Ch.24The Eastern Advance of Prosnak (5)

# Chapter 24: Prosnack’s Eastern Advance (5)

“Warning? WARNING?!”

Perhaps her pride as an Emperor had been damaged.

Artraia stood up, ignoring how her enormous chest heaved, and exploded with rage.

“They dare not only insult the last survivor of a species but also clearly consider our empire beneath them?!”

“…”

So it wasn’t about her as Emperor, but concern for the empire’s dignity.

It was truly a mystery how such an admirable personality could emerge from under that garbage former emperor.

However, if I left her like this, she might push for war participation again after I’d just managed to prevent it.

“I’ll declare war on Prosnack!”

‘No, I only thought about it, but she’s actually trying to do it.’

Seeing Artraia turning imagination into reality, I hurriedly moved to stop our Emperor’s rash action.

“Artraia, why don’t you calm down a bit first?”

“…Nnnnngh!!”

Fortunately, accepting my words, Artraia plopped back down on her sofa with a cute sound that contrasted with her voluptuous figure.

“Accept reality. We’ve already received substantial compensation from Prosnack.”

“I know, but…”

Despite this, she made no effort to hide her simmering anger, and I couldn’t help but sigh inwardly.

‘Is this what youth is…?’

Reminded of some blonde man in sunglasses’ words, I showed Artraia the confidential information I’d gathered from my intelligence network within Prosnack.

“More importantly… our fleet’s technology can’t match Prosnack’s fleet in battle.”

Numerous classified documents appeared through the terminal’s hologram.

Particularly fragments of information about Prosnack’s fleet’s latest weapons and technologies…

Although Artraia wasn’t a military expert, these helped her understand the situation at least briefly.

“Where did you get this?”

“You know, various friends across the galaxy who managed to extract it one way or another.”

“…Sighhhh.”

Realizing the harsh reality, Artraia let out a long, deep sigh.

She maintained that silence even until Riel returned after escorting Gaia and brought fresh tea.

“Om nom nom.”

“Om nom nom nom.”

“…Sigh.”

Only after we two dumb-and-dumbers started eating snacks with our tea did she finally break her long silence.

“According to the Federation’s official technology index, our technology level should be equal to Prosnack’s.”

Thinking about how she’d been agonizing over this, I finished the snack in my mouth and answered her.

“That’s because they judge technology purely by numbers.”

“…Huh?”

“You seem to have forgotten that unlike us, Prosnack’s technology has developed with a focus solely on combat, weapons, and military industries.”

Saying this, I manipulated the terminal to display a simple chart showing our technological development.

“As you can see, our side has grown broadly across all fields, not just weapons but social infrastructure, food production, and so on…”

With a gesture, I switched to the next screen, which revealed Prosnack’s technological status…

“…It’s overwhelming.”

“Yes, as you can see, Prosnack has been sharpening their blade for over ten years specifically for this war.”

While Prosnack’s other technologies were inferior to ours, their military technology—especially in spacecraft—was more than twice as advanced as ours, clearly displayed in the chart.

Perhaps beaten by undeniable facts?

“Nngh.”

Artraia pressed her fingers against her temples as if they were throbbing, continuously trying to suppress her anger.

But…

“Kergin, Prosnack, all of them daring to openly treat our empire as inferior…”

‘Uh-oh.’

With the empire being repeatedly insulted, Artraia’s patience seemed to have reached its limit.

But this kind of dark transformation was truly the worst possible outcome.

‘Has she been having a lot of irritating issues lately?’

The stress relief from seeing Gaia apparently wasn’t enough.

But even so, I wondered if she’d really been tested so severely in her imperial patience…

‘Come to think of it, there have been many issues.’

Thinking carefully, how many problems had piled up in less than a year—no, less than six months?

‘Rare resources depleted because of the former emperor, nearly facing rebellion because of the former emperor, almost losing a year’s budget because of the former emperor…’

Somehow all these issues seemed to have the same cause, and now a war on top of everything.

Major accidents that would normally happen maybe once a year had all erupted within half a year.

‘Hmm, fair enough.’

I was actually impressed that Artraia had endured this long.

“That damned trash… that trash… Kergin… Prosnack…”

Of course, that didn’t mean I should let the Emperor go dark and try to beat them both up.

“Artraia.”

“Grrrrrrrr…”

“Artraia.”

“Grrrr… what?!”

While she was grinding her teeth in rage, I called out to her, and as soon as she answered…

I quickly stuffed a snack into her mouth, successfully preventing the rampaging Emperor’s descent into madness.

“Calm down. Nothing will be solved by acting like this.”

-…Munch munch.

However, perhaps because I’d forced something too large into her small mouth, the always dignified Artraia’s face had become…

Well, like a hamster with its cheeks stuffed full of food.

And the sight of her desperately chewing that overstuffed snack…

“Kff…”

It was so hilarious by my standards that I had to do my utmost to prevent myself from bursting into laughter.

After some time passed, Artraia’s anger seemed to have subsided somewhat.

“…Still, what’s infuriating is infuriating.”

“Quite right.”

Of course, her anger hadn’t completely disappeared, so I decided to add one more thing.

“So wait a little longer.”

“Wait for what?”

“This war won’t last long.”

“…Hmm?”

“It’s just my opinion, but… I think Prosnack has a high probability of winning this war.”

Hearing this, Artraia responded with a relatively indifferent face, though tinged with curiosity.

“That means you have logic or evidence for your opinion, right?”

“Uh… well, yes?”

And upon hearing my answer, a bright smile appeared on Artraia’s face.

“That’s great. Then next time, Arto, you can give the answer.”

“…What?”

“Fighting!”

“What?”

————————

Unfortunately, it didn’t take me long to understand what she meant.

“The Executive Minister’s actions were nothing short of an abuse of authority!”

“Above all, it’s pro-Prosnack behavior! It’s no exaggeration to call it treason!”

‘So this is what she meant.’

Proving why Artraia wasn’t Emperor for nothing…

The high officials and nobles who opposed this decision couldn’t dare attack the Emperor’s opinion directly.

So they focused all their efforts on attacking me, who was seen as having guided her to make that decision.

Of course, I defended myself as best I could, presenting my own logic and evidence…

“Isn’t calling the Executive Minister a traitor going too far?”

“That’s right! The cause of his supposed overreach was the betrayal and corruption of the parties involved, not the empire!”

Proving that my efforts hadn’t been in vain, there were many people who defended me on my side…

“Damn! You pro-Prosnack bastards!”

“What pro-Prosnack? It was your faction that caused the problem in the first place!”

“Are you finished speaking?!”

“Yes, I am finished!”

If this weren’t an imperial court meeting but a regular one, there would have been brawls like those seen in democratic nations.

“…I wonder who will win this time?”

“That newly ennobled representative from Goroti is quite formidable. I bet on him.”

“I’ll place my bet on the representative from Zeltech.”

Or perhaps it was just high nobles treating this like a colosseum spectacle, with lower nobles following suit.

But even amid all this, time continued to flow…

The war news pouring in through the Galactic Federation and intelligence networks made one fact increasingly clear as time passed.

That was that, just as I had said, Prosnack was indeed turning the unfavorable 1:3 war into a victory.