After Otto. Lushi left the office, Nightingale's voice came from beside him, "He didn't tell the whole truth, especially about his experiences before coming to Border Town."
"It's not surprising. He must have arrived in the royal capital first and negotiated with Tifieke before heading to the Western Region," Roland chuckled. "It would be strange if he came straight to me at the beginning. Hedging bets is what diplomats like to do most. If I were him, I wouldn't put all my eggs in one basket."
"You mean...they might not be on our side?"
"At least they won't make a decision right away," he took a pot of hot water and refilled the teacups. "How much do you think the Lord of Dawn will believe after receiving this information?"
Nightingale stammered for a long time, "I...don't know."
"I don't know either," Roland said, and his shoulder was pinched. "...But one thing is obvious, this news sounds terrible, but it all happened several years later—we can't even give a precise date. And the threat of the church is imminent, maybe they will take action after the spring, so the Lord of Dawn will not lean towards us because of this information. He will most likely continue to sit on the fence until Tifieke and I are defeated. If he has the strength, he may even give benefits to both sides in order to seek future rewards."
This is also a common method of politicians. They are unwilling to take too many risks and like to obtain benefits steadily, especially war, which is a highly rewarding investment project. If there is no threat from the devils, Roland does not reject in-depth contact with them, setting traps for the other party to jump into, and then recovering more debts with interest. But now he is no longer in the mood to play this kind of diplomatic game with them. In the coming year, Border Town must take the initiative to stabilize the situation quickly. A storm is about to sweep in, and the fish that are still fighting for food in the pond will only die.
"Then...is it good to spread this news?" Nightingale asked puzzled.
"At least the Kingdom of Dawn is not our real enemy. I don't know how much those nobles can believe about the news of the devils, but they will definitely spare no effort to publicize the part about the church's ambitions, which is also weakening the church's ruling foundation," Roland explained. "Once they lose the support of the people, it will not be so easy for the church to quickly use the kingdom's resources."
Although he told the other party all the information he had, he actually only revealed to Otto the part about the existence of devils, and did not mention the Witch Empire and the previous two Battles of Divine Will.
The former is more unbelievable than the existence of devils, and may even have the opposite effect—because most areas in the folk are hostile to witches, this kind of thing, as long as a little guidance is given, may be twisted into a "witch conspiracy."
The latter is easy to undermine human confidence in fighting against the devils. If the first two times were failures, how much chance is there to win the third time?
In short, the seeds of fighting against the enemy hand in hand have been buried. As for whether they can reap the results, it depends on the Kingdom of Dawn's next reaction.
……
Three days later, Roland saw Otto. Lushi again.
From the disappointment in his eyes, he could guess the answer to the meeting.
"I prefer to conclude an alliance with you, but rather than discussing the details of the alliance, the most important thing now is to send the news back to Dawn as soon as possible," he bowed with his hand on his chest. "Therefore, I am here to bid you farewell."
"I hope to hear good news from you later," Roland nodded.
"Also...Your Highness," Otto hesitated for a moment, "I have one more request."
"What is it?"
"Please take good care of Andrea. Quinn."
Andrea is a witch from Sleeping Island. Instead of entrusting me, you should entrust Tilly. Wimbledon, even though he thought so, Roland sighed and agreed.
*******************
Standing on the top of the castle, Andrea faced the whistling cold wind and looked south—that was the direction the Redwater River flowed.
"A-Are you not going to the pier?" Sylvie hid behind the invisible barrier, shivering from the cold. "I heard he's about to take the boat a-and leave. As a childhood friend, it's, it's appropriate to see him off."
"It's the same to see him off here," she sighed.
"I h-heard from Ashes that he can't forget you."
"Only one out of ten of her words can be believed," Andrea said unhappily. "She actually praised that guy for being consistent in front of Lady Tilly. It's like a dog can't spit out ivory."
"Uh, i-is that so?" Sylvie chattered.
"That's right," she snorted, then looked at the latter who was huddled into a ball, "If you feel cold, go down first, and come back up to pick me up later."
"I-It's okay, I'll wait for you here." Sylvie shook her head. "A-Anyway, if I catch a cold, Miss Lily can treat me, and I can have two d-days off and play a few more hands of cards."
It seemed to make sense, Andrea gave her a thumbs up, then shifted her gaze to the Redwater River area—in the drifting snowflakes, she vaguely saw the rising sails, a little red flickering at the top of the mast.
That was the signal to set sail.
That's good, she thought, time will dilute everything, and forgetting is a better result for everyone.
Andrea was not completely unaware of Otto's intentions, but she still chose to avoid it—whether it was him or O'Luo. Tucker, with their status in the family, they could marry more suitable women, instead of wasting time on a witch. As the most prominent three noble families in Radiance City, such feelings were bound to be fruitless, and she was unwilling to return to the place that abandoned her.
Not seeing each other is the best choice.
Goodbye, my friend, Andrea thought.
The looming sails quickly disappeared at the end of the horizon.
*******************
After the envoy's affairs came to an end, Roland immediately devoted himself to the construction of Border Town.
Now the town's three-way project of water supply, heating, and power supply has been officially launched, and all three pipelines are buried in underground passages, leading directly to various residential areas. Since the residential buildings were designed with reserved holes in mind, the entry part is very simple, and the key lies in the location of the boiler and water tower.
In order to save materials and reduce transmission losses as much as possible, Roland abandoned the plan to take water entirely from the Redwater River, and instead went underground to get water—Border Town has abundant underground water resources, and the water layer is shallow, making it very easy to dig wells. In this era, there is no need to consider water pollution, and with Sylvie's perspective observation, Roland quickly determined four water intakes located in the town. Taking these four well points as the center, the extracted clean water can not only meet daily needs such as cleaning and drinking, but also be used for heating boilers.