So What If the Royals Are Annihilated?
The imperial family had been wiped out. So what was there to do about it?
I first assigned rooms to the messengers who'd rushed breathlessly from the Capital. The air in the emergency strategy room that convened afterward was utterly frigid. It was more fitting to say that shock had congealed into silence.
This had happened overnight, without a single warning sign.
A few doubted the absurd report's veracity, but no one would dare toy with the Northern Frontline using such a proclamation. The messengers even bore direct seals from the imperial family.
"According to further statements from the messengers, the remaining imperial members in the Capital are fleeing into exile in the southern imperial territories. And 3rd Princess Letitia. Her Highness the 3rd Princess and the moderate faction's personnel are marching en masse to the Northern Frontline."
The briefing echoed through the room, and the staff clutched their heads in unison.
It was sudden, but not entirely without ominous precursors.
Even before the messengers arrived, the regular carrier pigeons and relay horses shuttling between the center and the north had gone silent. The signs had been visible starting from Ron Manir, the territory bordering the Northern Frontline.
But honestly, who had time to worry about that amid my father's death notice?
As the sole heir, I'd just gone through the succession ceremony and was reviewing all the duties he'd left behind once more. What more could I possibly spare brainpower for?
Stroking my chin, I scanned the assembled staff.
The Capital. The 3rd Princess. The moderates.
And the Rahaspel Grand Duke.
As the keywords suggested, this was the world inside a novel.
The one I'd reincarnated into, no less.
But it was also a world I didn't know fully, having dropped it midway through reading. The genre was romance fantasy. The title was something like 'The Princess Hates Her Obsessive Male Leads' or whatever—I barely remembered.
I'd quit purely because it got boring, but I vaguely recalled bad reviews about it suddenly drifting into grimdark territory in the latter half.
Why the hell am I remembering that now?
Even if I did know, it wouldn't change a damn thing.
"Your Grace... please, make a decision."
I sank into thought at the Total Commander's words.
Everyone here was stunned, but no one was freaking out just over the symbolic fall of the Capital.
The Capital's fall was the Capital's fall. The North was the North.
The top priority was supplies and food.
Our military was bloated, and while we had territories that could sustain themselves to some extent, there were limits. We were talking 20,000 knight-level troops.
20,000 elite soldiers, period.
This wasn't a total count including regulars or standing army—it was just the elites. 20,000.
Sure, with guards you passed on the street being knight-level elites, our overall forces weren't overwhelmingly vast by comparison... but still.
I thought it over, then answered.
"First, before any countermeasures, we'll treat the Capital's destruction as fact."
I added curtly,
"The imperial family has been annihilated."
Romance fantasy.
A world modeled on Europe's feudalism despite borrowing from Eastern absolute monarchy.
The Capital was like a gleaming golden heart, its 1.1 million residents and nobles basking in otherworldly wealth and glory as a matter of course.
My statement was tantamount to medieval blasphemy.
Yet in this solemn atmosphere, though gasps rippled through, no one dared object. Pointing at adjacent territories on the map spread across the table, I continued.
"We'll establish blockade lines around every imperial territory bordering the Northern Frontline. If any castle lords or territorial governors resist, forcibly escort them all here. I'll explain personally."
It was a bombshell declaration.
Gazes darted between them in an instant.
"Your Grace, what do you...?" "That means...?" "Forcibly escort them? Your Grace... isn't that treason?"
The staff erupted in disbelief, pressing for answers. I got it. Of course they'd react that way.
This was effectively announcing the forced annexation of neighboring territories under Northern might.
But I didn't join their agitation. Meaning, I didn't respond.
Too tyrannical?
Nah, this is right.
When a disaster on the scale of national collapse hits, the central authority's initial response needs to be swift above all. At least, that's the modern sensibility from someone who's lived through the 21st century.
Pushback from those in power was inevitable with such a drastic decision, but given the crisis...
And the people involved.
All of them were hardened veterans of the Northern Frontline. Even the army chaplains spent more time gazing at the snowy peaks beyond the walls than central doctrine, their identity tied more to the Northern army.
"Next policy."
I turned to the Knight Commander.
He was one of my father's most loyal vassals alongside the Total Commander, originally from the central army but transferred north over a decade ago.
I recalled that the North's military had ballooned disproportionately from that period onward.
Thinking back now, was all that the scheming of the Apostles who destroyed the Capital?
It felt somehow deliberate, out of place.
Right after reincarnation, the duchy wasn't this grotesquely militarized.
It was strong, but not this massive.
But as I grew, key talents from the central army started transferring here like exiles: Aura Users, knight division captains, and so on.
Of course, "exiles" was purely my modern perspective.
There must've been propaganda. "Join the glorious empire's frontline and elevate your prestige," something like that.
Even common production roles followed suit, birthing a border count's domain equivalent to a full nation-state.
I glossed over it as 'romance fantasy tropes,' but who knew there was this backstory.
Just inference, of course.
Could be right, could be wrong. But it patched up the creaky plot holes nicely.
More importantly, it didn't matter anymore.
Whatever the case, the Northern Frontline had become a massive military encampment state.
I had to block the spreading ruin at its source before it reached here.
"What is the 7th Knight Division doing now?"
The Knight Commander hesitated before replying.
"...They're handling the southwest surveillance outpost. Last month, drakes assaulted in a group of 37 total, and we captured 31."
The 7th Knight Division.
Once hailed as the North's absolute elite. They looked nothing like knights—no armor, no mounts.
Yet they ranked among the empire's strongest forces without question.
Like Delta Force in modern terms.
"Effective immediately, reassign the 7th Knight Division to my direct command. Understood?"
"...As my personal knight division, you mean?"
Everyone furrowed their brows at me. Not just the division heads under orders.
Right now, I wasn't just preempting an imperial decree—I was forming a praetorian guard like I was plotting a coup.
But shit had to get done.
After 24 years in this new life, reason overrode sentiment, and "isekai munchkin power fantasy woo~" lost to "ah, fuck, this sucks...".
Even in idiotic situations, I judged pragmatically, taking it in stride.
"Can you manage, Knight Commander?"
He let out a groan before answering.
"Understood. We'll do it. But Your Grace, if I may ask the reason...?"
I didn't see his gaze as mere curiosity. It was like an interrogator's.
And not just him—the whole staff might suspect I was raising a rebel flag. As if I'd been waiting for the Apostles of the Evil God to topple the empire.
Are they sane?
As if.
I recalled the countless power players who'd lost their heads chasing ambition prematurely.
Not just in the empire's histories, but in modern records too—truthfully documented.
Though that's distant past now.
Deep down, I was still modern to the bone.
"To form a special forces unit."
"A special forces... unit?"
"The Capital has fallen. We can't just sit idle in this unprecedented crisis. There will inevitably be matters requiring direct investigation."
The fallout from the Capital's collapse—a colossal wave of destruction—was incoming. Could we really wait it out peacefully? Especially me, lord of the Northern territories?
No. Not by my common sense.
The North already teemed with threats: barbarians and magic beasts beyond the front, and foreign reactions to monitor closely. The empire's glittering capital's ruin wasn't trivial news.
Internal fractures and chaos demanded vigilance too.
If my identity were purely imperial, I'd have sat waiting for orders and let the North go down with the ship.
But it wasn't.
I had to become the Grand Duke who saved the North amid the empire's mighty collapse.
"...Your Grace, one thing. This is clear treason. Before issuing orders, clarify: is the empire our priority, or the North?"
I paused briefly at the Total Commander's words, then replied.
"Without immediate cooperation from neighboring territories, the Northern Frontline's self-destruction is only a matter of time. Debating loyalty comes later."
The Total Commander fell silent. I added,
"Any further objections will be heard once at the pre-mobilization council. Everyone clear?"
Despairing silence spread.
In times like these, leaders had to keep their heads straight above all. That was my utmost priority.