Homesteading in a fantasy world

In the capital city of the United Freehold, a lot of people were doing final preparations so they would be ready to march to war. There were a lot of emotions that shone through, but most of all, in everyone's eyes, there was determination.

In the centre of the legions' command, in a large room, there were a lot of people, not just from the United Freeholds but from two allied nations as well. Everyone was waiting for Rich to begin, so everyone would know and understand the current war strategy.

His voice was without hesitation, and his tone made it clear to everyone that he was in command. "To start this off, with the help of the mages, the roads can be made so we can already march using them. While I would have liked to wait a while longer, the enemy has left us no option. They have not yet declared war, but we can already see that our predictions were correct, and they will be marching their three armies towards us."

"We have active surveillance of their movements, thanks to my bonded animal, Goose. Over the course of a few months, he has been able to gain an ability that improves his long-range vision, so we can watch from a safe distance. So, if there is any change to their predicted movements, we can react almost immediately. Because of this, we also have their exact numbers."

"We are facing nearly 40,000 soldiers who are split into three armies. The first one has 12,000 solders. We have designated it the Eastern army. That will most likely move towards Bravenhold, our allies that are furthest from here.”

“The second army, which we are calling the Southern army, is 17,000 soldiers. A lot of the soldiers here have the lowest amount of training, and over 2,000 are just farmers given weapons. The third army, which we are calling the Western army, has 12,000 soldiers. It's the most well-equipped and trained army with a lot of elites."

"Speaking of elites, with the numbers we have been able to confirm, we actually have more elites than they do, but they also seem to be concentrating them in the Western army. We have also been able to confirm that the leader of this country and his 10 main followers are all with this army.”

“This indicates that both their Southern and Eastern armies, especially because they seem to be commanded by newer generals, do not mean to engage their opposing armies but keep them in place while they use their strongest army to engage and punch through anything we send against them."

"I would like to thank both Bravenhold and Frontier's Collective, who sent some of their very best to help bolster the United Freeholds army," Rich took a small pause and gave a slight bow to both of the leaders of their respective nations. The gesture was returned, so Rich continued. "It will most likely be that the United Freeholds army will need to engage the Western army, but that is not certain."

"For a significant amount of time, both the Western and Southern armies will be using the same road until they reach this point," Rich said while pointing at a clearly marked split in the road in the enemy nation's land.

"Unfortunately, with the time constraints we are under, we will not be able to reach the enemy before they reach this splitting point. It would have been better if two of our armies could simultaneously face two of theirs, but this is unfortunately not doable."

"The Frontier's Collective army is already focusing on making fortifications to hold if the enemy decides to engage. The town near that location, Aldermarch, will also be a huge logistic centre. Bravenhold’s army of 8000 will move north until they reach the Crane River. There, they will wait for a little bit, so the eastern army are able to get a bit closer and then start moving east to join up with the Frontier's Collectives army."

"Supporting Bravenhold’s army will be 500 of United Freeholds cavalry, along with 500 of Frontier's Collectives cavalry and 500 of Bravenhold’s cavalry. Fortunately, we have also been able to get 1000 mercenary cavalry from a nation towards the south who really needed the coin.”

“We will have a lot of options available to us, and what we will do will depend on how the enemy reacts. With the cavalry being so manoeuvrable, we should be able to find a favourable position to actually crush the Eastern Army."

"For the Frontier's Collective army of 10,000, their main goal would be to stop the southern army from advancing beyond this point," Rich once again pointed at the marked location on the map, which was a relatively small area between two rivers and quite a thick forest.

"Now, while I don’t think it will come to a direct fight, there will most certainly be a lot of skirmishes and testing of defenses. Your army is highly trained, and I am confident you will be able to hold even if it came to a direct conflict," Rich said while looking directly at the leader of the Frontier's Collective nation.

There were no other words, and after a short silence, Rich continued. "This all, of course, could change depending on the enemy's actions. In Aldermarch, we also have stationed 2,000 mercenary troops from the same nation we got the cavalry.

They would be able to move to help either the Frontier's Collectives or the United Freeholds army. If needed, we also have enough time to merge both armies if the enemy armies don't split up. We still think it's more likely that they will."

"Almost 500 of United’s Vikings will be used to patrol the United Freeholds borders as we have confirmed that elite units have been sent through the large forest that separates us from the enemy nation.”

“The United Freeholds army, with 3,500 soldiers, will be leaving tomorrow and would have easily enough time to make it and support the Frontier's Collective army or, as currently planned, engage with the 2,000 mercenaries the western army led by the enemy nation’s leader."

Most couldn't keep the wince out of their face as the numbers weren’t that good. Yet, Rich continued without stopping or commenting on their reaction.

"With my boosts and the amount of elite fighters we have, the fight will be hard, but we should be able to pull them towards the Frontier's Collective army. The plan is that if they don’t follow, we will use long-range attacks, and if they do, start retreating towards the south. This will be an incredibly messy fight with a lot of smaller skirmishes."

"With me and three other rank two fighters, we will be able to match the enemy leader, who's rank two, and his followers and other elite fighters, who all seem to be rank one. There is a good chance that we will be able to kill the enemy leader in the first conflict, but we should not be counting on that.”

“This brings me to the most important point of this meeting: the enemy has luck on their side, which means that every action, every order, will need to be triple-checked. Everything that could go wrong needs to be accepted that it will go wrong."

"This will put incredible pressure on everyone, yet we cannot let a simple mistake that could have been avoided ruin our chances at victory. For that, we have prepared procedures that everyone must follow.”

“The most important one being that all supplies will need to be kept as separate as possible because a simple fire that we expect will happen—even if we do everything perfectly—could possibly lead to our defeat."

What followed was a detailed and extremely thorough explanation of almost everything that could go wrong and how to make sure luck wouldn’t play a part in those things going wrong. It was a painful meeting that lasted well into the night and made literally everyone's brain hurt from so much information.

The enemy nation's leader viewed this entire meeting after the fact to learn everything. He was impressed, yet he was glad that he was able to fool Rich because, in the first battle between them, not him but Rich was the one who was going to die.