WeTried Translations

Translator: Coughing Baby

Editor: Coughing Baby

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◈ The Reluctant Imperialist

Chapter 138

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Your World (6)

I watched the ground from high above. The helicopter was astonishingly quiet, rotor and engine alike.

This was my own way of using mana.

Every person, every knight, used mana differently.

Probably because mana's attributes and properties differ, and because each of us pursues a different "path."

───

In my case, I handle mana in the purest possible way. It is a primitive use of the virus inside my body.

I simply release Ebenholtz mana outward and transfer its nature. So if I spread mana thinly over the entire helicopter like a coating, the noise is absorbed and our presence fades.

That is why the helicopter carrying me can fly through this night sky like a ghost.

"......"

I looked down through the helicopter's open door at the distant ground. I spotted a figure darting across the rooftops.

You might evade eyes on the ground, but from the sky you stand out too clearly.

Kwaaaaaa-

Wind surged toward me, and I prepared to descend.

Compared to jumping from a transport at several thousand meters, descending from a helicopter hovering only a few hundred meters up allows much tighter control.

Fwiiiiish-!

I threw myself into open air.

Fierce wind streamed over my wingsuit. I scattered mana and controlled air resistance. I adjusted my glide angle.

The target was the assassin on the ground.

Only one person.

Tick-

Suddenly, time in the world slowed to a sticky crawl.

Moisture beading like droplets. Trembling wind. The arc of each step the assassin took.

For one instant, all of it seemed frozen like a photograph.

Tap-

I stepped onto a layered foothold of mana in midair,

then accelerated once more and shot forward in a straight line.

───.

A precision strike aimed at one person only.

A certain sword stroke, driven at a calculated angle without even a hair of error.

Shhk-!

A silver flash split the dark. Before the assassin's dagger could reach Alonso, my longsword quietly severed his neck first.

Thud, roll roll.

The body pitched forward from inertia, and the severed head rolled across the alley floor.

It was a beheading that spilled not a single drop of blood.

-Thump.

My heartbeat proved where he came from.

Izenheim.

I turned toward Crown Prince Alonso, who stood frozen stiff.

"Your Highness, Crown Prince Alonso. Are you all right?"

Alonso finally let out the breath he had been holding and gasped.

"S-Sir Maximilian! My close aides, those loyal men, are still in the royal palace-"

"Yes. I know. Lieutenant Colonel Han?"

Lieutenant Colonel Kai Han and the chief of security supported both of the crown prince's arms.

"Your Highness, please go first. You are more important than anyone in Zerpa. Please protect your health. I will handle the rest."

At my polite request, Alonso nodded again and again, his eyes red. His guards disappeared with him.

I turned from the direction the crown prince left and looked toward the royal palace.

Kwaaaaaa-

Explosions burst out everywhere.

Rebel tanks were chain-detonated by pre-planted land mines, and plainclothes soldiers struck the rebels by surprise and collapsed their command structure.

Ratatatatat-!

At the center of an intersection where urban combat was in full swing.

“Lay down your weapons and surrender!”

Brigadier General Esf, a Royalist general loyal to Alonso, raised a megaphone.

“This is a fight you have no cause for!”

A coup lives or dies in the first twenty-four hours. Which meant this revolt had already failed. But the regular enlisted soldiers dragged into this uprising were no different from youths pulled in by superior officers without knowing the full story. They were young men sacrificed to their superiors' greed, fighting only to stay alive.

“Do not be mistaken, young souls! You are not traitors! The traitors are those rotten generals who drove you into this death trap!”

By the time night faded and dawn broke,

first light washed over the city, and Brigadier General Esf's pleading speech echoed through the Zerpan capital.

“Young men! Realize who those rifle barrels in your hands should truly be aimed at! For your homeland and your families, do not spill meaningless blood!”

It carried sincerity.

One by one, young Zerpan soldiers set their rifles on the ground. Crying, they raised both hands.

“Young souls! You are not traitors!”

Hundreds, then thousands of soldiers surrendered in a chain.

That was the importance of legitimacy, and the force of agitation and propaganda.

“The traitors are those rotten generals who drove you into this death trap!”

This speech was also a script written by Johann Goetze.

I found myself admiring his talent again as I watched the morning sun slowly rise beyond the horizon.

......

The urban battle that broke out in the Zerpan capital ended in a single day.

The forces in combat were rebel troops against Royalist regular forces and the Imperial Army.

"......Half of the senior officers who attempted the rebellion have been captured and are being transported."

Brigadier General Esf of the Royalist faction reported to me.

"It appears several ringleaders, including Lieutenant General Pavel, have fled, and a few others still have no confirmed status or location."

Step.

I heard someone approach from behind. Crown Prince Alonso staggered forward, supported by Lieutenant Colonel Kai Han.

"Your Highness. I am glad you are safe."

When I greeted him, he looked up at me with blank eyes.

"......Duke Maximilian."

"Yes."

I stepped closer. The crown prince's lips trembled.

"The palace, what happened to the palace? My people......"

What he desperately wanted to know was probably whether those "close aides" left in the palace were alive.

"The legal deputy, the chief secretary, and three other officials have died."

Alonso's face turned white at my words.

Of course, they were not really dead.

I had intended to pull a few agents out early around this point anyway. In other words, their contracts had simply expired.

No matter how good your acting is, no one can live as a spy forever. Force it, and trouble follows.

For those whose aptitudes did not fit and who wanted to return home, I simply wrote them an exit scenario called an "honorable death" with a generous bonus.

"......Hah."

The crown prince swayed as if the strength had drained from his legs.

Right then, medics appeared. They were carrying bodies on stretchers covered with cloth. At that moment, one corpse's arm slipped out from under the cloth, and by chance the crown prince's empty gaze landed there.

"......Chief Lecito?"

He seemed to recognize him from the blood-soaked uniform and the familiar bracelet on the wrist alone.

"Chief Lecito!"

Alonso ran toward the stretcher, gasping.

"Lecito......"

He pulled back the cloth. A pale face, drained of color, was revealed.

"......"

I raised an eyebrow quietly.

This too was a prop to complete the scenario. He was in deep sleep from a special anesthetic that slowed his pulse to an extreme, so to ordinary eyes he would look like a corpse.

"Ah......"

The crown prince staggered like he might faint, then dropped to his knees. He laid both arms over the body's torso.

I grabbed his shoulder firmly and pulled him up.

"Your Highness. You must not collapse here. If only for the sacrifice of your loyal men."

But it seemed no sound reached his ears.

"All cause and legitimacy now belong fully to the monarchy, to Your Highness the crown prince."

Even so, Alonso panted like a beast, trying to accept this reality-

"Lecito-!"

He looked up at the sky and screamed in agony. A ruler grieving the loss of his retainer. It was not a bad scene, and the palace survivors and soldiers who did not know the truth bowed their heads in grief.

"Lecito, why, why-!"

"......Lieutenant Colonel Han."

Watching the wailing crown prince, I whispered to Kai Han beside me.

"Who was Lecito again?"

"......"

Lieutenant Colonel Han cleared his throat and murmured back.

"......His golf caddie."

Hm.

Chief Caddie.

"They say he was effectively the crown prince's counselor. The one he shared the most emotional rapport with."

I looked down in silence at the top of Crown Prince Alonso's head as he cried without restraint.

"......I see."

He was definitely incompetent. I could only judge him that way. A man too ordinary and too weak to be a crown prince, never reevaluated even after my regression.

That was fortunate for me.

"Lecito-!"

Watching him, I became certain.

Living inside his own world, the crown prince would one day want to lay down the duty he had been given.

When that day came, he would come looking for me.

I knew him well.

Because even I sometimes wanted to lay all of this down......

* * *

Around the time the Royalist revolt in the capital was being suppressed.

"Fire."

Fweeeeeee-!

Countless rockets sliced through the air first.

Kwakwakwakwang-!

Rockets from the new multiple-launch magic system Kerben slammed mercilessly into the center of the defensive line.

As the ground overturned and shockwaves burst in clusters, the first line of the Durkon Legion led by Major General Schweitzer charged forward like beasts.

"Advance."

The Zeronica Mine defensive line had two weak points. One was the narrow gorge entrance connected to the supply route. The other was the northern slope, flattened for mine excavation.

Major General Schweitzer used deception tactics to attack both points.

He split his main force in two and pretended to strike both sides at once to disperse enemy defenders, then in reality concentrated only the first line at a single point on the northern slope and drove through like a wedge.

"I can see it. That's the mine, right?"

Schweitzer quickly built a fire position on a ridge with a full view of the mine and smiled in satisfaction.

"Yes, Major General. But the enemy has retreated inside the mine and appears ready for a last stand. They are preparing to barricade themselves, using tunnels and facilities as shields."

"Ah, yeah? Fine. Use every Kerben and blast all of them to pieces."

"......Pardon?"

The adjutant asked in alarm.

Zeronica Mine was Zerpa's asset. Calling it one of their most important assets would not be an exaggeration. If the mine was destroyed, reclaiming Zeronica lost its meaning. It could even escalate into a diplomatic issue.

"Will that be all right?"

But the one they feared was not the Zerpan government.

The famous madman of Durkon did not fear some country like that.

He only cared about one knight watching this place.

"The soldiers are tired from marching, so tell them to take one of those newly supplied stim packs. Push in immediately and today-"

"S-sir, Major General. If we destroy the mine facilities, later-"

"I'm telling you it's fine. This was already discussed with Knight Maximilian."

They had discussed it. At those words, even the adjutant's expression eased.

Schweitzer smirked.

"Anyway, he says all the equipment there is old as hell and useless."

If you smashed another country's core industry facilities and walked away, it would become a diplomatic problem. But Maximilian intended from the start to rebuild everything from scratch with the latest facilities.

He really did have a lot of money.

"So fire."

"Yes, sir! All batteries, prepare to fire!"

With the adjutant's repeat order, dozens of Kerben units lined across the ridge raised their launch tubes at once.

"Hit it like you're trying to trigger a landslide. Leave not even one rat, wipe them all out. Fire!"

Kieeeeeek-!

Kerben magic rockets screamed sharply and painted the sky red.

New technology developed to break battle lines poured down like rain on the Republican faction legion.

Kwaaaaaa-!

* * *

"Good work, Major General Schweitzer."

"It was hardly work."

Schweitzer captured the mine in an instant. The gap in military scale, including new technology, was already huge, and the command ability handling that force was overwhelming.

"You know that?"

Schweitzer looked at me and wiggled his brows with a slick grin. It was revolting.

"The easiest opponents are the ones who have something they must protect."

The side that had to protect the mine, and the side that did not care if it got destroyed.

The outcome was decided from that moment.

"So, what should we do with these prisoner bastards."

"......Well."

I walked slowly, looking over hundreds of disarmed Republican prisoners kneeling on the ground.

Thump-

My heart beat.

There were Izenheim among them too.

Quite a few, actually.

Prisoners in the thousands. Izenheim in the low dozens.

Thump-

The exchange ratio was not very good.

If I killed thousands of prisoners to sift out Izenheim, it would become a massacre. It was not time for that yet.

“Imperial pig bastards......”

A muttered line of Zerpan stabbed into my ear. I turned. I walked over slowly and stopped in front of him.

Thump-

By luck, he was Izenheim.

"Pig, huh......"

I drew Yukia's pistol from the holster.

I pulled the trigger right away.

Bang-

A suppressed gunshot. The fired mana pierced his glabella. He collapsed, blood pouring from the hole in his head, and Schweitzer flinched and stepped back.

"W-we are prisoners!"

Someone at the side screamed in desperate protest. One of the Republican commanders.

"We already surrendered!"

I aimed the pistol without a word.

Unfortunately, he was not Izenheim.

Thump-

But the adjutant beside him was Izenheim. A faint smile touched my lips.

Thank you for giving me an excuse.

"Prisoners are prisoners, sure. How I treat them is up to me."

I twisted the muzzle and shot the adjutant dead.

Puhk!

His skull burst, spraying brain matter and blood across the commander's face. The commander gasped as if his breath had stopped.

"The Empire is pigs?"

In fluent Zerpan, I spoke while coldly scanning the prisoners now consumed by fear.

"Yet all of you are leashed by those pigs."

Faces trembling in silence.

"I'll explain. You are not prisoners first. You are traitors. You are less than dogs, daring to bare your teeth at Zerpa's rightful master."

Click. I loaded mana into the pistol.

"Do you think I came to butcher you by order of the Empire?"

I judged this atmosphere was perfect to kill one Izenheim however I wanted.

"No. Before being prisoners, you are traitors, and therefore this is-"

Bang.

I shot another one dead on the spot.

"The will of Crown Prince Alonso."

Now no noise could be heard.

No one, absolutely no one, dared make a sound.

Not only the enemy. Even allied troops watching me were the same.

"......Major General Schweitzer."

"Yes."

Schweitzer stepped in front of me with a look that said he now saw me differently.

"Transfer the rest to the camps."

"Understood. Move out, all of you!"

As he gave me a tightly formal salute, I felt it was strangely different from before.

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