Re: Blood and Iron

Chapter 971: Kings In Name Only

The train ride home from Vienna was shorter than many commutes in his past life just from a suburban home to an urban office.

Bruno hadn’t said a word on the way back. He simply sat there looking as the world ripped b y the window. It was a view that he had once enjoyed over the course of a day’s travel.

Now it was merely an hour of his time. He sipped a glass of coffee, thinking about all that the world had become. How much it had changed, and how much it had stayed the same.

Bruno shook his head and scoffed, muttering under his breath prophetic words of Otto von Bismarck.

""One day the great European War will come out of some damned foolish thing in the Balkans..."

A sigh escaped his lips once more than he placed his teacup down on the table in front of him, stretching his arms backward as he reflected on the dispute between Romania and Hungary that had just been forcefully concluded with a simple stern talking to.

"I guess some things never change...."

---

The King of Romania returned to Bucharest with a head hanging low. Romania was forced to renounce any and all claims to the lands Hungary had taken from them during the Second Weltkrieg.

For years they had persisted with their claims, stoked unrest and strife in the lands they wanted returned. And even now, as the world moved towards a more... amicable future, conflict had emerged, briefly as it was, between the two realms over this disputed land, with Romania ending up on the losing side.

It had been many years since Bruno stepped foot in Bucharest, back when he was a foreign general and titan of industry. He had warned the royal family then and there that it would be best advised if Romania stayed out of the wars that were to come.

The late King Carol had heeded this warning, and his successor Ferdinand had done the same.

But Michael had not been present for those words. He had not felt the chill go down the spines of his predecessors. And in doing so, he had joined up with the Allied powers during the Second War when certain promises were floated their way that seemed too tempting not to accept.

The result was a swift and brutal occupation not by the German Armed Forces but by the Hungarians. And when they left, they took a part of Romania with them.

Today, the weight of that warning, decades ago, before Michael was ever born, hang heavily on his shoulders as he entered the palace not in victory, but defeat.

He didn’t need to say a word, just by his look alone his courtiers knew what had happened, and they said nothing.

He took a seat on his throne and sighed, exhausted, while looking down at those who gathered around him, like concerned cubs cornering a wounded patriarch.

"Romania and its ruling dynasty have renounced their claims to the lands that now belong to Hungary, in perpetuity. Romania shall also bear the remaining cost of the infrastructure that will unite Bucharest and Budapest. In exchange for this, peace shall continue as it were before this unfortunate mess."

The courtiers looked around at one another, some with silent acceptance, others in bitter protest. But none spoke up whatever their views may be. Because they knew Romania simply did not possess the might to enforce its claims, and as a result had lost the right to voice them.

At the end of the day, even though the imperial order built at the end of the world wars claimed to be based on mutual respect and cooperation, the reality was it had been imposed through the same means that all other historical hegemonies were.

By blood and iron....

---

The aura in the central halls of Budapest was the exact opposite as Bucharest. Hungarian banners waved in the palace, as King Pars waved to his courtiers, generals, and politicians.

All gathered around him with champagne, smiles, and sycophantic pleasantries. The disputes between them and their neighbors, that had been waged since the fall of the Dual Monarchy, was settled.

Militarily they had crushed Romania not only during the Second Weltkrieg but also during the border conflict. Proving that Hungary possessed the might capable of projecting power across the region.

At the same time, only the King and his closest advisors knew the truth... The matter ended in Hungary’s favor because Germany and Russia had put their foot down in favor of the Hungarian claim.

The victory was paradoxically both equally heavy and hollow. Heavy because of the repercussions it had on future international diplomacy, and hollow because it was not their victory to claim.

But even so, that did not stop Pars from doing so. Because his people needed to believe this was a victory that Hungary had achieved on its own. And sometimes myth was needed more than the truth.

By the time the King of Hungary retired that night, his expression was as heavy and sullen as his Romanian counterparts.

He may have gotten what he wanted, but the cost of it was so blatant and overwhelming that he could only mask his dread with a smile.

The old world was gone, and in this new world, the will of Germany was the only thing that remained.

Even after Bruno was dead and buried, the legacy he had built would endure, and the world would have to bend to their will, or break in defiance.

It was only now that King Pars was beginning to suspect this joint infrastructure project may have hostile intentions. Or perhaps grand imperial ambitions.

But he wouldn’t be able to prove it, the Germans had designed the project in a way that even a well trained, and paranoid eye would not easily be able to detect it, let alone convince others of what he had found.

Pars, Michael, these were two kings of a world where their crowns only mattered within their own meager realms.