Chapter 113
The Southern Army's first impression on the citizens of the capital was that of a terrifying military force.
And with good reason—the tanks brought in to break through the capital were all strange and unfamiliar objects to the city's residents.
To citizens who did not even know that automobiles existed, tanks seemed like things from beyond the limits of possibility.
House-sized masses of steel moved with a roar more terrifying than a monster's. Powerful flames erupted from their muzzles like the spells of high-tier mages, while the machine guns mounted on top reduced people to bloody rags.
The rubble of collapsed buildings could not stop the tanks' tracks. Before the tremendous power of their engines, obstacles in the streets posed little hindrance.
There were hundreds of those tanks.
And this was a monstrous unit that had smashed through the 400,000-strong main force of the Imperial Army at the Bruggen Plains. Feeling fear was an instinctive reaction.
Fortunately, that fear soon turned into relief.
The muzzles of those fearsome tanks were aimed not at the citizens, but at the Imperial Palace, where the nobles were barricaded and holding out.
A powerful being was frightening when it was an enemy, but reassuring when it was on your side.
Once they learned that the tanks' sole target was the Imperial Palace, the citizens quickly began supporting the Southern Army.
The next emotion they felt was awe.
The Imperial Palace's high outer walls literally collapsed. Against a simultaneous barrage from hundreds of tanks, the stone walls were utterly powerless.
The interior of the Imperial Palace, which they had thought they would never see in their lifetimes, had been opened to them. The people who had seemed destined to rule over them for life were blown apart before the tanks' guns.
The soldiers who had stormed into the Imperial Palace clad in steel armor from head to toe, their eyes glowing red, dragged the nobles back out with them.
Gripping the nobles by their hair with one hand, they proclaimed before the watching citizens:
"The outdated class system no longer exists in this Empire! Every unjust law that favored the nobles will be abolished, and all wealth accumulated through unlawful means will be confiscated!"
Naturally, the citizens cheered.
They no longer had to live crushed beneath the nobles' unreasonable oppression. From this moment on, the class known as nobles would disappear from the Empire.
For people who had been treated as lowborn their entire lives, those words could not help but be welcome.
Nor did the Southern Army stop there. It began security operations to stabilize public sentiment.
Criminal organizations that had tried to profit from the chaos were annihilated one after another. Against the Southern Army advancing with its near-human-tank Imperial Guard at the forefront, criminal groups that were hardly proper armies at all collapsed with ease.
As a result, the crime rate also fell noticeably compared to before. To the Southern Army, even criminals who had been in league with the nobles were simply ordinary criminals.
"Stabilizing public security is the fastest way to win over the people. I authorize on-the-spot firing against serious criminals!"
"Any soldier caught accepting bribes from criminals will be punished as well. The Grand Duke said there would be no exceptions!"
Kyle Leopold, the absolute ruler of the South, ordered them to stabilize public security. No one wanted to defy the command of a powerful man who could bring down even a thriving corporation with a single word.
Those who had tried to use the chaos to loot or commit robbery also quickly dwindled in number.
The chaos of the previous night was brought under control within a few days.
The Southern Army, which had occupied the capital, helped restore the damage caused by the war instead of looting the citizens. The sight of an army diligently providing aid to the people—something the nobles had never even spared a glance—left a favorable impression on the citizens.
That was why the citizens had considerable expectations when they heard that a victory parade would begin the next day.
The Central region was not a place where commoners could live well. Those who knew how prosperous the modernized South and West had become, along with the largely modernized East, looked forward to their lives improving as well.
The fact that Kyle Leopold had been driven out of the Imperial capital eighteen years ago over an unsavory incident?
That did not matter much to the people.
Was it as though the nobles had only just begun framing one another with bizarre accusations and sending each other into exile?
Since the nobles had always kept one another in check that way, people simply assumed that Kyle Leopold had suffered something similar.
The nobles imprisoned in the capital, however, had rather different thoughts.
For one thing, the foreign connections they had tried to call upon until the very end had been cut off.
"Former Duke Aslan, the Kingdom of Lumeria has decided to withdraw its demand for your handover, considering its relations with our Empire."
"Th-that can't be..."
"The sophistry that you're merely a foreign noble will no longer work. Until the Grand Duke arrives, I hope you will quietly reflect on your crimes."
The International League was only effective when the interests of its member states aligned. With their own colonies at stake, the great powers pressured the minor countries.
Once their foreign connections were severed, the nobles truly realized that they had nothing left.
The fortunes they had amassed over their lifetimes had long since been confiscated. The scraps of power they had tried to pick up by fawning over the Crown Prince could no longer serve any purpose.
No matter how loudly they shouted their status at the soldiers outside the prison, all they received in return was contempt and ridicule.
Moreover, the fact that Kyle Leopold was the man they had driven out played a part as well.
"Tch, if we'd known this would happen, we should have executed him instead of exiling him..."
"Who could have known that idiot would come back like this..."
In the end, what made the nobles tremble with fear was their own karma.
As the emotions of the former nobles and the citizens intersected, the morning of March 26, 1033, dawned.
***
Nearly two weeks had already passed since the city had fallen to the uprising. The streets had regained their former appearance, and the city was beginning to bustle once more.
The 25th was a day when people crowded into the central plaza from early morning.
Considering that the last time such a large crowd had gathered was decades ago, for the previous emperor's coronation, it had truly been an enormous gathering after a very long time.
Yet the atmosphere of the crowd itself was different from then.
The elderly men who had witnessed the current emperor's coronation with their own eyes decades ago could feel the difference.
The crowd gathered back then had been made up of people who had assembled because they were ordered to, many of them practically dragged there by force. Even their cheers and applause had carried a strongly ceremonial air.
But this time was different.
The Southern Army had not particularly forced anyone to participate. Its attitude was essentially that those who wanted to take part could do so, and those who did not could stay away.
Even so, people from the elderly to the young gathered until there was barely room to stand.
A leader who had finally brought down the noble class that had bled the Empire dry for so long.
What kind of rule would this young and intelligent leader establish? The faces of people who had lived without expectations were now filled with anticipation and excitement.
At least, the Southern Army's conduct so far had shown it to be far more considerate of the people and far more gentlemanly than the nobles.
The strictly controlled sections of the plaza, the military bands stationed there in advance, and the orderly ranks of the various units also drew the citizens' attention.
To people who had never seen a modern-style victory parade, all of this was unfamiliar.
And then, it was exactly noon.
The army began entering through the eastern gate of the capital's fortress.
Deng- Deng-
Amid the grand tolling of bells, the first to enter were the commanders of the various armies, appearing on white horses.
The army drawn up in the plaza saluted in unison, and the parade began as the commanders inspected their units' colors.
The military band belonging to the leading corps opened the march by playing a victorious military song. Its grand melody, worthy of the Southern Army that had crushed 400,000 Imperial soldiers, filled the plaza.
Behind them marched standard-bearers carrying the colors of each field army. The standard-bearers passed by with their flags held at an angle, and the main force of the army came into view.
At the head was, as expected, the Southern Army's 1st Infantry Division.
It was an elite division hastily established eight years earlier, one that had participated without exception in every major battle: the conquest of Sarsen County, the defense of Albion Port, the Battle of the Arcal Plains, the conquest of Forbin, the Battle of the Western Great Plains, the Battle of the Bruggen Plains, and many others.
It would be fair to regard the history of the 1st Infantry Division as the history of the Southern wars of conquest. That pride manifested itself in a perfectly orderly march without a single error.
The people's gazes naturally focused on the 1st Infantry Division.
The soldiers of the unit that had always been the first to charge into the fiercest moments of war possessed a unique aura that the weak Imperial Army could never imitate.
Next came the massive 203mm field guns of the 1st Breakthrough Artillery Division.
These gods of war had shown the world that even Sword Saints were powerless before overwhelming firepower, and the enormous field guns that rained thunderbolts upon enemies at the front and drove the battle line forward passed by one after another.
And finally.
The low, heavy rumble of engines that had terrified countless enemies rang out.
The tanks of the 1st Armored Division, which had fought the Imperial Army's main force for two weeks, came into view. The sight of house-sized steel machines marching in three columns drew cheers from the crowd.
Those cheers grew thunderous when the final procession of the victory parade appeared in the plaza.
In a luxurious vehicle escorted by countless soldiers sat a man with flawless blond hair, instantly visible even from afar.
It was Kyle Leopold, who would become the master of the new Empire.