The morning in Lingones had already reached its end.
From the moment the hour and minute hands of the clocks converged, the city no longer wore its familiar face.
In every district and every street of Lingones, small victories were being stitched together, coalescing into a great, irresistible tide.
That tide was surging toward the Imperial Palace.
To stem this flow, the Empire had to resort to its usual repertoire.
It meant brandishing truncheons, crossbows, and gun barrels—the distribution of fear before all else.
The problem, however, was that such terror no longer held the currency it once did.
As Duclos peeked his head out, he could see the right-wing militias across the main thoroughfare.
Clumsy armbands around their sleeves, clubs and iron pipes in their hands, and profanities spilling from their mouths.
They screamed at the gathered masses.
"You damn Reds! Disperse this instant!"
"We'll kill every last one of you maggots who dares insult His Imperial Majesty!"
Some flinched at the sound, while others ground their teeth in silent fury.
Yet, the crowd did not scatter.
Behind them, the armed revolutionary militias slowly took their positions.
Spears, blades, and crossbows.
There were industrial tools spirited away from factories, and weapons seized directly from the military.
And behind the hands clutching those weapons, there were infinitely more hands.
The hands of housewives, the hands of artisans, the hands of mothers clutching their children, the hands of shopkeepers.
Those hands were piling stones onto barricades, tipping carriages on their sides, and lowering ropes from windows.
But the right-wing militias failed to grasp this shift.
Their faces still betrayed the belief that 'intimidation' was enough to carry the day.
They raised their truncheons and took a single step forward.
In that moment, someone from the revolutionary militia shouted at the top of their lungs.
"Stand down if you do not wish to be hurt! We will take it from here!"
The right-wing militia faltered.
They were unaccustomed to such a scene.
"H-How did those traitors get their hands on those weapons?"
Before those words could even settle, other sounds overlapped.
From the distance, from other streets, and from other districts, the same chorus of roars erupted.
When they blocked one point, three more opened up.
The suppressive forces, already insufficient in number, were being ground into dust as they were deployed piecemeal.
Someone among the right-wing militia scanned their surroundings.
There were simply too many scenes they were expected to 'arrive at and resolve' simultaneously.
More fatally, the reinforcements they expected were nowhere to be seen.
The Gendarmerie had already been diverted elsewhere.
The police were scattered, struggling just to secure the roads.
Even the royalist organizers who had been egging the militia on moments ago were gone.
They had no intention of being the ones to take responsibility.
The line of the right-wing militia slackened.
One by one, men with loosened armbands began to appear.
"Hey, why are you backing away?"
"Look over there! They say the group at the other end was wiped out!"
"Do you expect us to stay here just to be beaten to death?"
Voices grew louder and more desperate.
Fear began to prove contagious.
Suddenly, one man from the right-wing militia tore off his armband and threw it to the ground.
He dropped his truncheon and melted into the crowd.
Two more followed, then three, disappearing in the same manner.
It was desertion.
At the most critical crossroads of their lives, most of the right-wing militiamen chose survival over the loyalty they had so loudly proclaimed.
However, no cheers erupted from the revolutionary side.
There were no cries of "They're running!"
Instead, someone spoke briefly.
"Do not pursue. We are heading for the Imperial Palace."
Every gaze was fixed in a single direction.
Everyone knew.
The deserting militiamen were not the significant enemy.
The problem lay with the last of the Imperial Army, and the place where they would eventually converge.
The Imperial Palace.
***********************
Central Avenue, District 3.
General Secretary Jacques Duclos, having taken charge of the field command, stepped back and gripped a liaison's shoulder.
"What about the Telegraph Office?"
The liaison nodded, panting for breath.
"A white cloth has been raised in the Telegraph Office window. Our internal collaborators have a firm grip on the station. However, the Gendarmerie... the Gendarmerie is coming down Central Avenue."
"Very well."
Duclos replied curtly.
From the end of Central Avenue, the sound of iron-shod boots rumbled.
Ordered, synchronized footsteps.
The sound of trained men.
It was the Gendarmerie.
They did not scream like the right-wing militias.
They simply, swiftly, and precisely formed a wall.
Their commander raised a hand.
Crossbows were leveled in unison.
The crowd took a collective, sharp breath.
Duclos did not miss that beat.
"Vanguard, hold the front! Armed squads to the sides—take the flanks!"
As the orders were relayed, the people moved once more.
The front row raised shields and wide pieces of furniture, preparing to absorb the enemy's assault.
Armed groups with bows and makeshift weapons scattered into the alleys to outflank the Gendarmerie.
The Gendarmerie commander roared.
"Disperse at once or be deemed traitors! Open fire!"
He wasted no time on rhetoric.
The first volley flew.
Screams erupted, and several people fell.
Duclos's vision blurred for a moment.
When blood is spilled, the fever of the crowd wavers.
If that tremor leans toward fear, it is over; if it leans toward rage, it becomes a riot and a massacre.
Duclos did not want a riot.
A riot breeds looting, and looting resurrects the legitimacy of the Empire.
Thus, he immediately looked for what came next.
Hands dragging the fallen away.
Cloth stemming the flow of blood.
People fashioning stretchers right there on the street.
The people did not waver; they continued to serve themselves and the collective cause.
The Gendarmerie continued their fire.
However, they found themselves in a predicament sooner than expected.
They were firing 'forward.'
But citizens and militia were pouring in from all directions, encircling them.
Spears were leveled.
Blades were drawn.
Crossbows were cocked.
And from behind, the citizenry pushed.
Stones flew, carriages blocked the paths, and alleys were sealed.
The space for the Gendarmerie to maneuver shrank.
To suppress a crowd, one needs space.
Suppression is the art of pushing back.
But now, there was nowhere left to push them to.
The commander shouted.
"Maintain formation! Push forward!"
The Gendarmes stepped forward with their truncheons.
In that instant, something strange happened in one of the Gendarmerie lines.
One platoon did not lower their crossbows.
Yet, they did not fire forward either.
They looked into each other's eyes.
Then, with the briefest of nods,
The leader of that platoon placed his crossbow on the ground.
The sound of metal striking the cobblestones echoed.
That sound carried further than any gunshot.
"What are you doing!"
The commander screamed, but the platoon did not budge.
Instead, they took a step back.
Their faces were etched with fear, yet a certain resolve dwelled there as well.
It was the face of someone who lived in this city.
As that image spread, other units began to waver in turn.
Duclos seized the moment.
He immediately turned to his liaison.
"That platoon—do not touch them. Only recover their weapons. Pull them back and protect them. We need every soul we can get right now."
The liaison nodded and sprinted away.
The revolutionary militia did not miss the opening.
They did not shout "Kill them."
Instead, they roared "Push."
"Push them to the Imperial Palace! Close every retreat!"
The Gendarmerie could no longer advance.
They began to retreat.
The destination for the Gendarmerie was solitary.
The Imperial Palace.
At the edge of the street's horizon, the great road leading to the palace came into view.
The moment Duclos saw that road, he became even more cautious.
The Imperial Palace was the heart of the Empire, and simultaneously, the place where the Empire had spilled the most blood.
Duclos pulled his cap lower and spoke as he wove through the crowd.
"Encirclement first. Storming comes later. Strangle the palace, but do not let yourselves get carried away by excitement."
Someone answered him.
"Understood, Comrade General Secretary."
He heard that title again.
The moment the word 'Comrade' descended upon the streets, Duclos realized one thing.
Lingones was no longer a city of the Empire.
Then, static crackled on the radio.
Short, urgent voices overlapped.
"Central Avenue secured! No signs of the right-wing militia remain!"
"Gendarmerie in full retreat toward the Imperial Palace!"
"Citizens are closing in! Barricades are being erected continuously!"
Duclos tightened his grip on the radio.
Good.
The momentum was theirs.
But he added silently to himself.
The real struggle begins now.
The Imperial Palace was in sight.
Its black silhouette loomed heavily over the city.
Duclos moved toward it.
The footsteps of the people filled the space behind him.
Slowly, but surely, Lingones was closing in on the Imperial Palace.
************************
Inside the palace, things were collapsing not by 'assault' but by 'inflow.'
The nobles had entered first.
Carriages tore up the garden paths, and porters ran with silk-laden crates.
Bureaucrats clutching stacks of documents scurried through the corridors, shoving one another while shouting their titles.
Officers were fuming with rage, while non-commissioned officers swallowed their curses.
The soldiers were fewer in number than the officers or NCOs.
Being few made them more exhausted, and they became sharper, quicker to snap.
"Ammunition status!"
"Lock the doors properly!"
"Over there! Block those people from entering!"
Orders were jumbled.
It was becoming unclear who was commanding whom.
The palace was a structure solidified by authority, yet the people inside were tearing that authority away from each other.
In the midst of this tumult was Empress Prillieve.
The Empress was by no means a fool.
She recognized what was falling apart.
However, the world she had been raised in was not like this.
While she read the terror in the faces of the nobles who had fled inside, she simultaneously failed to understand it.
Why did they not think of the subjects first?
Why did they treat the Imperial Palace as if it were their own home?
The Empress stopped a passing maid by grabbing her wrist.
"Where are my subjects?"
The maid answered with a frozen expression.
"...Outside, Your Majesty. Outside the palace... the people..."
The Empress closed her eyes briefly at those words.
Her lips trembled.
That tremor was not born of fear, but from a wounded heart.
"Have they come... because they are starving?"
No one could answer.
Answers become politics, and the moment something becomes politics inside this palace, it becomes a blade.
Instead, the Empress focused on something else.
A portrait of the Emperor hung nearby.
The face of Corsica I looked down at her from within a gold-leafed frame.
The Empress took a step toward the portrait.
"Until you return... I will endure."
The words were as soft as a prayer and as firm as a vow.
She loved her people.
And simultaneously, she loved her husband.
She was a person who could not live by discarding one for the other.
Just then, an officer ran down the hall and dropped to one knee.
"Your Majesty, the main gate is surrounded. The militia and—the citizens... there are too many citizens."
The Empress paused for a breath when she heard "too many."
It wasn't because of the quantity, but because she understood the meaning embedded in that number.
The citizens had come.
It wasn't a few hundred rioters.
It was the city of the Empire marching against the Empire itself.
The Empress looked at the officer and asked quietly.
"Are those children... there as well? The ones who were beaten and carried away this morning?"
The officer could not bring himself to speak.
Silence was his answer.
The Empress nodded very slightly.
That nod was less of an 'I see' and more of an 'I do not want to believe it.'
Nevertheless, she did not retreat.
Suddenly, the Empress looked around.
Nobles who had fled inside were pushing soldiers aside to protect their luggage, and bureaucrats were raising their voices, blaming one another.
The Empress's voice rose above the din.
"Be silent."
It wasn't a loud shout.
Yet, the clamor in the corridor came to an abrupt halt.
There was a strange power in the Empress's tone.
It wasn't the power of politics, but the power of a conviction—that 'at least here, one must maintain dignity.'
The Empress shifted her gaze toward the nobles, and then the bureaucrats.
"This is not merely a refuge. This is... the face of the Empire. All of you, maintain your dignity."
It was a profoundly naive sentiment.
She might have known intellectually that the face of the Empire was already being torn by blood in the streets, but her heart had not yet accepted it.
Yet, that very naivety became a pillar of support for some soldiers.
For them, the 'dignity' the Empress spoke of was something they had to cling to until the very end, to prevent total collapse.
Low whispers exchanged between the officers.
"...If reinforcements from the neighboring cities arrive."
"...We are low on ammunition, but if we hold out."
"We can hold. Until His Imperial Majesty returns."
The moment someone uttered the word 'Emperor,' the Empress lifted her head.
Just hearing that word seemed to restore her composure.
However, outside the palace, the iron gates began to groan more loudly.
The sound of hammering on the iron gates was no mere threat.
The weight of the entire city was behind it.
************************
Duclos stood a step back from the iron gates.
He did not entrust the front line to his party members.
Today, the protagonist of the revolution had to be the city, not the party.
Above the gates, gun barrels were aimed.
Below the gates, spears, blades, and crossbows were raised.
And in between, there were the empty-handed citizens.
"Surrender!"
Someone shouted.
"Open the gates this instant!"
Another voice followed.
Then, a voice fell from atop the iron gates.
"The Empire does not surrender!"
It was a brief declaration.
That declaration was immediately followed by the movement of weapon barrels.
Duclos narrowed his eyes.
There was no sign of surrender.
If so, this would shift from a 'standoff' to a 'battle of time.'
Whose side was time on?
If reinforcements arrived, the palace would survive.
If the city grew weary before then, the revolution would collapse.
Duclos pressed the radio battery in his pocket once more.
The cold touch of the metal bit into his fingertips.
That touch represented supplies and promises.
And choices he had yet to unveil.
Duclos called his liaison over and spoke in a low voice meant only for his ears.
"The crates."
The liaison gasped and asked,
"...You mean the 'special processed compounds'?"
Duclos did not answer immediately.
He checked the gun barrels atop the gates once more.
The citizens below, the people moving to and fro with stretchers, the faces hardening behind the barricades.
And finally, he looked up at the Imperial Palace.
"Not yet."
He spoke curtly.
"But have them loaded."
The liaison nodded and vanished.
Gas shells were loaded into the revolution's few pieces of artillery.
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