"Every night before going to sleep, we must ask ourselves: what weakness did I overcome today? What virtue did I acquire?"

-Seneca

Deep within the bowls of Odin, in the Imperial Armed forces supreme command center. High Admiral Lohengramm, once admiral Musel looked on with interest at the various interviews and public speeches about the newest political shake up in the F.P.A

"Admiral Yang, is not your platform of 'peace in our time' also a betrayal of the sacrifice of countless of our our noble youth in the war against tyranny?" One reporter asked.

"The purpose of war is to achieve a goal. We have achieved our current goal of securing allied space by the capture of Iserlohn, the next step if to deescalate the conflict. For in my opinion triumphing trough diplomacy is a much better path than trough war, and it's easier to talk to each other when we aren't pointing energy weapons at one another." Yang replied in the press conference.

"Clever. It's a stance that both hard line military supporters and peace advocates can support, along with the moderate majority, combined with the fact that the war has been going on for 150 years now and his recent military success...I think it's possible he has a legitimate chance of giving the current administration a run for their money." Siegfried said from behind his master.

"LONG LIVE THE WAR FOR FREEDOM!" A voice shouted into the crowded room and a masked figure jumped on Yang, pushing him tot he ground before he ran of him and threw himself out the window, evading security.

There and then Reinhard turned of the monitor.

"That's it then. This campaign has already been decided." The Admiral said as he started going over his various plans.

xxxxxxxx

Back in Heinessen there was a chaos as inside the room where it happened medics and security personal rushed to the scene.

But he biggest shock of the day had not arrived yet, for Yang Wen Li, with his now bloodied shirt and bandaged stomach, suddenly took a few steps and sat back down in the interview chair.

"What is the next question?" He asked plainly, like the assassination attempt and his very visible wounded and patched up body was not troubling him at all.

UC calendar early summer of 796.

The chaos surrounding Admiral Yang's very public assassination attempt instilled a vote of no confidence in the current council, since there was a prevalent rumor that the assassination attempt against the admiral was made in a bid to silence the biggest rival candidate to the administration.

Because of that a special emergency election was held, during which Admiral Yang won by a landslide.

But what was most surprising of that was not his victory. The Admiral now being a popular hero with both the army and the civilians but also the fact that Trunich was visibly supporting him.

'The faci frate si cu dracu pana treci podul' An acient Eastern European phrase was quoted by General Schenkop in his diary. Which roughly translated you become friends with the devil until you cross the threshold.

This might have explained why the Yang faction, now the Yang Administration allied themselves with him. As for Trunich's reasons, it was an open secret that his objective was power, regardless of means or morality.

xxxxxxxx

Admiral Yang Wen Li. Now Chairman Yang Wen Li looked closed the blinders to his window as he looked down at the cheering crowd bellow.

"Tomorrow we'll discuss the cabinet appointments. Who we'd like to appoint, who we would be forced to appoint and how much we can compromise between the two." Yang said to his gathered supporters who were all nodded and returned to gorging themselves on champagne and victory, while Yang hardly touched a drop.

It was rather odd, since he was knows to be a heavy drinker, though not a drunkard, in private.

"Oh and Colonel Shenkop."

"Yes Admiral?"

"You dropped this." Yang said and handed the knife that was responsible for what the public called 'an assassination attempt' back to it's owner.

"How careless of me." Schenkop said in the least bit sorry. After all how many Colonels where ordered by their commanders to pretend to kill them and make it look good.

But don't let the press know that!

The next day would be the first meeting of his administration.

So Chairman Yang Wen Li entered the Council Room chamber, sat down in the Chairman's seat and closed his eyes in despair.

"At the very least I doubt that I can do worst than my predecessor." Yang said as he deleted the folders for Operation Free Stars from the data base and made a memo to promote the officer in charge of it and kick him up to a well payed position, but one that had no real power or prospect for fame an glory.

The doors opened and his first cabinet meeting was about to begin.

The easy part was over. He now had power.

Now came the hard part.

Now he had to rule.

-Riddle of Ruin-by RMSolea.