Chapter 921: A Sorrowful Parting

“Sir. I’m back.” Akado forced a smile, reaching out to take the old man’s withered hand. The long illness had drained the life from him; his barely open eyes had lost their former light.

“It’s good that you’re back! It’s good!” August laughed, the wrinkles on his face blooming like a flower. But Akado was in no mood to study the old man’s expression. He just held his hand, speechless for a long moment.

Seeing Akado’s return, the old man’s spirits clearly lifted, and the ragged breathing from yesterday was gone. His mind, it seemed, had not slowed with his body’s rapid decline but had grown wiser and sharper with age.

He squeezed Akado’s hand and spoke. “You know, I’ve always had one wish, and that is to assist you in ascending to the throne as Emperor of the Reich. It seems now I won’t have that chance. It is a great pity.”

Akado tried to say something, but the old man cut him off, continuing as if to himself, “I have already given my final instructions to Dominis. While his ability to react is still somewhat lacking, he is more than capable of taking over my work. As a transitional Chancellor, he is quite good… At least he will not cause you any trouble, of that I am certain.”

“Sir… please don’t say that. I know Dominis will be a good Chancellor, but I hope even more that you will see the moment of our final victory, the end of the war, a prosperous and thriving Reich…” Akado said to August with sincerity. “You can say these things to me then. We will have plenty of time to discuss these matters.”

“There is no time, Your Majesty… no time,” August said, shaking his head slightly. The movement was so small that if one were not watching closely, one might not even have noticed it. “Matters of diplomacy can be left to Ribbentrop. He is a talent I have deliberately cultivated in foreign affairs. I know you have also had your eye on him for a long time. On this point, I am very much at ease.”

Akado had no choice but to repeat himself. “Sir, I have said the war will be over soon, and peace is at hand. We will have plenty of time to discuss these matters later. What you need now is a good rest. I promise you, the future of the Reich will be a beautiful one. You must see it with your own eyes!”

The old man smiled. He closed his eyes for a moment, then suddenly opened them again. In that instant, his gaze was incredibly bright, just as it had been when he had first met Akado. He spoke in that very gentlemanly tone, saying what he wanted to say, “Your Majesty, please allow me, in these final moments, to stubbornly address you as such.”

He paused, then continued, “I know my own time is short. This may be my last while on this earth. So I have a few questions that I care about very much, that I wish to ask you… or rather, that I wish to help you solve.”

August forcefully extended one finger. “The first question. You and I both know that the current economic situation of the Reich will eventually reach its end. I would very much like to know how you intend to solve this problem.”

Without needing a detailed explanation, Akado knew the old man was talking about the intractable problem of the wartime economy. What Akado was doing was still the same trick Schacht had designed for Hitler: borrowing money to wage war, then using the spoils of war to repay a portion of the debt. This economic system would eventually collapse when the war ended, and the Reich would inevitably have to pay the price for this act of “borrowing a chicken to lay an egg.”

To put it bluntly, Akado, to this day, did not have sufficient capital reserves to cover the blank checks he had written. Both his own White Orchid Group and the giant conglomerates like Krupp were anticipating the huge dividends from conquering the Soviet Union, but the spoils of war were in fact not enough to repay the numerous capital groups.

Monopolize, annex, and then become a behemoth comparable to a nation-state. These financial groups were sucking the lifeblood of the entire Reich, while also feeding it with arms and capital. As long as the foreign wars continued, these interest groups would eventually form an unprecedented “empire of assets.”

As for how Akado would deal with this problem, he had actually already thought it through. He had no intention of lying to August now, so he answered softly, “Capital will be infinitely concentrated in the hands of the monopoly financial magnates. Eventually, these people or groups will become the enemies of the Reich… If they do not abandon their excessive demands, then I will have no choice but to use the power in my hands to eliminate them.”

To make the financial magnates collapse, to leave the final dividends of the war to the state and the common people—this was Akado’s final solution to this economic deception. He had already let down too many, many people, so he no longer cared about letting down a few more of the conglomerates that had once helped him.

He had even thought of a specific implementation plan: he would mobilize the most loyal special forces, launch a surprise attack on the Reichstag himself, and in one fell swoop, eliminate all those who disagreed with his forced nationalization of the spoils of war. Then he would use his lifelong prestige to suppress everyone, striving to let the Empire’s economy land softly and complete the final transition from war to peace.

It was very bloody, but very effective. To gradually transfer the war dividends of the state into the hands of a few monopoly financial magnates, and when this unseen capital had been transferred to a few individuals, to use the power of the state to brutally erase everything, to complete the elimination of this huge debt—to borrow money and then kill the creditor, this method of not repaying was both simple and logically clear.

“To not even spare your own assets. I was not wrong about you, Your Majesty,” August seemed very satisfied with this terrifying answer. He didn’t even argue for his friend Krupp, but just nodded in agreement. “This is a radical but good method. At the very least, in terms of prestige, everything you do will have the support of the people. That is why I say you are a wise and martial emperor, yet you have always denied it.”

He then extended a second finger, looked at Akado with some curiosity, and then asked, “Then, Your Majesty, could you tell me, what on earth did you come to Germany for? Or rather, who exactly are you, where do you come from, and what do you want to do here? Are you willing to tell this old man who is about to close his eyes?”

Akado was taken aback, then gave a bitter smile. As expected, his sudden appearance had never put this old man at ease. Even though he had unconvincingly brought up some mysterious Far East, had brought up that world-famous Art of War, it had not made this wise old man believe him in the slightest.

The reason he had not exposed the lie was because Akado had always been doing things that were beneficial to the entire country. He had not interfered too much in the economy, and his contributions in the military were there for all to see. So his origins, or rather, the reasons behind his rise, seemed less important. Perhaps August had also once hypnotized himself, convincing himself that the Führer was “a gift from God.”

But as he was about to leave this world, the old man’s curiosity overflowed. He now seemed very eager to know if Akado was a gift from God, or really just a once-in-a-generation genius. So he looked at Akado with his bright eyes, waiting for his answer.

“I come from the future, from the year 2015. I don’t know how I came to this world, but when I thought I was dead, I opened my eyes and was already the current Akado,” Akado said after a moment’s thought, telling the old man a story that was almost a fantasy. “In the history I know, Germany took many wrong turns, and so it lost this war…”

“Is that so? So we lost,” August sighed with a sense of loss. He seemed to have believed everything Akado said without needing much explanation. He was sad for a few seconds, then raised his head slightly and, looking at Akado, asked, “Then what about this time? Will Germany be defeated again this time?”

“I have changed some things, made Germany take fewer wrong turns. We are now much stronger than in the history I know… and the current situation is more favorable for us,” Akado said, looking at the old man’s expectant expression and answering truthfully. “But the history I know has been changed by me beyond recognition, so I now don’t know if we will win the final victory in this war.”

“That makes sense… that explains it!” August nodded slightly, then released Akado’s hand. “That explains why you developed so many excellent weapons in advance, and it also explains why you could discover so many talents in advance…”

Then the old man asked another question, “If only I could also go back to the past…”

Akado was taken aback for a moment, then nodded. “You will. You will definitely go back to the place you want to go back to!” As he spoke, he extended his palm and gently stroked old August’s already dimming eyes. He could not feel the breath of life, only a slight coolness that pierced his palm.

He then leaned close to August’s ear and said softly to the old man, “My original name was Gu Changge. It was a pleasure to meet you, Mr. August von Bismarck.”

In the evening of April 25, 1939, the Chancellor of the Third Reich, August, passed away in his hospital room at the Imperial Hospital in Berlin, at the age of 73. At the time of his passing, the Führer of the Empire, Akado, had personally rushed over. The two had had a secret conversation for about an hour, the contents of which are unknown.

The next day, Dominis assumed the office of Chancellor of the Third Reich. On the same day, the Japanese army, isolated and without support, retreated to Darwin.

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