Road to the Crown 235 State of the Tarnowian Marketplace

After dealing with the mercenaries, it was finally time to go to the marketplace and send the signal to the ships so that our supplies could arrive. Yet as if nothing could go my way beside shedding the blood and wasting my now limited funds on the money we had to use to do so, rather than welcoming us back to the city that was inf act, my personal property, the moment I stepped inside the firing range of the buildings, I heard someone's loud voice calling me to stop!

"Dot not make a single step further! I don't care who sent you, but this place is off-limits for all the war parties!"

While initially, I thought that with such spontaneous reaction it might be a bit problematic to enter the city, but hearing the familiar voice from the building, I couldn't help but smirk.

"Pavlo, is that you?"

While I would never claim to know every single retained or my by the name, this shrew, little guy was someone who I just couldn't forget, no matter what. Despite serving as your everyday militiaman and guard of this city, he was, in fact, the boss of the underworld organisation that settled in there as soon as the entire place started operating!

Even despite knowing about this, I never bothered to eradicate them, as thanks to exchanging just a few letters, our cooperation actually turned way more beneficial to the operations of the marketplace than I was initially worried it would be harmful.

From stopping various bandit groups around the place from ever reaching with their greedy hands for my market, all the way to pursuing any smaller banditry that was stupid enough to attempt establishing here without adhering to the rules set by Pavlo…

Just like in that bad joke, when they gave a new policeman a job, but due to the mistake in the books, he failed to receive his salary for several months straight. And when they finally asked him why didn't he ask someone for it, he just responded that he thought that since he got a gun, he was supposed to take care of himself from now on…

As silly as that joke was, Pavlo was a perfect example that it was still well-grounded within the bounds of reality!

"Wait, is that you, sir Mike?!"

It was no wonder that due to the distance that separated us and the lack of the light that would at least help him discern what he was talking about, just the fact that I knew his name was enough for him to guess my identity.

"And who do you think would bring such insane guns to deal with damned mercenaries without losing a single man? They are not that greatly trained in the first place, I will have you know!"

While I was flaunting the prowess of my troops right in Pavlo's face, I could finally see him coming out from between the buildings. Even though he was perfectly conscious of the fact that I would do him no harm nor would any of my pen attempt to do something like this, he still dared to bring several guards along!

"You know this isn���t necessary at all…"

As much as I wanted to ignore this fact, doing so would only mean my silent approval of this kind of behaviour. Despite the situation we were already in, there was no way I would let him do as he wants!

"As they say, a God guards the back of the careful man! Welcome to the Tarnowian marketplace, my lord. How can we be of your service?"

From the moment the two of us finally met face to face, I could tell that Pavlo relaxed, as if all this time ever since I first called out to him, he was worried whether or not this was some kind of clever plot aimed at luring him out.

"It's nice to know that at least you didn't believe in this bull of crap about my treason… Anyway, I need you to prepare the river port, quite a lot of my ships will be landing there with supplies."

As much as I would like to question him out about just how in the hell did the stalemate between that mercenary force and the marketplace develop, with how limited time we had to finish all of our preparations, I simply couldn't spare all that time!

Obviously, there was no way for us to finish everything and move all the way back to the outskirts of Tarnow before the sun would set the face of the earth alight again. The best I currently hoped for, was that by the time the enemy forces would notice our arrival, we would already have our firing stations set up, upgraded reaper guns stationed on the elevated positions and everyone ready to start firing!

Yet as hopeful as I was about the incoming battle, I had no other choice but to accept the fact that my initial plan was already in shambles. With how slow everything was going on when compared to the initial idea, there was simply no way for me to use the cover of the night in order to take the position that I wanted beforehand.

"Sir, we are ready to send the signal."

As soon as we approached the shore of the river, I could see that Pavlo did actually a good job. Rather than just waiting for the next orders, he already went out of his way to send some men to set the fire under the steam engines, providing the power for all the cranes that were now just waiting for their use.

Right now, all I had to do, was to finally let my men launch an experimental projectile that I came up with on our way there. Consisting of several layers of copper casing, it would continue to burn even after reaching up the skies!

"Seeing how everything is going well, let's not waste any more time… Set the flare!"

Chapter end