The morning after the council, the horns of war blew across the camp.

Not the quiet roll of assembly, but the thunder of full mobilization.

The legions stirred like a giant roused from slumber — standards unfurled, wagons creaked into motion, cavalry pawed at the mud with eager hooves.

Julius had chosen his moment.

Francia was fracturing, the Concordat shattered, and before rumor could ossify into truth, he would strike.

Four fronts.

Four spears.

Four fires set against a kingdom already gasping for air.

To the north, the Brittania would continue to press down from their coastal holdings to secure territory deeper inland, as additional spoils in the war against Francia.

To the east, the strongest front, six legions under the supreme command of Julius himself would continue marching east, further expanding the corridor they'd previously created, while ultimately heading to meet up with the southern front for a final push on the Francian capital, axes felling trees to carve roads where none had been before.

In the west, the Legio Fulminata marched along the coasts, no long simply raiding, having been reinforced enought to start absorbing up the eastern lands and pulling them out of the conflict.

And in the south, Elheat himself led the allied forces of the army, the Legio Invicta, the hammer of refined Romanus steel, and Germanian barbarity.

The drums beat in rhythm with the tramp of thirty thousand boots.

Francia was not ready.

News of poisonings and broken oaths still had not reached many lords.

Some still thought the Concordat held, that Romanus marched as it always had: to take land, not to annihilate.

When the legions appeared at their gates — scarlet lines against the horizon — many faltered.

Some gathered their men and marched to resist, shouting Joan's name.

Others, wary of the rumors trickling from the royal court, raised the white banner before a single arrow was loosed.

And when those white banners were met not with sack and fire but with terms — stern, exact, but merciful — disbelief spread faster than fear.

The first lord to yield, Count Alphonse of Languet, came before Julius barefoot, his sword laid across his palms.

His eyes were hollow with dread, expecting chains, perhaps execution.

Instead, Julius spoke with the calm of law.

"Your lands are now Romanus. Your people, my people. You will swear the oath of obedience. You will keep your roads and wells open. You will pay taxes to the crown. But your house will stand. Your people will be fed, not burned. Break this oath, and there will be no second chance."

The count swore, trembling, and when he returned to his people alive, his surrender spread like wildfire.

In village after village, gatehouses creaked open before the siege engines rolled within reach.

Legionaries marched in, shields high, not to slaughter, but to occupy with precision.

They posted guards at wells, assigned patrols to granaries, stationed engineers to repair bridges and aqueducts.

No plunder was taken.

No shrines were defiled.

And when soldiers attempted to steal or harass, their centurions cut them down without trial.

The people of Francia stared in stunned silence.

They had expected wolves.

Instead, they found a wall.

Harsh, cold, but incorruptible.

Yet not all bent the knee.

In the north, fanatics under Joan's banner hurled themselves at the brittons, poisoning their own wells to deny Brittania use of them, befouling their waters with death.

The battlefields stank of smoke and rot.

But unlike in the south, east, and west honor was not uphheld.

retaliation was taken against the villages that surrendered.

What little supplies there were to be had were taken by force, to feed their own rather than left to the francians civilian or otherwise.

Even greater crimes such as the taking on of war-wives, and slaves started to become common practice as the Brittons continued their march.

~

Sabellus, riding at Julius's side, remarked after one such village was spared by their own forces: "They expected revenge. Their women wept when they saw our standards. Yet now they weep for another reason — because we did not come as beasts."

Julius's reply was iron. "If Romanus becomes beast, then We cease to be Romamus. Better they hate us as men of law than love us as monsters."

In the west, Lord Marcien of Doulac tried resistance.

His men salted roads, set fields alight, barricaded his fortress with stones ripped from his own walls.

The Legio Fulminata crushed him in three days.

When Marcien was dragged before the Roman tribunal, he shouted of Saint Joan, of Francia's holy cause, of Romanus's villainy.

The soldiers expected Julius to have him executed as an example.

Instead, he was stripped of title, his fortress garrisoned, and he was simply imprisoned for now, until a proper investigation and trial could be held, execution was not written off, since if his crimes against Francia demanded it, Julius would provide the people with some solace that the villans of their own nation would be held accountable for their actions.

The message was clear: surrender and your people live while you yourself might not, resist and not only yourself but also your people will die.

Only those who poisoned or struck in shadow would face the sword as agents of chaos, the blame would not land on all peoples for the actions of the few.

It was a new kind of terror — not the terror of fire and blood, but of inescapable law.

The offensive pressed on.

Four spears driving deeper.

Francia cracked.

The king's court, already fractious, imploded.

the remain lords loyal to the crown accused one another of cowardice, of being the first to loose poison, of conspiring with Romanus in secret.

Peasants deserted the nobles' levies to return home, believing surrender offered better survival than following banners to certain death.

Only Joan's fanatics held fast, their zeal burning hotter with every defeat.

In whispers they called Julius the Devil, his restraint a mask for devilry.

Yet even among them, seeds of doubt took root.

If Romanus were truly devil-born, why had they not torched the villages?

Why did the soldiers feed orphans instead of enslaving them?

Whispers turned into a dangerous thought: perhaps it was the king who had doomed them, not Romanus.

At campfires, the legionaries muttered of how strange the war had become.

They had braced for savagery after the Concordat's fall, yet their emperor held them tighter than ever to discipline.

Many cursed the lack of plunder, yet none dared disobey.

The executions of the first week had seen to that.

And slowly, pride replaced grumbling.

They began to boast, not of what they took, but of what they withheld.

"We are not beasts," one centurion told his men, voice loud over the crackling fire. "We are Rome reborn. Let Germania butcher. Let Britannia poison. We will conquer with iron, not filth. And when the world is ash, they will see only our standard still standing, proud amongst the ruinous beasts they all have become."

The chant caught: Roma Victor!.

By the third week, all but the heartland of Francia lay under Romanus, and Brittania's control.

Towns flew white banners before the legions appeared on the horizon.

Noble houses sent envoys with keys and oaths of fealty.

The mad king raged in his palace, executing counselors by the dozen, even as his realm shrank to a circle around him.

Julius stood before his war council, maps spread before him.

Each front had pierced deep, the spears of Rome now converging toward the capital.

Sabellus placed a hand on the table. "It will not be long now. Francia is all but gone."

Julius's gaze lingered on the heart of the map, the symbol of Joan's last host and the fractured court.

"Francia is not gone," he said. "Not until the people themselves accept our rule, otherwise rebellion will ocur and our men will never leave these lands. That is the true conquest. Not land, not crowns — but hearts. We take them not with cruelty, but with order. Let them see we are not like their king. Then, when their banners fall, it will not be surrender they give us, but relief."

The war council bowed their heads.

Outside, the drums of four armies echoed across a broken land.

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