Sovereign

“Disaster in West Asturia! For the first time in a hundred years, a thirty-four thousand-strong all- women’s force of the Royal Army of Lorathia (III Royal Corps) participated in a daring naval landing. The III Royal Corps landed on the shores of Cadiez alongside twenty-thousand regular troops of the II Army Corps (forming the First Lorathian Expeditionary Force), supported by the Royal Lorathian Navy and the Royal Lorathian Air Force in an attempt to open a second front against the Asturian Republic. The landing managed to push twelve kilometers off the port city of Cadiez, before being repulsed by an ARDF response force eight days after the landings. Currently, both sides are desperately digging as the soil on the coast of West Asturia freezes. Lorathian casualties are heavy, with protests already erupting in Redcastle for an ‘immediate withdrawal’ of the III Royal Corps.”

- Geopol News

“Women now finally taste the stench of real warfare! They thought that they would be able to do better than their cannon fodder, but fools they were! It appears that no magic can beat the terror of heavy artillery and armored warfare. The Republic has utterly repulsed and nearly deleted their invasion force, forcing them to dig in a desperate attempt to repulse ARDF counter-attacks. If these Lorathian women find the need to taste trench warfare, then the Republic shall give them its full five-star course! Viva la República!”

- La Vanguardia

+++

West Orland

County of Wittfield

City of Eutstadt

November Palace

January 14, 2025

Amelie and Nia barely slept last night, and so, they were both down sleeping dead on their desks by the time William arrived to check in on them early in the morning. Naturally, when no replies came in after his knocks, the Royal Guard Knights posted outside of Amelie’s office didn’t bother stopping him from entering inside without much issue.

William sighed, all while one of the Royal Guard Knights took a peep as well, before she sighed to herself, muttering something about “the hardworking Queen” and “her self-destructive behavior”. William, for his part, didn’t make any further comments, merely taking permission to close the door, before he silently slipped inside.

Together, the two were buried in mountains of paperwork at their respective desks. William almost felt a strange kick of wholesomeness at the view of the two’s peaceful sleeping faces, wondering to himself how on Pollos they managed to sleep at the same time together. Because if they didn’t, someone surely would have alerted the other that they were slipping to sleep on their desk.

But no, they were rock-dead asleep. Both of them. Truly, these two must have been close back in Amelie’s university days. They almost both shared the same stupid habit. “Ladies.” He tried, attempting to wake both of them up. He cleared his throat for a second try. “Ladies, it’s morning!”

Grogilly, Amelie raised her eyelids just to see William standing in front of her desk. She placed her head back down, refusing to wake up. “Ten more minutes…” She said, drifting back asleep. William tried waking them up again because quite frankly, the both of them would probably do better to sleep in their respective rooms instead, but…it failed. Not even Nia responded to his attempts.

And he absolutely would not touch any of them in a vain attempt at waking them up. And so, he simply scooted out of the room, his daily report documents still in his hands. He sighed to himself as he walked through the Palace hallways, finding the absolute monotony with some…strange comfort, he supposed. Perhaps it was growing on him, which he certainly didn’t expect. That was when he nearly bumped into someone.

Shit…it’s the Foreign Minister. He immediately fixed himself up, just as she spoke.

“Is the Queen awake?” She asked.

“I’m afraid not, Minister Wallenstein. I recently checked and she’s asleep in her office.”

“I see.” She scanned him, before smiling a bit. “Well, Major William Porter was it? I’m afraid we never really talked much, did we?”

“Hmm, not exactly. Not that it matters. I believe you have more important matters to attend to all the time.”

“Oh, yes, I do. But tell me…you…you led the defense of the Royal Capital, did you not?”

William didn’t really reply quickly to that, merely staring at her neutrally. “I suppose I did. But, that discounts the management and actions of countless other officers during the battle that is worthy of more attention.”

“But you led them, under Her Majesty’s orders. Holding the frontlines for months, until the relief armies of Orland came…” She almost…seemed impressed by him. “Yet, you’re keeping your profile low. Still as enigmatic as ever. Much of the Orlish public knows nothing about you. Many diplomats have asked me about you, but I scarcely had anything to answer.”

“The records of history would shed light on whatever happened one day, but for now, none of it matters. I am just another officer serving Her Majesty, and there’s no point for me to divulge any information about me or what I did to anyone that would threaten the Royalists’ military situation.”

“So, you’re laying low to prevent sensitive information from leaking out?”

“Perhaps, but not exactly. I just…look, I’m not interested in any of this attention that I’m getting. I’m just a Major. Nothing more, nothing less.”

She smiled. “Orland needs more men like you. Officers ready to defend our cause with loyalty and without personal gain. Other officers want a massive spotlight on their backs. And they want so much political gain. One of the main grievances of many countries across the world is how men betrayed their roles in the military. To be an apolitical force.”

She looked up thoughtfully. “But…I suppose it’s unsurprising why that happened. There’s no way men in the military can ever remain apolitical. So…you, being so close to the Queen, you’re not that apolitical, are you?”

“I am not.” William firmly said. “I am with the Royalist cause. I am on the side of the crown. That’s about as political as it gets when this civil war is about whether or not Orland should be a Republic or a Monarchy. Of course, I’m not.”

“I see…” Adelaide sighed. “You know, I’ve been wondering…and I haven’t really talked much with folks brimming with military knowledge…”

“Scared of talking with General Albrecht or Admiral Halberd?”

She gulped a bit, being caught completely correctly by William. “I…well, I suppose that’s the case. They’re not exactly that inviting. General Albrecht especially.”

A chilly wind almost breezed through them when his name was mentioned. Even among international circles, General Albrecht was known as a “butcher” after all. The sheer mountains of corpses from the final offensive of the Ivory Alliance at the tail end of the Great War were simply shocking, to say the least. Women acted like the war was a pointless affair…until they watched entire trains filled with nothing but corpses passing through their peaceful towns and cities.

All of it was mainly attributed to General Albrecht’s “all-out offensive” that held back nothing, devastating both the Ivory Alliance’s combined armies and the Order Pact’s defending forces. Something which William remembered all too well…

Women act as if all of this is apocalyptic. He thought to himself. But all of it…nothing compared to all of that.

After all, the meat grinders were never close to population centers. But on frontier borderlands, thus, they rarely saw it. Still, General Albrecht’s reputation remained the same, he supposed. As shown by Adelaide’s discomfort at even the mention of his name.

“So, what do you think about Lorathia’s naval invasion of West Asturia?”

“Not as bad as Liebnich.” William scoffed at the international attention it garnered. Everyone was talking about it, with footage and images flooding in as if it was a waterfall. Articles and endless rants about how awful it was. Everything about the sheer suffering of the III Royal Corps, the blame game against the Lorathian Navy and Air Force, “men screwing up the support role”, and everything packaged together.

All while in the actual frontlines between Gallia and Asturia, nearly four hundred thousand young men already perished in its freezing trenches. Both of them knee-deep for months in a campaign that demanded everything to be fed into a wider and more intense meatgrinder. He supposed that the situation for the III Royal Corps could deteriorate faster due to its nature as a naval invasion, but…

No one even talked about Liebnich. He thought bitterly. No one. All of it, their stories, the men he served with, the battles he saw. All of it, nothing. All that resulted from it was the dry, almost clinical reports of official Orlish military history. Back in the day, when he was knee-deep in that encircled peninsula, starving and freezing while gas filled the trenches on an almost biweekly basis…no one even knew of what was happening to them.

Even today, not many people would even be able to point at Liebnich on the map. Yet, ask anyone, and they would know where Cadiez was with pinpoint accuracy after the international media outrage exploded.

“It’s a disaster,” William answered. “They just created another meat grinder.”

“I believe that’s a widely shared opinion.” She seemed outraged herself. “It’s just…the Lorathian government made a massive mistake with it. They shouldn’t have landed there. And I cannot fathom how the Asturians refuse to negotiate a proper, civilized withdrawal. Savages, I say.”

“But they won’t abandon it, won’t they?”

“The Duchess of Alburrie refuses to pull out. She already said that her troops will be reinforced and that she will ‘push them back’, and much of the Lorathian Royal Court supports that stance. Politically, it simply would not work to abandon the assault. They…they have to prove themselves…”

William laughed. “You women have to prove yourself? That you can fight too? Is it perhaps the veneer of superiority cracking?”

“That’s not…” She looked down and sighed. “I suppose, yes. But I’m sure they can do it. Sure, the casualties will be heavy, and there is outrage over it, but most of that outrage is already being aimed at the Republic anyway.”

“Yeah, how dare they defend themselves.” William scoffed at it. “I’m on the same side as yours, but don’t you think this sounds stupid and hypocritical.”

“It’s about the rules of war too! There were reports of Asturian soldiers shooting some women on sight! Even when they surrender. Sure, it may be little incidents, but it’s violations regardless.”

“Ah, how awful.” William couldn’t help but laugh inside at how they deliriously wanted the absolute enforcement of the rules of war when it was them getting the beating. He didn’t remember that crap back in the Great War, and the frontlines currently manned by men today in the global crisis weren’t having such niceties either.

Still, he did see why she should be angry about it. Rightfully so. Rules of war were rules of war. Yet…the way the world was now dead set on enforcing it specifically on Cadiez and Cadiez alone because there were women there, but none of these discussions was even raised much during the four grueling years of the Great War…it seemed hollow.

“I agree with you,” William added. “But how do we even address this? Is the Lorathians asking for Orland’s involvement?”

“Perhaps. This will indeed complicate Her Majesty’s plans, considering that Orland isn’t even at war with the Asturian Republic.” Adelaide said. “By the way, you’re probably coming to an upcoming MN conference.”

“I suppose where the Queen goes, I and the 16th would find themselves in the same place. Yes, she already briefed me about her plans of ‘uniting the MN’. We’re preparing when the word comes.”

“Good.” Adelaide smiled. “It will be quite a long and stressful trip though. Goddess knows, talking to other diplomatic missions from dozens of bickering nations is a pain, especially when we’re planning to unite that.”

“I see that.” William nodded. “But, I’ve had worst trips before.”

“You do?”

“Nothing for you to be concerned with. Just saying, this is not that awful for me and for most of my men. We will be ready for some little guard duty. We’ve seen worse already.”