Viking: Master of the Icy Sea

Chapter 315: Balance of Power

During the inspection tour, Gunnar promoted Knight Oliver to Baron, entrusting him to continue raising his illegitimate son, Henry.

Over the past two years, the relationship between the Duke and his wife had plummeted to a freezing point, and they had lost all interest in communicating with each other. Gunnar worried that his wife would eventually target Henry. Rather than risk that, he decided it was better to let the boy take refuge in Iberia. He would rather have Henry face the swords of the Moors than return to Normandy to suffer a treacherous assassination.

After the inspection tour concluded, Gunnar remained in Iberia to help Alfonso stabilize the situation. Following a temporary expansion of his forces, Alfonso had assembled an army of fifteen thousand men. They were currently making the most of their time to train, ready to counterattack the Moors at any moment.

According to the plan made before his departure last year, Gunnar should have returned to Normandy by now. However, he simply could not extricate himself. Military affairs, the internal affairs of his new territories, and maintaining relationships with the Visigoth nobles—countless matters kept him thoroughly entangled.

From the looks of it, he might not even be able to return by autumn. Yet, Gunnar had no other choice. Juggling two massive responsibilities at once, exhaustion was entirely inevitable.

At the same time, the royal court in Cordoba was completely stunned by the war. With one piece of bad news arriving after another, the Moorish nobles were at a loss for how to respond. After a long period of arguing, someone suggested borrowing troops from North Africa—specifically Morocco and Algeria. Additionally, Britain was also considered a promising target for requesting aid.

Soon, the merchant fleets brought this news back to Britain. Based on the various reports gathered by the captains, Wigg used a quill to sketch a thin line across the Iberian Peninsula on his map.

Overall, the situation in Iberia was not entirely one-sided.

The Moors' defeats in the first half of the year were primarily due to their commanders severely underestimating the enemy, compounded by sluggish reactions. Pounded relentlessly by Gunnar, who excelled at offensive warfare, they ultimately suffered a cascading series of routs that inflicted heavy casualties on their field armies.

However, the terrain of Iberia was incredibly complex. South of the Meseta Central lay the Sistema Central, a mountain range stretching from the southwest to the northeast. By relying on these central mountains to hold their ground, the Moors could hold out for at least the better part of a year.Their comprehensive national strength absolutely crushed that of Asturias in the north. Once they trained and organized new field armies, they might even transition from defense to offense. Taking advantage of the Visigoths before they could firmly establish a foothold, they could very well drive Alfonso back into the northwestern mountains.

At an emergency Cabinet meeting, Wigg articulated his perspective:

"The Visigoths have secured a massive victory, but it is not enough to completely reverse the balance of power between the two sides. Over the next few years, the north and the south are expected to fall into a prolonged stalemate, with neither able to wipe out the other in a single decisive stroke. Britain's best choice is to remain uninvolved and avoid participating in this time-consuming war of attrition."

The Minister of Internal Affairs spoke up, "What if the Moors use trade as a threat..."

"Then we deploy the navy," Wigg interrupted coldly. "I spent a fortune building that fleet precisely to resolve this kind of trouble. If they push me too far, I will have the fleet sweep straight down the coastline of the Iberian Peninsula.

"Furthermore, we have recently found a new trading partner—the Idrisid dynasty in Morocco. The more profitable a business is, the more people there are scrambling to do it."

Concluding that topic, Wigg brought out a Reform Plan and announced the implementation of a new mobilization system:

Across the twelve directly governed counties, peasants who owned more than thirty acres of arable land were obligated to undergo military training for forty days each year, with their respective towns bearing the responsibility for organizing it.

During training, the gentry who owned more than two hundred acres of land were required to provide their own horses, serving as mounted messengers or reconnaissance riders.

Retired military officers and soldiers under the age of forty-five would be transferred to the reserves to serve as instructors for the militia's intensive training.

In the event of war, the instructors would select adequately trained peasants to form militia regiments, taking on active combat duties.

The ministers passed the Reform Plan around, utterly shocked by the King's sheer resolve.

The Prime Minister recalled the demographics of the directly governed territories: a population of eight hundred and seventy thousand spanning one hundred and thirty-five thousand households. Of those, eighty thousand peasant households owned more than thirty acres of land. To organize such a massive group for military training... just what exactly was the King planning to do? Wigg then produced another document, which recorded the large-scale wars that had erupted across Europe over the past few decades.

"As time passes, the intensity of warfare is constantly escalating. A standing army of merely a few thousand men can no longer meet our needs. We require a larger pool of reserve troops to deal with an increasingly dangerous global landscape," Wigg declared.

Under the King's forceful insistence, the Cabinet was compelled to accept the proposal. Countless documents were dispatched like falling snow to the subordinate counties and towns, ordering local officials to complete the registration process as quickly as possible. Everything had to be prepared before October to properly organize the militia training camps in every town.

On the other hand, Wigg and his wife temporarily set aside matters of state, pouring all their energy into preparing for their eldest son's wedding.

After careful and multifaceted consideration, the couple chose the safest and most reliable alliance—the Earl of Kent. His youngest daughter was in excellent health, able to read and write the Viking tongue, and even possessed a modest vocabulary in Latin. She was entirely free of scandalous rumors and met all their stringent standards.

Fridleif obediently agreed to his parents' decision. He had met Ulf's youngest daughter before and certainly harbored no dislike toward her.

In mid-June, the royal family held the wedding ceremony at the temple in Londinium. To express his gratitude for the King's high regard, the aging Earl of Kent paid a staggering dowry of two thousand four hundred pounds, leaving the nobles who had come to attend the ceremony profoundly awestruck.

Among the crowd, Ulf's old nemesis, Leonard, muttered quietly to himself:

"That old eel has some incredible luck. Transferring his fiefdom from barren Liverpool to Kent, he made an absolute fortune off the trade in Dover. To think he's actually wealthier than me now."

The celebration lasted for ten days and cost a total of one thousand eight hundred pounds, filled with an array of extravagant expenses. For example, during the carriage parade, attendants were specifically tasked with tossing Silver Pennies into the crowds lining the streets. A knightly jousting tournament was held in the arena, and the four theaters in the city offered free admission, with all costs borne by the royal family. Taverns also supplied beer and sugarcane rum at heavily discounted prices.

Furthermore, the Royal Palace hosted grand banquets every single day. The invited guests included nobles, civilian officials, military officers, and merchants who held knighthoods.

"In just ten short days, the entire annual revenue of Aberdeen County has been completely exhausted. This is far too extravagant," Wigg lamented, feeling a sharp pang in his chest, though he did not deliberately cut back on the expenditures.

To the outside world, the more a royal wedding cost, the more it demonstrated the strength and authority of the royal family. If the King were to act overly frugal, it would conversely weaken his influence among the nobility and the commoners.

After the wedding concluded, Wigg arranged for his eldest son to travel to a town under the jurisdiction of Lundinium County, tasking him with governing the local area to accumulate administrative experience.

Having graduated from the Army Academy, Fridleif originally thought he would be assigned a post in the military. He had even carefully compared the strengths and weaknesses of various regiments, never expecting to be assigned a civilian role.

"Luton Town? What exactly do you need me to do there?"

"During the rebellion in Ireland, you experienced life within the grassroots military units. Now, observing the daily lives of the commoners up close will be immensely beneficial to your future rule," Wigg explained.

After reviewing the documents regarding the small town, Fridleif accepted the appointment. Taking his newlywed wife, a hundred soldiers from the Royal Guard, and more than twenty servants, he departed from Londinium to fulfill his very first official assignment as an adult.