Ves picked up a data pad and skimmed through the intelligence that the ck Cats had gathered about the Fridayman presence on Davute.


    He had always been aware that the Friday Coalition might not be finished with him, but he never took the state seriously as a result.


    Despite winning the Komodo War, the Fridaymen lost a huge amount of strength, wealth and manpower.


    They needed to allocate almost everything they had left just to take possession of the former territories of the Hexadric Hegemony and integrate them into their growing state.


    Given all of their needs at home, how could the Fridaymen possibly transfer so many troops, resources and qualified manpower to an entirely different dwarf gxy?


    Starting a colonial adventure should nevere at the cost of losing one''s foundation at home!


    Ves bet that pretty much all of the leaders and powerful stakeholders of the Friday Coalition still resided in the Komodo Star Sector.


    Each of these leaders came from lineages that had built up their ownmercial and political empires in their home state. It was in their best self-interest to avoidpromising their existing assets just to be able to nt more gs in the Red Ocean.


    Ves never took the Fridayman colonies as a result. The Golden Skull Alliance had grown too strong for his old enemies to attempt another raid like the one that resulted in the Battle of Reckoning.


    He expected the Friday Coalition to mind its business and stay in its ownnes while Ves went on with his business like normal.


    To be honest, he couldn''t care less about the hostile state. While there were still harsh feelings between the two, the heat of the moment had already passed after the Komodo War had passed.


    Years had passed since the Hex Armyunched millions of Valkyrie mechs and other living mechs at the mech armies of the coalition partners.


    Back then, there was a real rationale for taking out Ves as his removal would directly reduce the losses suffered by the Fridayman mech forces.


    Now that this was no longer the case, the Fridayman shouldn''t be so eager to invest so much resources into neutralizing him. They had much better things to do with their depleted forces.


    Though Ves and the Friday Coalition still had some remaining entanglements, they shouldn''t be enough for either side to continue to obsess over each other.


    He never expected the Fridaymen to take the initiative to contact him, though. Not this soon and not through an unexpected spokesperson like Tristan.


    "Why him? Why did hee here? Shouldn''t he be building up his career all the way in the old gxy?"


    Ves still possessed a decent impression of Tristan. As one of the direct disciples of Master Meredith Katzenberg, he had ess to a lot more wealth and opportunities than almost every other mech designer.


    Such a mech designer did not need to build a mechpany from scratch nor go through desperate measures in order to carve a ce in the mech industry. He just needed to follow the arrangements of his Master or use herwork to gain a head-start in his own career.


    A soft mech designer like Tristan Wesseling did not belong in a harsh and wild environment like the Red Ocean!


    The new frontier was a turbulent ce for mech designers. Plenty of them who did not possess opportunities at home had risen up from nowhere, but even more of them were beaten down by the overwhelmingpetition from the dominant market yers.


    Rather than trying so hard to achieve sess in one of the mostpetitive mech markets in human space, Tristan would have a much better time if hepeted in a market he was familiar with and could take maximum advantage of his existing connections.


    However, ording to the intelligence report, it did not seem that Tristan had traveled to the Red Ocean in order to start his own business ory the groundwork for Master Katzenberg to extend her tentacles to the new frontier.


    "The Friday Coalition has turned Tristan into an envoy." Cbast sinctly exined. "The goal is to secure an opportunity to bring you to the negotiating table in person in order to hold a deep and serious discussion with you. Previously, the Fridaymen had dispatched their diplomats to us, but Minister Shederin never let them go any further."


    "I imagine that''s for good reason. Shederin would have notified me if there was any use to talking with the Fridaymen. Is this why they decided to send Tristan this time?"


    The Director of Intelligence grinned as she squished Lucky''s face. The cat luxuriated in the pampering that he received.


    "Correct. In truth, the situation of the Fridaymen has changed over the years. As their position has worsened, they have be more desperate to negotiate with us. Sending Tristan is a sign that they are willing to be sincere about concluding a deal that satisfies both sides."


    "Oh? Tell me what''s going on. Anything that makes the Fridaymen feel uneasy should be advantageous to us." Ves leaned forward in anticipation of hearing a good story.


    Cbast did not disappoint on this front. The ck Cats had gathered a heap of intelligence. Combined with the analysis conducted by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Larkinson n possessed a pretty clear picture of how the Friday Coalition was doing these days.


    The spymaster quickly went over the aftermath of the Komodo War, the increasing tensions between the ''winners'' and ''losers'' among the coalition partners and the increasing importance of securing colonies in the Red Ocean.


    The rise of phasewater technology most acutely affected the new frontier, but also had massive implications for the old gxy.


    Every state and established power that was rooted in the Milky Way needed to establish a colony in the Red Ocean in order to gain an ''internal'' channel for phasewater.


    If a state like the Friday Coalition was unable to found and keep their colonies in the new frontier, then it would not only have ess to less phasewater than other rivals, but also be forced to buy it from alternate channels at a hefty premium!


    It would not surprise anyone at all that states without their own supply of phasewater would have to pay triple the amount of money to obtain this valuable substance!


    This was a massive expense and one that could seriously affect the bnce of power in many star sectors and star clusters.


    Now that Ves thought about it, the colonization fever had picked up as ofte. A lot more pioneers had poured into the Red Ocean despite the price of passage remaining as high as ever.


    Building up a presence in the Red Ocean was no longer seen as a luxury. It had be a matter of survival!


    Given the increased importance of maintaining a solid presence in the Red Ocean, it made a lot more sense why the Fridaymen wanted to hold a serious talk with Ves.


    This was especially the case considering the vengeful Hexer exiles could not let go of the fact that they lost the Komodo War!


    His wife may have told him stories about the Hexers stirring up trouble against their Fridayman rivals in the Magair Middle Zone, but he never expected that it had reached this level!


    "They''re still going on about this?" Ves puzzlingly asked.


    "Yes." Cbast stated. "Many of the dynasties that previously reigned over the Hegemony have sessfully managed to transnt the essence of their forces and liquid assets to their new holdings in the Magair Middle Zone. They currently possess a significant force advantage over their old enemies, and have not been shy about exploiting this disparity."


    "Why don''t the Hexers roll over the Fridaymen colonies entirely if this is the case? I can imagine that those angry women are more than eager to exact their pound of flesh."


    "They can''t, Ves. The Magair Middle Zone is bigger than the Fridaymen and Hexers. There are many other pioneers that have founded their own colonies in the same region. Each of them have formed their own power blocs that each put the other in check. The reality of the situation is that every colony must constantly be protected by a sizable garrison in order to deter opportunists fromunching raids."


    "I see."


    The Hexers probably would have loved to do nothing more than to kick the Fridaymen out of the Red Ocean, but they could not afford to deploy the majority of their mech forces away from their own holdings.


    Many of the powerful dynasties essentially had nothing left now that they had fled to the new frontier! The colonies that they had founded a few years ago represented thest bastion of these dynasties. There was no escape route left after they had sacrificed so much already.


    This led to the current impasse. The Hexer raiders might not be strong enough to topple the Friday colonies outright, but they still made the lives of their old enemies hell by harassing the weaker and more vulnerable settlements.


    However, it just so happened that the weaker Fridayman colonies happened to belong to the less well-off coalition partners!


    While a number of the colonies founded by the Carnegie Group, the Vermeer Group, the Vanguard Group and the Puffer n all suffered serious losses and setbacks, the stronger ones founded by the Gauge Dynasty and the Konsu n were mostly spared from harassment!


    Ves began toprehend the nuances behind thetest development.


    "Not every Fridayman is eager to negotiate a cessation of hostilities, is that what you''re saying?"


    "Correct. Nominally, the Friday Coalition wishes to stem the losses by negotiating with you." Cbast said after rifying the context behind the new development. "In reality, only a part of the Coalition wants to form a resolution of the problem. The other part is not in a hurry to stop the Hexer raids. The more the current situation proceeds, the more the bnce of power will tilt towards the most dominant members of the state."


    Ves cynically chuckled. "I knew these backstabbers wouldn''t be able to remain united. Those Gaugers have always been too full of themselves. Why the hell should we intervene in the first ce? Let them fight and suffer!"


    He was not particrly sad to hear that the Friday Coalition was starting to show its fault lines.


    A sense of schadenfreude overtook his mood. He derived a lot of pleasure from imagining how the Friday Coalition might fall apart one day!


    "The Friday Coalition isn''t made up of stupid people, Ves." Cbast cautioned him. "It is impossible for the Fridaymen to let external parties take advantage of their infighting. The Coalition is unlikely to break uppletely, but it is a realistic possibility that the Gauge Dynasty and the Konsu n will be a lot more dominant than before. From our analysis, we believe that as long as the weaker coalition partners are willing to make concessions to the Gaugers and the Konsus, thetter two will do more to protect the outlying colonies that are under pressure."


    Ves frowned. This situation sounded increasingly moreplicated.


    "So the primary conflict is not between the Fridaymen or the Hexers, but between these dummies themselves. The Hexers and myself are simply external factors that the Fridaymen wish to leverage in order to manipte their domestic politicalndscape."


    The overarching message that Cbast wanted to convey was that everything revolved around interests. The Gaugers and the other coalition partners were solely trying to secure their own advantages without letting their feelings and sentiments interfere with their calculus.


    Tristan''s surprise arrival in Davute had nothing to do with trying to reconcile a strained rtionship. The Fridaymen who supported the negotiation effort just wanted to hold an exchange of interests.


    "The Gaugers and the Konsus might not be so eager to forge a new deal with you, but the remaining ones are much more desperate to enact changes." Cbast noted. "You should expect them to offer a considerable amount of concessions to you in order to obtain your agreement. This alone makes it worthwhile to listen to their proposals."


    "I don''t know, Cbast. The Trailzer Expedition is due to start. I don''t need any further distractions in my life. More importantly, I''m pretty sure that my wife will vehemently oppose any deal I make with the Fridaymen."


    He could already imagine his wife screaming in his face!