“Sir!”
Hodd came bursting in at that moment. Jackson turned to him.
“It’s war!”
“What?”
There had been smaller wars happening throughout the land, but they were only small battles to protect the food in transit.
“Dentrion and Katzback have declared war on each other! Merchants say they tried to take each other’s corn and it became serious. I heard Galia and Benzen are joining in.”
“They’re crazy!” Todd shouted in outrage. The world was barely getting out of its crisis. It was not time for more warfare.
‘The world is going mad,’ Jackson thought. It seemed like everything was going well up until now. Jackson even speculated that everything would return to normal by end of the year.
‘Ugh… it’s the people’s greed.’ The problem was always the greed of the people.
‘But it was as he guessed.’
-Nothing will happen while I’m gone… oh. If things get better, I’m sure some will start acting up.-
-What do you mean, sir?”-
-Those kingdoms. They will do something if they get out of their problems.-
-Now? But what motive will they have to do anything at this point? We are giving them food too.-
-No, no. It’s not against us. They will fight with each other and try to take away another’s share of the pie.-
-Hmm…-
It was what Joonbum speculated just before he left. Jackson was skeptical of it, but it happened.
“Tell our men to stay out of it. It’s their war.”
There was no choice left but to watch it happen.
‘It will make it easy for us to consume them when they’re worn out from the war.’
Jackson began to think for their own sake.
“Hodd, go tell Hectos to bring all refugees around the area. Todd, tell merchants to bring all the refugees. Spread the rumor that we are accepting all refugees seeking asylum.”
Todd and Hodd answered quickly and left the room.
‘We have land and we have corn. We can harvest at least three times a year at the current scale. We just need more people, so we’ll make this our opportunity to bring in more people.’
Jackson organized his thoughts. The commoners did not care who their lords and kings were. All they cared about was to live a life without poverty and starvation.
‘The people do not care about the boundaries of the country. If we have the people, then we can become a country.’
The land was vast due to its desolate nature. It had been largely abandoned because it was considered impossible to farm. But that land was now turned into vast farmlands.
‘By the time you return, our village will become a huge city!’
The village was full of various people. It was safe to say that the world’s economy was now revolving around the Ainos village. Countless merchants visited the village to trade for food and refugees kept coming in.
Jackson smiled as he began thinking up a plan.
*
“Wake up.”
“Hmm.”
Doral shook Joonbum’s shoulder lightly to wake him up.
“Jinpok.”
“Huh? What? What’s going on?”
“They’re after us.”
Jinpok frowned as he woke up from Joonbum’s call. He reached out to grab his axe.
“I knew it. I knew it when that town elder was so flattering,” Jinpok smirked. But Doral scoffed as he didn’t believe Jinpok knew what was coming.
“Huh? Hey, Ainos. You don’t believe me?”
“Of course.”
“WHAT!”
“Weren’t you snoring just now?”
Jinpok blushed at Doral’s calm accusal. But he scoffed it off and spoke.
“Huh? Oh, haha. So, even you were fooled! What do you think? I just acted like I believed them, you know.”
Joonbum laughed and Doral frowned. Jinpok then carefully put on a tactical vest from Joonbum and wore a breastplate with a tiger engraving on top of it.
“So, the plan is to just kill anyone that attacks us. Right? Show them no mercy, okay?” Jinpok said.
‘He’s getting stronger by the moment. Is it because he’s from Earth?’ Joonbum thought as he felt Jinpok’s strong power emanating from him.
“The lead?”
“I’ll go.”
Joonbum took up a shield. He then burst open the door of the room and jumped out. Three of them quickly moved out of the house, attacking unexpecting attackers in sight. Jinpok swung his axe at one of the man’s heads, easily slicing it off from the body and Joonbum smashed his shield on the other man’s head, crushing it instantly.
“Ki-kill them! ARGH!”
“Den!”
“UGH!”
Another man fell down with an arrow in his mouth, screaming in pain. Three men were killed instantly and all men around were ridden with fear.
“A-attack! We outnumber them!”
Three men thrust their wooden spears at Jinpok. One penetrated Jinpok’s body.
“OH!”
“We got him!”
“YES! WE-”
It was right after their attack succeeded that a giant axe was quickly swung at them, killing them instantly.
“You bastards, it still hurts with the vest! Dammit!”
As Jinpok was raining hell on the attackers, Doral was shooting his arrows, killing them with each arrow. He was aiming at the men who seemed to be the leaders.
There was no mercy. Three men attacked coldly, killing everyone in their way. After a brief while, the battle was over. Most were killed and their number dropped down to less than ten, after which they threw down their weapons and surrendered. But Jinpok carelessly swung his axe at the begging men, killing them all in one swoop.
