The Steam Age: Gears and Bones

Chapter 73

The carriage traveled for six days on the post road from the Wild Boar Ridge fortress to the capital of Romulus.

The Elector's personal letter and the eagle emblem stamped on the envelope carried more weight than Perfitt had anticipated—the commanders of every outpost along the way immediately let them pass upon seeing the stamp, without questioning or making things difficult for them; some outposts even offered to replace their horses.

Ludwig and his grey-armored knights escorted them the entire way. Their dark blue uniforms and the Northern Legion insignia on their shoulder straps served as passes. When the garrison along the route saw them, they would stand at attention and salute, their eyes filled with a complex emotion that was a mixture of respect and pity.

When rumors of Romulus's complete annihilation had already spread, the sight of a group of gray-armored knights emerging alive from the North was itself a silent declaration.

But the sights along the road gradually silenced Perfit.

When she stood atop the spire of Wild Boar Ridge Fortress, overlooking the area south of the defensive line, she saw smoke rising from chimneys, farmhouses, and church spires gleaming warmly in the setting sun.

From that distance and height, the villages appeared peaceful and serene.

Now that the carriage was passing through them, she realized that the tranquility was just an illusion created by the distance.

The real Romulus border region has long been eroded by years of war – most of the fields are abandoned, and a small patch of winter wheat can be seen occasionally between the snow and permafrost, as sparse as hair on a scalp.

The stone walls of the farmhouse had collapsed in several places, and some roof tiles were missing halfway, haphazardly stuffed with dry grass, with bits of grass falling down with every gust of wind.

At the village entrance, you can occasionally see a few old people and children. Their clothes are covered with patches, and their faces show neither fear nor anger, only a numbness that has settled after being repeatedly crushed.

In a market town about two days' journey from Wild Boar Ridge, Perfit found the recruitment post.

The conscription station was set up at the entrance of the town hall, with a rough pine wood table behind which sat a sergeant and a clerk.

The sergeant's voice was hoarse from shouting, as he repeatedly read the emperor's signed order for total mobilization.

There was a crooked line in front of the table, all men, ranging in age from their teens to their forties and fifties.

At the front of the group stood a gray-haired man wearing an old hunting coat, a hunting rifle slung over his shoulder, standing silently next to several young men, his rough fingers stroking the iron bolt of the rifle without his voice.

Ludwig dismounted and walked to the recruitment station, where he borrowed a copy of the mobilization order from the sergeant general and glanced at it.

The mobilization order was brief and direct: all reservists and men of retirement age must report to the nearest military outpost, local garrisons will be reorganized on the spot, and all granaries and blacksmith shops will be under the unified command of the quartermaster department.

The document bears the imperial seal of His Majesty the Emperor and the joint signature of the Electors' Council, dated just two days prior.

"Two days ago," Ludwig said to Perfit as he returned the mobilization order to the sergeant and mounted his horse, his tone devoid of any further comment, but his jawline was more taut than usual.

Within two days, the mobilization order reached here from the capital. The messengers at the post station ran all the way, killing more than one horse in the process.

Such efficiency would normally be inspiring, but at this moment it only signifies one fact—the rear has been utterly terrified by the news of the border collapse, and panic is spreading across every inch of Romulus at a faster rate than the number of infected people.

Perfit lowered the carriage curtains without saying anything.

Her judgment was correct—the wartime system had indeed been activated.

She simply hadn't expected that when she finally saw firsthand how full mobilization operated at the grassroots level, it would look so awful.

Every day thereafter, new details reminded her of this fact.

As she walked through a fallow field that had been requisitioned as a temporary military camp, she saw new recruits lining up to receive their uniforms.

Not all movements were synchronized—some recruits were bewildered when the sergeant called out the order to form ranks, not knowing where they should stand; some people's military boots were too big, and their heels slapped against the soles of their shoes as they walked.

They weren't conducting any drills; they were just practicing their formations.

Ludwig told her that these people had been recruited at least twice before.

Romulus and Ross fought a protracted border war for years. Before Perfit even set foot on the Old World, the border counties near the north had already been conscripted in rotation. Most of the able-bodied men were sent to the front lines, and the rest were mostly veterans who had been discharged due to injury or illness and teenagers who had not yet reached the age of conscription.

These people are now being recruited for the third or even fourth time. Most of the new recruits standing in the ranks this time are over thirty, and many are even close to fifty. Many of them still have old injuries from their previous service.

Behind them, in the fields that were still arable, the figures working were almost exclusively women and teenagers.

Perfit leaned against the carriage window, watching a child standing on tiptoe by the edge of a field helping his mother with the plow until the carriage rounded the bend before looking away.

The child was about the same size as the tiny, curled-up skeleton she had seen in the ashes of the old Ross outpost, and even younger than the young faces she had seen when she was handing out black bread to the soldiers as she led her expedition through the swamps.

They would sow seeds in the spring, weed and water in the summer, harvest and thresh grain in the autumn, load the grain into wagons and send it to the front lines, year after year.

Their fathers and brothers had either died on the front lines or were queuing to enter the barracks.

The mobilization order would take away most of their last remaining rations, leaving them only with a meager allowance to barely survive.

Perfit looked away and stopped looking out the car window.

She knew that this exploitation was necessary.

If we don't do this, the defenses will collapse, infected people will flood in, and everyone will die.

If we don't do this, the defenses will collapse completely one night, like a sandcastle repeatedly battered by waves.

If she were in Emperor Romulus's position, she would have signed the same general mobilization order.

But she is not Emperor Romulus; she is Perfit Brandlis, a seventeen-year-old girl who has been forced to bear various consequences since the first day she transmigrated to this world.

She was used to bearing the consequences, but she could never get used to watching others bear the consequences for her.

The carriage continued south, and with each town it passed through, Perfitt's silence grew longer.

But deep within her eyes, which had regained their composure, something that had wavered slightly during the fierce confrontation with the Elector's plan atop the spire had now become even more resolute.