The War as a Whole

It didn't take much to relay the message to the fleets to start engaging the enemy in battle. The once formidable fleet of King Rorik had been fractured and split between some of his sons and a few of daughters. Their families had given their help and comprised most of their respective forces in both land and sea. Normally such numbers would present a credible threat and challenge. But your enemies' division and disunity is your advantage.

You join your troops in the field. You charge with them, you scream your battle cries with them, you hold the line with them, you fight with them. But because you're relatively inexperienced and lacked sufficient training, you are always surrounded and well guarded by more seasoned soldiers who make sure nothing happens to you. Among those men was Otto who has done a spectacular job of saving your life once.

One by one, the divided armies of Helga's half-siblings fall. Somehow all the nobles involved in those armies end up dead with no one taking credit for such a kill. Helga demanded the bodies of each of her half-siblings and was grew increasingly mad when someone tried to reason that they were dead. Rather than pissing off the next Queen of Daynland, your soldiers do as she says. You expected Helga to desecrate their bodies in one form or another. But surprisingly, she has graves dug up for them as well as individual graves for all the fallen men. They are all given proper burials with all the funeral rites in accordance to their faith.

Helga then shows herself to surviving soldiers of her half-siblings' armies. To each one, she offers them a choice: swear their loyalty to her, take her as their new Queen and live and return to their families or face banishment. Considering most of the surviving men are comprised of fresh conscripts who didn't willingly join any of the armies, they took their chances with Helga's mercy. It paid to have seen Helga order graves to be dug for their fallen including those who were her main enemies.

Seems like Helga knows how to play the role of a ruler who can be merciful. Her anger for her half-siblings was real. She gave them a proper burial not to honor them in **** but to appease her subjects. It gave them a show of a Queen willing to bury grudges with the dead. You mentally laugh. It's exactly something your mother or sister would pull off.

The Toscana fleet had gotten a lot of sea battle experience. All the better for future skirmishes with pirates. They found the cold unbearable at first but when battle came and their lives were on the line, the cold seemed like second fiddle. Now they occupied the northern areas of Daynland.

The losses on your side were nothing to laugh at. But General Gunter's leadership as well as some input from you had reduced your casualties. The entire campaign had been a massive victory and created a strong sense of camaraderie with the Lothelsabourg forces. Not to mention it had been a great moral booster to the Toscana forces when they and your forces met up.

At the end, your forces were victorious and Helga was the last child of King Rorik left breathing which made her the new Queen. Her brother with the mother from Schlestein never received help from Schlestein. You and Helga find it almost disappointing. If Schlestein had acted against you, you could have crushed them and split the land between the two of you. But you both know deep down that was an arrogant way of thinking about it. In the end, you were both glad neither Schlestein or any of the Northern Kingdoms came to help.

All that's left now is Helga's Coronation and the creation of your shared child.