Claude was very busy. Even though Misik had helped him settle most of the candidates for HQ during the preparations for the new war theatre, he didn't have to worry about the communications, intelligence, logistics and other departments.
But due to Claude's decision to move HQ to Lanu, everyone was incredibly busy.
Misik didn't object to Claude's decision, however, as he felt that Grenor Castle was a little too out of the way as the capital of Anfiston. It wasn't as convenient as Lanu, which was in the middle of Anfiston.
It was just that Grenor Castle was the largest mining city in the colony and was home to two gold mines.
Anfiston had always focused on mining and for the sake of the two mines' safety and development, it was understandable that the capital would be at Grenor Castle.
But it would be a waste of time to set HQ at Grenor Castle during wartime.
It would take more than half a day to travel from Lanu to Grenor Castle. If there was an emergency, it would take a day to go back and forth.
However, moving the HQ to Lanu wasn't an easy task. Just transporting Ranger's supplies to Lanu was troublesome enough, let alone everything else.
Not to mention, Misik had ordered all the four-wheeled carriages to be taken to Tyrrsim to pick up the immigrant families.
Just as Misik said, time was of the essence.
Storm had already escorted the immigrant fleet out to sea and they would reach Tyrrsim in about half a month.
It would take more than 20 days to get from Tyrrsim to Anfiston. Of course, that was if they had carriages to transport them.
In other words, HQ had to complete the relocation within 30 to 40 days and set up a camp for the immigrants in Lanu so that they would have a place to stay.
He also decided on the property arrangements for these immigrant families. During this period, he also provided these immigrant families with daily necessities, food supplies, and medical assistance ….
Claude was so busy that his feet barely touched the ground. Even though his mansion was in Lanu, he didn't have time to go home for a good night's rest.
Fortunately, with the help of Myjack, Berklin, Dyavid and the other trusted aides, more than 4,000 of the 5,000 veterans of Line 131 were willing to join Thundercrash. That allowed Claude to complete the basic structure of the new folk without much effort.
Misik's guess was right. More than half of Ranger's soldiers were willing to transfer to the second line after being promoted.
Compared to salary and benefits, they were more willing to fight for a better future on the battlefield.
As long as they won a battle, the rewards they would receive after the battle were far greater than their salary. That was especially true given their confidence in Claude. Under his command, they would receive far more than any other unit in Ranger.
Of the thirty thousand veterans of Ranger, around twenty-six thousand were willing to transfer to the five reinforced folk. Of the thirty thousand new recruits, around two thousand were willing to stay with the veterans.
Misik decided to assign 5,000 veterans to each folk and left the remaining 3,000 to Thundercrash.
The 30,000-odd soldiers of Ranger that were supposed to be brought back to the kingdom were used as laborers by Marshal Michelic. Before they returned to the kingdom, they had to build a camp in Lanu, pave roads, and expand the town. They were exhausted to the point of complaining.
Misik, however, didn't mind at all. He said that since these useless people didn't even dare to go to the battlefield, they could at least do some manual labor.
Weyblon's son, Deriweyk, joined Thundercrash voluntarily as a retired officer and became a first lieutenant again. He was currently learning and adapting.
Claude had a short meeting with Henderman, the president of the Mining and Commerce Association, to confirm the principles for the distribution of immigrants.
As Claude had expected, the mining association didn't need immigrants to work in the mines. That would be left to the young and strong nidjana to do.
What they needed was talent. For example, a family in this world would have five or six people at the very least, up to a dozen at most.
Apart from a retired soldier in each family, the immigrants also had parents, siblings, and so on.
The mining and commerce association needed to find talent from them.
Compared to the other prefectures in the kingdom, it was much harder to find talent in the colonies.
The mining and commerce association was too arrogant in the mountainous regions of Anfiston and they lacked the most basic management.
They had no choice but to assign the nikancha to the lowest management positions, which resulted in low productivity.
In the past, they couldn't find anyone to work for them. Now that there were 100,000 immigrants in the kingdom, the mining and commerce association naturally had their eyes on the families of the immigrants.
Just as Henderman said, it didn't matter if they couldn't read or write. Managing the nikancha was something they could do with hard work.
They didn't need much help either. With a gun in one hand and a whip in the other, the nikancha would listen to them obediently.
What the mining and commerce association lacked the most were people with guns and whips. It would be even better if the families of the immigrants could read and write. There would be plenty of positions for them.
Claude also came to an agreement with Hendman that he wouldn't object to the association recruiting talents from the immigrant families, but it had to be done on a voluntary basis. The association would have to send people in after the immigrant families arrived at the camp without any coercion or deceit. Only those who volunteered to settle down in the mountain city would be allowed to be settled by the association.
Time passed quickly. In the blink of an eye, more than 30 days had passed. The first batch of immigrants was about to arrive.
That was when Claude, who was at HQ, received a report that something had happened in the logistics department.
The head of Ranger's logistics department, General Fansnik, was causing trouble again. He didn't know that Misierc had already left all the military supplies for the new theatre and that Skri was in charge of the logistics.
Based on the accounts of the logistics department, he felt that there were a little too many Shiksan supplies stored there, so he wanted to find a merchant to sell the goods in those warehouses.
Perhaps it was because the day of their return to the kingdom was getting closer and closer, General Fansnik, as the head of the logistics department of Ranger, was getting more and more unscrupulous. He wholeheartedly wanted to sell all the unused military supplies in the warehouse and turn them into cash.
He felt that since he couldn't bring them back, he might as well sell them all. So, he decided to contact a merchant to sell them off.
It wasn't easy for him to get in touch with a merchant who was interested and excitedly invited him to check out the goods in the depot.
As soon as he opened the door to the warehouse, General Fansnik was shocked. Not only were the goods stored in a few warehouses gone, but some of the supplies that were still stored in the warehouses were all sealed with the stamp of the Logistics Department of the Theater of Operations …
General Fansnik panicked. They were supposed to be Ranger's military supplies, so how did they end up being the logistics department's?
He angrily went to Skri and demanded the return of Ranger's supplies.
However, Skri told him that it was an order from Misierc to hand over all the military supplies to the theatre since they couldn't be brought back to the kingdom anyway.
The flustered General Fansnik declared that Misierc's order was a random one. As the head of Ranger's logistics department, he didn't know about it at all. So, without his permission, the military supplies couldn't be handed over to other units. He ordered Skri to return all the supplies to him.
Skri immediately refused to carry out his order and demanded that he get Misierc's permission first. It wouldn't be too late to return the supplies then.
However, Fansnik didn't have the guts to go to Misierc. His original plan was to sell off the surplus supplies and get a share of the profits. Then, he would put the rest into the accounts of Ranger's logistics department as a political achievement.
Now that his plan failed, he was furious and stressed that Misierc didn't have the authority to deal with the supplies. It was under his jurisdiction as the head of logistics department.
So, he accused Skri of embezzling and transferring the supplies and ordered the military police to lock him up. He then packed up the supplies in the depot and sold them to the merchant who came to buy them.
Skri was currently in charge of the logistics department in the new theatre. The moment he was locked up, the logistics department was thrown into chaos. No one could make decisions and many things piled up.
Fortunately, there were other officers in the logistics department who were clear-headed enough to notify Claude and Beechlin of 4th Monolith Folk in Grinosburg.
Even though the new theatre's command center had been moved to Lanu, Skri's logistics department was still in Grinosburg dealing with the supplies Ranger transferred to the new theatre.
Nobody expected something like that to happen. Misierc just had to go to Brikaman in Robisto to inspect the construction of 1st Monolith Folk and the Dorinibla River defence line.
Fansnik was the highest-ranking officer in Ranger's command center, so nobody could stop him.
Claude was too far away and he couldn't fly to Grinosburg right away.
All he could do was send an eagle message to Beechlin and request him to enforce martial law in Grinosburg and prevent the merchant who bought the supplies from leaving the city. He was to lock him up first before rushing to Ranger's command center to rescue Skri.
But more than an hour later, Claude received another eagle message from Beechlin. It said that Fansnik had mobilized the supply camp of Ranger's logistics department to escort the merchant's convoy out of the city.
Both sides were currently in a standoff and Fansnik accused Beechlin of plotting a mutiny.
Even though most of Ranger's troops were in Lanu for construction, there was still a garrison and supply camp at Grinosburg's HQ.
Claude couldn't make Beechlin open fire on the supply camp under pressure. That would cause a huge mess. They were only acting on orders, after all.
The communications officer in command reported that it would take three hours for the eagle to reach Robisto's Brikaman. It would be around six in the evening by the time they received a reply.
Misierc, on the other hand, had left the previous morning and was still on the way. They would probably only reach Brikaman the next afternoon.
Moreover, although Marshal Michelic had brought a hawk with him, he had to release the hawk first and use it to deliver the message to Marshal Michelic.
It was impossible for the messenger hawks in the Battle Command to target a group of people who were in a hurry …
What should he do?
Claude pondered with furrowed brow. If this incident wasn't handled well, it would greatly affect the war theatre.
Nobody expected that useless General Fansnik would use that opportunity to catch everyone off guard. Truth be told, the supplies he sold didn't really matter. They were Shiksan's reserves, after all.
Misierc would naturally deal with him when he returned in a few days.
However, Claude didn't want to let Fansnik go. If he didn't teach him a harsh lesson, he might cause even more trouble in the future.
If he got his way, it would only cast a shadow over the new war theatre's command center.
His superiors naturally understood his predicament, but what would the soldiers think of him? That would greatly diminish his prestige as the new highest commander of the war theatre.
"Send a hawk message to Colonel Beechlin to let them pass …"
"Have Thundercrash's Guerrilla Battalion move out with me," Claude ordered.
Guerrilla Battalion was the only full-strength battalion in Thundercrash at the moment. It was set up like Ranger Battalion 131, with Myjack as its commandant.
The battalion consisted of around 1,600 men, all of them veterans. They were the sharpest knife Claude had prepared for Thundercrash.
After around two hours, Claude led Guerrilla Battalion to the entrance of the mountain path and gave the order to rest.
At the same time, he sent sentries up the mountain path to see if the convoy escorted by General Fansnik had arrived.
Fortunately, there was only one path down from Grinosburg, so the convoy could only pass through it.
Half an hour later, the sentries reported that the convoy was about to arrive.
What happened next was simple. The Guerrilla Battalion that had been lying in ambush at the side of the mountain path suddenly appeared and shouted that General Fansnik had committed treason, that he was to be arrested immediately and that anyone who resisted would be killed on the spot.
Most of the soldiers in the supply camp were confused and didn't know what to do, so they were easily disarmed.
Fansnik, on the other hand, roared furiously, saying that he was a branch of the Stellin royal family and couldn't possibly commit treason. It was clearly slander.
The officers around him were tempted and wanted to question him, but they were beaten up and tied up by the veterans of Guerrilla Battalion.
Claude walked up to General Fansnik and took out an eagle message and waved it in front of everyone. "This is a message from Marshal Michelic. It says that General Fansnik has betrayed the kingdom and colluded with Shiks to steal intelligence from the war theatre. Orders for the war theatre to arrest him immediately."
Nobody could see what was written on the letter, but based on his solemn tone, they believed that it was an order from Misierci.
Only General Fansnik continued to jump up and down. "Nonsense! I didn't commit treason!
You're slandering a member of the imperial division! I won't let you off! "
Claude punched him in the chin and he fell to the ground, struggling.
"Tie him up and throw him into the carriage. Stuff some socks in his mouth as well. The carriage will be bumpy so he won't bite his tongue." Claude took out a white handkerchief to wipe his fist.
"Sir, what about the merchant and the convoy?" Myjack asked.
"Take them away and get Colonel Saljorak to interrogate them. Isn't he an anti-spy?
I need the merchant's confession that he's a Shiksan spy. "