The sound of his boots echoed faintly as Elias stepped inside the main corridor of the HQ.
The air was crisp, the stone walls still gleaming with that unreal newness—too perfect, too clean, like something summoned from a blueprint that had never been touched by human hands.
Lights powered by unseen means flickered to life automatically, casting a dim, warm glow through the hallway.
The first structure in the entire world to have electrics, specifically it would be another 30 or so years before the light bulb the world knows would come into being.
Elias ran a hand along the steel trim inset within the wall—cold and smooth, humming faintly beneath his fingertips.
This wasn't a hut.
It wasn't a cabin.
It was a command center.
At last.
Taking a quick look around he could break the HQ into different departments or sections: Operations Center, Storage, Dormitory Block, Comms Hub, and Map Room.
Each space had been pre-configured, designed to accommodate future growth.
And every one of them—his.
He walked through the main corridor toward the dormitory section first.
Opening a heavy door, he stepped into a barracks-like hall outfitted with rows of simple cots, footlockers, and storage units.
The air smelled faintly of oil and fresh timber.
Though unoccupied, it was clearly ready for use—housing enough for a hundred personnel.
The HQ had housing space for 100, while overall space indicated the ability to staff greater than that, after checking out this room he carried on.
Finding that everything one could ask for was operational and ready, systems ready to support independent life functions including food prep, water recycling, medical care, and long-distance communication via analog lines.
That last part caught his attention.
He crossed the hallway toward the Comms Hub.
Inside, he found what looked like a compact telegraph station fused with an early-era war room.
A large table sat in the center, and around the walls were a series of desks outfitted with stacks of paper, along with writing implements in place of typerwriters-abscesses on the walls would indicate the eventual presence of telephone once they likewise had been invented.
Above it all were maps: some blank, others marked with lines, coastlines, rough borders.
"Cheat code indeed,"
he muttered.
The last room he toured was the one he'd been most eager to see.
The Map Room.
Massive, circular, and empty except for one central console surrounded by an illuminated topographic table.
At his approach, the lights flickered to life—casting projections upward: Montenegro, Balkans, Europe, and finally a global map that shimmered in low detail.
Lines traced the rail networks of Austria-Hungary, British colonial shipping routes, Ottoman garrisons. The world as it existed in 1800—raw, fraying at the edges, drunk on the illusion of control in the wake of numerous inventions that would help the ongoing situation to spiral further out of their control.
It was magnificent.
"System,"
Elias said, unable to keep the hunger from his voice.
"Can I overlay my assets on this map?"
Affirmative.
A blink—then the HQ glowed faintly in the Montenegro range.
A dotted line marked the Refinery under construction nearby.
No troops.
No structures.
Just two nodes.
But it was a start.
"When credits are available… can I construct a barracks?"
Yes, Supreme Commander. Infantry Barracks available at 300 Credits. Enables training of Riflemen, Engineers, Field Medics, and Trench Infantry.
"Engineers?"
Elias perked up.
In the game they could only repair friendly structures or capture enemy ones, but now that this was real life, perhaps they were just engineers, capable of designing and leading a workforce.
Now that was useful.
With Engineers, he could begin the network—installing relay posts, connecting telegraphs, building bunkers hidden across the hills.
If war was to come, he wouldn't just have troops.
He'd have infrastructure.
"System, once the Refinery is operational and earning credits, prioritize construction of the Barracks. Queue it."
'Confirmed. Barracks construction will begin automatically. Estimated operational status in 16 hours post-funding.
Perfect.
At the current rate he would have a working refinery most likely with carts to haul the mined ore, and a barracks all within the same day, from there he could begin recruitment and expansion of his plans to grow his control over the local region while also sending some to the larger cities to start establishing themselves in preparation of conducting a coup, civil war, or revolution in the future.
Elias turned back toward the center of the HQ and made his way to the mess hall—a modest kitchen space with crates of dry goods and a cast iron stove, pre-stocked like a survivalist's dream.
He set a kettle to boil, watching the flame flicker into life under a flat ceramic burner with no fuel source.
Even here, in a world without electricity, he had future-proof tech tucked inside a 1900s shell.
As the tea steeped, he leaned back in one of the chairs and let himself breathe.
It was strange, how quickly he had adapted.
A week ago, he was broadcasting angry monologues to a disillusioned world from a dim apartment.
Now, he was quietly plotting the foundations of a sovereign force—a proto-state—tucked in the Balkan wilderness.
And somehow, he felt more himself than he had in years.
Night fell.
The winds outside moaned through the peaks, but the HQ was silent and secure.
From his private quarters, Elias looked out a slitted window at the snow beginning to drift once more.
Distant lights flickered in Razvrsje, no doubt from oil lamps and hearths.
They didn't know what was growing above them.
Not yet.
once the refinery started churning ore, it wouldn't take more than two weeks of stealth buildup before he'd have the cash flow to expand significantly—pillboxes, scouting posts, maybe even cavalry.
But more importantly, the Barracks meant people.
Soldiers.
Workers.
Engineers.
Followers.
Not locals, not yet.
He didn't want the villagers involved in anything military until he'd cultivated deeper trust—or until he had no choice but to send their lives into the crucible that is war.
But once he had trained professionals, they could begin building further outposts and laying wire lines toward other settlements.
Elias closed his eyes and thought back to the first time he had played Command & Conquer as a boy.
The music.
The rhythm.
The power of giving a single order and seeing an entire battlefield obey.
Now, it wasn't a game.
Now, it was history.
And this time, he was writing it.