Chapter 16

As soon as we finally seized the capital, the first thing we did was…

Establish a new power structure for governance.

[From now on, we will create a governing body to assist His Majesty in managing state affairs, inviting experts from various fields, led by key figures of our Revolutionary Army.]

Though, in reality, the so-called “experts” were just the soldiers who cooperated with us during the coup.

But we announced it that way anyway. At least outwardly, we needed to show diversity to avoid criticism that it was just a military takeover.

Thus, within a week, the hastily assembled governing body was named the Supreme Council for National Reconstruction.

Those in the know will recognize it’s modeled after Park Chung-hee’s era. Since we’re doing similar things, we just borrowed the name. It sounds decent, right?

“Do we really need to go through all this trouble to package ourselves? We’ve already taken the capital and have military power.”

“There are problems in this world that can’t be solved by force alone. And our position isn’t exactly stable yet.”

Honestly, I’d love to just impose military rule and do as I please, but our strength isn’t sufficient for that.

The Revolutionary Army is undoubtedly elite and possesses excellent combat capabilities, but our numbers are too small.

With just around 50,000 troops, we can control the capital, but it’s impossible to hold the entire nation.

If we stay like this, uprisings will surely break out across the country, or new revolutionary armies will emerge, or we’ll face mass disobedience.

Frankly, we’d be called power-hungry bastards, and we wouldn’t have a leg to stand on.

That’s why we created the Supreme Council for National Reconstruction.

We rose up to stop the monarch’s tyranny, so now we’re giving the impression that we’re stepping back and returning power to the people.

Even if the essence is the same, the public’s perception is different between soldiers directly controlling the state and doing so through an official body.

The latter at least follows legal procedures and respects existing political culture.

We might get criticized for our actions, but we’ll be less likely to be condemned for our very existence.

“So, from now on, we’ll be assisting His Majesty in governance?”

“Yes. Though, of course, we’ll never actually give that pig any real power.”

Oh, and even though we’re supposedly assisting in governance, Karl VII will just be a figurehead. Otherwise, the meaning of our uprising would be lost.

A guy who doesn’t respect the soldiers’ sacrifices or prioritize the nation’s future should never be given power back. Unless you want the country to collapse.

And there’s another advantage to this.

“Soon, those who want to collude with us to share power will appear. To manage and use them, we need a council like this.”

Local nobles dreaming of revenge after being pushed out of central politics. Anti-royalists who just hate the Liudolf Dynasty. Thinkers opposed to feudalism. Ambitious people dreaming of rising to power.

No matter who they are, those who sense the shift in political power and try to seize the opportunity will inevitably appear.

Those who were previously suppressed by the privileged class and lacked influence. Those desperate for revenge and victory.

Our Revolutionary Army needed to absorb such people.

We’ve taken the Royal Capital Rahator, but potential opposition forces are everywhere, and powerful external enemies loom above.

Rather than sitting back and enjoying the spoils, we need to act decisively to solidify our foundation and secure the future.

Alliances with smaller factions will be a key means of securing that foundation. Even if each is weak, together they can wield political influence.

The Supreme Council for National Reconstruction was an extremely useful tool for this.

As a body we can control, it’s convenient for communicating with allied factions, and it’s easy to create positions and give them fancy titles to appease them.

“Though, we’ll have to filter out those who try to exploit us.”

Identify the enemy and increase our allies one by one. As our strength grows, we’ll crush the opposition through political battles.

It’s not much different from combat. Only the means have changed from force to words, logic, and justification.

But we don’t need to make eternal allies. Politics is just a scramble for limited power.

Even if we share the same goals now, there’s no guarantee it’ll stay that way in the future.

We’ll use them, and they’ll use us. We’ll use them until they’re no longer useful.

When they’re no longer needed, we’ll either purge them or quietly send them back to where they came from.

“Have the other members arrived yet?”

“They’re probably waiting in the meeting room. Let’s go, Lieutenant General—no, General, sir.”

“Looks like I’m going to be late on the first day. I should’ve gone to bed earlier last night.”

Anyway, the Supreme Council for National Reconstruction was formed with a total of 17 members.

The Chairman was General Alfred von Albrecht, who had cooperated with us. The Vice-Chairman was me, Karolus von Roytel, who promoted myself to General.

The members included Lieutenant General Baden, Brigadier General Elan, Lieutenant General Mauer, and Colonel Kais (we promoted everyone by one rank) from the Revolutionary Army, as well as Lieutenant General Holtman from the Central Headquarters, and others.

We selected only reliable people, regardless of their branch of service.

“What’s on the agenda for today’s discussion?”

“Please wait a moment. The documents are… ah, here. It’s the analysis of the current war situation with the Empire and the reorganization of the frontlines.”

The glorious first task of our council was to discuss strategies for the endless war with the Empire.

* * * * *

“Since everyone seems to be present, let’s get straight to the point.”

The meeting room, temporarily remodeled from part of a royal palace once used for noble parties.

Here, close to the Headquarters, we took time to review the information we hadn’t been able to access before.

To be precise, we received detailed reports on the war situation that had been controlled.

On the frontlines, we only ever received censored documents to maintain morale. We needed this opportunity to properly investigate the reality.

And the results were shocking.

“The eastern front isn’t much different from what we knew…”

“What the hell is this on the western front? The frontlines are in chaos, and they’ve been hiding the truth?”

“What were the royal family and the Headquarters thinking? The forces sent there were the kingdom’s main army! How could they let this happen?!”

The reality was utterly devastating.

The eastern front, with its rough terrain, wasn’t much different from what we’d heard. Both our kingdom and the Empire had sent just enough troops to keep the frontlines from breaking. It’s a stalemate.

The northern front, which we’re familiar with, is still holding up, so we’ll skip that.

But the western front…

It’s on the verge of collapse.

A force of 150,000 was sent to defend the hills and low mountains, but now they’re gone.

After several disastrous battles, the western army has long retreated to the old fortress area.

But even that fortress has been neglected for so long that the situation is deteriorating in real time.

They taxed us to death for the war, and this is what they did with all that money? How the hell did they manage to screw up this badly??

“Chairman, why was this fact kept hidden? How could even I, as the Deputy Commander of the Northern Army, not know about this?”

At my reprimand, General Albrecht let out a deep sigh.

“What could I do? It’s not like I wanted to hide it. His Majesty himself ordered it to be concealed.”

“The King?”

I can understand not revealing the defeat to the public. But why hide it from the top officers?

“Up until a year and a half ago, the western front was holding up fine. We even occupied some Imperial territory. But then a new commander took over, and everything went to hell.”

“Who was it? Among the high-ranking officers capable of commanding the frontlines, who could’ve performed so poorly?”

“Sigmund von Liebert. The eldest son of the Liebert Marquis family.”

“Ah.”

Damn, it had to be that bastard. Back when I was in the military academy, he got second place thanks to his family’s influence and acted like it was all his own skill.

“Seems he was jealous of you rising to Lieutenant General at a young age and making a name for yourself. So he pushed to take the position and ordered reckless offensives, and well…”

“You don’t need to explain further. I get it.”

He had no skill or experience, but his ambition for glory led to this disaster. I didn’t need to hear more.

The Liebert Marquis family is also the family of the Crown Princess. So, to save face for the royal family, they hid the defeat.

“Damn it. The country’s going to ruin because of these incompetent nobles and royals.”

“Your name also has ‘von’ in it, doesn’t it…?”

“That’s why I added ‘incompetent’ as a qualifier. What’s the point of holding high positions without the ability?”

Hearing this, I’m newly amazed by Karl VII.

With one front collapsing and the nation being invaded, he reduced another front to buy jewelry. Just how far does our King’s incompetence go?

It’s an absurd situation, but we have to fix it. We need to send reinforcements, but we’re severely short on troops.

“Do we have any reserve forces left?”

“If we gather them from here and there, we might get around 50,000.”

“The troops that blocked my way here.”

“Including them and the new recruits in training. It’ll be hard to send them all to the west. Some are needed for southern defense, and others for the eastern and northern fronts.”

50,000. And only part of that.

It’s woefully insufficient. To recover the lost territory, we’d need at least 70,000. That’s the minimum to stabilize the front and plan a counterattack.

Where can we get more troops… Ah!

“Then let’s do this.”

“What do you mean?”

“This disaster is the responsibility of the nobles and the royal family who allowed it. So they should be the ones to fix it.”

Let’s weaken the troublesome nobles and make them pay for lounging around all this time.

“We’ll conscript the private armies of the nobles. As many as possible.”