Chapter 34
In Due Discourse
"It should come as little surprise that Prince Ulysses was and is extremely popular in Europe," Mr. Taylor said. "Not only did His Highness help bring the Empire into the war against the Soviet Union, he also personally visited the continent on multiple occasions to demonstrate Britannia's commitment to the fight. The first such visit was to Great Britain, shortly after the Empire declared war. At the time, Britannia was still mobilizing, and could afford to send only a token force to reinforce their new allies. As such, His Highness' royal guard adamantly refused to allow him to set foot on the continent proper. Even so, Prince Ulysses' visit greatly heartened the European populace, as he assured them that Britannia was indeed prepared to help its European cousins.
"The fullness of the Empire's commitment was demonstrated when Britannia deployed over half a million soldiers as part of its first proper wave at the beginning of 1952. These soldiers were deployed all across the western front, helping relieve exhausted European formations. Another million soldiers followed in the months after, and by June, Berlin had been retaken and the Soviets were getting pushed back across the Polish border.
"It was shortly after the liberation of Berlin that Prince Ulysses conducted his second tour of Europe. This time, His Highness insisted on traveling to the continent, and even managed to get as far as the recently freed German capital before his guard put their collective foot down and refused to let him go any further east. Still, his foray to the continent was not without some fruit, for it was in Berlin that he would meet his future wife, the German lady Angelica von Hayek."
Another clear reason for Ulysses' popularity with the Europeans, he had taken one of theirs as his beloved wife. And indeed, before the recent political turmoil, Charles himself had inherited a great deal of the goodwill extended to his father, especially after he put an end to the increasingly decrepit and incompetent rule of his grandfather. These days, the Europeans were much more wary of Charles after his aggressive expansionism, but there were still occasional murmurs about hoping Britannia would return to being a force for stability instead of stirring chaos in the world.
"I'm sure quite a few of you already know the story of how the two met," Mr. Taylor continued, "so I won't belabor the point overmuch, except to indeed confirm its general veracity. Berlin had seen a rather brutal occupation in the time it was held by the Soviets, with countless members of the middle class executed in a purge to eliminate any possibility of resistance. And when it looked as if the Allies might retake the city, the treating Soviet forces tried to destroy as much of it as possible in their retreat."
One would not be remiss in calling the Soviets vindictive. And this was neither the first nor the last instance of the Red Army so egregiously violating the laws of war. The fall of Athens had been meant as an example to discourage the other nations from resisting so fiercely, but as was usually the case, the destruction wrought only stiffened the resolve of the remaining Allied nations. With every atrocity that was committed, the desire for revenge was also flamed, to the point where as the war did turn against the Soviets, it was not unusual for European military units to simply shoot any Soviet prisoners they took. The resulting brutality on both sides played a major part in pushing the total body count for the Great War to over a hundred million dead.
"This left thousands of people homeless and in desperate need of every basic necessity. Indeed the Princess Ulysses' journey to Berlin was partially motivated by his desire to try and help the city's people, hence why he was accompanied by a massive relief convoy organized by Eden Vital. There, His Highness not only met with those few civic leaders that remained, he also dropped in unannounced at one of the field kitchens set up to provide food to the populace. And as fate would have it, one of the women manning the soup lines was Angelica von Hayek."
There was a certain enthused light in the eyes of several of the girls, while the majority of the boys looked decidedly more disinterested. Of course such reaction was not entirely universal. Suzaku for one was listening attentively as always, while Kallen's expression remained politely impassive.
"Lady Angelica's father had been an instructor at one of Berlin's universities and was an early victim of the Soviet pogroms. The good lady herself only escaped a similar fate thanks to the generosity of her neighbors in hiding her away, and when the city was liberated, she immediately set out to help all those in need in her home. Indeed, her determination to do so was so great that when His Highness arrived, she actually berated him for taking up so much space in the field kitchen with all his guards that there was less room for those in need of food."
A will of iron, and one inherited by many of her descendants, if Charles and Lelouch were any indication. Of course some also probably came from Ulysses himself, the men in the family had to contribute something along the way.
"His Highness was unperturbed, and took up a spot next to Lady Angelica on the serving lines, and worked with her for much of the rest of the day. From this meeting, the two kept in touch, and on His Highness' second visit to Berlin a year later, he would ask her to accompany him back to Britannia."
An almost fairytale ending, save for the tragedy that ultimately struck. Still, for this brief moment, one could at least imagine the happiness the budding couple must have felt in each other's' presence.
"Before we continue on with the European theater however, it would behoove us to catch up on events in Asia," Mr. Taylor said. "You will all recall, I hope, that Japan formally declared war at approximately the same time as Britannia. What some of you might not have known is that the decision to declare war was something forced upon the Japanese government by its own armed forces. While Japan did possess a parliamentary system of government, at this time, its armed forces had functionally grown beyond the ability of the civilian government to control. This was especially true of the Kwantung Army, a large detachment of troops stationed on mainland Asia ostensibly to protect Japanese interests.
"Prior to the Great War, Japan had been taking advantage of the relative weakness of the Chinese Federation at the time to enlarge its own sphere of influence. It had fought a successful war against China over control of the Korean Peninsula, and even defeated Tsarist Russia in a brief conflict in the prelude to the European War of 1914. Since those victories, the Kwantung Army had been seeking to make further claims upon Chinese territory, specifically the Manchurian region north of the Korean Peninsula. Those efforts had been stymied as an increasingly assertive China modernized and reformed, at least enough to make any further attempts at military conquest chancy.
"The eruption of the Great War however provided the Japanese military with an opportunity. Without consulting or even warning the civilian government back in Tokyo, the Kwantung Army launched an assault on the Soviet city and naval base of Vladivostok. The Soviets, forewarned by its intelligence service of the pending offensive, managed to reinforce the city in time and repulse the attack. The Kwantung Army was not deterred however and insisted that Tokyo lend its full support to the war effort, which the Japanese government ultimately did so as to not anger the military."
Had this been a Japanese school, the history would have undoubtedly been framed differently, to more emphasize Japan's contributions in fighting the Soviet menace than the internecine squabbling between different parts of the Japanese state. That however was not to say the Japanese were any more likely to want to hush up the more ignoble parts of its history, but rather that the group of politicians and bureaucrats that would have otherwise governed Japan had Britannia not invaded remained overtly sympathetic to the motives and desires of the military cliques that commandeered policymaking in the past. Whether that was because they were being willfully blind to all the problems those officers caused, or were themselves believers in the nationalistic zealotry so embodied, was a bit more ambiguous.
"The motives of the Kwantung Army however were not solely limited to avenging past Russian insults. Indeed, its true objective was to use the war as a pretext to further expand its influence into China, specifically to press for passage through Manchuria and thus allow for the deployment of Japanese soldiers in the region. The government back in Tokyo dutifully assisted in this endeavor by putting diplomatic pressure on the Chinese to join the conflict, knowing full well that while China was gaining strength, it was hardly in a position to effectively open a second front against the Soviet Union, even as the Soviets were focusing so much of their efforts on the western front. Still, the fact that the Soviets were a threat to all other nations could not be denied, and China reluctantly committed itself to the war, but not without extracting assurances from several other nations, Britannia included, that any attempt to exploit the war to take advantage of China would be met with swift reprisal. And it was ultimately the fulfillment of this promise that led to the downfall of the Kwantung Army, and with it, the military command that previously had a stranglehold over the Japanese government."
Japan before the Britannian annexation was a parliamentary democracy, but it most certainly did not start out as one. The oligarchs that precipitated the coup against the Tokugawa shogunate kept a tight reign over governance even after ostensibly extending the vote to a significant portion of the populace, taking steps to limit just how much of a say the electorate would have on policy and decision making. One means by which they did this was to explicitly exclude the civilian government from the military's chain of command, an arrangement not entirely unlike that of the Britannian Empire even now. In Japan's case however, that unrestrained independence had led their nation to near-disaster. Where the difference lay, was perhaps in the personage at the top of the respective chains of command. The old Japanese imperial military, for all its professed loyalty to their emperor, more often than not used that claimed loyalty to justify whatever actions it wanted to take.
The Britannian Armed Forces on the other hand was kept on a much tighter rein due to the manner in which its chain of command was distributed. For one thing, the Britannian emperor could and did issue direct operational directives, and his delegated subordinates were there to execute those directives, not make up ones of their own. This restricted the freedom of the military's high command sufficiently to keep them from engaging in reckless adventures, and also kept the armed forces mostly out of the Empire's domestic politics. The first and only time the Britannian military ever defied their sovereign was when elements of the army, navy, and air force all conspired to unseat the Emperor Fredrich and replace him with his grandson, Charles. While that might have seemed like the highest form of disloyalty, few could argue that the change was not for the better for the Empire as a whole. A stark contrast to the harm the old Japanese military's continuous domestic interventions brought about to their country, all while loudly proclaiming their absolute fealty to their own emperor.
"Despite Japan formally joining the war against the Soviet Union, the Japanese military in general and the Kwantung Army in particular was not actually interested in coordinating efforts with their nominal allies. For much of the first year in which Japan was formally at war, aside from the failed Vladivostok offensive, the Kwantung Army focused primarily on extending its reach into Manchuria, building bases that they claimed were part of a logistics chain that would help support a future offensive into Siberia. Their true purpose however was to strengthen their hold over the region, an aim that was sufficiently transparent that China protested with increasing vigor that Japan was not actually participating in the fight, while China's own troops had engaged in near continuous skirmishes along the border."
Put that way, Japan, or at least the Japanese military, really did not look particularly good. Perhaps the oddest part was the sheer blatancy with which they acted, as if they believed that their success was assured and that no one could stop them.
"Fortunately for the Kwantung Army, the attention of the rest of the Allies, and that of Britannia in particular, remained on the western front as they sought to liberate those European nations occupied by the Soviets. For a time, it looked as if the Kwantung Army's poly would work, until Britannia launched a massive attack upon Vladivostok without any logistical support from any of the Asian powers, and successfully took the city. From that beachhead, Britannia made it known that it expected further offensive operations against Siberia to flow through that port and issued an explicit warning to the Kwantung Army to redirect its efforts to the war proper against the Soviet Union or have all those associated with it be considered pariahs, Japan included."
It probably spoke volumes of just how pissed the Britannians were at the Kwantung Army's antics that they orchestrated a massive amphibious assault to make such a point. Of course there were strategic reasons for seizing Vladivostok as well, but the Empire had arguably made things much more difficult upon itself by not making use of any of the Asian regions in close proximity to the port city as a staging point for their invasion. As a demonstration of Britannia's power and wealth, it was emphatic indeed. For that matter, there were some rather striking parallels between the manner in which Japan angered Britannia during the Great War and the collapse in relations that presaged Britannia's invasion and annexation of the nation in more recent times. One could say there was a lesson to be drawn about the price of being faithless. Or perhaps the lesson was in not overreaching in one's ambitions. After all, it took a certain degree of megalomania for the generals of the Kwantung Army to seriously believe Japan had the resources to actually conquer mainland Asia, much less actually occupy all that territory.
In either case, it was evident that the Kwantung Army failed in its ambitions, but just how it was finally brought to heel, and Japan itself rid of the corrosive rogue military echelons, would need to wait for another day of lectures as the bell rang.
The number of times that Lelouch and Cornelia found themselves seated across each other was not small, considering the two's respective duties required them to interact on a fairly regular basis. That they kept finding themselves opposite of each other in this manner however was likely getting tiresome for both. Of the two, Cornelia looked decidedly more exhausted by these exchanges. She certainly looked more visibly exasperated.
"How the hell do you do it, Lelouch?" she said with a weary sigh.
Lelouch blinked. "Do what exactly?"
"Be so reassured about your loved ones being in danger."
The cardinal's eyes narrowed.
"I'm not talking about just Euphie here," Cornelia continued before Lelouch could respond however. "You haven't so much as bat an eye about the danger you keep insisting I'm in, while I feel like I'm getting an ulcer just thinking about what could happen to either of you. How the bloody hell are you so calm about all this?"
Lelouch regarded his sister for a few moments before finally responding. "The anxieties you describe are the sort of things that Dr. Keller is supposed to help you deal with during your counseling sessions. Do I need to find a different psychiatrist for you?"
This time it was Cornelia's turn to stare at her sibling before mustering a response. Along with a sigh.
"No. Dr. Keller is doing a perfectly fine job. It's just, as soon as she's able to help me deal with one set of issues, some new emergency or drama crops up and we're back at square one again. I at least feel a bit guilty about all my seesawing when I go see you."
A guilt that apparently did not apply to all the times the princess vented her frustration on Lelouch.
"That is the nature of the duty that comes with our station," Lelouch said. "And try not to give Dr. Keller too much trouble. I need her at least somewhat refreshed for my own therapy sessions with her."
Cornelia raised an eyebrow. "What?"
"Dr. Keller is first and foremost my psychiatric counselor," Lelouch stated. "I am lending her services to you because there is no one I trust more to be able to help you, but that doesn't mean I'm inclined to let you monopolize her time and attention."
Another demonstration how, in his own way, Lelouch did care immensely about his family. Even if he remained somewhat reserved about openly expressing it. Cornelia gave a slow shake of her head even as the edge of her lips quirked upward.
"I'll try to keep that in mind, but I can't really make any promises." The princess straightened in her chair. "Anyway, we should probably deal with the matter at hand. Of the knights accompanying me, there are two or three that I'd be comfortable seconding to Euphie, and even releasing into her service if they develop the necessary rapport. What I don't have are any suitable candidates for fleshing out her regular armsmen, and an officer that could be trusted to command them."
"We likely do not need a proper guard captain in the short term," Lelouch said. "Once Dame Nonette arrives, I intend to place her in overall command of security for the alpha priority persons in Japan, including the Princess Euphemia. The reinforcements accompanying her should also have an all-female squad that can accompany Her Highness wherever she may have need to go."
The sigh this time was one of relief. "If it's Nonette, I can entrust her with Euphemia's safety." She then looked over at her brother. "Will you be assigning a guard detail to Millicent as well?"
"Milly already has one," the first instance of Lelouch using a personal nickname or form of address. Everyone else had a title or courtesy adorning their name. "The Ashford household staff has several former Japanese Special Police members in its employment, along with Armed Forces veterans. Her security is arguably already as good as that possessed by any royal."
"But not good enough to deal with the threat the heretics represent," Cornelia stated.
"That is what Sisters Kallen, Oldrin, and Toto are for," Lelouch said. "Though at this point, the one I truly need to augment security for is Ms. Sumeragi."
The mention of Kaguya brought another frown to Cornelia's face, though it was arguably a more subdued one now that the prospect of a union between Lelouch and the Sumeragi heiress was ended. Still, the increased importance to which Kaguya was ascending remained a source of some disquiet for Cornelia. The prospect of the Japanese girl gaining the sort of power, of type even if not of degree, as the grandmaster of Eden Vital, Cornelia could not help but worry.
"So do you intend to draw upon the reinforcements accompanying Nonette to do that as well?" the princess asked.
"No, I have a rather large pool of candidates already available here in Japan," Lelouch said. "The past few months of rotating squadrons from the 597th have proved very useful in vetting those most qualified to assume responsibility for Ms. Sumeragi's safety." The cardinal snorted. "Not that any of them ever came close to coming short of their charge, it seems the all-female platoons of the 597th consistently score higher than the male ones."
The expression on Cornelia's face now was more thoughtful. The 597th regiment was the cause of some of the greatest misgivings Cornelia had had about Lelouch's capacity to oversee the military forces stationed in Area 11. Concentrating basically all of the Honorary Britannian soldiers into a single, monolithic unit, which actually required constituting a regiment over 50% larger than was the norm, had seemed like it was creating a powder keg of potential sedition. Even more troubling, the man Lelouch placed in command was an avowed Purist openly disdainful of any other races. For the first few weeks she was in Japan, Cornelia had been genuinely worried about a mutiny occurring. Now, she was prepared to admit that Lelouch might have been onto something with that particular reorganization. While they had yet to be tested properly in battle, thus far the 597th had discharged all of their other responsibilities with competency and efficiency. At least now, Cornelia was not quite as antsy about squadrons from the 597th being posted at Ashford so close to Euphemia, even if they were officially there to protect Kaguya.
"So which of your knights are you proposing to second?" this time it was Lelouch that raised the question.
"Either Marika or Liliana would be capable of the task," Cornelia said.
"Marika," Lelouch repeated the name. "As in Marika Soresi?"
The sister of the man Lelouch personally ran through. Cornelia's lips thinned.
"I have complete and total faith in Marika," she declared.
"Then that is fine," Lelouch said. "Just keep in mind that Euphemia tends to be a rather empathetic sort, so she may press the point even if Dame Marika does not raise it herself."
Cornelia sighed yet again. "Must you be so rational about all this, Lelouch?"
"Seeing as few others seem so inclined, someone has to," Lelouch said, though the quirk of his lips suggested at least a touch of humor in his response.
A knock sounded on the door, intruding upon the discussion. While Cornelia frowned slightly, Lelouch seemed to take the interruption in stride.
"Enter."
The door opened to reveal Sancia and the woman dipped her head slightly in apology.
"A dispatch has arrived from the Citadel, regarding a development with the Holy See."
It was Lelouch's turn to sigh as he started typing, bringing up the mail application and unlocking it to access the secured messages. Even as his eyes scanned the text, Cornelia made no move to leave, instead remaining in her seat.
"Hrmm," Lelouch grunted.
"A problem?" his sister inquired.
"The Holy See is being stubborn about the agreement they negotiated with the grandmaster," Lelouch said. "The agreement is functionally defunct what with the decision to reconstitute the Ise Grand Shrine as an independent ecclesiastical order, but the Holy See is insisting on a different interpretation, that regardless of whether Eden Vital exercises the contingency protocols in the Treaty of London, their acceptance of it has been granted and thus their end of the bargain is met."
"A rather aggressive negotiating stance to be taking," Cornelia remarked. "And are they not reaching a bit here? It is at the grandmaster's discretion whether to grant a contract or not, no?"
"It is, but outright dismissing the Holy See's claims is liable to irritate them, and considering the current diplomatic climate, keeping them and their European sponsors on side is important, at least until the heretic situation is resolved. The Vatican knows this, hence why they both feel confident enough to make the approach and are in such a general rush."
Cornelia's brow furrowed into a scowl. "How odious."
Lelouch shrugged. "That's diplomacy. And this is their opening, so they likely are not actually expecting to get everything they ask for. If the grandmaster does grant them a contract, we will likely extract a different concession."
"How tedious," Cornelia said this time.
"It's why you leave diplomacy to the diplomats, Your Highness," Lelouch said, then frowned slightly. "It looks like the Holy See's contract candidate will be accompanying their observation delegation to Japan."
"Why Japan?" Cornelia mirrored her brother's expression.
"The grandmaster intends to conduct the interview with the candidate here instead of back in the homelands," Lelouch said, his own frown deepening.
"Is that even necessary?"
"Not as far as I can tell," Lelouch said. "And no reason has been provided in the dispatch, just an order to prepare for the grandmaster's arrival."
Cornelia snorted. "Is your grandmaster always subject to such whimsy?"
"Yes," Lelouch stated without missing a beat, then looked over at Sancia. "How large a retinue is accompanying the grandmaster?"
"A single cohort," Sancia immediately answered.
Lelouch's head dipped noticeably and Cornelia was given the sight of her brother looking more put upon than she could ever recall.
"I trust the grandmaster is not intending to traipse all about Japan during her visit?"
"She has not given any indication of intending to do so," was Sancia's less than definitive response.
For some reason Lelouch's gaze shifted over to Cornelia.
"What?" the princess asked.
"Why is it, that all the women in my life always go out of their way to complicate mine?" the cardinal asked dryly.
Cornelia gave a snort. "Consider it karma, for all the grief you give us in turn."
"Over the course of this past term, we have conducted a detailed examination of democracy, its principles, its applications, its strengths and its weaknesses," Mr. DuBois said. "In the process, all of you have been exposed to the challenges inherent in constructing any system of governance, democratic or otherwise. The one topic which we have yet to delve into is why, despite using democracy as a model of instruction, the Empire rejects it as a model of actual governance. And the answer to that question is ultimately also the foundation upon which Britannia seeks to train all of you to wield any future authority you might obtain or inherit responsibly."
Which was the entire point of the civics course here at Ashford. That they had sat two and a half years of these courses to reach this point spoke volumes about just how much instruction the Empire invested into the effort, and even that was no guarantee that the students would actually take the lessons to heart and go on to properly fulfill their potential.
"You will all recall the fundamental issue in a democratic system, where the quality of the decisions arrived at by voting is heavily dependent upon the capacity of the individual voters to cast well-informed votes, and to obtain this capacity required a significant investment of time and resources by society as a whole to so equip each individual voter. A problem arises however that fundamentally, there is a limit as to how much information any one person can comprehend. And within that limit, a prospective voter must be able to both comprehend things related to the issues he or she will be voting on, as well as whatever knowledge is necessarily for their day to day lives. This being the case, depending on the amount of issues that must be decided by a vote, the average quality of the vote will inevitably suffer as more and more issues are brought to the attention of the electorate. In that respect, achieving an optimal result, or even ensuring a reasonably not-bad outcome, is a functional impossibility, regardless of how many resources are poured into educating voters. There comes a point of diminishing returns that flattens out to zero, after which the overall democratic process simply does not scale."
A hand rose.
"Yes, Naomi?"
"Isn't that sort of problem exactly what representative republics are designed to solve?" the Japanese student asked.
A pointed question that, with the added subtext of asking why such a solution could not have substituted the one Britannia currently employed. In a way, Naomi could be construed as implicitly criticizing the Empire. In an actual autocracy, such questioning of authority would be heavily frowned upon if not outright verbatim. If for no other reason than Naomi's own personal safety, it was fortunate for the girl that despite the missteps in Britannia's prior handling of Japan, the Empire was not actually an autocracy.
"Republics have often been touted as means by which to arrest the worst of democracy's excesses while harnessing their strengths," Mr. DuBois answered without hesitation. "Indeed, if one were to perform a survey of today's extant democracies, all of them past a certain size employ representative forms of democracy instead of direct democracy. This level of abstraction however does not do away with one of the bigger problems of democracy, the manner in which the democratic process actually magnifies the splintering of society into irreconcilable factions. After all, representatives owe their offices to particular factions of voters. They are given no greater impetus to compromise amongst themselves than the various voter blocs are with each other. Without such an impetus, even a representative democracy inexorably careens towards a point wherein the competing factions resort to undermining the very democratic processes that are supposed to underpin their society in their efforts to win."
Put that way, there seemed to be no system of government that would not inevitably fail. Assuming one subscribed to the longevity of a government being important for overall society stability and thus prosperity, then one could argue that systems of government better able to forestall this fall were more desirable. Of course, nothing came for free, so one also needed to be mindful of the costs associated with maintaining this stability, or even stagnation.
Naomi raised her hand again, to which Mr. DuBois gave a nod of assent.
"Is this path functionally a historical truism, then?"
"In the absolute literal sense, yes," Mr. DuBois answered. "But it must be recalled that democracy casts a very wide net in terms of what systems and processes qualify to be called one. After all, Japan was a parliamentary democracy prior to its annexation, but it possessed a highly stable political environment as compared to the European democracies, or even to Britannia."
That elicited slightly surprised looks from many students, not least Naomi.
"Would any of you be able to explain why?"
Heads swayed side to side as Mr. DuBois scanned the classroom. The student his eyes finally fell upon silently cursed herself for not shaking her head like the rest of her classmates.
"Millicent, why don't you take a crack?" the teacher said with a slight, almost teasing smirk.
Milly let out a weary sigh as she began. "Japan was an extremely homogenous society to begin with. The bulk of its population self-identified as being of a singular race, and many furthermore considered themselves to be of the same economic middling class. There were some regional differences, but the overall social cohesion of the country as a whole was very high, which translated to a fairly static political environment as well."
Of all the students in this class, Milly was perhaps uniquely positioned to actually give such a qualified answer thanks to all the work she was doing helping bootstrap the Japanese language, literature, and history coursework at Ashford. Combined with the additional background information drilled into her to better allow her to serve as one of the public faces of a more benign Britannian integration effort, the Ashford heiress had actually built up a substantial amount of knowledge about Japan's history and politics.
"An astute summary of the Japanese political climate," Mr. DuBois said with an approving, almost proud, smile. "And indeed, pre-annexation Japan was something of an embodiment of two methods for preventing the formation of factions. One method, as Millicent described, was the homogenization of a society, something that Japan managed to achieve to a remarkable degree. The other was the destruction of liberty."
That elicited widened eyes from many of the students, for one thing that had been repeatedly emphasized in their readings was how one of democracy's fundamental tenets was the defense of liberty. Indeed liberty was often noted as an essential precondition to the political life of democracies. If Japan truly was a democracy, albeit of the parliamentary variety, how then could that be reconciled with the claim of it destroying liberty?
"Keep in mind that, as with many things, liberty is a spectrum, not a binary condition," Mr. DuBois began his explanation. "The same could be said for homogeneity. Factions arise when people sharing mutual interests converge to defend those common interests against other groups that hold different ones. The fewer divergent interests that exist, the fewer opportunities for people to splinter into factions in the first place. That is homogeneity."
Nods there. That at least all made sense.
"Then there is the question of opportunity to develop different interests in the first place," the teacher continued. "If certain interests are outright forbidden, groups advocating them will have much greater difficulty emerging. Such restrictions then constitute a destruction of liberty."
That also made sense, and more than one student seemed to pick up where this train of thought was leading.
"Now, if the number of divergent interests were low to begin with, due to a highly homogenized society, then the number of interests that must be explicitly forbidden similarly decreases. As such the resulting destruction of liberty is small, and might even be minute enough to not be readily noticed. In the case of Japan, as previously noted, the society was already possessed of a substantial homogeneity. This homogeneity was further maintained by subtle destructions of liberty. The government actively promoted a singular vision of what it meant to be Japanese. It laid out in detail the prescribed steps to achieve success in society. All this was further reinforced with a mainstream media that toed the official line, such that alternatives slipped completely out of the public's awareness. The end result of this dual employment of homogeneity and destruction of liberty was an extremely stable internal political climate. It was not perfect, there were certainly some rather severe and complex problems building up within Japan, but the managed nature of society produced a democracy that was more successful than many others in keeping society from fracturing into partisan factions."
A very longwinded answer to a student's question, but Mr. DuBois was not one to shortchange them when it came to satisfying the intellectual curiosity of his charges. Their parents were after all paying enough for his services.
"Factions and ill-formed decisions," Mr. DuBois said. "Those are the two problems the Britannian system of government seeks to solve, and which the Empire believes itself to have found a better alternative than representative democracy as practiced by the likes of Europe. That method will be the subject of our studies next term. Before that though, all of you will need to demonstrate you sufficiently understand everything that's been taught this term."
Groans sounded all around as the students were reminded just what awaited them in the upcoming weeks. It was exam season.
While the Ashford Foundation had been restricted from installing more advanced tooling and instrumentation in Japan during the reigns of the previous viceroys, since Lelouch's appointment they had been given approval to finally proceed with the outfitting of an R&D lab in the administrative area. The actual physical structure had been completed nearly a year ago, and most of the actual office and lab spaces were ready for occupation, but without the equipment to actually perform tests and experiments with, the place was more a glorified office building than a proper research lab. Still, that did mean there were plenty of places wherein various meetings and conferences could be hold, and considering the guests invited this day, the location was quite fitting.
The official purpose of today's meeting was to explore in what manners the Sumeragi Group and Ashford Industries might collaborate in various projects of mutual interest. The actual technical details would be left to the various research directors and project managers attending, while the more symbolic joining of hands would be represented by the two young ladies attending. Milly Ashford and Kaguya Sumeragi might not yet be the heads of their respective households, but few could deny that they were taking highly active roles in the advancement of their familial and professional interests.
In many ways, the conference was something of a rushed affair, seeing as the decision to hold it was made only a week or so ago. Arguably a bit more time should have been spent on the planning and preparations, but a variety of factors had ended up requiring it be held as soon as possible. Part of this need was a consequence of how packed everyone's schedules were as the end of the year approached. Both Milly and Kaguya had upcoming exams, the studying of which this conference was arguably interrupting, not that either girl was going to complain overmuch about that, and Milly had a few social events that she needed to accompany Lelouch on come the holiday season. Kaguya also had to give a report to the rest of Kyoto House as to the overall progress of the various reforms promised by the viceroyalty, which she would do at the upcoming New Year gathering.
"Welcome to Ashford Industries' Advanced Materials Research Complex," Milly said as they stepped out of the car. "This will be the sixth major research lab run by the Ashford Foundation, and is intended to explore in greater detail the applications of sakuradite from a materials science perspective."
"Six?" Kaguya said. "So many?"
"Well, the Empire is a pretty big place, so lots of places to build things," Milly said. "Our North American east coast facility does lots of advanced robotics work, for example, while our west coast facility is home to a compact toroid plasma device, built as part of Ashford Industries' Field-Reversed Configuration fusion reactor program."
"So," Kaguya looked up at the massive building they were entering. "Ashford also has a nuclear fusion program."
"Well, it's more like Britannia as a whole also has one," Milly corrected. "Ashford just happens to be working on one of the cornerstones."
Despite the lab complex still being technically unfinished, there were still guards manning the entrance that carefully examined the passes of the visitors before waving them through. Waiting inside were several men and women in suits, though more than one looked a bit out of sorts in such formal dress. Those were probably the actual researchers pulled from their work to attend this conference. After the various groups from both sides were paired off to begin their respective discussions, Milly and Kaguya headed to a conference room to continue their own conversation.
"Britannia, Japan, presumably Europe and China also have their own fusion programs?" Kaguya said as she continued to walk alongside Milly.
The older girl nodded. "The Europeans have been working towards a magnetic confinement approach using a design called a tokamak, and they're building a giant prototype in France. They broke ground back in 2007, but they're not expected to actually finish physical construction until sometime in the 2020s, and probably the latter half of that decade at that."
Kaguya's eyes widen. "They're taking twenty years to build their prototype?"
"Well, to give the Europeans some credit, they are building a pretty large machine," Milly said with a shrug. "And their tokamak reactor design is technically further along the commercialization pipeline than our FRC reactor, we're still working out the mechanics of getting to the higher temperatures we need. But once that is worked out, the fusion reaction in our reactor has some notable advantages."
"And what would those be? Assuming a non-specialist like me could understand them," Kaguya cracked a wry smile.
Milly gave a snort. "Don't worry, they already dumbed down the explanation when they gave it to me, so I'm sure you'll have no trouble with anything I can come up with." Then more seriously. "At a basic level, it comes down to the fuel used in the reaction. Most other designs use a fuel combination that as a byproduct of the fusion can produce difficult to handle waste. Not as much as a nuclear fission reaction, but some of it can be even more troublesome to handle. The fuels selected for Ashford's FRC reactor don't produce those byproducts, or if they do, they produce it in much more minute quantities. That makes handling them much, much simpler."
That elicited a nod from Kaguya. "I see. That certainly is helpful."
Seeing as Kaguya was at least somewhat familiar with the industrial processing of raw sakuradite, her awareness of safe byproduct handling was a bit less abstract than one might first presume.
"The other big advantage though is, in other reactor designs, a lot of the energy that gets generated, it's actually difficult to immediately convert to electricity," Milly said. "Much of it is heat that you have to first turn into steam to then drive a turbine. The energy that's released by the FRC reactor though, it comes in a form that we can directly convert into electricity. So not only do we not have to deal with any conversion inefficiencies, there are overall fewer moving parts that you need to maintain."
"That arguably sounds like a much bigger advantage than the first one," Kaguya remarked.
Milly flashed a smile. "Better to save the best for last."
Kaguya gave a chuckle as they arrived at their destination. "And is there more better to be had?"
"Well, I'd like to think so," Milly responded.
Upon the conference table around which they were stepping to was a model of some sort of elongated, cylindrical machine. The two cylinders met at a central chamber with eight large protrusions sticking out, protrusions that were somewhat reminiscent of the laser mounts on the Sumeragi Group's ICF chamber, so that was presumably the ignition chamber.
"I take it this is a model of the FRC reactor?" Kaguya asked.
While the two girls might not be technically versed enough to discuss the details of nuclear fusion, showcasing the Ashford Foundation's crown jewel as a sort of reciprocal act for the Sumeragi Group's prior openness served as good cover for the true conversation that would be happening today. And besides, something might as yet come from these discussions.
"Yep," Milly nodded. "All two hundred million Britannian pounds of it."
That elicited a sharp intake of breath from Kaguya. As wealthy as her own family and company were, that was still a substantial amount of money.
"How long do you expect Ashford to need before you can commercialize the technology?"
"Assuming it works?" Milly responded. "We're in the middle of a major upgrade, which should let us achieve temperatures in the billions of degrees centigrade."
A necessary qualifier on Milly's part, seeing as Britannia rather stubbornly retained the old imperial system of measurements in day-to-day usage, even as the majority of its scientific and even industrial parlance had shifted over to the metric system.
"That upgrade is expected to take another year to complete, and then more experiments need to be run to make sure the empirical behavior of the plasma matches our simulation models."
Which they by all rights should, seeing the granularity with which things could be simulated by the thought elevators. If there was a discrepancy, it would almost certainly be due to some design or manufacturing defect in the actual reactor.
"If the numbers hold up, then we should have a prototype reactor built within the next decade."
Kaguya raised an eyebrow. "Wouldn't you arguably be neck and neck with the Europeans then, despite their head start?"
"Goes to show you the advantages the Empire enjoys," Milly said.
Advantages that included not just two thought elevators, but also a code bearer and geass contractors that could more fully employ the computational power of those elevators. Indeed it was arguably that advantage that allowed Britannia to attempt the more complex fusion reaction to start with instead of going with the more traditional approach everyone else was taking. That was not to say the others would not get there eventually, and even benefit from the lessons the Empire learned in its pathfinding, but there were still some pretty hefty early mover advantages. For one, if the design did indeed pan out, Britannia's own projections were that they could completely retire all large-scale fossil fuel power plants by 2050, replacing them with a far smaller number of nuclear fusion plants. Of course, even nuclear fusion was a mere steppingstone to the true holy grail of energy production that Britannia, or rather, Eden Vital was working towards, but until they managed to get their hands on a magnetic monopole, they would have to make do with the knock-off Yggdrasil Drives instead of proper solar furnaces.
"So I can see," Kaguya said. "And the Sumeragi Group would certainly be interested in some sort of collaboration, though off the top of my head I'm not entirely sure what we could contribute. This reactor design is clearly very different from the one my company is working towards."
"That's for the actual scientists to work out," Milly said, "and the collaboration doesn't necessarily have to be between our respective fusion programs. Let's just say that I got an absolute avalanche of emails from our research teams when they realized just how compact the Guren graser is. I think some of them forgot I don't actually have the physics background to understand half the ideas they spout, but they're clearly really, really excited about what they might be able to do with one of your grasers."
"Well, I hope you don't mind me selling it dearly," Kaguya said with a vibrant smile.
"I would expect nothing less," Milly responded with one of her own. "In fact, the person that'd be most capable of meeting your price has arrived."
Kaguya blinked, and then heard the door open behind her. Turning about, she was greeted with the sight of a young-looking woman with flowing green hair and vivid yellow eyes. She was dressed in the black robes of Eden Vital, though the golden trim along its edges stood in stark contrast to the less adorned uniform worn by the lay members Kaguya had encountered, or even the red patterns of Lelouch's uniform as cardinal. But that was perhaps to be expected, considering who the woman standing before them was.
"Kaguya," Milly said, stepping next to the girl. "May I present Lady Cecilia Clermont, Grandmaster of the Order of Eden Vital."
Kaguya had already made a guess as to who the newcomer was, based not just on her dress, but also on descriptions given to her by Lelouch.
"Grandmaster," Milly continued, "per your order, I have brought Ms. Kaguya Sumeragi, the provisional high priestess of the Ise Grand Shrine."
And here was the other reason for the rush. For obvious reasons, C.C. did not tend to leave the Britannian homelands, or even the Citadel, very often. On those rare occasions when she did, those with cause or need to meet her had to scramble to not miss the window that such trips offered, even when the other party was the provisional head of their own ecclesiastical order. Still, it was in mindful awareness of her relative station that Kaguya merely dipped her head instead of bowing when she greeted the other woman.
"Grandmaster Clermont, it is an honor to make your acquaintance. I hope that our relations will be a long and prosperous one."
C.C. graced Kaguya was a warm, even gentle smile. "Your bearing is ever so reminiscent of Lady Kimiko. You are certainly your grandmother's granddaughter."
Of course C.C. would be acquainted with Kaguya's grandmother, the previous high priestess. Though whether her words now were earnest or mere platitudes meant to endear herself to Kaguya remained to be seen.
"I thank you for your kind words," Kaguya responded politely.
C.C. continued smiling at Kaguya, then regarded Milly. "Leave us."
Milly dipped her head and withdrew. C.C. then glanced at the attendants accompanying Kaguya. The girl immediately got the hint.
"Leave us," she echoed.
"Kaguya-dono," one attendant began to protest.
"That is an order," Kaguya however promptly cut them off.
After exchanging worried looks, and casting a glare or two at C.C., Kaguya's attendants bowed and took their leave as well. Only once the door closed behind them did C.C.'s expression assume a solemn demeanor.
"I was greatly heartened when I heard you would revive the Ise Grand Order."
Kaguya met C.C.'s gaze levelly. "You do not regret letting slip a thought elevator?"
"Power concentrated can be corrosive," C.C. stated. "I would rather the power that the thought elevators represent be appropriately distributed amongst those responsible enough to wield them than to hold all of them within mine own hand."
Kaguya thought back to the history taught her as part of the preparation for reviving Ise. It was Eden Vital that proposed the original terms of the Treaty of London, and even helped provide the seed knowledge that allowed the other ecclesiastical orders to make use of the elevators in their custody to perform computations. While the other orders would certainly have eventually been able to figure it out themselves, it would almost certainly have taken them considerably longer, and cost a great deal of blood in the process, considering how many people the Soviet Union literally burnt out with their ad-hoc approaches. Indeed, it was partially to prevent a repeat of such tragedies that Eden Vital made the offer in the first place. Now that all of the other powers knew the potential of the thought elevators, none of them would be able to resist the temptation, so if they were going to try to use them anyway, the Order could at least show them the safest way of doing so.
"There are clearly some who disagree with you, though," Kaguya said next.
"And they have brought naught but ruin wherever they so tread," C.C. responded. "Your own house bears witness to this."
"We have also borne witness to the ruin your efforts to stop them have wrought," Kaguya pointed out. "The heretics are not the ones occupying Japan, for one."
"Also true," C.C. did not try to argue otherwise. "And there will always remain a subjective element as to whether their containment has been worth such costs. I cannot demand that you agree with the rationale behind my decisions, but at the same time I am not obliged to account for your own priorities when setting mine."
A rather blunt response, in answer to Kaguya's own frankness. But compared to the mealy-mouthed fudging that politicians and diplomats usually engaged in to try and pretend differences of opinion did not exist, such frankness was almost refreshing. And in the end, it was certainly to the Japanese people's benefit if C.C. truly did prefer the thought elevators be distributed amongst trusted stewards beyond just Eden Vital. Trying to gain the benefits of that stewardship without paying the associated costs was to exhibit a considerable sense of selfish entitlement. Still.
"And are you to also be the sole arbiter of whether my own hands are sufficiently responsible to be steward to a thought elevator?" Kaguya asked.
"It was at least at my discretion whether to recognize your provisional status," C.C. responded. "Whether you can formalize it, well, that will be up to your own capabilities."
And whether Kaguya possessed the ability to prevent C.C. from intervening if the grandmaster ever felt inclined, it went without saying. Kaguya took a deep breath.
"I am the House of Sumeragi, and I will discharge all the attendant duties that come with it," she declared firmly.
C.C. smiled again. "I am glad to hear it. So, how about we discuss the manners in which Eden Vital might be of help in the discharge of those duties?"
"For the appropriate price?"
"Better to pay in full than to have a lingering debt."
That was fair enough.
"So what then does Eden Vital offer?" Kaguya asked.
"A contract."
Kaguya's eyes narrowed. "My understanding was that Eden Vital was not willing to dispatch contractors to assist with Kamine Island's reactivation unless Ise accepted full communion with the Order."
"And that remains the case," C.C. said. "But a single contract, granted to the appropriate recipient, would be within the grace I am prepared to extend."
The Japanese girl's gaze remained steady even as her mind raced. Lelouch had personally explained to her exactly what a geass, and code, was, along with the associated costs. Not only did a person need to have a sufficiently robust neural physiology, it was also recommended that they be further augmented with at least a neural-link interface that could act as a sort of safety buffer. In addition to these physical considerations however, there was also the more abstract cost of the duty the grandmaster demanded be shouldered.
This duty might not necessarily be particularly burdensome, and it might even be something the prospective contractor would have carried out anyway. But it was undeniable that the contract created an explicit bound between the candidate and the grandmaster, one that the latter was certainly not going to let slide. And even if the contract was not meant to represent an explicit subordination, being open to any behest from C.C. carried with it a cost that was only amplified by just how long-lived the grandmaster was. After all, being functionally immortal meant C.C. could be extremely patient in laying out and watching unfold her plans. At minimum, C.C. was immeasurably more experienced with such machinations than Kaguya herself, and that was reason enough to be wary of any grace being shown.
"I think, Grandmaster, I will have to decline your kind offer," Kaguya finally said.
Kaguya might be giving up a major boon that could hurry along Ise's revival, but the more that revival was under their own terms, the more firmly could they stand by themselves and not be beholden to anyone else. To be an equal to Eden Vital was probably impossible, it held too many advantages to be so readily overcome. But to at least be worthy of respect, reaching that point would be arduous because such shortcuts could not be taken.
If C.C. was at all disappointed at having her offer rejected, the woman did not show it. Instead, she stepped closer to Kaguya, and reached out to place a hand on the girl's head. Kaguya frowned at the slight presumption this represented, but did not otherwise try to push the hand away. And then, a certain nostalgia flickered from the sensation of C.C.'s hand. Blinking, Kaguya could almost swear this was not the first time the grandmaster had paid her this affectation. It was as if, a long time ago, C.C. had done this very thing.
"Dear friends are a treasure, regardless of how long or short they may be with you," C.C. said. "And Kimiko Sumeragi was precious to me indeed."
Kaguya inhaled sharply at the mention of her grandmother, as C.C. also withdrew her hand.
"I bear fault for allowing the heretics to become such a threat that they could claim your family's lives, and that failure will remain with me amongst all the others I have suffered through my long existence. But looking at you, I am reminded of the spirit and resolve that the House of Sumeragi has always displayed." C.C. smiled again. "The road to power can be a lonely one. And I, for one, would welcome company upon it."
Despite her continued wariness of the much older woman, Kaguya was starting to realize that, even if it would be unwise to take the grandmaster too lightly, she was also an immensely powerful ally to have on your side. And not just because of the power she wielded, C.C. clearly also had a strong sense of loyalty too. Loyalty enough that those that won it in turn trusted her enough to meet with a young Kaguya. The girl could barely recall the memory, but she was now absolutely certain it was indeed a memory, not some figment of her imagination.
"I too would not object to such company, for I suspect there is much that I could learn from such acquaintances," Kaguya thus responded.
"Oh? Then shall I tell you about the time Lelouch snuck an extra slice of cake out from the Citadel cafeteria, intending to treat himself? Only to have his sisters discover him, and demand he share? After which he organized a heist involving all of the cohorts in his age group to pilfer enough cake slices for all of them?"
Kaguya blinked, and then let out a giggle as she imagined such a scene.
"Was he truly so mischievous?"
"That hardly warrants being called mischief, as far as my dear boy is concerned," C.C. said. "But alas, such tales should probably be reserved for after your discussions with Millicent are complete. There is still plenty of opportunity for your respective Houses to find commonality, I think."
After a moment, Kaguya nodded in agreement. "Yes, I think there to be."
C.C. nodded in turn. "Do not fret, I will be in Japan for some time yet attending to other matters. We will have ample time, the three of us, to reflect upon my boy's many antics."
A wide smile crossed Kaguya's face again. "I eagerly look forward to it, Grandmaster."
"And I to many more such conversations, High Priestess."
Back in his office, Lelouch felt a shiver run down his spine. That the cardinal immediately attributed the cause to the grandmaster was not paranoia, it was just plain common sense.
End of Chapter 34
Two more chapters, I think, before we hit the Refrain arc. I keep having to shuffle things around as I discover the need for more scenes than I originally planned. I am also coming to a rather uncomfortable realization, as I watch the word count tick ever upwards, that this story might actually reach similar proportions as Calculus. I want to say it won't be as long, but I've only reached what I consider to be around the 30, 35% mark and I'm already over 300K words. That's, not good. Or is good, from the perspective of the readers, I suppose.
Another image finished, though this one is for Calculus instead of Meridian. I'm keeping my artist very busy.
deviantart dot com slash z98 slash art slash A-Lady-and-Her-Knight-872318144
Considering the volume of artwork out there, I've actually been rather surprised at the relative dearth of images of Kallen as a Rounds. I seem to recall a photoshopped recolor and a few more simplistic pieces, but until I commissioned my first image of Kallen, I don't think I ever saw a high quality one. We'll see if I have reason to get a few more pumped out, I still have a long backlog of other images I want done first.
As that image by itself should make evident, I'm perfectly willing to set characters on a very different path than what they trod in canon. Indeed if seeing characters put in different circumstances than in canon is enough to break your understanding of those characters, well, the characters you were looking for in the first place were probably never there in my works, and that's intentional on my part.
I can actually imagine at least one person that would be a qualified matchup with Kaguya from canon. Whether I could frame the courtship well enough to justify it in my story, well, we'll see if the need arises.
There's not going to be any incest in this story. If you want to ship Lelouch with someone, pick someone that's not a blood relation.
In general whether Japan is independent or not has little bearing on Kaguya's decision last chapter. The issue at hand is how Kaguya could, with possession of a thought elevator, parlay Ise into a powerful enough force to benefit the Japanese as a people. This she can do even while Japan and her people remain part of the wider Britannian Empire. After all, prior to annexation, Ise was not "independent" of Japan, and neither is Eden Vital "independent" of Britannia. The latter clearly possesses great influence and power, and is responsible for a significant chunk of the prosperity Britannia enjoys. And if you were to compare Eden Vital with the Holy See, which is considered its own country, which would you say is the more powerful ecclesiastical order?
So, completely unrelated to the above, the next section is in response to a different review. Or reviews, I suppose. This happens every once in a while, wherein a reader comes under a certain misconception about the stories I write. It's common enough that I time to time have to write a response in the author notes, but rare enough that previous instances of such notes are too sparsely spread out to necessarily catch the attention of such readers and deal with their remarks preemptively.
I do not write stories for the purpose of allowing readers to reaffirm their own personal understandings or perceptions of characters in a particular franchise, whether their preference be positive or negative. My stories are not intended as vehicles by which to elevate some fictional character onto a pedestal, the characters are depicted the way they are based on the needs of the narrative. If such affirmation is what you seek in the stories you read, I would suggest asking yourself whether you actually want to follow my works. As far as I'm personally concerned, no character is intrinsically more or less deserving of good or bad ends based on the person they are, their fates must serve a narrative purpose, and I generally will not compromise the needs of the narrative for the convenience of a character. Nor does a reader's dissatisfaction with how things turn out for any particular character indicate any favoritism on my part, all it really does is show where a reader's own prejudices regarding the characters lay.
As such, there comes a point where reader comments that persist in trying to recast the characters and events with strawman arguments stop being feedback or a dialogue, they instead are a pretty clear indicator that a reader isn't actually interested in the story I'm crafting and are a rather transparent attempt to push me into writing to suit their tastes. Which, to be blunt, isn't how this works. I have chosen the narrative I have because I personally find the story interesting. Considering the lengths of my author notes, it should be pretty evident that I am more than happy to discuss with readers any questions or misgivings they might have and provide clarifications as warranted, and I certainly appreciate feedback that point out gaps in my narrative. As a writer, I readily acknowledge that there are plenty of ways in which I can improve. And while I am mindful that other people have their tastes and I do not begrudge differing preferences, I am less appreciative of when others try to force theirs upon me and expect me to exert effort on their behalf to meet their tastes when I do not share them. And I am outright dismissive of anyone that would so misconstrue their own personal tastes as some sort of self-evident conclusion that others are obliged to share.