Me, Hydra

"What are you doing here? An emissary of the Greek nations."

Nodding, the white-clothed messenger raised his brocade high in his hand.

"None other, make peace."

At the words, Hydra narrowed her eyes.

Making peace was the logical thing to do in Hydra's eyes, autumn was almost over and what followed was a cold winter. The winter was cold and dry, which was extremely unfavorable for the expeditionary army. The mountains were covered in snow, and if a quarter of the foodstuffs that the Spartan banished army had burned in the first place relied on the supply lines were still able to barely fill the gap. But if it was a different season, it wouldn't be so easy in winter....

After a moment's contemplation Hydra said quietly.

"Read to me what's written on it."

At the words, the messenger nodded and then recounted the entirety of what was written on the brocade.

A moment later, Hydra arrived in winter.

"Since this is the peace you have begun, that is, the terms of the peace should be set by me, will you represent the Greek states?"

Hearing Hydra's words, the messenger nodded.

"I am a messenger personally appointed by the great god Zeus, as long as the terms of peace are combined, I can question the kings of Greece here to agree to it."

"Well then, my terms are simple: you cannot unilaterally start a war for two hundred years. Open the borders, allow and protect our caravans to exchange and trade within the Greek states, and reduce taxes on caravans by sixty percent. Allow all trade regarding rare ores. And allow the buying and selling of people."

Hearing Hydra's words, the messenger nodded his head.

Hydra's conditions were much more relaxed than expected, and such things as population trading were very common among Greece. Or rather, things like slaves were already part of the commodity. Although the tariffs on caravans would be much less, this did not affect the internal economy of the Greek states, but the trading of rare ores surprised the messenger. However, it was still within the affordable range.

"Yes, on behalf of the kings of the Greek states, I swear by the great god Khaos."

Nodding, Hydra waved her hand, indicating that the messenger could leave.

Seeing the situation, the messenger did not dilly-dally and left the Great Shrine after performing an inherent salute.

Seeing the messenger leave, Skaha, who had been silent at his side, asked lightly, "Why did you agree to a truce? We're almost certain to win by the time winter drags on, right? And the terms of your peace deal are a bit of an understatement. It's perfectly possible to cut a swath through them."

Shaking her head, Hydra spoke easily.

"Sparta's foundation is still too thin, although Sparta can support short or medium term wars, but when it comes to long term wars, Sparta will be overloaded and thus fall into internal collapse. For Sparta, sullen development is the hard truth, it is still the Cold War era, the numerical superiority of the Greek allied forces is too great. Sparta's entire military strength combined is only a total of 130,000. The Greek nations, on the other hand, had a military strength of over 300,000, not counting the many orc races including the centaurs. Develop, develop now, and when that guy Hephaestus completely develops hot weapons, Greece's numerical advantage will be gone..."

Frowning, Skaha wondered.

"What the hell is this hot weapon's you're talking about? Ever since Hephaestus came to Sparta, he's been working intensely on the musket you speak of. But by now, it's only about half made, right?"

Nodding, Hydra looked over at Skaha.

"Of course you can't understand, you are from this era after all, trust me, when the hot weapon comes along, that's when the times will start to change..."

As she said that, Hydra turned on her own side.

"I'll get some sleep, feel free~"

"Cut..."

In the main city of Mycenae, Leonidas nodded as he looked at the news delivered by the messenger.

"I didn't expect the war to be over by now, I was expecting to be fighting for half the winter~"

With a shrug of her shoulders and a cup of hot tea in her hand Atalanta looked all together reasonable.

"To be fair, the Greek states are not really our enemies. Our enemies are the guys on Mount Olympus, and as for the Greek nations attacking, it's actually more because of those temple priests' oracles. There is no shortage of discerning people among Greece, and that little dwarf Socrates counts as one, as well as that student he recently took in, Palatine. Once they succeeded in opening their borders with Greece, it also meant that they could return to their homeland for missionary work. It's a more effective means for us to deal with that group of gods on Olympus than killing the enemy."

After all of this, Atalanta was also feeling a little dry, but the scalding hot tea was very uncomfortable for a feline like Atalanta....

Shaking his head, the aside Quintus took the cup of tea from Ta Meow's hand then took a cup of cold water and mixed it with the hot tea from his own sister's cup, feeling the temperature to find it was fine and handed the cup to Atalanta.

"It's a bit of a shame, but it's going to be winter soon and all the young and strong Spartans are out fighting in the war, so I don't know how my mother is doing. There must be a lot of things that are hard to do when you're home alone. Not only my mother, but also many Spartan families are doing the same, starting to stock up on supplies for the winter, not without the help of the youngsters~"

As he said that, Quintus also shrugged his shoulders.

The current Quintus but also in terms of age was already a top ranked existence among the humans of Spartan Main City, but relying on the immortality in his body and the time stream refracted by his cloak, the current Quintus seemed to be in his forties....

But no matter how much time passed, it could not make Quintus forget the youth that his own mother, Callisto, had given to him in the first place.

After a moment of silence, Leonidas nodded.

"That's true, it will soon be a new year again. How quickly time flies...how are our losses?"

Lifting up the tent and walking in, Hippolyta spoke bluntly.

"Fine, I tapped it, 80,000 soldiers almost half dead, three dead if the forbidden guard, over fifty lightly wounded and five seriously wounded. It looks like we'll have to recuperate for a while..."

Nodding, Leonidas was a bit frustrated.

"Looks like we'll have to prepare something about the expansion of recruits when we get back... Never mind, don't want this kind of stuff, depart and withdraw tomorrow, let's get drunk tonight."

"Of course! I've been waiting a long time for you to say that!"

........

Colds are really hard on people....

You'll never guess what happens when you drink water and suddenly your nose drips into a glass of water....

My mental turmoil at the time that was really....

emmmmmmm....

(ps: begging for tickets~)

Volume 1: Text-119.Return to Sparta

"Mom~~~"

When she saw Callisto's figure, Atalanta jumped into Callisto's arms with an excited face. Not caring about the faces of the surrounding Spartan inhabitants.

Smiling bitterly and hugging Atalanta who jumped towards him, Callisto turned around twice before quietly dissolving the force. Then he touched Atalanta's head with a loving face.

"You still haven't changed at all after being out for so long, you can be more steady in the future~"

Hearing Callisto's fireless reprimand, Atalanta nodded nicely then continued to hump around in Callisto's arms.

"Ah, what decadent tits..."

Passing through the crowd, Quintus greeted his own mother ah. Now after all, it was a crowded place, Quintus wasn't a girl like Atalanta but a serious man. There was a difference between men and women, at least in this kind of public place it was necessary to keep some distance.

But that said, the excitement in Quintus' eyes at the long-awaited reunion could not be concealed.