"Shut up."
The first words I spoke in a low voice were amplified through the microphone and echoed across the square.
"Cowards."
"W-what did he say?!"
"Has he lost his mind?!"
The crowd stirred. Provoking them, when soothing them would not have been enough. But I did not stop. I sneered.
"If you still have the nerve to shout, why didn't you take up guns and fight with that courage? When that proud corps commander of yours was kneeling beneath my feet, where were you, and what were you doing?"
At the hard-hitting facts, the jeers began to die down.
"Gathering in a safe square now and spitting curses—is that your patriotism? That is not patriotism. It is merely the ugly thrashing of losers."
"Y-you bastard…!"
A young man in the front row fumed. He looked ready to leap out at any moment, but was soon shoved back by the buttstock of a military policeman's rifle. Just as the atmosphere had grown as ugly as it could, I changed my tone.
"However."
I took a sheet of paper from my pocket and held it up.
"I have no interest in your petty pride. My concern is only one thing: order."
After the paper in my hand fluttered for a moment with my gesture, I opened my mouth.
"As of today, Imperial military administration will be enforced throughout Soissons. Curfew will be from midnight to five in the morning. Any violation will be met with summary execution."
"Dictator!"
"We are not slaves!"
Just as the jeers were about to erupt again, I played my second card.
"And the Empire shows mercy to citizens who keep order."
I snapped my fingers.
Then the covers of the trucks waiting behind the platform were stripped away all at once.
Fwoosh!
What was piled inside was food. Sacks of flour, boxes of canned goods, and freshly baked bread and meat still steaming hot.
The eyes of the citizens, worn down by hunger, began to waver.
"The Republic abandoned you and fled, but the Empire will feed you."
The look in the crowd's eyes began to change.
[The crowd's mentality is rapidly tilting from "hostility" to "compromise."]
[The instinct for survival is overwhelming political conviction.]
"……."
Silence flowed through the square. No one could readily curse. Because the food piled up back there offered hope that it might be on their dinner tables tonight.
"Distribution begins in one hour. Disperse."
Without a trace of lingering attachment, I turned my back and stepped down from the platform.
*
"That was madness, Lieutenant Colonel."
The underground vehicle maintenance garage of City Hall.
Amid the acrid smell of oil and the heat, a sharp voice rang out.
The commander of the 1st Armored Battalion, Major Frederica von Kessel.
She was sitting on the track of her personal tank. Her ash-gray bobbed hair was a mess with oil stains, and black engine oil marked the tight sleeveless shirt she wore.
"Analyze status."
[Name: Frederica von Kessel]
[Status: Accumulated fatigue, maintenance stress]
[Emotion: Believes Max Jaeger's speech was reckless.]
I approached with a faint laugh.
"Wasn't it enough that it worked, Major? Thanks to that, we avoided the unfortunate incident of your tanks crushing the rioters."
"…A good result does not forgive every part of the process."
Even as she grumbled, she tightened the monkey wrench in her hand with all her might. The grating screech of metal meshing rang out.
"More importantly, what are you still doing awake? Your battalion must all be passed out by now."
"How am I supposed to sleep when my beloved steed is sick?"
Frederica complained with a frown.
"You pushed it to the limit on the way to Soissons. Two road wheels are broken, and the transmission is making a scraping sound. Spare parts ran out long ago."
She let out a sigh and wiped the sweat from her forehead with her forearm. Her sweat-soaked shirt clung along the curves of her chest.
Her anxious back. I quietly approached behind her.
"Move aside. I'll take a look myself."
"…It's dangerous. The engine heat hasn't cooled yet."
"I said move."
I lightly pushed her aside and looked into the engine room. The acrid smell of exhaust stabbed at my nose.
"Analyze status."
[Target: Imperial Army G-type engine and transmission system]
[Status: Critical damage]
[Special notes: Four teeth broken on the third-stage planetary gear, main shaft bearing wear rate 85%, clutch disc deformed due to overheating.]
"It's a mess. The teeth on the third-stage planetary gear are gone."
Frederica heard me and snorted.
"Don't joke with me. We haven't even removed the transmission cover yet. How could you possibly know what gear teeth are broken without looking inside?"
"The main shaft bearing is loose, too. The play is roughly… about three millimeters. And the clutch disc must be a lump of charcoal by now."
"Lieutenant Colonel, are you writing a novel right now? Do you think maintenance is a joke—"
"I can tell just by the sound."
I tapped the engine room with a thump, thump, and continued.
"When we came in earlier, the engine drive sound was irregular. Especially the cycle of the vibration rattling at low speed—it was exactly the rhythm you get when the shaft axis is slightly off."
Of course, it was a complete lie. I hadn't even been riding in this tank.
But seeing Frederica's expression stiffen, it seemed my technical bluff had worked perfectly.
"Th-that's impossible… You're saying you can distinguish that just from the vibration? Even veteran mechanics couldn't possibly—"
"That's what battlefield instincts are, Major. If I can't hear the screams of the steel I'm entrusting my life to, I don't deserve to be a commander."
I pulled off my oil-stained gloves and shrugged. Frederica's eyes trembled greatly.
[Status: Astonishment, suspicion]
As if possessed, she rose from her seat, looked into the engine room, then looked back at me. It was impossible for her common sense to accept, but my diagnosis was too specific for her to refute.
"Then… that makes it even more hopeless."
She bit her lip.
"If the planetary gear and shaft are gone, field maintenance is impossible. We need precision-machined parts to Imperial standard, and even if we send an emergency telegram to the homeland, it will take at least three weeks to receive them. On top of that, the Republic bastards' standards are different from ours, so we can't use captured parts either…."
"Don't worry. I'll solve it."
"Pardon? No, didn't I just tell you? We don't have the parts."
"All we need are materials."
I pointed with my chin toward the wreckage of the Republican tanks piled in the corner.
"Isn't all that lying over there material? If we melt down armor plates and gun barrels, that's top-quality steel. And gears can become spare parts if we just rework them."
"Ha! Melt them down and make them? Do you think tank parts are hoes that can be hammered out in a smithy? They are precision parts that require tolerances of 0.01 millimeters! And how exactly do you intend to use Republican parts that won't even be compatible—!"
Frederica snapped at me as if she were dumbfounded.
I smiled meaningfully and tapped her on the shoulder.
"There is a very special technician I know in Soissons. A man like a magician."
"Now you're talking about magicians…"
"You'll see. So go wash up and get some sleep, Major."
I looked her up and down.
"What kind of state is that for the Empire's youngest battalion commander? If your subordinates saw you, they'd think an oil ghost had appeared."
"……!"
Only then did Frederica become aware of her own appearance.
Her pale arms were stained with black oil, and her black tank top, drenched in sweat, clearly revealed her curves. Beneath her ash-gray bob, disheveled from field maintenance, the neckline left a deep cleavage defenselessly exposed.
"Urgh…!"
Frederica bit her lip, then hurriedly untied the dress uniform jacket bound at her waist and pulled the lapels closed. Only now had she realized that she had shown such a defenseless appearance in front of a man, and her superior at that.
In the end, Frederica left the parking garage without saying another word. She pretended to be calm, but I could see the tips of her ears had turned strangely red.
Left alone in the garage, I quietly stared at the [Mini-map]. Within a 500-meter radius of the garage, there were no signs of anyone except for a few military police posts.
"Phew, then…"
Shall I work a little magic?
I approached the wreckage of the Republican Army Rene tanks shoved into the corner. Parts lay scattered all around, and an old chain block hung from the ceiling, making for a bleak sight.
"The materials are sufficient."
The core of [Material Conversion] was "homogeneity." It was a knack I had learned in Rosenheim after using [Material Conversion] to death. Just as making bread from flour was easier than making bread from bricks, the more similar the material used was in form or properties to the desired result, the lower the mana consumption and the higher the precision.
I climbed onto the wreckage of a tank. I forced open the rear engine room cover of a Rene tank. The smell of burning and oil, even worse than before, stabbed at my nose.
But it was worth it.
"Found it."
A Republican-made transmission assembly.
It was impossible to remove and move the whole thing. Without a crane, it was a weight I couldn't even dream of handling. But I had [Material Conversion].
I placed my hand on the transmission case. There was no need to tear it out. I only had to extract the parts I needed.
"Material Conversion."
[Skill "Material Conversion (Lv.3)" is being activated.]
[Target: Material and shape of Republican-made planetary gear]
[Conversion goal: Imperial Army Type IV tank-standard planetary gear]
Ding.
[The trait similarity between the target and the conversion goal is high.]
[Conversion efficiency is being maximized.]
Ziiiing—
A sensation like blue sparks scattering through my head along with tinnitus. I clenched my teeth. The lump of steel inside the transmission began to melt under the interference of mana, then started to reconstruct itself.