The Next Erased Title for Security Reasons

Chapter 4: Espacea

Villages of Espacea

At a local inn, Ioscis sat at the table piled with books. He had borrowed them from the library. The Behemoth wanted information. Quality information, not country gossips. He had visited every shop in the villages, and studied their working. The farms and cropping area had been thoroughly studied while he travelled. Trade had been studied after the lord turned him down. Now the local crafts and culture alone remained.

Espacean blacksmiths made ordinary tools. But their smelting techniques were world-class. A fine source of weapons. Their wood work was good. The rebel archers would benefit. They had excellent weavers. The farms had a lot of cropping waste like fibres and leaves. Combined with the research technology developed by the Federation, these could be woven into sails, ropes and camouflage. Espacean medicine was unnaturally well-developed. Ioscis smiled to himself. Now he knew why both Meltinzer, and the 'Prince' focused on these seemingly backward villages.

"Good. Look again." The Behemoth whispered into his ear.

Ioscis read the book again. He saw it. The true reason the 'Prince' was after the villages. As a matter of fact, the villages itself weren't what had caught the Behemoth's eye, but what lay beneath the land. There was a set of land maps. Climate, altitudes, topography, soil, rainfall, vegetation..... And the latter two was very less in most of he area surrounding the farming villages. Even though the altitudes were very close to sea-level. It spelt one thing:

Radion-Rignine-Tazarine.

Minerals from the Behemoth's personal collection. Very rare, very valuable. Radioactive. And a huge deposit of them. The Behemoth had given the rebels the technology to process and exploit them. He chuckled. "I didn't think such minerals would exist outside my homeland. This is good. We can harvest them without anyone's knowledge."

Ioscis wrote a letter to Alpha General Carmelion IV asking him to come immediately with an excavation team. Then, the Behemoth left to preach at the craft guilds. He spoke, and his words won half of them over. His smile did the rest. When he was quite sure almost the whole of the villagers were eating from the palm of his hand, he stopped and returned to the inn. Saphniel, his aides and the village girl from the last day was standing there, waiting for him. The woman stepped forward. "Sir, why did you preach about such revolutionary changes to us? If you aren't interested in ruling us, if you don't profit from it, then why did you speak to us?"

"Who said I don't get any profit? I'm not doing it for free, you know." The Behemoth smiled that enthralling smile, and slid a long, slender finger across his lips. It was meant to be a carefree smile, but a hint of a threat lurked behind those cherry lips, and it was enough to silence her and make her blush at the same time. Saphniel snorted. "I see. What happens after the leader dies? You take over?"

"No. Let the people replace him. By that time, another one would definitely come up."

"And if that new one isn't of any use?"

"Kill him."

A pregnant pause followed this extraordinary solution. The Behemoth wet his lips. "I believe a Sword of Damocles can be quite the motivator."

He left them again with their mouths agape. Saphniel glared at his departing figure.

                           ---------------------------------------------------------

Alpha General Carmelion IV brought 'Speed Angel' to the barren wastelands surrounding Espacea, just as the instructions in Ioscis' letter had been. The three-tonne cargo ship was huge, but light, and hence it's name. Excellent for illegally transporting mammoth rocks at the speed of sound. His excavation team had already set up the equipment and was now drilling a narrow tunnel into the ores. He wondered what the Behemoth wanted to steal from these poor villages.