If the capital of the Military Nation's citizens is Amitengrad, then the capital of the Military Nation's soldiers is the Inner Circle Command.
While Amitengrad, built upon the capital of the former kingdom, served as a residential city—encompassing housing, jobs, and farmland—it embraced its population with everything a normal city should have.
In contrast, the Command had too many disqualifications to be called a city. Its population distribution was skewed, and it endlessly devoured resources without distributing them elsewhere. A city prepared solely for war.
Thanks to this, the Military Nation maintained a massive army relative to its size.
The Command was densely packed with every military facility needed to wage war: steelworks, munitions factories, military academies, and so on. Under the supervision of soldiers, the forced laborers continued to toil, and the weapons and materials produced by their labor gradually piled up.
All this amassed power was to be unleashed upon other nations when the time eventually came.
The Inner Circle Command outpost, situated in the very heart of the Military Nation, and thus always safe from invasion.
There, an officer was trembling with inner fear.
Although the Military Nation hadn't given a clear explanation, by the rank of officer, one heard all sorts of rumors.
The Bottomless Abyss had collapsed, the worst beings in history had been released from there, and they were approaching the Command to hold those who had imprisoned them accountable.
His mission was to stop them from attacking the Command.
That was the extent of what he had been told.
In other words, he knew nothing.
"Are you afraid, Second Lieutenant?"
A heavy voice came from behind him. It was a voice he had heard only a handful of times, but one he could never forget—or rather, must never forget.
The Second Lieutenant, snapping to attention, quickly turned and saluted him.
"Loyalty!"
There stood a general in an officer's uniform, hands clasped behind his back.
In the Military Nation, where power dictated status, the age range of generals was relatively consistent. But since Ki Gong was quite difficult to master, even he, who belonged to the younger side of the generals, was already approaching his mid-thirties.
He spoke to the much younger, newly commissioned officer as if to pat him on the back.
"Your shoulders are too tense. Relax. An unfired gun is the most threatening, and an undrawn sword is the sharpest. If you tense up already, you'll lose your strength when you actually need it."
"I will correct myself!"
"I ask again, Second Lieutenant. Are you afraid?"
Only then did the Second Lieutenant recall that he hadn't answered the first question. He was in trouble. In his haste, he replied.
"I am only a little afraid!"
"Oh. A soldier of the Military Nation feels fear?"
"I, I will correct myself!"
"No need. I am also afraid."
The general patted the Second Lieutenant's shoulder, then clasped his hands behind his back and walked forward. While the Second Lieutenant panicked at the unexpected answer, the general glared beyond the darkness and muttered.
"You can't predict victory or defeat before a fight. But I have a rough idea whether I'll live or die. The enemy is powerful, and compared to them, the outer defense forces are lacking. No matter how harsh the training, they can't surpass the level of a typical Level 3 unit. Anyone can see that we are... a discarded horse."
At the cold truth, the Second Lieutenant looked greatly shocked.
Even if it was the truth, there was a difference in weight between making a self-deprecating joke among colleagues and having someone of such authority declare it. The Second Lieutenant repeated in a trembling voice.
"A dis... discarded horse, sir?"
"Yes. You're guarding this place without knowing that fact, but if an engagement occurs, you shouldn't expect reinforcements. Fight with the resolve to die in battle."
If you wanted to know the feeling of an abandoned horse, you only needed to read the Second Lieutenant's mind. As he hung his head in despair, a word from the general reached him.
"Instead, I promise you this one thing. I am your commanding officer, and the one responsible for this place. I will meet the same end as you at this outpost. Whether we live or die."
Is there anything easier to move a heart than one that has fallen in despair? The Second Lieutenant looked at the general with a moved face. For the first time in a long while, he offered a salute from the bottom of his heart.
The general, who had expected that, cast his gaze outward so as not to show a satisfied smile.
The general was a commander.
Compared to gears, he bore the crucial role of the axis of the gears. Under his command, countless gears threw their bodies and ground their flesh. The axis must bear that force and weight and survive to the end, so the Military Nation treats them specially.
Even so, the part that first clashes with the enemy is the Second Lieutenant commanding troops on the frontline. Even if the axis of the gear is important, if the gear is broken, it will just spin idly.
Therefore, the general personally appeared on the frontline to boost their morale.
'Whether it's a Second Lieutenant or a General. We're all just parts anyway. It's just a matter of whether there are few or many.'
The general muttered self-deprecatingly. However, it was merely a calm assessment of his situation; he didn't harbor any particular dissatisfaction.
By the rank of general, one could know many things. Even the fact that he was nothing more than a chess piece. Perhaps knowing that was a blessing. The majority of soldiers simply did as they were told without even knowing what part they were.
Only those who have climbed high realize how insignificant they are. Only at the level of a general, becoming the axis of the gears and connecting to the center, can one realize their position.
'Even so, isn't it better than the Kingdom? Better than that terrible country that constantly eyes the opponent, and is hell-bent on dueling when they show weakness.'
However, with the word 'but', the general suddenly thought.
The Second Lieutenant who just graduated from the military academy and was commissioned was young. The time he lived in the Kingdom was only a few years after his birth. He was the 'good generation' who couldn't even remember what the Kingdom looked like.
But to those who can't remember the Kingdom... what would the Military Nation look like?
'I wouldn't know. As long as I can't read minds.'
When the muttering general threw his gaze outward.
The searchlights swaying left and right caught something. Five beams of light stretching from here illuminated the other side of the darkness. The searchlights had definitely caught some moving figures.
The general raised his hand.
"They're coming."
The waiting soldiers, fully tense, aimed their weapons forward. Cannons and machine guns also turned their muzzles toward the other side of the darkness. Being soldiers of the Military Nation, no one ran away in the face of fear.
A sound of swallowing saliva was heard from a bone-dry mouth. It was a sound coming from none other than his own body. The general let out a hollow laugh.
'Even though I've risen to the position of a general, I'm still nervous facing an opponent of a higher rank. Heh. There's no difference between a field officer and a general.'
The general scoffed and inserted a weapon packet into his bio-terminal. In that instant, thin alchemic steel wrapped around his entire body. It was Cheollin-gap, a defensive general-grade artifact specially made for him, who mainly used daggers.
The shorter the reach of the weapon, the more it needs armor that can save one's life even once. Feeling the stability provided by the slightly suffocating armor, he raised a dagger sharp as a fang.
The rattling sound gradually grew closer. Perhaps because they were cloaked in darkness, their figures were not yet visible. However, judging from the area swept by the searchlights, they must have come quite close.
'Wait. Darkness? I was definitely told to be careful because they can't be seen through with searchlights...'
When he recalled the information he had received from the signalman and snapped his head up.
Along with the rattling sound, what arrived before them was... an automaton carriage looking as if it had rolled about five wheels from somewhere.
The smashed body was one thing, but compared to the inside, the outside looked somewhat intact. The inside was broken and misaligned as if someone had grabbed and twisted it with one hand.
But the most important fact of all.
The inside of the automaton carriage was empty.
The general, having finished his inspection, raised his hand and shouted.
"It's a disguise! The enemy has already slipped in under the cover of night! Relay this fact to the signalman!"
"Yes, sir!"
Watching the Second Lieutenant quickly run toward the communication golem, the general let out an inward sigh.
It was only much later that he realized it was a sigh of relief.
There are times in life when you want to destroy your country. Even a king gets cursed when things go wrong, but since the Military Nation has no king, my grumbles inevitably had to be directed at the nation itself, the Military Nation.
You say I shouldn't curse? As you live, there are times when it's hard to endure without pouring resentment on someone. That's how you become an adult.
When I was a model citizen, whenever I felt things weren't going well, I used to soothe my depressed heart by cursing, 'May the damn Military Nation just collapse.'
Of course, it was a joke. An ordinary individual cannot bring down a country, and things that can absolutely never be achieved have the elements of a joke. To me, the curse for the Military Nation to perish was a remark that stayed strictly in the realm of jokes.
But now.
I was with a being who could truly bring the Military Nation to ruin.
Automaton carriage assembly factory located near the Command.
"The Military Nation's combat style is mobile warfare. Signalmen, automaton carriages, and the chain of command. With these three, the speed of executing orders catches up with the speed of issuing them. The existence of automaton carriages is essential for that."
With the burning and collapsing equipment process in the background, Historia walked out from there and reached out her hand. The blazing flames lit a mana cigarette in her hand.
With shadows cast over her face, she put the mana cigarette in her mouth and explained plainly.
"This assembly facility cannot be easily restored. No matter how many parts there are, without going through the assembly process, they're just lumps of iron. If the assembly process itself is destroyed, the factory is paralyzed. Unless there's someone like Director Maximilian, it would take five engineer battalions working together to restore it."
Then, her eyes caught an automaton carriage right before completion. She gave the automaton carriage a hard kick from the side. The door with a military boot imprint bounced back, and the automaton carriage, creaking and sliding sideways, crashed into the wall and shattered with a crash.
"Without this place, there will be disruptions in the Command's troop deployment."
Historia, having cleared even the last one, walked away with her military boots clacking.
Historia, who was in the highest position in the Military Nation and knew more about it than anyone else, committed destructive acts herself with her power and knowledge, so the fragile steel mechanisms couldn't withstand it. Before Historia's systematic violence, the soft alchemic steel was broken and crushed. Before alchemy (physics), nothing could maintain its original shape.
Leaving the factory, which became a giant torch illuminating the night, Historia walked out the door.
The regressor who had helped with the destruction beside her replied with a sullen face.
"I'm telling you this has no meaning? It's really just at the level of holding their ankles. I'm saying the signalmen will scrape them together from somewhere else. Unless you do something about the signalmen."
"We can't do anything about the signalmen. Even as a Six-Star General, I don't know where the signalmen work. Perhaps no one in the Military Nation knows except the parties involved."
Historia didn't seem too regretful about the fact that she didn't know. The regressor asked probing.
"You seem to be strangely concerned about the signalmen for someone who doesn't know? Don't you actually know something?"
"...I don't know. That's why I'm concerned."
Historia exhaled a puff of cigarette smoke and muttered.
"They definitely exist, but I've never seen them with my own eyes. How terrifying this is... most people don't know. Even for a captain, the situation isn't much better."
It exists but cannot be seen. That means they are hiding somewhere or living without revealing their identity.
Although she didn't know the fact that they only conversed through golems in a windowless room, Historia guessed something similar to that.
"Of course, if we attack the communications headquarters, there will be disruptions, as you say. If the communications headquarters falls, the amount of information that can be transmitted drops drastically."
"Right! That's where we need to strike first!"
"Even for that, this process is necessary. We can't fight a war after losing all the key facilities. Surely, the Military Nation will dispatch elite troops from the Command... Then, at that time, we can raid the empty Command."
It sounds plausible at first glance. But the regressor was also a person who had been through many trials and hardships. She grasped the hidden intention in Historia's proposal.
"You're using a lure to avoid fighting, aren't you?"
From diverting their direction to raid the automaton carriage assembly factory, to persistently targeting only the facilities. Historia was openly avoiding combat.
"Hmph. You're quite the pacifist."
"There's a kid who wants to stop the war with me, so I guess I caught it from her."
The regressor, having no words to retort, turned her sharp gaze away. Historia didn't avoid her gaze.
The two glared at each other for a moment, then each turned their heads away in displeasure. The regressor asked.
"Where is that guy?"
"If you mean Huey, he went to gather the forced laborers."
"Why?"
Flicking the completely burnt mana cigarette butt, Historia muttered, shaking her head.
"He's probably trying to pull off some trick again."
There is a joke in the Military Nation. That the factories of the Military Nation have nothing but gears.
Naturally, factories need workers. No matter how precise a gear is, it doesn't have flexibility. In order to perform tasks suitable for all sorts of situations, it is rational to use humans in some places.
Then why only gears?
That's because humans become part of the gears and work.
Gears creaking, half-assembled automaton carriages flow along the belt into narrow spaces where stretching one's arms might result in limbs being severed. Human heartbeats vary, but the factory's heartbeat is constant for everyone. Tick, tock. In the darkness where everything meshes with the same beat. The forced laborers had to lie down or crouch in their given spots and insert the parts delivered along the gears in time.
If they miss, it's a penalty. Because everyone works to the same beat, even one person's trivial mistake leads to a delay for the whole. The supervisor shouts in anger and presses them, and the next shift of forced laborers watch with cold eyes as they correct their mistakes.
Because it is such harsh work, the Military Nation only sends those who have committed crimes to the Inner Circle labor camp.
Because they force them to work so harshly, the Inner Circle labor camp boasted the highest production volume.
Gathering the survivors, I sensed a thought from a corner over there and approached. People were hiding in a corner of the facility. I approached with loud footsteps and popped my head over them.
"Eek!"
"Now, now! Please come out! I told everyone to come out, so why are you keeping your mouths shut!"
When I urged them, the forced laborers came out even while sobbing. Having followed the Military Nation's orders for years, there wasn't even a sprout of rebellious spirit in them.
I herded the crawling people into one corner. Over two hundred people on the night shift who were running the factory even at this night. I began a grand speech toward the people cowering in fear.
"...Now, it seems everyone still doesn't understand."
Swish. I reached out both hands and pointed to the hangar. There, 200 automaton carriages that had not yet been taken out stood waiting for their owners.
"I'm telling you I'll give each of you an automaton carriage for free? Without any conditions! Wow, don't miss this opportunity to get your hands on an automaton carriage that you could only fully possess after working until you die, resurrecting as a vampire, and working for about 30 more years!"
A few forced laborers were tempted, and a few doubted my motives.
But most were so terrified that they closed their ears and just waited for me to leave.
"Leave us alone..."
Most of the forced laborers in the Inner Circle are criminals.
I hope not all criminals are viewed with bad eyes. In the Military Nation, ruled by strict rules, the term 'criminal' is a catch-all for people who aren't quite model citizens.
People who stole things, people who hit their neighbors, people who scraped money through fraud, people who killed others by accident, people who engaged in smuggling, people who had antipathy toward the Military Nation and tried to join the Resistance only to fall into a trap.
People who were once brave enough to ignore the law, but were now thoroughly cowed, huddled together, passively waiting for their verdict.
"So I'm giving you a chance to throw all of that away right now! There are automaton carriages right in front of you, and the troops that oppressed and imprisoned you have all fled! Come on, what you've lost are chains, and what you've gained is the freedom to roam this world! Live a new life with the automaton carriages!"
"...What if we get caught running away?"
Someone muttered the worst-case scenario. Once someone started, the forced laborers' murmurs poured out like a burst dam.
"We'll be dragged even deeper inside. We, we'll all die."
"We might disappear and become materials... N, no. Not the inside."
"This is unfair. You're the ones who attacked... It's because of you that we couldn't meet our quota."
Now they poured their resentment toward us. Worry about the future romanticizes the past.
We were doing fine among ourselves, and then you suddenly came. If it weren't for you, tomorrow would have been the same as yesterday.
They were dragged here because they committed crimes. They trembled in fear seeing those who ended up in even more terrible situations for rebelling. They put down their pride and obeyed the Military Nation.
The most exemplary success created by the Military Nation's rehabilitation team that disciplines criminals. The true success story of the rehabilitation team's reform project.
A living gear created by trampling on dignity.
But we can't leave them here. Historia and the regressor only destroyed the facilities, but these people were the core components of this factory. With their existence, the factory's restoration speed would be faster too.
Now, to truly destroy it completely.
I gave a small cough and brought out the words to persuade them.
"Everyone, did you know?"