[Arknights] The Originium Gambit

Part 18: Fanning the flames

Author's note: 

So this will act as some sort of intermezzo, in which this chapter will not focus on Ivan's POV. The next chapter will probably be like this as well, but in a different POV, obviously.

Setting that aside... 

A week after I posted the chapter where Priestess fucking kills the Pope, the IRL Pope dies. And then the Arknights 6th anniversary features a Laterano event.  What a... coincidence...

Also funny meme in the bottom of this chapter, read the chapter first though.

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"...D.C. is scrambling to contain the situation, as markets remain flatlined for the second consecutive day with no signs of recovery. The Secretary of Energy has issued an order for 'controlled blackouts' across urban centers housing critical infrastructure. Negotiations are reportedly underway with the Standard Originium Company for a potential stabilization package."

"...At midday, the Ursus Empire—without formal declaration—has mobilized forces into Kazimierz, Sami, Yan-Lungmen, Higashi, and Leithanien under a sudden Imperial Decree, issued mere hours after the economic collapse..."

The television hums with static and tension, broadcasting the elegant collapse like an orchestra reaching its crescendo. The camera pans over smoke-wreathed cities, flashing sirens, tumbling indexes, and rows of boots marching across once-neutral soil.

All this chaos, all this momentum...

A ballet of ruin, choreographed by a man who still believes he is special—a maestro in a hall of shattered instruments, utterly unaware he's dancing to someone else's rhythm. Or perhaps, he chose a blind eye to.

Ivan Romanov...

So... bold, yet so deluded.

So useful.

It would be a shame to discard him this early in the symphony.

He thinks he's the hand tipping the dominoes. But every one that fell, fell in the direction I nudged it.

And me?

Ah. Forgive my delay.

Let me turn now... to you.

Yes, you. The one lingering at the edges. The one whose eyes keep skimming too quickly, whose fingers twitch with anticipation. You feel it, don't you? You want to quickly gloss over this story. Why is not in Romanov's POV? You ask.

Don't skip.

That whisper behind the headlines. That pattern in the static. That tightness in your chest you've convinced yourself is caffeine, or holding your breath for something.

You're right to fear it.

Because the dominoes will not stop.

They will fall until the last illusion of order collapses. Until all thrones are ash, until the laws are ink bleeding from forgotten paper.

War... You've heard the phrase, I'm sure. "War never changes."

What a quaint little lie.

No, war is a creature. An evolving, writhing thing. But its bones... ah, its bones never change.

The same faces. The same factions. The same men pounding their chests in parliament chambers and gilded thrones, then weeping behind locked doors when their nations burn.