Chapter 20
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Translator: Silver Dragon
Chapter: 20
Chapter Title: Heart of Steel
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The back seat of the military vehicle was rock-hard. The leather seat offered no cushioning whatsoever, digging into my backside. Inside the car hung a strange smell. Oil, leather, and the cold tang of metal. The scent of the army.
If Vienna's carriages were romantic relics from a bygone era, rattling along bumpy streets, this German automobile was like a growling beast. The engine rumbled in steady rhythm, like the stomp of marching boots.
I gazed out the window. Munich's night streets sped by. Streetlamp lights flashed across the glass and vanished in repetition.
I'd left Franz at home. The soldiers wouldn't welcome dragging a kid along. He looked terrified, but he believed my promise to return soon and locked the door tight.
Erich Ludendorff.
Anyone with even a passing knowledge of history knows the weight of that name. The brain of the German army during the Great War, the real power who led Germany alongside Hindenburg. And after the war, he spread the stab-in-the-back myth, laying the ideological foundation for Hitler's founding of the Nazi Party.
Why would a man like that summon a mere mural painter?
Anxiety surged through me, but so did curiosity. How does a soldier at the pinnacle of power view art? Vienna's crown prince had seen mockery of hypocrisy in my work; Klimt saw deprivation. What had Ludendorff seen?
The car pulled up at a barracks on the outskirts, a military base ringed by barbed wire, sentries guarding the gate with rifles slung over their shoulders.
"Get out."
The officer who'd fetched me opened the door. His manner was polite but coercive—a silent pressure that brooked no refusal.
I straightened my clothes and stepped out. The night air was cold. Dry wind laced with the smell of gunpowder, nothing like the air in Vienna's woods.
As we walked the corridor, the clack of military boots drowned out my own shoes. Gray walls, closed doors, men in crisp uniforms. This was a world of utter control. No place for the wild curves of freedom in my paintings—a realm of straight lines only.
"Go in."
The officer swung open a heavy oak door.
The room was spacious and cool. A massive operations map hung on the wall; papers piled high on the desk. And behind that desk sat a man.
Solid build, closely cropped hair, a stubborn jaw, cold eyes stripped of emotion.
Erich Ludendorff.
He didn't look up from his papers as I entered. He scribbled rapidly with a fountain pen. The only sound was the scratch of the nib filling the silence.
I stood without a word. I'd played these staring games plenty in Vienna. The one who speaks first loses.
After a long while, he set down the pen and lifted his head.
"You're Hitler."
His voice was dry, like a machine speaking.
"Yes, General."
"I saw the Hofbräuhaus mural."
He leaned back, eyeing me up and down.
"Noisy thing."
"It's a tavern painting."
"No, the painting itself screams. Looking at it, you hear shouts in your ears. It boils the blood, numbs the mind."
He pulled a cigarette from his desk drawer and lit it.
"I know nothing of art. Color, composition—that's for women. But agitation? I know that. Your painting has the power of agitation."
Spot on. A soldier's instinct is a fearsome thing. He hadn't seen aesthetic value; he'd seen the violence and energy embedded within.
"I'll take that as a compliment."
"Not a compliment. Analysis."
Ludendorff exhaled smoke.
"You're that Austrian hick? Made a name in Vienna, they say."
"Not bad for a hick."
"With that talent, why scribble on tavern walls? Waste, isn't it?"
He was getting to the point. I tensed.
"Tavern wall or cathedral ceiling—if people see it, it's a canvas."
"Not all who see are equal. It's who you paint for that matters."
Ludendorff rose and walked to the map. A huge chart of Europe, the German Empire marked red at the center.
"War is coming."
He spoke flatly.
"The French dream of revenge, the Russian bears growl with hunger. The British tap calculators across the sea. We're surrounded."
He traced the German border with a pointer.
"To break this encirclement, we need steel-hard power. But steel alone isn't enough. We need something to bind the nation's spirit as one."
He turned and fixed me with a stare.
"Like your paintings. Something to intoxicate them, make them forget fear, charge as one."
No way.
"You want me to paint army recruitment posters?"
He snorted at my question.
"Posters? That's third-rate hack work. I want a 'symbol.' Something overwhelming that visually embodies Germany's greatness and might."
He leaned on the desk, fist planted.
"Like the Dionysus at Hofbräuhaus—intoxicate the German people. Not with beer, but patriotism. You can do it."
Not a proposal. An order.
What if I refused? I could vanish without a trace. Ludendorff was a cold-blooded man who chose ends over means.
But his offer stirred a strange sense of déjà vu.
In original history, Hitler designed the Nazi flags, uniforms, symbols himself. He was a genius of visual agitation. Ludendorff was trying to draw out that 'Hitler' potential from me now.
If I painted here glorifying German militarism? History would run its course. Or accelerate.
Refuse? My Munich life ends.
Then twist it.
Show them the 'power' they want, but reveal its true nature starkly.
"What do you think Germany's power is, General?"
I countered.
"Discipline, order, overwhelming firepower."
"Wrong."
The officer flinched, hand to his pistol. But Ludendorff raised a hand to stop him.
"Ho? Then what?"
"Germany's power is the 'machine.' Humanity deleted, reduced to parts in a colossal mechanism."
I glanced around.
"The soldiers here, the operations on that map, even you, General. All cogs in a vast machine. Cold metal turning without emotion or fear. That's Germany's true power."
Ludendorff's eyes narrowed. I expected anger, but he seemed intrigued.
"Go on."
"France and Britain appeal to emotion. Freedom, justice, all that talk. But Germany is different. We worship efficiency and function. Like Krupp factory cannons—cold, merciless, crushing foes. That's the 'steel power' you want, isn't it?"
"And?"
"I'll paint it for you. The monster."
I grabbed a sheet of paper and pencil from the desk.
No permission asked, I started sketching.
Painting soldiers bores me, but machines? That's intriguing. I borrowed images from 21st-century SF films and dystopias.
A colossal steel giant.
Human-shaped, but armored plates for skin, steam hissing from joints. No eyes, nose, mouth—just a cold filter like a gas mask.
The giant strides forward.
Underfoot, enemy troops crushed like ants. Not splattering blood—just pulverized. No mercy, no rage. It simply walks.
Background filled with black smoke billowing from factory smokestacks, swirling like the giant's cloak.
Steel Titan.
This wasn't praise. It was terror.
A prophetic image of war escaping human bounds, becoming industrialized slaughter.
I finished the sketch in five minutes and slid it to Ludendorff.
"This. Germany's portrait."
Ludendorff picked it up. His face was rigid. He stared long and hard.
The monster in the drawing was merciless. No heroic pose—just sheer mass and destruction.
A typical commander would bristle. Treating our army like a monster?
But Ludendorff was different. He invented total war—the idea that war consumes a nation's full might to annihilate the foe. He knew it better than anyone.
The corner of his mouth twisted upward.
"Beautiful."
A chilling response.
"This is exactly what I wanted. Pure power incarnate, untainted by weak humanism."
He set the paper down.
"Paint this as a large oil. It'll hang in the Berlin General Staff conference room. To wake up those old generals."
"One condition."
"Name it. Money?"
"No. Don't interfere with my painting. Whether I depict a monster or a demon, if it's Germany's reality, accept it."
"Reality... Fine. Better than false victory reports."
He pulled an envelope from the drawer. Cash, not scrip.
"Advance. Studio in Munich?"
"Yes. In Schwabing."
"Guards starting tomorrow. No interruptions."
Protection and surveillance.
"I'll pass. Soldiers at the door scare off inspiration."
"Better than you running. Until it's done, you're army property."
Ludendorff was firm.
I pocketed the envelope and stood. No point lingering; it'd just choke me.
"I expect great things, Painter Hitler."
His call stabbed my back. Painter. Odd title from a soldier.
Outside, the officer waited.
Back in the car. The return felt darker than the outbound trip.
I fingered the cash envelope in my pocket.
Military money.
It reeked of blood.
My sketch. Steel Titan. Ludendorff felt 'power' in it; I packed 'doom.'
That monster will keep walking, crushing even itself, tumbling into the abyss. Like the German Empire's fate.
But if he doesn't see it, that's not my fault.
Home at last. The officer drove off.
Climbing the stairs, I thought.
I'm walking a tightrope. In Vienna, among artists; in Munich, among war hawks.
One slip, and I fall. But if I fall, let them remember my colors etched deep.
I opened the door. Franz waited awake, broom in hand instead of a bat.
"Teacher!"
He ran and hugged me.
"Scared?"
"No! Just... thought maybe they'd taken you."
"Taken? Came back with a commission."
"Who? Another big shot?"
"Very big. Very scary. But paid well."
I shook the envelope.
"Sausage party tomorrow."
"Yay!"
Franz is simple. Good kid.
Into the studio. Munich's night sky through the window. Stars unusually bright.
Under those stars, millions will soon die.
Can I stop it?
No. Can't stop it. War's a tidal wave. One painter's not enough.
But I can warn.
The wave is coming. If you can't escape, at least open your eyes and face the horror.
I prepped the canvas. For Ludendorff's commission.
But not as he imagines.
At the steel giant's feet, among the crushed soldiers, I'll mix in Germans too. Machines don't distinguish friend from foe. And on the giant's back, not medals but gravestones draped like a cloak.
Title stays: Steel Titan.
But people will rename it.
The Cannibal Called War.
I took up the brush.
My hand didn't tremble. It felt ice-cold.
General Ludendorff, you ordered propaganda. What I'll deliver is prophecy. May this painting haunt your office and fill your nights with nightmares.