Chapter 15: Heartfelt Hate

I, along with dozens of soldiers, burst into the banquet hall and pointed weapons in all directions.

Some held guns, while others brandished spears and shields.

Then, an elderly man with a pale, ashen face pointed at me accusingly.

“Who, who are you!”

His clothing had buttons adorned with jewels, clearly indicating he was not from an ordinary family.

Under normal circumstances, I would have immediately lowered my head and asked for his name.

But I casually ignored him. I approached the noblewoman beside him, grabbed her shoulder, and pushed her aside.

“Kyaak!”

“Pardon me.”

I picked up some food from the table with my fingers and tasted it. It was luxuriously delicious.

The meat’s texture and fat were vivid and soft, not hardened at all.

It was a level of beef with sauce that I had never even tasted in my own territory.

How much would such a dish cost outside? Would it consume my entire month’s living expenses?

These bastards were eating this not just on a regular day, but during wartime, while enduring a siege.

“Didn’t I ask who you are! How dare you ignore the words of the Duke Barelmud’s, do you not know the meaning of courtesy!”

Moreover, this texture could not have come from preserved ingredients.

It was certainly meat from livestock slaughtered just yesterday or today.

In other words, they had been carefully raising livestock with feed, even while people were starving.

Hay must have been difficult to obtain, so they likely substituted it with grains, and a cow’s food consumption is more than ten times that of a human.

It’s right to say that for the mere entertainment of a banquet, they starved more than ten people.

The satisfaction of their own greed is more important than the lives of the lower classes…..

Now, I feel nothing but disgust.

Whether royalty or nobility, both of them.

I had to risk my life for these parasites all this time.

“Immediately reveal your name and position and kneel–“

–Crack.

“Shut up right now. Before I put a lead bullet hole through your jaw.”

When I pressed the pistol against his chin and shouted, the old man instantly became quiet.

I let out a short sigh and looked around before speaking.

“Who are we? Former Northern Army, current Revolutionary Army. We’ve come to overthrow your household.”

When I showed our armband with our symbol, some people fainted and collapsed to the floor.

Apparently, they couldn’t bear the horror of such a situation for the first time.

If it were up to me, I’d send them straight to the Goddess’s side, but for now, I instructed them to be carefully detained.

They’re all valuable hostages and caught in the act.

We must kill them officially in court, after all.

“And I am Major General Carolus von Royten, the leader of the Revolutionary Army. Have you heard of the deputy commander of the Northern Army?”

“Roytel? Could you be the one they call the Wolf of the North?”

“I’ve only heard rumors, never seen him directly.

Who would have thought he would appear in person?”

The nobles were shocked upon hearing my name.

My reputation hadn’t diminished over time.

Some remembered me by my nickname.

Those idle bastards must have given me such a strange nickname while I was stuck in the snowy fields.

“Major General Royten, indeed. I remember. Surely he was an officer I personally commended.”

Even our damn monarch, King Carl VII, moved his heavy body, acknowledging me. He rose from the table and approached me with the Queen.

“Did you not swear eternal loyalty when I bestowed honors upon you? Where is that loyalty now that you commit such violence?”

“Violence… that’s quite a funny statement. Wasn’t it Your Majesty who made me, who made us, like this?”

“What are you talking about?”

“Are you trying to make excuses now? How shameful. You know the principles our Revolutionary Army stands for, yet you come out here like this.”

His vocabulary was somewhat polite. But his attitude was anything but.

I stood right in front of the king’s face.

My body, hardened by long combat and survival training, was incomparably more robust compared to the king’s body, soaked in meat and fat.

King Carl VII, who had tried to intimidate me with his physique, was now stepping back, overwhelmed by my presence.

“It was just a small piece of jewelry! A tiny trinket to be worn on a woman’s head!! It was you who made our sacrifices worthless just to obtain such a thing!!!”

I no longer use honorifics.

I grab the king’s collar with my left hand and point at the queen.

To hammer their mistake deeply into their thick skulls.

“It was exactly 10 years and 7 months! The period my soldiers and I fought in that hellish snowfield!! Over 10 years, enduring bone-chilling cold, engaging in a bloodbath with imperial forces!! Do you even know how many of our comrades are buried there?! Oh, of course you don’t. Even though reports were submitted multiple times, you were too busy watching operas and hosting banquets!! Our deaths were always just considered routine losses for you and these noble parasites!!”

I release his collar. Instead, I pull out a notebook from my chest. A small notebook I’ve had since I first became an officer.

The thin pages, like those of a religious text, are densely filled with small writing on both sides.

This was my diary.

A report for myself documenting everything experienced on the frontlines, a trace of my life.

The history of the past 10 years, written to maintain my sanity in that harsh battlefield.

I never originally planned to write so much, but somehow it became this thick from writing every day.

“Everything that happened in the North is written here. Would you like to know what is most recorded? Deaths from freezing! Dying before even fighting the enemy, or dying from exhaustion after fighting… We were always short of clothes and weapons, and food was scarce due to the weather. Every day was nothing short of a life-or-death struggle. Sometimes, when a blizzard hit, regardless of rank, soldiers and officers alike would fall victim to the harsh conditions.”

Oto, Bairek, Castin, Oscar, Trovey, Becken.

These were the names of the soldiers I first led.

They couldn’t even last a few months and perished.

They would mumble, “Lieutenant, I’m so cold,” and lose their vitality one after another right before my eyes.

I couldn’t do anything to help them.

All I could do was hold their freezing hands and weep.

And this memory is not just mine.

It’s a shared experience of those who have served in the Northern Army for a long time.

That’s why we could unite through our shared suffering and persevere with the sole hope of victory.

“But we endured. No matter how difficult it was, we gritted our teeth and held on. We fought, repeating to ourselves that it was for the kingdom and our families. We barely managed to suppress the urge to desert, driven by our patriotism and loyalty. Whether you and the nobles partied in the rear or enjoyed chicken and beer, we endured solely for the sake of our duty as citizens of the kingdom. However, you have insulted our dedication. You’ve trampled on the loyalty and sacrifice of the entire Northern Army, treating it like trash on the street, all for a pile of jewels like this!”

He grabbed the queen’s hair, removed her wig, and took off the tiara on her head.

It was a luxurious piece adorned with diamonds and various gemstones along its circular, pure gold frame.

In a past life, I might have simply admired its beauty. But now, it was nothing but repulsive.”

“I couldn’t bear the fact that we were treated like trash for this kind of toy.

I handed it to General Vaden, who had accompanied us with the intention of selling it abroad, and looked at Carl VII again.

“You’re cutting military spending to fund the queen’s adornments? You’re abandoning the entire northern snowfield for just a tiara? Was the land we defended so easily disposable for your and the royal family’s extravagance? If you could just abandon a natural fortress like the snowfield and turn the fertile plains into a battlefield just to buy a shiny object, why did you even start the war? You should have just given some land to the empire and negotiated! That’s why we raised the flag of revolution. That’s why we turned our guns around and came this far. You abandoned your duties and responsibilities as a monarch, so we’ll take over those duties for you! We must ensure that the sacrifices of the tens of thousands of soldiers who died for this country are not in vain!”

After ranting for a while, I grabbed a nearby wine bottle and drank it down.

I smashed the empty bottle on the floor and declared to the royal family and nobles who were cowering:

“From today, the royal capital of Rahator will be under the control of our revolutionary army. All administrative systems and public institutions will be under our management, including the royal administration.”

It was a declaration to seize the heart of the kingdom and take control of the state, essentially saying that we would rule the kingdom instead of the king.

Many people objected, but no one dared to speak up. The gun barrels were too close to defy the tide.

“Also, until the war with the empire ends, all kinds of excessive entertainment like banquets and operas are prohibited.”

A wave of discontent swept through the crowd. There were no objections, just silent expressions of resentment. It seemed like a few of them were even considering suicide.

“From now on, until the day the revolution is completed, the royal family and nobles will live a life of humility and moderation.”

“Prohibit their activities. In these times when we must support the military, we must not waste resources on such unnecessary places.”

I, who had completely banned the pleasures enjoyed by the upper class, warned the high-ranking lords as I was leaving.

“Make sure you are prepared. You will pay the full price for enjoying your comfort through our blood.”

And then the banquet hall’s doors were closed.

No one would be able to leave from there.

At 8:37 PM that afternoon.

The Revolutionary Army’s flag was raised on top of the palace clock tower.

The civil war, which lasted just over two months, ended with a perfect victory for the North.