I write an Isekai about communist revolution until an anime is made out of it

Brethren before wenches

I was still reeling back from the kiss when I heard a new, familiarly barely-decipherable voice calling from across the streets, and turned to see the teenage boy at least a few years younger than myself who it belonged to.

"Sir! Sir! Are you the offworlder, by any chance? Commander Federeff wants to speak with you."

"Um -" who the hell is that? "- uh, sure, why not?"

I followed him out the gateway and through the slums for a good fifteen minutes before arriving at some seedy tavern lodged within the darkening streets, light shining from within like a quest marker between nondescript shacks. I tightened one hand on my holster and the other on Honse's reins as I became increasingly certain that I was about to be robbed. The only scant hope that this guy was legit came from his ceaseless rambling of praise that seemed carefully constructed to divulge as little as possible about the "leader of the Valkgrine company" they revolved around.

"Here you are at last, offworlder! It is a relief to finally meet you."

The man approached seven feet tall as he rose from a slight bow, the sunken tissue of a burn scar crawling back along the left side of his face, and etching a gap in the sideburn that rose from his black beard. His guttural voice carried an unfamiliar accent as he spoke.

"Sit down. There are many things I would like to speak to you about, but first I must introduce myself. My name is Hadlon don Federeff, once knight-commander of the Valkeim guard, now leader of the Valkgrine company. I will make no attempts at deception, Offworlder: my people and I are unwell. It has been two years now since my liege fell to the lord of darkness, and his realm of plenty was put to frost. I once lived within a gleaming tower, and am now left among beggars, hunting my former countrymen turned bandits so that my soldiers and I can afford to feed what remains of our families. I realize now what a privileged life I lead, having lived in that one place for eighty-nine years along ten generations before me. That grand sovereign who I took to be ordinary was perhaps among the greatest lords to ever live. Now he lies dead, leaving those who flourished on his decks to drown in his absence. At sea, it is the unquestioned standard of decency to bring any drifting survivors aboard, but here, the "noble" lord who rules this city is among the few gracious enough to allow us to cling to the sides of his hull. To think that I once counted myself among them. They care not who I am; without the mighty king demanding respect for his noble servants, they have no reason to even look in the direction of any too weak to challenge them."

By now we had amassed quite a crowd, filling the tavern around us and peering over eachother's shoulders from the windows. Hadlon continued without so much as a glance to his audience, while I clung to his words to ease the weight of the eyes trained at me welling in my gut.

"And then you arrived, plucked from another world by the high queen to rid her of that madman who now rules the north. That's what she must have been expecting, anyway. Even here, the powers that be are constipated with resentment for your having the audacity to share your knowledge with the world. "Handouts to the undeserving" they call it. Pah! My grandchildren sleep above their floors for the first time in over a year because of you; hunting is far more lucrative if one only has the right tools. I must bestow upon you my thanks, and the thanks of all the sons and daughters of Valkhiem who still draw breath. Not only have you given us the means to make an honest living, but you have demonstrated how pathetic the lords and ladies of the land truly are; like a basket of crabs unable to escape only because they pull one-another down."

That monologue left a lot to unpack, but I had at least enough social sense not to interrupt a speech he'd clearly rehearsed. Before I could formulate my own question, though, he asked one to me:

"But that's enough about my own miserable corner of reality. Let's hear about yours."

After a few minutes struggling for a place to start, I began to lose myself in the military history of planet earth. Battles and wars, heroes and generals, conflicts and revolutions, empires' rise and fall. I rambled on and on about the mongol conquests, about Alexander the Great, about Kursk, Thermopylae, and Vietnam. About Garbo, the bat bomb, and Karansebes. About the Nazis' increasingly ridiculous wünderwaffen, and how their inventors wound up putting an American on the moon. About everything that Sabaton made a song about, the existence of the band itself, and that one meme video of the red baron flying into Joakim's head.

It was something like three in the morning when the crowd had somewhat subsided and I finally called it a night, giddy with positive attention and the few sips of beer I'd managed to coax past my mouth as I stumbled up to a room and plummeted into bed before the high could subside.