Chapter 189: Adrian’s Ways Are Too Risky
Chapter 189: Adrian’s Ways Are Too Risky
Adrian let out a soft sigh.
"I should have expected that." Adrian rubbed his face. "She is used to eating the food that I make for her. So she doesn’t really understand that she cannot just get the exact same premium quality food everywhere we go."
"No, I should have tried to make the food better." Draven argued back, defending Aria’s actions. "But I really do not know what she actually likes. I instructed my chefs to make their finest dishes for her, but she just refuses to eat anything."
"Well, I will take care of that somehow." Adrian smiled.
He quickly shifted the conversation back to the military.
"What about my soldiers?" Adrian asked. "How are they holding up?"
"They have been doing absolutely great." Draven praised them instantly. "In fact, at this very moment, especially during the last minor skirmish against the scouting monsters... they actually performed better than my soldiers."
Draven shook his head in pure disbelief.
"I don’t even know how you managed to build such an elite force." Draven said. "The overall quality of your troops is ridiculously high."
Adrian chuckled.
"Well, this is exactly what happens when you give them top tier knight manuals for free." Adrian stated bluntly. "They will be incredibly loyal to you, and they will strive to get stronger. Both for themselves and for you. You just need to create a system where they’ll feel rewarded for being strong."
Adrian crossed his arms.
"But you will also find people who are just naturally lazy." Adrian added. "You just need to give them proper merits based entirely on their hard work and battlefield performance. And they will continue to strive forward to earn more."
Draven just looked at him skeptically.
"Well, the main issue is that you cannot really tell when they will decide to desert you." Draven argued. "And having a fully trained, sworn knight desert you is a massive threat. Because they can easily turn around and go against you at any time."
"Well, just make them sign a soul contract." Adrian shrugged his shoulders.
He leaned forward against the edge of the wooden desk.
"I literally did the exact same thing to my own men." Adrian explained. "Every single one of my soldiers has formally signed a contract with me. They swore they will never go against me or Oresfall, and they swore they will never sell or share the knight’s manual with anyone else."
Adrian smiled.
"That is basically it." he said. "They will have to work for me until they are either officially retired or they die in battle. And every single one of them voluntarily signed it without me forcing them."
Draven frowned deeply.
"Well, the major issue here is that Soul Contracts are incredibly rare." Draven stated. "They are something that are strictly only accessible by the royal family. A marquis like me do not really get the chance to use Soul Contracts. Maybe a Duke could get one but even that is in the hands of the royal family."
"I guess that is true." Adrian nodded slowly.
"Did you actually use a real Soul Contract on thousands of men?" Draven asked in shock.
Adrian did not want to admit that he had an supply of highly restricted soul contracts. That would definitely land him in some severe trouble. Even if he trusted Draven, if someone else found out or made some guesses, then both of them would hand in trouble.
"Well, I did use a Blood Contract." Adrian said, which wasn’t really a lie since he had used blood contracts at the start when he didn’t have a soul contract at hand.
"Even Blood Contracts work." Adrian explained. "But they are obviously not as secure as Soul Contracts. If you are worried about your people just turning around and selling the manuals to other nobles... then just make the manuals hold zero market value."
Draven blinked. "What?"
"You can just sell a low tier knight training manual all over the place." Adrian suggested. "Just make the basic knowledge completely public. This way your soldiers can just use it however they want. And if they actually try to sell the books to other people, it won’t even matter. Because the information is already sitting in the public market for cheap."
Adrian tapped a finger against the heavy desk.
"But honestly? I think it is way better to just force them into a Blood Contract and hand them the higher tier manuals." Adrian advised. "This way, your personal army will be stronger than the others. And it will force the other rival nobles to scramble and find knight manuals for their own soldiers just to keep up."
"Since you’ll be talking the first step and keeping the whole operation a secret, it’ll take them quite some time to find out about this. Even if they did, they’ll hesitate to do the same thing like you are right now. The whole empire already knows that I have an army of knights, even if I just took fifty to the war last time. I don’t see anyone following my example and even you’re doubtful about my methods. Just do what I’m doing and it will give you a massive tactical advantage over the other territories."
Draven stared at him for a long moment.
"Did you give your own soldiers a low-tier knight manual too?" Draven asked carefully.
"Well, not really." Adrian said casually. "I just gave them the top-grade one."
Draven sat straight up in his chair. He just stared at Adrian in pure shock.
"You what?" Draven asked, his voice completely flat.
"I gave them the top-tier manual." Adrian repeated calmly.
Draven let out a massive, exhausted sigh. He rubbed his face aggressively.
"You are an absolutely crazy man." Draven muttered. "You trust your people way too much."
"Well, I do not blindly trust them." Adrian smirked. "But I have my own secret ways to keep this manual from leaking out. So yeah."
"Okay." Draven let out a low grunt. He clearly had zero interest in pushing that dangerous political topic any further.
"Let’s just go grab some food." Adrian said as he grinned at the Marquis.
"Sure, but talking about food... what’s actually wrong with the monster meat? How did you find out?"
"Well, I did a bit of testing during my free time while I helped Serena. The bodies are temporary and they will disappear after six months."