Semi-Coercive Imperialist

Gush, gush, gush.

Black liquid flowed down purified pipes and poured into rows of glass bottles.

Thud. Thud.

Each time the conveyor rattled, hundreds of bottles advanced a handspan.

Hiss. Click.

Filling, carbonation, cap pressing.

Hiss. Click.

Filling, carbonation, cap pressing.

The taste might be unfamiliar to the people of the continent at first.

But taste was taste, and addiction was addiction.

He had the capital and power to force it across the continent until people became hooked.

Surprisingly, cola was supplied to the knight orders before it reached the cinemas. Knights had become a profession every imperial citizen envied, regardless of class, wealth, age, or gender. It was both welfare for the knight orders and propaganda.

"...Hmph."

Hanna Usar leaned against the break room wall and stared intently at the bottles.

"You can just take one and drink it?"

"Yeah."

Knight Royce answered while drinking cola straight from a glass bottle.

"You should try it too."

Clear glass refrigerators stood in every break room. Inside, rows of glass bottles filled with black liquid were lined up neatly.

"Is this really good...? It looks strange too. Like a person's waist."

"Just drink it."

She took out a bottle, pried off the cap with her fingers, and took a sip.

"Argh! What is this supposed to taste like?"

The sting of carbonation on her tongue made Hanna shudder.

"If you keep drinking it..."

"My tongue's sensitive enough already."

Perhaps because she had grown up in the countryside and had not eaten many different foods, her taste buds seemed underdeveloped.

"Urgh."

Hanna's lips trembled as she returned to her office.

Before long, though, she had a refrigerator installed in her private office as well.

She said walking to the break room refrigerator was too troublesome.

As scenes of knights going to work, carrying out their duties, and heading to the field with cola in one hand became increasingly common, public interest grew.

At last, cola reached the cinemas as well.

"...Sniff."

This was Palast, the Empire's largest cinema.

"Sniff."

Leutern sat among the audience and watched the documentary Thousand-Year Empire, recalling the moving day at the World Expo, now already half a year past.

Rummmmmmble!

The Imperial Pavilion of the Expo was recreated on the screen.

It was the Hall of Light, the place whose image had graced the covers of art magazines throughout the continent.

"Wow..."

"Oh my..."

"Hah..."

Leutern had witnessed that first day with his own eyes.

As countless spectators gazed in sincere awe, waves of colored light rippled through the film's recreated night sky. It was not quite as magnificent as the real thing, but it was close enough to revive the emotion and wonder of that day, along with amazement at how incredible technological progress could be.

"Sniff..."

Large tears rolled down Leutern's cheeks.

"...Delicious."

His eyes streamed with tears while his mouth devoured cola and popcorn...

That was how cinemas were built throughout the Empire.

Small theaters appeared even in rural villages where farmland covered most of the land.

"Come on, get in! It's screening day!"

On screening days, official vehicles carried the villagers to the theater.

They sat in heated cinemas, enjoying warm coffee, bread, popcorn, and cola as they watched documentaries.

...Along with that free warmth, other things seeped in.

* * *

These days, the first thing I do each morning is read patent notices from across the continent.

In truth, I do not sleep much. Three hours at most. Around then, my body wakes on its own.

Was it pressure? A sense of duty?

I thought about it, then found a better word.

Responsibility.

Anyway.

As I remembered it, quite a few inventions were concentrated in this period of the continent's history.

Science and technology were ripening all at once throughout the continent.

This was the period when the creativity that would explode during the war, or after the Empire's collapse, was gradually maturing.

I was a farmer who knew exactly what fruit would grow on each tree.

Of course, I had Lorenzo Academy, but I could not waste their creativity on things that would be invented anyway.

They had more important tasks, so I intended to save time by buying inventions from those who had already made them.

I would pay generously, but make refusal impossible.

I had already purchased patents for various things, including zipper and Velcro, which had also been called rip-rip before my return, and established production systems for them.

Today, though, I found a more special patent.

── [Yursled Patent Office] ──

Registration No. 52,189.

Applicant: Pavel Aneman

Title: Linear polymer substance and filament derived from mana stone refining residue.

Summary: A new substance produced by purifying and heating waste liquid generated during the mana stone refining process, then polymerizing the resulting monomers into chains.

When extruded and drawn through fine holes while molten, the substance forms threads and retains flexibility and elasticity even after cooling...

────

It was a mana stone chemical that would one day be sold as stockings, become new suspension lines for parachutes and gliders, and be used in mosquito nets and bulletproof vest linings.

It was vastly inferior to the wingsuits made from the highest-grade mana stones for knights, but it was far more economical.

The location was Yursled.

An eastern country that did not belong to the Eastern Union.

I personally visited a tiny company that used a three-story building in the Yursled capital as both its headquarters and laboratory.

"I hear Imperials persecute Mer people."

The company's president was Mer. That was why he had rejected the imperial proposal I sent through an intermediary, and why I had crossed the border to come in person.

He asked, "Do you think I'd sell my company to the Empire?"

I nodded.

"Yes."

"...What? Get out!"

He waved me away roughly, but I simply smiled.

"You know Yursled, your homeland, persecutes Mer people too."

"..."

Mer people were persecuted even though they were not among those the continent called "subspecies."

That meant racial discrimination was already widespread across much of the continent in this era, even outside the Empire.

"You need to make money before you can save your people. Can a company this small really make money?"

"That's funny. Then why are you trying to buy something invented by a fucking tiny company like this?"

"I never called it tiny."

I had expected him to refuse.

I simply did not have time to persuade him.

Coming here myself had already been a waste of time, so I went straight to the point.

"I'll make you an offer you can't refuse, Mr. Pavel. The material you invented requires greater capital and more raw materials anyway."

"That's for me to deal with..."

"Korba Bank."

The president's expression shifted at once.

"That is your lender, I believe. You've borrowed quite a lot."

I had neither reason nor time to drag things out.

"And Velua, the clothing company that invested in your company."

"What the hell do you expect me to..."

"I now own that bank and clothing company."

"...What?"

His voice was full of disbelief.

I handed him the relevant documents, and his eyes widened as they ran over the pages.

"As the owner of the bank, I'll refuse to extend your loans. As the owner of Velua, I'll demand that it recover its investment. This building will probably be the first thing you lose."

An offer you could not refuse meant you truly could not refuse it.

Oh, and I had never heard of Velua before. If anything, that made me want to turn it into a luxury brand.

It was a company that had not existed before my return...

Anyway.

"Mr. Pavel, you've created a miraculous material."

I stated my real purpose to the man who had no choice but to crumble, keeping respect in my voice.

"You found value in the black waste liquid left after refining mana stones."

Thread finer than a spiderweb and tougher than steel cable.

Magic that turned garbage into silk.

For someone like me, who owned a great many mana stone mines, that meant the raw material was effectively free.

It also meant it would never run out.

"I know its value."

I took out the acquisition contract and offered it to him.

"I'll leave you a minority stake. So take this money and..."

Royalties were a form of respect.

For people like you, who contributed to humanity's progress and civilization's survival despite persecution.

"Live the rest of your life in wealth."

Looking straight into his eyes, I added one final line.

"With money, you can protect not only your family, but your people as well."

President Pavel lifted the contract with trembling hands.

One, two, three, four...

His lips moved silently as he counted the digits.

The amount written there could not have been small.

"..."

He moistened his dry lips with his tongue.

Tick. Tick.

After a long silence.

"...Nylon."

Inventor Pavel Aneman spoke a word I had heard quite often in the not-too-distant future.

"That is... the name of the material."

The acquisition negotiations were settled.

I smiled.

"Yes. A good choice."

...

The week I returned to the Empire with the nylon patent, Leo was undergoing two-against-one training in the mansion's backyard.

"Hup!"

One cadet shouted as they brought down a wooden sword.

"Grrr!"

Leo was already gone from where the sword struck.

His body flowed away like a snake, low enough to brush the ground. He folded his forelegs like springs.

Whoosh!

They snapped out, launching him like a bullet between the cadet's legs.

His teeth grazed the cadet's ankle, and their lower body gave out completely.

"Urgh!"

"Ah!"

The remaining cadet aimed for Leo's back, but Leo changed direction without even rolling.

Scrape!

All four paws tore into the dirt as he made a sharp turn. Before the sword could finish cutting through the air, he had already slipped into the blind spot and rammed his shoulder into the back of his opponent's knee.

Thud. Thud.

The two cadets landed on their backs side by side in the dirt.

"Woof!"

Leo snorted at the fallen cadets and stepped back.

"..."

"..."

For a moment, the two young cadets looked as if they were questioning themselves.

"No need to get discouraged, you brats. This dog is already at the level of an active knight. You weren't bad."

Freya helped them up and was about to continue the lesson when...

"Knight! They say they succeeded in refining it!"

A staff member suddenly ran over, shouting at the top of their lungs.

Refining.

No one needed to say what had been refined.

"Prepare the car. Freya, please take care of the rest."

"You'll be paying extra. You know that, right?"

"Of course."

"Yes!"

I immediately headed to Lorenzo Academy.

Deep underground was a laboratory sealed under strict security.

"Knight. This is it."

The substance a researcher handed me was called...

"...Penicillin."

"Yes. That is the name given to it for now."

Before my return, all I had read about the substance were its name and a few scattered details.

A miracle drug that came from mold.

A cure for infections caused by bacteria such as staphylococcus.

Apparently, mold, which was neither a mana stone nor mana liquid nor anything of the sort, had dramatically improved humanity's chances of survival.

That was all I knew.

Naturally, I did not know how it worked.

In the past, I had been a homeless man interested in all sorts of things and had read plenty of magazines, but medical discussions that went too deep had not interested me.

For this project, I had no choice but to stake everything on the scholars I employed, giving them only my assurance that it would work, that it had to work, and an endless budget.

The Empire's intellectuals had found the method themselves.

...

"Just as you said, Knight, the mold kills infectious bacteria!"

Lorenzo hurried in with an excited expression.

He looked clearly exhausted from staying up all night, but his eyes shone like a boy's.

Perhaps it was because he was a good man.

This invention was meant, at its core, to save lives.

"That's a relief."

I smiled as I looked at the unknown purified powder inside the sealed glass.

"Your name must be included in this invention, Knight."

Lorenzo's voice burned with enthusiasm.

"Not at all. It's fine. What did I..."

"No."

An unfamiliar voice suddenly cut me off.

That face...

"...What? Don't tell me you're Armand?"

The boy who had made the mana stone waterwheel long ago.

Lorenzo's direct pupil, and now his adopted son.

"Yes. It has been a long time, Knight."

At some point, he had become taller than me. He was now an adult who looked quite natural in a white research coat.

He continued clearly.

"Knight Maximilian was the first person to make the initially absurd claim that mold could kill staphylococcus."

"..."

Armand was praising me proudly, but honestly, it pricked at my conscience.

"Many researchers thought it was impossible. Whenever their enthusiasm faded, you came in and scolded them."

It was because I had stolen an invention from the original future.

"You even gave evidence from stories that army doctors had called superstition."

The stories I presented as evidence to those who doubted me were things like this.

[During the Western War, supplies were cut off at one unit. A folk remedy spread there, where moldy bread was crushed and applied to wounds. That unit had unusually few cases of gangrene.]

[...They lacked bandages and had to boil and reuse them. One bundle of bandages had become moldy due to poor storage, but they could not bear to throw it away. The wounds wrapped with those bandages actually festered less.]

They were records full of superstition, but in truth...

No such records, bandages, or bread existed.

Naturally.

I made them up.

"...Ahem."

I turned my eyes toward the culture vessels and tried to change the subject.

"So, is it finished now?"

"No. It begins now."

Armand shook his head.

"We need more mold. The yield of the current strain is terrible. Even if we squeezed out an entire vat of culture medium, it might not produce enough for one patient. So we want to gather mold from across the Empire."

"Across the entire Empire?"

"Yes, well..."

Armand looked slightly hesitant, and Lorenzo spoke in his place.

"Mass production through the current method is still far off. We need not only mold but an entirely new manufacturing process. But... the cost will be astronomical. Greater than any business you have funded so far, Knight."

If Lorenzo himself stressed it this much, it would truly cost an enormous amount.

"...My policy remains the same."

I simply smiled with satisfaction.

An invention that had taken this long and still needed more time.

"There is no limit on the budget."

I only hoped they could achieve mass production before the war.

* * *

I went to work at the Sentinel Knights in high spirits.

"Knight."

A staff member placed a file before me. It was sealed with tape reading [Classified - Maximilian].

"This is an intelligence report delivered through the Hailand network."

Hailand. Prozen. Most other countries on the continent also had my spies planted within them.

They did not work for the Empire. They worked only for me.

I had built my own intelligence network long ago, using what I considered the most sophisticated method.

...I had read about it in a novel from the future.

Its core was making sure no one knew the whole picture.

The spies existed only as points.

They were cells that knew neither one another's faces nor even one another's existence. Each carried information only from their assigned area, and that information changed hands five or six times before it reached my desk.

Even if one point was discovered, only that point was cut off.

More than half did not even know they were spies.

"One agent infiltrated the Empire..."

I tilted my head as I read the report.

"...One?"

There were not many enemy spies in the imperial center.

Georgen was entirely responsible for that.

They promoted a culture of informing and watched foreigners with near-pathological suspicion.

"Yes. They are said to be an exceptionally capable, top-ranked Black agent."

Hailand categorized agent ranks by color.

Black was the highest rank.

Their agency was the Sixth Intelligence Bureau. We had infiltrated it only with great difficulty.

Simply put, it was Hailand's knight order.

── [Classified - Maximilian Intelligence Report] ──

Classification: Top Secret

Access: Maximilian

Source: Inside Sixth Intelligence Bureau / High Reliability

1. One Black agent belonging to the Sixth Intelligence Bureau was confirmed to have entered the western Empire via a merchant vessel early this month. Their cover identity is presumed to be a Hailand trade broker, but this has not been confirmed.

2. This matter is unlikely to be an operation against the Empire. The mission assigned to the agent before departure appears to have been the pursuit and elimination of one person of interest from a third country.

3. Target: Terrorist "Illich." Hailand appears to have detected signs of the target infiltrating imperial territory first...

────

My eyebrows rose.

It was a familiar development.

It had happened before my return, and after the war, related events had been published in Hailand as a novel.

"Keep tracking them."

"Yes."

As a former homeless man, I had made a habit of reading every magazine, newspaper, and discarded famous novel that came into my hands.

Perhaps those days I spent drifting through the streets were what made me who I was now.

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