OR1-EP3: The Bloody Coat of Arms (16)

Most of the entertainment venues in the Britannian Empire are only open to the nobility, and the entirety of civilian life is work and death. Although some nobles had previously suggested to the Emperor to gradually weaken these physically visible divisions in daily life by learning about EU, most of the nobles believed that it was these differences that would show the difference between the nobles and the commoners, especially between the commoner riffraff and the last-rate nobles, and so no one has proposed a similar idea since then. What really made this kind of regulation a mere formality was not that the nobles themselves had suddenly gone soft, but that the nobles, who used to firmly control the empire's economy from top to bottom, had their biggest competitor - the ever-expanding number of merchants. These merchants, who often traveled around the world for business, saw how their counterparts were treated in the EU, while they were second-class citizens in the empire, and the huge psychological gap prompted them to take action, aiming to change the status quo of the empire once and for all. However, this kind of resistance would be immediately crushed once it touched the imperial power. The emperor or the royal family needed pawns who could confront the great nobles, not rebels who would send the monarch to the guillotine.

Even though these rebellions often ended in failure, as long as they were still willing to work with the Emperor, they could always be granted appropriate concessions. As a result, McNeil could walk into the park with dignity, rather than being thrown right out by the doorman or whatever. He was still a bit weak, and even his inhuman constitution only assisted him in recovering faster rather than making the pain go away immediately. The young ex-commander followed a path to the pool, looked at the ornamental fish swimming in the pool, followed in the footsteps of others and sat down on a bench to the side and began to close his eyes. He had been near-exposed, there was no safe place in all of Pendragon, and these unscrupulous nobles would surely stop at nothing to root him out as long as their enemies had a chance to take advantage of him. McNeil had reason to believe that the assassins were only taking such an inefficient approach to intercepting him for a bit of cat-and-mouse pleasure, or else he would have died long ago.

For some reason, the streets had become much more tense. At every intersection there were police officers standing by to interrogate passersby and check their documents, expecting to catch any lurking miscreants from these civilians, but their efforts were destined to be nothing more than a waste of effort. The true professionals would not be so easily caught by such a simple method, they had their own set of behavioral logic and code of conduct, and others would not be able to catch these people by the tail if they tried to use common sense.

This was the last peace before the storm swept through Pendragon. On the surface, all the nobles tried to convince themselves and their enemies that it was business as usual, but underneath the undercurrents the fighting was already in full swing. No one can stay out of it, and foreigners can't pretend they don't see it; they are often an important part of the chaos or even the cause of it, the wealth and power are often hidden between the risk. Only those who dare to invest enough cost can get a generous return ... or nothing at all.

The bearded man in robes appeared in the corner of the grove and walked toward McNeil.

"I thought you were dead."

"I don't die that easily, at least now I must live." McNeil said listlessly, "I guess, they are already in a hurry, but I can't go and declare myself safe and sound with them for the time being."

Wang Shuang looked at McNeil, who was lying on the bench like a lazy man, and suggested:

"Don't lie down, let's go for a walk."

Michael McNeil just stood up and almost fell head over heels. Wang Shuang realized that the other party's physical condition was really worrying, so he gave up his previous proposal and instead sat down with McNeil. In front of them was a clear pool and a vibrant grove of trees, and in the distance, there were a few children playing around, surrounded by their two parents. Looking at the carefree smiles on these people's faces, McNeil thought again of the workers and peasants who could never raise their heads in the factories and farms run by the nobility. He instinctively sensed that something must be wrong, but couldn't say why. He tried to convince himself that it was just a normal division of labor, a universal phenomenon that would be present in any society - however, he was quickly reminded of the EU by the Empire, and what was the real difference between the two sides, other than the fact that they weren't ruled by an Emperor?

"That cul-de-sac in your office hasn't been any problems lately, has there?"

"To be sly, this is something I don't want to talk to others about, because no one would believe me if I said it." Wang Shuang was very depressed and rubbed his hands, "Later, we really couldn't help it, so I volunteered to go forward to explore the road, which knows that the end of the road is sealed ... that is to say, there is no exit at all, as if someone deliberately dug an abandoned tunnel. However, those probing devices clearly prove that someone did come out from there."

McNeil had never heard of such a thing.

"Are you sure?"

"A thousand times for sure." Wang Shuang hurriedly said, "I think there's something else behind it, but Lord Huo could no longer tolerate it at that time, and he directly asked others to fill in that culvert to eliminate any future problems. Although doing so did eradicate the hidden danger ... we will never have the chance to know exactly what kind of people are out there."

In addition to these bizarre events, there were other disturbing details. Perhaps due to the fear that mobilizing the Imperial Army would cause even larger-scale infighting and thus allow for foreign armed intervention, the two factions of nobles gave up on pulling in their armies as the situation grew more and more tense, and instead decided to mobilize their own forces to join the war. In fact, these nobles with a large number of family slaves and private armament would not have to rely on the army, they are fully capable of starting a war by themselves. The only problem was how to get a large number of strangers into Pendragon without them realizing it, no one wanted to be the first to be exposed and provide the enemy with an excuse to use force. Attentive citizens of Pendragon would have noticed the sudden increase in strangers from out of town, all of them with a menacing look on their faces, looking not like civilians who were trembling with fear and going about their lives as planned by the Empire, but like criminals who never feared the regulations.

"Where is my priest friend?"

"Him? He's doing well, he even persuaded a bunch of nobles to donate billions of pounds two days ago." Wang Shuang smiled as soon as he said that, "Geez, those guys thought they had found a new money laundering foundation, they'd probably be so angry they'd die on the spot if they knew that all of that money had been taken to purchase supplies."

McNeil thought back to the makeshift fabrication shops he'd seen around the Zevon's control area, crude enough to play the role of a competent arsenal in short order. Soldiers needed weapons, militia needed weapons, anyone who decided to take part in this fight had to have weapons, and whoever had enough weapons and resources had enough capital to keep themselves safe. Regardless of what kind of name they carried, for nobles, living was everything, no noble would seriously gamble the life of an entire family for their own slogans. Even between the two rival nobles who seemed to be on the same page, there were still not a few who collaborated with the enemy.

"How did you get injured?" Wang Shuang asked.

"Shot in the back by a Knight of the Rounds on a street with no streetlights." McNeil took a deep breath, the sharp pain at that time still retained a lingering sensation in his mind, "Fortunately, those guys weren't very bright, and they actually hoped to slaughter me using melee methods, but they ended up losing one of their own instead. By the time they decided to shoot, my saviors arrived on the scene in time to save me."

"So, this is the bravery of the Knights of the Rounds." Wang Shuang gritted his teeth and cursed angrily, "Ancient Roman Emperor Commodus claimed to be the reincarnation of Hercules, but he was just making his opponents seriously injured or unarmed on the field during every joust, which is no different from referees playing soccer themselves. I can't imagine that after so many years have passed, these human-faced beasts are still using this self-deluding method to show off their so-called nobility."

"Don't get angry, there's no need." McNeil gently advised Wang Shuang, "Would you be so angry that you jump over the railing to take a bite out of a monkey in the zoo just because it bared its teeth to you?"

Wang Shuang laughed at McNeil's analogy. After the joking time was over, the two began to seriously discuss the countermeasures their respective embassies needed to take. The worst possibility was that one of them would attack the embassy directly (although the probability was small) and everyone would be left to fend for themselves. There was no point in talking about retaliation, that was a topic that needed to be discussed in each country, and if they, the parties involved, died here, it would all be for nothing. As such, the third-class ambassador of the Nanting Protectorate has come up with a somewhat outlandish but potentially workable solution: get the embassy district to unite for mutual defense. As long as the embassy district completely sealed off the neighborhood and declared its neutrality, armed invasion by other forces would be tantamount to starting a war, and these nobles, no matter how audacious they were, would not be able to attack the embassy at the risk of bringing the two giants of the empire and the world into conflict. If the time was right, the Embassy could also decide on which side to add the proper leverage to tip the scales of victory.

"What is your country's idea?"

"My country?" Wang Shuang was a bit embarrassed, "I think there have been many people who have reminded you that we are not country."

McNeil knew that these people valued names very highly, and quickly corrected himself.

"Well, I mean, what is the position of your Nanting Protectorate?"

"What the king means is that we choose to stand with the emperor. In fact, even if someone wanted to support the Magnate Noble Faction, we couldn't do it." Wang Shuang sighed, "That Charles III, despite his rough methods, is ultimately a lord of his generation. For so many years, the Britannian Empire is almost dead, the nobles have been nobles for generations, and the commoners will always be slaves, and Emperor Charles declared that in the future, anyone will have to rely on their ability to gain power and status, this is simply the last hope in the eyes of those commoners who have been enslaved by the nobles for more than a hundred years. I think most of the commoners will choose to support Charles, because whether Emperor Charles fails or he goes back on his word, the result will not be worse than what it is now." Speaking here, the melancholy in Wang's eyes became even more intense, "I just can't understand ... how they will once again pin their fate on the mercy of the Emperor, who is the most unreliable figure under the heavens, and can include all the princes and nobles in his weighed interests, only he won't include these civilians."

"Your king is also a monarch." McNeil reminded.

"That's different!" Wang Shuang's reaction was unusually fierce, "We ... our king is completely different from those rampaging monarchs. Since the establishment of the Nanting Protectorate more than a hundred years ago, there has never been anyone who has been able to be the sole ruler here."

"Then you are a republic." McNeil said firmly, "Please don't misunderstand - what I mean is that from your description, I see the Nanting Protectorate as a republic that refers to its consuls as kings. There is no title that is hereditary except the self-appointed title of king, and power does not come from the title of king. Frankly, you only have the title of King, everything else is more like an EU's autonomous republic."

The Nanting Protectorate has no real allies. It is nominally affiliated with the Chinese Federation, and has decided to ally itself with the Britannian Empire because of the constant fear of the Crown's army crusading south. The Nanting Protectorate 's intentions were also simple, they had to maintain good relations with the Britannian Empire for now, and then wait for an opportunity to move based on changes in the world situation. If the empire was strong, the Nanting Protectorate would choose to submit to the imperial court and work together to fight against Britannia; on the contrary, if Britannia continued to decline, it would be the only foreign aid that the Nanting Protectorate would use to defend itself against the imperial court.

As for the EU's position, it's clear to anyone with eyes: they don't care about the monarch, only business. Weakening both factions at the same time to the point that even if they were united, they wouldn't be able to resist EU's infiltration would be the most favorable way to handle the situation for EU.

"But I don't believe you only want business."

"I don't believe that either." McNeil pulled the small black ball out of his jacket pocket; he had never figured out what substance it was made of. He had tried to cut it with a crowbar and a chainsaw, and those attempts had all failed; the black blob was unharmed. "Again, one has to believe it. Their motives don't seem like they're going after long term gain. These people appeared to be shrewd businessmen, but they were too ratty to realize it."

For security reasons, McNeil decided to send all the rest of those miscellaneous items to the Zevon family to be held in trust, and he couldn't afford to resell the collection for other nobles lately. He wondered if the workers working overtime had found anything of value, but he hoped they wouldn't just throw away the rest of the goods in one fell swoop.

After a few turns, an emissary from Duke Bradow von Breisgau had the difficult task of finding McNeil, this time the Duke wanted him to secretly deliver some of the goods that had been hoarded on the outskirts of the city to some warehouses in the city of Pendragon. Knowing that the task was somewhat dangerous, McNeil decided to return to his temporary lodgings to organize his belongings before making his way to the outskirts. His last experience had taught him a lesson: always have enough equipment or supplies to deal with the unexpected.

TBC

Chapter Notes:

It is worth noting that the execution of entire families of defeated nobles in power struggles in the Britannian Empire was common.

Tragically, Emperor Charles' father, the previous Crown Imperial Prince who was assassinated, was indeed a pro-reformist leader. Charles likely borrowed his father's influence long before he became emperor.