"WHAT?!?"

The Lord of Blackbriar's family looked at his castellan with anger, surprise, and dread mixed in his eyes.

"Are you sure?!?"

"Yes, my lord. All of our food supply is gone. Not only that, but all of our gold inside our vault is also gone."

Matthew Blackbriar has been the lord of Blackbriar marchioness for more than thirty years. He already enjoyed the power of being a noble lord since he was ten years old! In his reign, there is no problem that he cannot solve.

Bandit? Order his knight to deal with it. Peasants cannot pay the tax? Torture them until they agree to sign the slave contract. The only thing that never becomes a problem is food. God blesses Blackbriar's land. Its land is so fertile we sometimes have an excess of grain even after selling some of it to the others.

Never in history has the Blackbriar family had a shortage of food. So when all their food and money are gone, Matthew doesn't know what to do!

"Father, what should we do? Uncle Phineus already accepted our reasoning, and he also already sent a letter to the king. If we don't attack the Lionheart family, we need to give the Lionheart family at least five hundred thousand gold for making a false war declaration!"

He knows about it, dammit! If the person who declares war did not move their troops for a month, then the one declaring the war will be considered a loss for the one declaring the war. Then the side that loses the 'war' needs to give a certain amount of gold to the 'winning' side. This thing is called the False War Declaration.

A Duke family needs to pay one million gold coins. Marquess needs to pay five hundred thousand gold coins. Count pay three hundred thousand gold coins. Viscount paid one hundred thousand gold coins. Baron paid fifty thousand gold coins.

Not only losing money, but the noble house will also have a huge chance to have their position demoted. After being demoted in rank, all their vassals will get independence and free from taxes that their lord set for them.

"Don't worry. We can still get a loan from the bank in the Holy Light Empire. With this loan, we will buy as much grain as we can for our soldiers. We only need to make a fake movement while we wait for the grain we buy from the other lord."

"I see! What an amazing strategy, father!"

Before he could say anything, his office door got kicked open by someone. When Matthew is about to scream at the uncultured swine, the said uncultured swine shouts at the top of his lungs.

"My Lord! My Lord! My Lord! Bad News!"

"What is it?!?"

"The armory! The armory!"

"What?!? What happened to the armory?!?"

"All of our weapons are gone!"

"What?!?"

The f*ck this man saying!

"What do you mean all of our weapons are gone!?!?"

"It is as I said, my lord. All of our weapons, armor, and even arrows are gone! All of them are gone!"

"Let me see it!"

"This way, my lord."

Matthew and his son follow the knight captain. After a minute of running, they arrive at the barrack, where Matthew kicks open the armory and immediately kneel in front of the armory after seeing what is inside the armory or rather the nothingness of the armory.

The armory is empty. There should be a thousand swords, five hundred spears, a hundred pieces of armor, a thousand shields, seven hundred bows, and ten thousand arrows inside the armory. However, instead of seeing that, Matthew did not see anything inside the armory.

"How? How could this happen to me?"

Matthew weeps at his misfortune before looking at the knight captain and screaming at him.

"Search the city! I want every single soul in this city to get checked. Check every corner, home, and even the sewer! I want the culprit to be found!"

Before the knight captain could follow his lord's order, a cloud of smoke rising from the docks, the pale face of Matthew becomes paler when he sees the smoke. He begins to run toward the docks, and after running for fifteen minutes, they arrive in front of a massive fire that burns all the merchant ships and the ship used for the army.

Matthew's legs begin to give up from running around the city. The lord of Blackbriar, one of the most powerful houses in the Vulux kingdom, kneeling down on the ground for the first time in his life.

Matthew did not move from his position for a full ten minutes before he suddenly got up and began to walk toward his castle.

"Father! Where are you going?!? The ship is on fire!"

Matthew looked at his son before saying.

"What should we do? We cannot do anything about any of this. The only I can do is to go back to the castle and sleep, hoping that this is only a nightmare."

Matthew walked toward his castle in silence. As he reaches his bedroom, he sees a letter on his bed. He takes the letter and opens it before reading it.

"Winter is Coming"

Matthew's body and mind begin to shut down after reading it, and the darkness consumes him.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

It has been a week since Yuka came back from robbing the Blackbriar family blind. From food to gold, Yuka robs the Blackbriar without mercy. Not only that, but she also burned all the ships the Blackbriar family had, making them unable to trade for a long time.

Richard also reports to me, saying that the Blackbriar declare war on the Lionheart family because she stole their peasant even though the distance between our land is so far away a normal peasant cannot move from their land to mine.

Anyway, the war declaration is delivered with the royalty stamp. They really sent a letter to the Duke family, and the duke family asks the royal family to agree with the Blackbriar family declaration of war.

Heh. It looks like they cannot gather enough soldiers with their situation. I guess they can demand some gold and army from their vassal, but that will make the Blackbriar vassal hate the Blackbriar lord more.

While there is a chance the Blackbriar family will move their army, I still have some time before they reach the Gate, where we will welcome them with an open arm. While I still have time, I don't stay idle. I ordered my arms master to prepare for war.

Fortunately, Yuka also stole all the Blackbriar weapon reserves. With all this weapon, I easily equip all of my men.

Lord Byron, my vassal, waited for my instruction and already armed his men. I ask them to wait for the Blackbriar family movement. If they decide to continue the war, I will inform Lord Byron to gather an army in the gate.

But for now…

"Richard. Send a letter to each Northern lord saying that we will send them the grain they need."

"Of course, my lord. Do you want me to ask them for a reinforcement?"

"For the Blackbriar family?"

"Yes, my lord."

"No. We don't need the other lord to get involved in this mess. However, I want you to see the condition of the Blackbriar family. There must be a reason why they have not sent their army yet."

Richard bows his head at me before walking away from my office. After Richard left the room, I sigh a little before smirking at all the gold I currently have in my possession after Yuka finished doing her mission.

With all this money, I could begin to make a road and other projects I want to do. The first one is a road; I don't like the condition of Lionheart County road. The next one in my project is an introduction to a new farming technique. I also want to create a ship for the army. Lastly, building a brewery to make some vodka.

I want my city to have a specialty, and I know Vodka is a good specialty for the Sea Dragon City.

Yeah, with this money, I want to make my land prosper.