I had brought the West under my control.
Of course, it wasn't completely in my hands yet. I had merely installed a puppet government that would do as we pleased.
Now I would use it to lay railroads throughout the West, build factories, hospitals, schools, and all kinds of facilities, and gradually accustom the Westerners to the South.
Once they had tasted the comforts of modern civilization, it wouldn't be easy for them to go back.
Even if the Empire tried to intervene later, the people themselves would probably reject it first.
Starting the modernization of the West wasn't difficult.
With the corrupt nobles who had held government posts all having fled, the West was now suffering from a severe manpower shortage.
"Your Grace, the Western Grand Duke's Office has sent a request for support."
"What does it say?"
"They say they lack the personnel needed to run the administrative and judicial systems. What should we do?"
That question wasn't even worth pondering.
I answered without hesitation.
"Send our best personnel from the South, no matter what."
The puppet government of the West sent us a request for manpower support, and we responded by sending all kinds of experts.
Naturally, the experts we sent brought our businesses into the West as well.
Thus, an industrialization boom began in the West.
First, railway tracks began to be laid, while steel mills and textile factories were built one after another.
The efficiency of the magic stone mines also improved.
Mining methods that used explosives were much faster and safer than traditional manual labor.
And the money needed to fund all this?
It was piled up in abundance in the warehouses of the corrupt nobles.
The wealth they had accumulated over the fifty years since Kaiser III was truly immense.
"No wonder the Empire is doomed, leaving things like this locked up in warehouses."
Indeed, the Empire was undoubtedly a great nation.
Just look at how it had managed to avoid collapse despite allowing corrupt nobles to enrich themselves for fifty years...
In any case, one month into the occupation, the West began to revive.
The 'Peace of Our Time' that the Crown Prince and I had agreed upon also played a part.
Peace of Our Time.
A name I had heard often in my past life.
"The Empire is more incompetent than I imagined."
Still, the "Peace of Our Time" associated with the Munich Agreement had served a purpose of its own.
During the time bought by the "Peace of Our Time," the British Royal Air Force nearly tenfolded. In exchange for giving up the Sudetenland, Britain reorganized its collapsed military and was able to lead World War II to victory.
...Of course, our Crown Prince didn't seem to have thought that deeply.
According to the Ministry of Intelligence, the size of the Imperial Army hadn't changed in about a month.
In exchange for handing over Sarsen to us and acknowledging our authority in the West to some extent, what the Empire had gained was...
...nothing but an incomplete peace that could collapse at any moment.
"I thought they would at least try to intervene. I didn't expect them to choose to just watch."
Well, that was fine by me.
Thanks to that, I had learned one thing.
"The Empire fears civil war more than I imagined."
And in situations like this, the one who knows how to take a big bite wins.
Just like Europe in the 1930s.
The memorandum I had sent to the Crown Prince, stating that "I will no longer expand territory"?
Was there anyone who would actually believe that?
Even the nobles who opposed civil war wouldn't believe it.
Now that even the Center was hesitant to intervene, no one could stop me.
Southern public opinion?
There was no one who wouldn't welcome the Grand Duke who had succeeded in Taggapdoe and won the war. The thrill of victory soon translated into overwhelming approval ratings.
The military?
The military had originally started out as my hunting dogs, meant to deal with corrupt entrepreneurs. Anyone who would defy me couldn't even join the military in the first place.
Entrepreneurs?
I was the one driving the large-scale modernization project in the West. There was no way any entrepreneur would dare defy me.
You could say that all the major corporations in the South were tied up in it.
Parliament?
Parliament had never been a particularly powerful institution to begin with.
With the Labor Standards Act in place and the voice of the working-class commoners growing louder, it was an institution that merely looked the part, giving the impression that "We're trying to start something like democracy too."
Parliament was nothing more than a rubber stamp, raising its hand for bills handed down from the Grand Duke's Castle.
"But... there is one thing that concerns me."
The East of the Empire.
Unlike the Crown Prince, whose head was full of flowers and who had brought back something like the "Peace of Our Time," it was obvious that the Grand Duke of the East, Edward, wouldn't accept the agreement.
After all, he was the sort of person who instinctively believed, "If it were me, I'd do things differently."
Befitting someone who would later start a civil war in the Empire, Edward had an ingrained sense of superiority as one of the chosen few.
The problem was that the East was essentially our South's lifeline.
More than two-thirds of the export goods heading to the Empire traveled along the Eastern sea route.
If that route were blocked, the South's own survival would be at stake.
There was a reason I had called the Belport Archipelago the "South's right to survival."
If we couldn't secure the sea route near the Belport Archipelago, we would ultimately be held hostage by the East.
"If that's the case, I'll have to side with the Navy in this year's second-half budget."
I needed to create more means of responding to the threat.
Since naval guns couldn't inflict proper damage underwater, I needed to develop new weapons that had never been shown before.
What about a warship to carry those new weapons?
That could be built too.
The shipyard that had built large coal carriers and steamships had now even gained experience building battleships.
The problems posed by the East ultimately came down to one thing.
"Just throw money at it and it's solved!"
The variable I couldn't control at all lay elsewhere.
Aria, the heroine of "Monajoh."
Because she was the woman who would destroy the Empire.
She seduced the Crown Prince and the Grand Dukes, caused the Empire's civil war, and even used the Western Grand Duke as a hunting dog.
The body I had possessed, Kyle Leopold, had been used by Aria and driven out to the South.
Naturally, with the heroine acting like this, 'Monajoh' couldn't have been an ordinary romance fantasy.
And for good reason...
"Because this is a crazy revenge drama."
With my eyes closed, I recalled the plot of "Monajoh."
The heroine, Aria, had lost her parents to the Empire.
Her father had been assassinated while investigating corruption in the Imperial Army, while her mother, who had raised Aria alone, had died after being treated like a toy by corrupt nobles.
Therefore, Aria hated the Empire.
She wanted the very existence of the Empire to disappear from this world.
A beautiful girl who had come to the Center to destroy the Empire out of hatred for it.
At first, she had no feelings for the male leads. She had merely approached them deliberately to achieve her goal.
However, as the male leads she had used as chess pieces to destroy the Empire sincerely approached her, she gradually developed feelings for them. After the Empire's fall, they eventually ended up together.
By Aria's hand, the Empire was thoroughly dismantled.
The Empire split into five and descended into civil war.
Weakened by civil war, the Empire was carved up like Qing China by the great powers, including the Republic.
What finally destroyed the Empire, which had already been reduced to half a corpse, was the Monster Wave.
All that remained where the Empire had once stood was ashes.
In the end, Aria got what she wanted.
The Empire fell, her revenge was complete, and she eventually lived happily in a peaceful place with a harem.
It was a happy ending.
"Though not for the innocent people sacrificed in the process."
Aria, enraged by the sacrifice of her innocent parents, had gone on to take countless innocent lives.
No matter what story lay behind it, her actions could never be justified.
Naturally, the comment section had been ablaze with debates over whether the ending was right or wrong. I, too, had been filled with rage and left a long comment.
...And the next day, I was possessed.
"I can't let it end like that."
If she wanted revenge, she should have found the culprits and killed them.
The moment she turned her hatred toward the innocent citizens of the Empire, Aria became no different from the very perpetrators she despised.
The problem was the future that lay ahead of the South and the Empire.
The Empire had already lost its former grandeur. Whether it was the Grand Duke of the North or the Grand Duke of the East, either could declare independence and leave the Empire at any moment.
On top of that, countless hyenas were closing in, eager to tear apart the huge piece of meat that was the Empire.
And finally... the Monster Wave that would surge out of the North and sweep the Empire clean.
It was as if the world itself desperately wished for the Empire's destruction.
"Still, it's not completely hopeless."
This world no longer followed the original story of 'Monajoh.'
After all, I had personally defeated the Western Grand Duke, who had done the most damage to the Empire.
From now on, my knowledge of the original story would be almost meaningless.
I no longer knew what consequences this change would bring.
But that didn't matter.
At least I could be certain of one thing: the future would be much better than the hopeless future of the original work, in which the Empire had no way out.
"Lucilla."
"Yes, Your Grace."
"The 'gift' I sent to the Empire should be arriving soon."
The most miserable end I could give Charles Raymonds.
What would Charles Raymonds think when he was treated like a discarded hunting dog?
And what expression would Aria wear when her plan to destroy the Empire began to unravel?