Pursuing The Summit - Chapter 11 Louis

Louis had stopped concocting early, despite consuming a Spiritual Energy Upper just a few batches of pills before. He could still work for another six hours without a problem, but went home immediately.

Amelia and Amber had gone to sleep. After a couple of weeks of sleeping of being away every other night, they had gotten used to his absence. He was both happy that they no longer made a fuse and pushed themselves past their limits and simply slept, but also sad that he felt a tiny rift develop between them.

Then, he walked up to the third floor, where Silva was waiting for him. Before her, was a small thin notebook, a bit less than what he had expected, but she had a giant smile on her face, so he took a seat and started reading immediately.

Allyn County had roughly a million people and the number was only growing by the day. However, the population has been increasing much faster than the county’s ability to sustain it, especially since a large part of the agricultural goods were either exported to the elemental counties to the west or the states to the east. The other part of agricultural goods were medicines used in alchemy, which was traded much in the same fashion with agriculture, but a good portion was traded to Moonling County, the county just north of Allyn County, since they were renown for their alchemy and their fire oriented nature was not as conducive for agriculture and much of the water funneled there from Allyn County was either used for blacksmithing or preventing it from burning to the ground.

However, the relationship with the other counties and states around Allyn County was not particularly good and they were suffering from their own population troubles, especially the state of Hania, which was admist the worst population crisis it ever had. Hania was the biggest state, separating the mainland and the Great Forest, but only a fourth of its population was free. Although the countries and empire had reduced the number of people into Hania. Everyone else were either indentured servants or slaves, either convicted within the state or, more likely, sent from the empires itself. Adventurers, with their slaves, would venture deeper and deeper into the Great Forest while they have not yet fought the demons and high elves, wars was drawing close.

Serenis was the elemental county to the west of Allyn County. It was purely a dictatorship which sustained itself from the rich minerals within its lands and its military, the biggest within all of the elemental counties, especially since its population was only average within the elemental alliance and a significant portion of the population are impoverished. To the south was the Citadel of Teresa, the goddess of light. The county was a theocracy and its main element, of course, was light. They were the truly the city of healers, a different type than water which would simply heal wounds, they could ‘bless’ the wounded to restore even arms and heal smaller problems like sight, hearing and many problems under the sky. Furthermore, also had paladins, a combination of light element users and warriors, who were unkillable, though the methods of training such paladins were a secret. From rumors, however, despite how well the middle and upper classes lived, a majority of the population lived much like the civilians in Serenis.

While no direct conflicts happened between any counties or states yet, pressure and trouble were both brewing, which called for every clan to unite. With the mounting pressure, Dennis Allyn, the current clan leader at the time, became sick and had to pass on the throne to Arthur Allyn. Because of the untimely ascension, Arthur Allyn had to perform a meritioc deed of leadership. No task was more heroic nor meritioc than conquering a ruin, even one that was almost completely explored. After all, this task was mostly for formality. The twenty nine nobles followed him so each clan could claim a spot, along with a person from the Moonling Family. When the expedition took too long and eventually only Arthur came out, Brian was selected as the new Allyn Clan Leader. This was one of the reasons that Louis, who was not even born yet, was betrothed before he and Amber were even born. All the other daughters of the Moonling Family were already married, so they could only wait to the next generation.

Currently, Allyn County is split into two: northwest still remain loyal to the Allyn family, since the Allyn and Rosenburg families are at the north and west respectively; the southeast has the Eten and Camphill families, which are south and east respectively. There are five cities standing in the middle who are now neutral ever since the southeast noble families expressed their discontent. While only the Eten, Inzud and Ayde families wanted Arthur dead, many other families wanted to use it as an excuse to regain their sovereignty.

While potential external troubles keep the county together currently, the sentiment that the Allyn family has started to fall remains a heated issue. Especially when people have been migrating into the Mortal World and into the mainland and elemental counties. While no one has been talking about it explicitly, many people have died for various reasons throughout the county. The deaths disproportionately occur within the lower classes, especially in the slums, but quite a few people within the middle class and a few nobles have also died.

Once Louis put down the book, he was at a loss. He had never participated in any wars. He was first and foremost an alchemist, not a warrior. Furthermore, the empire he was a part of experienced an unprecedented level of peace and prosperity, though many of his royal brothers either killed themselves for the throne or overworked themselves and assassinated. However, there were no large scale conflicts. Especially, not like this. War was never on his mind and he had no idea what to do.

Getting stronger was obvious. He needed to protect his family, his fiancee and himself, but the threats exceeded his imaginations and he lacked both rudimentary knowledge about what cultivation he required and just what was truly needed to get himself out of this mess. Unfortunately, the only ones he could talk to were the Second Generation and he just learned more than a few would like to see his family perished, so he was not too ready to go all in on their help.

“Are you shocked?” Silva asked, hugging her legs. “But relax, it’s all for the adults to figure things out. Things have been fine and will still be fine.”

“Things are not fine. The county is not united one bit. Soon the external pressures of the other counties and states will force the cities abandon us.” Louis said, tapping on the notebook. “Still, there should be some time for us left to get stronger, even if it is difficult.” Then he looked up at Silva. “Right, how strong are the average cultivation levels of the upper ranks?”

Silva frowned and thought hard. “Well, mother is the sixth realm, so around the sixth or seventh realm?” Then she clapped her hands. “But legends have it that the high elves and demons in the forest have achieved the ninth realm.” She sat up again and started frowning. “What you mean the cities will abandon us?”

Louis sighed, rubbing his temples before he turned to an empty page in the book. He grabbed a pen on the desk then started drawing a rough map of the immediate area around Allyn County.

“Disregarding the internal problems within the county, there are two major problems we have to deal with in relation to our immediate surroundings: a food shortage and a flood of immigrants. The Moonling Clan prioritizes fire and earth and the Serenis Clan prioritizes water and earth, but neither of them produce much food, certainly not enough to find their own population, let alone export any. Great sections of the Serenis Clan is destroyed due to hundreds of years of exploitation while Moonling County produces weapons, armors and medicine, but lacks food. The Cathedral of Teresa produces priests, healers, warriors and paladins but not one of their miracles involves food production. Worst of all, the state of Hania does not produce enough food and has resorted to invading the Great Forest, which would only last until the demons and high repel them.

“Admist all of this, Allyn County is the only county that can produce enough food while clean water is basically synonymous with our clan. So where will the other counties go when they need food?” Louis asked.

“Will they target us? But we have an alliance with them.” Silva said, standing up.

Louis shook his head. “That alliance prevents fights, but does not protect our food. Plus, the state of Hania is not part of the alliance. Once they are repelled from the Great Forest, they will either target the other states or, more likely, target us. After all, we are the ones that supply their food. Threatening us to get more food would not be too surprising, if they truly need it.”

Louis took a deep breath. “Now, here comes our second problem: a flood of immigrants. Normally, fresh blood is welcome, it improves the economy, since more people will consume products, work jobs that wealthier and more established civilians would rather avoid, and contribute tax funds and military personnel. However, when a massive flood of immigrants arrive from the Cultivation World, it means the situation there is extremely poor and we, the people who will receive them, will not have the adequate facilities to help them. More than anything, conflicts will emerge, if nothing more than to reduce the number of mouths to feed.

“When we account for our crumbling political stability, there seems very few outs for us to salvage this situation.” Louis said, laying on the couch. “At least, I’m lost.”

Silva was on the brink of tears when he looked over, so he got up and sat beside her. “Relax.” Louis said, patting her back. “Things are probably not that bad. It’s just some guesses and I don’t know enough yet, since I only know what you gave me. Who knows? The mainland and the Great Forest can handle it and we will be safe and sound.”

Silva nodded, wiping her eyes. “Yes.”

“Why don’t we go to a restaurant? I’ll buy you some cakes, as a thank you for these books.”

Silva smiled. “Alright, but I want some strawberry ones.”