at capacity. Other Epan countries are nearing our goal. The Union branches in the West still exist, although we’ve halved our support for them.” She readjusted herself and crossed her arms. “Additionally, we’ve had a development in the East. A branch has opened in Guguo. There is no set location yet and I did not order for the creation of one, I think our ideas have simply spread.”

“And numbers?” Arascus said.

“Rancais stands at around a hundred and fifty thousand, Epa as a whole has almost a million. The Guguo branch has five members currently. Union members dropped severely although I think the lowest point is past us. Numbers have risen back up to eight hundred among the sixteen branches that exist.” The woman finally leaned back and smiled at everyone in the war-room. Two months ago she was a mere sapling among the men and women here, now she had grown into an oak that stood equal among them. “I would like to add however that in Rancais, twelve of the fifty nation-wide branches have been compromised. In Epa, we estimate about fourty percent now have some police or intelligence operative working within them.”

“That is not an issue.” Arascus said. “Do you know which branches are non-compromised?”

“I’m not able to be certain on that, but to degree, yes.”

“Very well.” Arascus turned to Rickard Narma. “And the expenditure of our expansion?” Rickard flipped through his notebook.

“Far cheaper than expected. We’ve not expanded into new locations, branches are simply meeting more often. In Aris, some of the branches have decided to share the same buildings and simply rotate. So one branch has Monday, another Tuesday and so on. The Guguo branches requests start-up capital. They’ve forward a report with a cheap room to rent as part of their set-up. It will only cost around five-hundred thousand Guguoan Yon. In real terms, that’s about eight hundred Epan Marks, or six hundred Union ones. Monthly-payments.”

“Pocket change.” Arascus said.

“Indeed. I’ll confirm the transaction.” Rickard commented. “Donations have risen from the spike of new members too. We’re floating a good treasury. About twenty million Marks right now, I’ve factored in a drop-off of income after the recruitment surge but by three months, even the worst estimate is we’ll have fifty million.” Several of the members around the table looked at each other in shock.

“And the best?”

“Two hundred.” The table burst into clapping for a few moments. Arascus let them have their moment of joy, these would be rare enough in the near future. “That’s all for my report Sir. It’s good news all-around.”

“Ilwin.” Arascus asked. “And the factories?”

“I’ve found three locations which are deemed suitable. All three in Karaina.” Three documents emerged from his folder and he slid them along the table to Arascus. “East of us, I don’t even know if it can be said to be Epa anymore.”

“Long distance.” Arascus said dryly.

“With little oversight from the government, there’s a good amount of autonomy in the provinces, and it puts us closer to support Fer’s hordes too. The Karaina-Guguo railway also lowers transport times considerably.”

“How expensive?”

“The Tarin plant costs thirty, Aklasia is thirty two, Kira car factory is fourty, but it’s the largest one and we could use it for vehicles too.”

“Why are they being sold?”

“Depopulation largely, people have moved to cities from the local towns and there’s not enough workers. I’ve sent men to pose as buyers, the plants are old but there’s no issue with them fundamentally.” Arascus nodded.

“Even better for us then. Kira, then the other two. Narma, secure the funds, the earlier the better. When they are secured, start moving excess members from branches to the nearby towns and restock the population. Give them decent wages, but don’t tell them what is going on.” Arascus stood up and walked to one of the wooden cabinets behind him. “Daganhoff, stand up.”

“Yes Sir.” Sara replied and stood up, her face painted with nothing but excitement. Childish true, but Arascus preferred that to fear. He returned to his with a small box, he extended an arm to the woman.

“For your impressive performance.” He passed the box to her. “Open it later and sit down. Good job.” Sara smiled in disbelief, took the box and sat back down.

“Thank you Sir. I will do my best.”

“Do better than your best.”

“You’re correct Sir.” She pulled a salute. “The best is not good enough.” Arascus looked around the table.

“You may inquire about her gift privately. Everyone who manages to achieve in their field what Miss Daganhoff did over the past two months will receive a similar reward.” Arascus smiled. Gifts always made everyone work better, the goal was to give them sparingly enough to be worth the effort, but not so sparingly that people forget they exist. The table clapped for Sara again before being cut off. Arascus turned to Iliyal Tremali. “Report on Fer?”

“The Guguoan Great Hunt is underway, it was larger than predicted. Fer is currently retreating her position and moving West, towards the Karainan border.”

“How long before she gets to it?”

“She’s moving slowly to avoid detection. Three months at the current rate. So far, we’ve confirmed the deaths of twenty members of the Hunt and about thirty beastmen. One darkfur has died.” Arascus nodded.

“In regards to Fer, keep monitoring but do not engage.”

“Yes Sir.” Iliyal Tremali replied. Arascus extended an arm to the man at the end of the table.

“Now for the main course of the meeting. Alash, you have something to show us.” Mikhail stood up and awkwardly waved for one of his helpers. The man from the back came forwards with an object wrapped in black cloth and placed it on the table.

“Ladies and Gentlemen.” Mikhail began, his voice in pure bliss. “Sir.” He bowed to Arascus. “I would like to present the Alash-1.” He unfurled the cloth. Iliyal and Arascus stared at the object with a smile, the rest of the table simply did not know what they were looking at. Mikhail began, Arascus let the man boast, frankly, this thing surpassed his expectations in every regard. The engineer deserved his pride. “Just as sporting arrows have spiralled feathers to add spin, the inside of the barrel is rifled to add spin to the bullet. The issue of muzzle-loading has been solved with this breech.” He pointed at some mechanism in the side. “The A-1 is able to shoot with a deviation of two centimetres to a range of a hundred-metres. Six centimetres at two hundred. It has a maximum fire-rate of twenty-four shots a minute, and that’s with reloading the clip.” He picked up a small thing, a metal stick with six brass casings on it. “The metal will not melt under stress. It has passed all my laboratory tests, the only thing I need now is live fire experiences to know how to improve it further.”

“Mikhail, if I may.” Rickard interrupted the man. “That’s nice and all, but what is that?”

“This, my friend, is the weapon of the future.”