Mommy Wolf: Raise A Cub, Claimed By His Beast Daddy-Chapter 225: Ignite the War (V)
"Your Highness, we’ve spotted a fortress north of our direction! It’s a huge fortress situated directly under a summit, and the scout saw a squirrel beastman in one of the towers!"
Crown Prince Ludwig was surprised that the information given by those pair of merchants was correct. There was truly a kingdom full of beastmen which had been flying under the radar and slowly building up their strength by looting the merchants who passed by.
The crown prince scoffed. He got out of his tent and told the general, "Bring the two merchants to me. I want to get some more information."
Marik and Leah were dragged into the tent, where the crown prince and the general were already discussing their plan.
"Please excuse us, Your Highness. It seems that you’ve summoned us," Marik said politely as he bowed in front of the crown prince.
"Yes, I want you to tell me about those beastmen who raided you before. Are they working well together, and is there a leader among them aside from their king?"
Marik quickly improvised by nodding. "They work flawlessly. In fact, I think their teamwork is better than us humans. There were about thirty beastmen of various species that attacked us, and aside from the king, I saw a vicious eagle beastman who acts as a commander. He also killed my apprentice in cold blood using his talons..."
Marik recalled the eagle beastman who helped Kael chase after Sisi during the night of the blizzard. They were fast and obviously trained as soldiers.
He guessed that the eagle beastman would be present if a skirmish between the humans and beastmen happened, and that would increase his credibility.
On top of that, Marik wanted to make sure the crown prince understood how savage those beastmen were. He had to create panic within the human side so they would become overly suspicious of the beastmen and then attack over the smallest provocation.
He was here to ignite the war, and Marik was more than ready to escalate the situation even further.
Just as he predicted, Crown Prince Ludwig’s expression turned ugly. "Then let’s just send an envoy and two soldiers to the gate. Let’s observe what they will do upon seeing humans within their territory."
"Wouldn’t that be a suicide mission, Your Highness?" the general asked.
"I’ll give them the benefit of the doubt. If they don’t attack our envoy on sight, then we can exchange letters or even have a formal discussion. But if they stay true to their savage nature, then we will not be kind—for the sake of humanity."
Leah watched the crown prince’s expression with giddy excitement. She knew that war was inevitable because the Beast Kingdom was very racist toward humans, just like how humans saw beastmen as a bunch of simple-minded savages.
’Oh, if the war actually happens, then it’s possible that Ruela will get dragged into it and die. Hah, serves her right for betraying me, the girl who has been supporting her since she was young!’ Leah still held a grudge against Ruela, because without her intervention, she would have succeeded in killing both Sisi and Jojo. Then they could have continued to be accomplices, slowly warming up the heartbroken Beast King, and Leah might even have been kind enough to let Ruela be a concubine once again while she became the new queen!
Too bad Ruela was an idiot who didn’t understand the benefit of teamwork.
**
Vestor was busy in the throne room, reading one document after another while sitting on a small stool right behind the throne.
It was the best spot for him to focus because it was quiet since nobody dared to enter the throne room except during morning court.
However, the silence that he liked didn’t last long, because the door was slammed open and two beastman soldiers walked in while escorting an envoy and his two human guards.
"Sir Vestor, we’re here with a few... guests!"
Vestor frowned as he slowly put down his documents. It was rare for the palace to have guests, because most problems in the city could be solved by the city council instead of going straight to the palace where everyone was very busy.
Nevertheless, since he was now a stand-in until their king returned, Vestor was obliged to see what the problem was.
He came out from behind the throne and stood right next to it. His frown deepened when he saw a human wearing luxurious clothing, followed by two other humans wearing armor, whom he assumed to be guards.
It was extremely rare for humans to come into the Beast Kingdom because this place was isolated.
There had been a few merchants from the far south Ashoka Kingdom who had strayed a bit too far and had to be escorted to the Beast Kingdom for safety.
They were now the prime traveling merchants who could trade goods from their kingdom and other surrounding kingdoms with the Beast Kingdom.
Other than that, there hadn’t been any contact with humans whatsoever—not that the Beast Kingdom required any contact with them, since they were self-sufficient.
"Welcome to the Beast Kingdom. What brings you here, esteemed guests?" Vestor said amicably.
Had it been the Beast King, he would have referred to them as "humans" or "strangers." But Vestor didn’t have the same strength as the Beast King.
He was a mere feeble old man who had to be polite to his potential ally or enemy.
"My name is Robert, a merchant from Barion Kingdom. I came to know about your kingdom through word of mouth from other merchants," the envoy introduced himself as a merchant, though it was obvious that he wasn’t. He was just trying to test whether these beastmen would attack him on sight the moment they heard the word "merchant."
Surprisingly, they didn’t seem to react at all when he mentioned "merchant," which wasn’t in line with the information they got from those traveling merchants who had been attacked.
"Are you the king of this kingdom?" the envoy asked rather arrogantly. Just like all humans, he was conditioned to think that beastmen were below them. Of course, he wouldn’t try to be polite with an animal, right?
