The villainous daughter of the Duke, needs a hero

Translated by XianPiete

Alicia walked with her long lost friends through the great halls of castle von Plettenberg explaining the state of the world as she walked. She spoke softly with great confidence, "You see, things ended up this way because of the choices that we all made. Guy's Ito Conglomerate extinguished all competition in the business community worldwide. Olivier's action of sending the grand army of the twelve nations against Wolter bankrupted the world governments. Wolter's action of bringing all the world leaders here for a summit on how to stop us, destabilized the world when three great jumping dragon goats randomly attacked."

Madeline asked, "Wait, did you say three great jumping dragon goats?" She turned and glared at Guy who pretended to clean out his ear.

Alicia saw that and facepalmed, "I should have figured it wasn't random, please don't mention that to Wolter. At least you weren't behind the goose." Madeline glared at Guy once again, who also pretended to clean out his other ear. Alicia looked at them and sighed, "Oh my, please, never mention the goose either." She pointed out the window and said, "The airship yards that Guy built became the starting point for the Ito Conglomerate's power. They started making fleets of airships which they sold to various governments and then Madeline's brother married Odila de la Marche. The Ito Conglomerate backed the King of Pays Des Abrutis and tempted him with a new kind of airship, ones that were fitted with steam cannons. These first armed airships became the weapon of choice for war. Combined with the drop knights, groups of knights that are literally dropped over a territory from the belly of an airship with help from the Council of Magic, Pays Des Abrutis became the Aumont Empire."

Alicia pointed to several large airships bristling with cannons, "Those are the normal ships of war for most of the world now, Imperial Cruisers. They use steam power to fire heavy metal slugs at each other and targets on the ground. The speed and weight of the objects have explosive force. No castle wall or fortress could withstand them. Knights and soldiers on foot or horse were unable to even touch the flying fortresses."

Guy asked, "How did the Ito Conglomerate end up meddling in politics?"

Alicia looked at Guy and said, "When the world governments failed, the Ito Conglomerate saw a drastic drop in profits. In order to maintain growth, they needed to support two sides in a war. They joined with the Aumont Empire to become the Aumont-Ito Empire and at the same time began to secretly fund and back a rival power in order to maintain sales to the Aumont-Ito Empire. Once both world powers were set, they sold to both sides."

Madeline turned pale. "Why did my brother allow this?"

Alicia looked at Madeline and said, "He lives in absolute luxury with a harem of women, he doesn't even know what goes on in his name, nor does he care. Even if he did, the decisions are made by the Ito Conglomerate board of directors, even if he wanted to change anything he is the Emperor in name only. The Council of Magic is also bought and paid for by the Ito Conglomerate, they mainly act as support for the Aumont-Ito Armada. Two mages per ship to bless and lighten the drop knights."

Diggory asked, "What became of our school?"

Alicia said, "The Academy of Swords and Magic train the drop knights and new mages now. Everything we wanted was perverted."

Doreen asked, "Alicia, surely you could have done something... "

Alicia nodded and said, "I brought the last of the good people here to Wütendes Menschenreich. What's left of the world you know lives here. Murphy and his team brought the real plans for the airships Guy wanted and we militarized them with steam cannons. Now we are locked in a cold war with the Aumont-Ito Empire that threatens to become a real war as the hawks on the Ito board of directors push for war."

They entered a great hall where two men stood around a table, the two men looked up and the other one bellowed out, "Montfort. Is that you?"

Guy laughed and said, "Oh man, Wolter, did you go bald? This is too rich."

Wolter shook his fist and growled, "Who else would make me go bald but you, and I know you were the one responsible, don't deny it. That goose, it could not have entered my castle without your help!"

Madeline cleared her throat and asked, "Emperor von Plettenberg, what do you think needs to happen right now, to restore order to this world?"

Wolter stood tall and then said confidently, "Order? There is order, what the world lacks is freedom. The Aumont-Ito Empire is building a world where decisions are made by gold, where honor has been replaced by material wealth, where nobility has been replaced by greed. There was a time when I once sought to build a world where every decision would be mine to make. As I came into power I realized what a huge burden that was to maintain. Instead, I wanted a world where I would have respect and people who loved me. By the time I found that my nation was in ruins. It wasn't until my dear Alicia came with her people that things became what I wanted."

Guy nodded his head and said, "The balance between financial oppression and personal freedom is hard to maintain, wealthy fingers always have a way of tipping that scale when there is no government to stop them."

Diggory shook his head, "Do we need to kill so many once again?"

Guy looked at Diggory and grinned, "I think the first thing we need to do is go home."

Madeline frowned, "By go home, you mean to throw out your board of directors and kill our way into the Tower of Magic, don't you?" f𝗿𝗲e𝒘e𝚋ｎ૦𝘃𝙚𝑙.com

Alicia giggled, "Ah, well there is no more Tower of Magic. I already broke it." She thought for a moment and said, "Also, you won't be able to go into Aumont-Ito airspace, their Armada will shoot you down." fre𝑒𝘸𝚎𝚋n૦ѵℯl.c𝒐𝘮

Diggory laughed, "The Montfort won't fall to their armada."

Alicia raised an eyebrow at Diggory. Guy smiled and said, "Didn't Murphy tell you? The Montfort has the same defensive fields the Tower of Magic held. It also has magic weapons."

Wolter shook his head, "The world has forgotten the power of the war mages, I dare say a huge change is coming when you return. I just don't think you should expect that what you'll find there will be pleasant. In fact, you'll most likely be very unhappy. It's not the Pays Des Abrutis you remember there. The days of chivalry, nobility and kindness have been replaced by depravity, anger, stress, and desperation. Women sell their bodies, men sell their souls and the ones in charge only care about themselves."

"Don't forget about Sakka, they love Sakka now." A voice sounded behind them. Everyone turned to look at Murphy as he walked in the door, he smiled and said, "I saw the Montfort here and I couldn't believe it, it's like you fell through a hole in time to arrive when we needed you the most, Mage Montfort."

Guy smiled and said, "It's good to see you, Murphy, how are you still alive?"

"Hey, I'm only fifty, stop making me sound dead!" He pouted.