A derailment significant enough to prevent the party from reaching the intended ending.
✦ ✦ ✦
It was the spring of the year 242 of the New Imperial Calendar.
A young lad was bringing his younger brother to the Emperor Edgar III Imperial Museum, located next to the Martin I Imperial Aeroport in the old capital of Berylin. It was a warm day. The Sun God in the sky cast a gentle glow which made the brothers’ blond hair and blue eyes glitter.
“It’s so big...” the little one said.
“It sure is,” the older brother replied.
The younger brother had been all aflutter at seeing the Theresea-class Lead Ship Kaiserin Theresea, put proudly on display for all to see, but now he was somewhat subdued by the grandeur of the museum, built at the start of the Empire of Rhine’s latter era, when it became a constitutional monarchy following the western revolution.
“So our ancestor’s sword is meant to be in here, right?” he went on.
“It sure is. They’re bringing it out for display just this week!” the older brother replied.
The building, built in the old imperial style that favored pragmatism, had banners that fluttered in the breeze on it that read: Mystic Blades, Modern And Archaic: Famous Swords Exhibition. The organizers of the exhibit must have been keen to lure in customers; signboards stood all about guiding prospective visitors.
“I wanna see our ancestor’s sword right away!”
“Cool your jets. This museum’s got stuff on the past thousand years of imperial history. There’s so much other stuff to see.”
It had been two hundred years since the Trialist Empire of Rhine had become the Constitutionalist Empire of Rhine. Thanks to the development of magical technology, railways and automobiles had become a common sight, but even now, these museums—built all across the land—had not lost their luster from the age when this country had been the strongest in all the west.
These two brothers had begged their parents for some pocket money to come and see their ancestor’s sword, a veritable relic of the past that had been donated to the empire many years ago. However, the lad wasn’t quite sure whether to believe it. Their ancestor had many children, and countless towheaded, blue-eyed braggarts claimed his lineage. His house had a family tree, originally penned by the man himself, and the dagger that had been at his side in all his battles was still kept as a family heirloom, but could they really believe what the museum said?
The age was no longer one of the sword, but enchanted gun and cannon. Strategic Great Work polemurgy and the accompanying logic of mutually assured destruction reigned supreme in the grand hierarchy of violence. Swords stood now merely as symbols—fossil icons of power. For the older lad, a student at a gymnasium like other good boys and girls their age, sword practice was nothing more than a social rite or a matter of private discipline, so he had never truly held one seriously. In all honesty, what did it matter now that they were from a family of swordfighters, that their ancestor had received a nobleman’s “von” to append to his surname for his distinguished service in the Great War? It made for an interesting little anecdote in future job interviews, one had to suppose...
“Let’s get our tickets and head in,” he said.
“Okay!”
The smartly dressed goblin attendant gave them their tickets, one child and one adult, and the pair went into the museum. The younger brother was about to burst with energy, so the older brother told him to not talk too loudly and gave him a reminder not to touch any of the items on exhibit.
“Wow, what a big painting!”
“It’s a reproduction of the painting of the Emperor of Creation in the Imperial Castle.”
“Oh, so that’s Emperor Richard. We learned about him in history class!”
“Yeah. So magnificent that no other emperors were named Richard, so yeah...”
“But he looks so normal!”
“Hush, now.”
It was an imperial museum, so it made sense to have a portrait of the man who laid the foundations for the current empire, the Trialist Empire’s founder, right by the entrance. Having such a large reproduction of his portrait here probably also reminded foreign tourists that the spirit of the empire persisted to this day. Still, it was true—his face didn’t project much majesty. Partly it was an inevitable consequence of the adaptation to paint on canvas, but working from the man’s diaries, it was a matter of public record that Richard himself abhorred the notion of idealizing his reign, and always insisted that his portraitists and sculptors capture minute details and flaws as they worked. The episode where he kicked over an overly beautified sculpture of himself and yelled, “Are you mocking me?!” was particularly famous.
“All right, the mystic blades and famous swords exhibit is in the special exhibition room off in the west wing of the complex, it seems.”
The grand Edgar III Imperial Museum had undergone many renovations and extensions throughout the years, and now, in addition to the main building, there were east and west annexes, a second west annex, a north annex near to the east annex, and even another smaller building dedicated to modern art. It seemed like the Institute for Thaumaturgical Research and Innovation, an organization once known as the College of Magic, were preparing some sort of display, so the second west annex, which housed historical artifacts, was where the exhibition was taking place.
“This is where they show off the empire’s spoils of war, official documents, personal items belonging to famous emperors, and administrative artifacts...”
Similarly to how the east annex was designated to house works of art, the west annex exhibited items that embodied the empire’s administrative history. About seventy percent of the permanent exhibition was for the loot from the empire’s long history of war, with the last thirty percent detailing how government policy was carried out.
“Brother, let’s go see the sword already!”
“Listen, the west annex is filled with relics of the empire’s history! Look at that golden statue. Apparently, it was earned as reparations from a satellite state.”
“Huh? It says it’s a copy.”
“Really? You’re right...”
The plaque detailed that most golden statues, imperial crowns, and other valuable items had been returned to their original owners after peace negotiations, and so the item on display was a finely crafted replica. The only originals that remained were from countries that no longer existed or war flags and imperial crowns that would not be returned at any cost. The Constitutional Empire still held one of the most powerful armies on the western continent, and made sure to show its might to the world, but during this era it was the nations of the new continent that were at the heart of economic growth, and so there were certain matters that they wouldn’t budge on.