"About damn time," pronounced Heinkel, pouring out the contents of his glass into the fireplace, the flames momentarily turning purple from contact with whatever neurotoxin the Hussar was drinking this week. "Unlike you pencil-pushers, I've got to drill the Guard in the morning, so let's get this over with."

An annoyed snicker came from the seat opposite Subaru's, "If anyone's a pencil-pusher, that's ye, with all yer equipment requests every time we meet." Chin responded in a mocking tone. "Maybe ye should just retire already, old man. Let the real revolutionaries take the stage." The ex-bandit continued as he began flipping the letter opener in-between his fingers.

Heinkel sank into his seat with a grunt, "Keep talking militia-boy, you may outnumber us 15 to 1, but each of my men can take 20 of yours." The red-haired Hussar sneered, "But actually, that would be too low of me. After all, I don't slaughter civilians."

Chin gritted his teeth, "Whatever you say, turn-coat bitch."

"That being from an ex-royal sell-out?"

"I don't need a month to make a good soldier."

"At least I don't resort to banditry like a lowly criminal."

"Yet I'm not the failure of my blood-line."

There was a click of the hammer and a 'shing' of an unsheathed bayonet.

In a space of seconds, both men were at each other's throats, Heinkel staring down the militia-man as the bayonet point on his throat drew a drop of blood, while Chin growled at the muzzle put up to his head.

"Are you both done or should I wait for you to tear each other's throats out before the President of the National Convention and I can speak in peace?" Otto, who for now has stuck to a neutral silence in his armchair, sighed. The two darted their eyes to the side, throwing a look at Subaru, before slowly lowering their weapons, their looks still unblinkingly pinned on each other. Heinkel's musket hammer came back down with a hollow click, and Chin's bayonet returned to his pocket. The former dropped into his seat, the latter slipped into his armchair, keeping his eyes trailed on the muskets.

"Thank you, Otto." Subaru cleared his throat. "Gentlemen, before we begin going through the agenda, I would like to ask for preliminary reports."

"I'll go first." Otto shook off the dust on his dark green overcoat and stood from his seat, looking expectantly at Subaru, who nodded in return.

"Hlockard Transportation has agreed to sell us their construction services, though they want more of the royal gold."

Subaru hummed approvingly. "How much?"

"Approximately two per cent more of the confiscated goods."

Subaru felt an exhausted sigh begin to creep into his breath but purged the emotion quickly. "Tell them that one and a half per cent is already a sizeable cut, haggle at a fourth per cent at maximum."

"Hm... I may have a knack for such thing, but Natsuki, with all due respect, they may reject the offer."

"We're out of a civil war, Otto. A construction company's dream, all the demand they can ever get, if they don't want it, find someone else."

Otto nodded, noting the words down. "We'll try our best, I suppose." He pronounced unenthusiastically, low concern rising in his voice.

"Is that all?"

"Yep." Otto nodded, sitting down and crossing one leg over the other as he began to note down something in his notebook, his eyes darting from calculation to calculation, his lips silently moving as if he was reading out figures to himself.

Subaru turned his gaze to Heinkel. "And what of the professional military, hm?"

Heinkel grunted as he stood up, the swords and muskets on his belt giving out a metallic thud. "I picked out some of the better militia-men to be put under my training-" There was an annoyed but quiet 'tsk' audible from Chin's seat, one which Heinkel promptly ignored. "For now, all is proceeding as planned, I was able to raise two battalions with help from the Guard and a third should be on the way."

"Any news on military production?"

Heinkel looked to the side and up as if counting. "I'd say we produce around a cannon a day, and about thirty rifles a day, though we're on the verge of implementing... pardon me, what was it again?"

Subaru sighed, "It's a reverberatory furnace, Heinkel."

"Sure." The Hussar said without much interest. "Though if you'll want anything more detailed, Otto'll send you the reports."

Subaru turned to Otto, "Otto?"

"Should be on your table by the time you come back." The merchant pronounced without lifting his face from the calculations.

Subaru gave a satisfied smile, the first time over the meeting. "Perfect. Well, anything else?"

Heinkel tightened his fists as if about to pull out a very painful splinter. "We-"

"-REqUiEr mORe SuPPlIES." mocked Chin from his corner, dropping his voice to a strained monotony.

Heinkel gave out a low growl and went silent.

Subaru sighed, "Heinkel, I suppose I don't need to remind you that-"

Heinkel interrupted, "With all due respect, we NEED more drilled army recruits. There may be a shortage, but the use of such-"

Chin also interrupted with a whimsical tone, "Yeah, well, my forces do tend to get the most results, Heeeeiiiiiinkeeeeeeeeelll," He chuckled, "Maybe we should-"

"Rachins Hoffman," Subaru's voice seemed to have pushed the room into permafrost, his fingers intertwining and elbows stabilizing on the armrests, "I believe that we are here to discuss official business, not trying to settle personal scores. We already discussed the advantages AND disadvantages of a professional army before, have we not?"

Chin stayed silent and sunk into his armchair, clearly uncomfortable with the sudden push-back he was receiving.

"And while your inflammatory rhetoric is helpful towards progressing the meeting, I would ask you to mention your grievances when I ask you of them." Subaru took a short pause, readjusting his exterior back to his meeting style, his hands relaxing, his tone warming up to its usual business-minded straightforwardness. "Otherwise, Heinkel, we have already reached a point where the army receives twice the infantry equipment that the usual militias do, so my only possible suggestion, for now, is to wait for further progress in production and to tighten your belt when it comes to equipment usage."

Heinkel nodded grimly, his fist relaxing, but his facial expression darkening.

"Anything else?"

"No..." The Hussar sat down again, his gaze being indiscernible in the shadows created by his facial features.

"And finally," Subaru's eyes finally fell on the white-haired militia-man. "Chin, anything?"

Chin slipped out of his seat, standing up with his usual crooked posture. "Nothing to report," He mumbled in a bored manner, "the guys near the southern border are still running the usual interception on the Royal Underground supply routes. As usual, they tend to come from over the border."

The ex-bandit scratched the back of his head, trying to remember something. "Out of the UNUSUAL, there was the Vollachian march attempt for Picoutatte but that got crushed and the Garkla revolutionaries finally did their thing and flipped the city to our side, though we're unsure if we should march in."

"No, hold. We can't afford the war right now." Subaru pronounced with little to no thought, the response coming in near-instantly.

Chin scrunched up his face, "Then what? We just let 'em get crushed? They'll get slaughtered, y'know."

Subaru sighed and rubbed his temple. Chin was right, but he was also impulsive, and unlike him, Subaru did not have that privilege anymore. "If we try to occupy Garkla, this will be considered an official act of war, a war we cannot yet sustain. Furthermore, we still have no diplomatic reason for it-"

Chin gnashed his teeth. "I suppose leaving behind the most loyal has become republican policy by this point."

Subaru sighed. "We've been over this. Maintain your positions. Vollachians and Kararagi only need an excuse. If we get our Casus Belli on the Vollachians, the Kararagi won't be able to commit their forces due to them being diplomatically unpermitted to do as such. Otherwise, we get rolled over by the coalition of the two." Subaru stood up, putting his hands behind his back and standing in front of the flame. "As we all know, gentlemen, we are up against the world now. Need I remind you that we have no allies? Need I remind you that we are the only ones who stand for freedom in this rotten world? For now, we are weak and for now, we are unready. But that shall not be forever."

Subaru turned to Chin, his eyes glinting with the reflection of the flame. "We shall have our day, Chin. That day is not today. Hold positions."

The ex-bandit, irritated but begrudgingly accepting, nodded and returned into his seat.

Subaru yet again turned back to the fire, watching the flame dance and convulse before him. "Our main topic on the agenda is the discussion of our further plans. As our nation stabilizes, we must have a set of ambitions, just like any other." He paused. "For now, I have pinpointed several severe issues faced by Lugnica at large. These are to be known as the Four Fallacies."

Subaru out up his fist and lifted his index finger. "Traitorous partisanship." The middle finger went up. "Racial tensions." The ring finger all raised. "Encroaching imperialists." Finally, the pinkie went up as well. "Unimplemented Innovations." He put his hand down and turned to face the three of the most influential men of Lugnica.

'None of them are perfect. But all of them are what I need.' Subaru thought. 'Otto may have been a simple merchant, but his organisational abilities would have gone to waste in trade. Heinkel may be a headache about his wife, but he is the only one who can reliably act as field marshal. And then there's Chin... the part that at some point will have to be cut off... Militias aren't a viable way of maintaining order, and while the National Convention may need the hot-heads, seating him among us, among the real rulers, the puppeteers of the Convention, is utter madness...'

Otto raised his hand, "By unimplemented innovations, you mean..?"

"A revolutionary overturn of everything, education, economics, trade, manufacture, weaponry, defence," Subaru answered, "It shall be policies that touch all sectors, from civilian to military."

Otto put his hand down. Subaru looked over the other two. "Any more questions? No? Well, then we have to decide what we shall start with."

"All in favour o-"

A far-away sound of an explosion ripped through the air, like thunder hitting the ground, the basement shaking. All four co-rulers of Lugnica grabbed for their weapons, Heinkel flipping out both his muskets, Otto's hand straining at the ready to cast Dona, Chin slipping out his bayonets and Subaru cocking the hammer of his musket. Their gazes darted up, to the ground floor, before going to each other and nodding in near-unison.

Subaru sighed. "Meeting adjourned." His eyes gained a steely edge. "Let's go find whoever did that."

The student shakily grasped his book bag, blindly stumbling away from his arrival point. "A waste... such a damn waste..."

Dying again was not as bad as the first time, he noted. No, it still hurt, it still dragged him into that eternal darkness, only to pull him out, like some unholy baptism, but the familiarity made it just that little bit more bearable. But he still didn't want to do it again, especially for such an unsatisfying result.

Subaru put his weight against the wall, looking around at the streets. He could clearly just turn around and go in any other direction. Search for some other source of income and influence, join a workforce or simply learn the language one way or another and translate all that he brought with him...

But that was unsatisfying. Many could settle for this. Many even would. But Natsuki Subaru could not just let an opportunity as such go. Not like this.

"If there is no death, then there won't be defeat either," Subaru reassured himself through his teeth as another wave of nausea hit him. "I just gotta..." He dry-heaved. "use it smartly..." Slowly but surely, breath by breath, nausea subsided, being replaced with slight vertigo, Subaru pulling himself up and pushing off of the wall.

"Right, I don't need to find her this time." His mind returned to planning, the route becoming more clear. "First, the insignia, then I can return it. After that, maybe I can shake a favour or two out of her, maybe a payment." He smiled to himself. Thank god that whoever was her puppeteer wasn't accompanying her, otherwise, he'd have to go for another route. "And after that..."

His mind caught it in the midst of the crowd. A head of silver hair. He was about to break into a sprint to catch up and call out, but something caught in his brain. Is this really the best move?

Natsuki blended into the crowd, slowly following the half-elf, his mind weighing the pros and cons. She may be naive and slow in general, but if he could get them to the thief's hideout before sundown, he'd have a much heftier arsenal on his hands. Magic or not, ice bullets are still bullets. He nodded to himself, setting his face into a friendly expression.

"Excuse me!" He called out, pushing through the crowd to the half-elf, "Sorry!" He finally reached her and tapped the mage's shoulder.

"Pardon me! Are you Satella?" He said in a friendly yet overly straightforward tone. "I was looking for y-"

His phrase caught in his throat. Satella expression bore a mix of rage and disgust, as she took a step away as if she just saw a five-foot leach.

"What in the world is wrong with you?!" She answered with earnest rage in her voice.

Subaru, blindsided by the sudden one-eighty could only mumble, "P-pardon?"

"Now, listen, I don't know who you think you are but don't ever call me by the name of the Witch of Envy! What were you thinking?!" Satella questioned, the rage giving her the strength to push back at Subaru.

However, the student also regained his bearings, his voice filling up with ice. "Pardon me. I seem to have mistaken you for someone." He attempted to slip away from the conversation.

Satella only became even more disgusted. "How can someone mistake anyone for the Witch of Envy?! Who are you!?"

Subaru's lips turned into a thin line as he surveyed his surroundings for a chance at escape. A crowd of rubbernecks has already formed around them, and their disposition was also worrying. Mumbles of agreement, tightened fists, annoyed gazes, he really needed to get out before-

A blonde-haired child darted past him, Subaru not instantly recognizing the- "Thief!" He called out as he attempted to grab the pickpocket. Instead, the child tapped against Satella and disappeared into the crowd. The half-elf quickly fished in her pockets.

"N-no way!" She pronounced in a stunned panic, her hand turning up with nothing. "M-my-" Her panic quickly turned to rage. "Are you an accomplice!? Did you just want to distract me?!"

Subaru decided to not answer, the situation deteriorating too quickly for him to salvage it. The near-accusation has already rung out through the crowd, as the surrounding passers-by gathered to look at the 'thief accomplice'.

"Ugh! It doesn't matter, the guards will deal with you if they find you again!" Turning on her heel, Satella sped after the thief, leaving an extremely annoyed Subaru in the centre of the crowd pondering a very simple but at the same time important question.

'IF A PIECE OF JEWELRY IS A PROOF OF POWER IN THIS WORLD, HOW INCOMPETENT SHOULD ONE BE TO STORE IT IN THEIR POCKET?'