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Chapter 28 - Prepare for the Next, and the one after that

Elias awoke before dawn, though sleep had never been deep these days.

The hum of his bases was constant now, a rhythm that no longer faded when he traveled.

It was in him—threaded through his very awareness.

He did not need to sit in the iron command chair to issue orders, nor stand above the glowing map tables to move his forces.

The system had afterall, already told him his command authority covered the breadth of the earth, so long as Elias did not leave earth he had total command.

He could be anywhere on Earth, and still the system would obey.

That realization had struck him first as a curiosity, then as a temptation.

Freedom.

The Iron Hand had marched across Wallachia, Romania, and Crimea at his call, their rifles bending history's arc.

But Elias was not chained to them.

His authority, his view into the bases and their machines, stretched across oceans.

He could walk the streets of London as a gentleman of leisure, or ride through Cairo as a wandering scholar, and still the miners would dig, the credits would flow, the spies would whisper their reports.

For the first time since his summoning, Elias considered what it might mean to live.

Not simply as a commander directing faceless troops, but as a man.

A traveler.

A witness to the wider world, getting to experience the planet he had only even seen a few locations of having focused almost exclusively on his work in his previous lifetime.

Montenegro, he knew, would burn in a year's time, as they sought true independance from the Ottoman Empire, while the Empire sought to reassert their claim to the region.

The Battle of Grahovac would be the fulcrum, the clash that forced the Great Powers to acknowledge the little mountain kingdom.

He had no intention of abandoning the place—his veterans were already embedding themselves in the Montenegrin clans, and his agents were ensuring the mistakes of history would be corrected, all while his established bases couldnt simply pack up and move on, and till now he was limited to just the two, his lottery draws the last two years were far from spectacular, no new special unit, buildings or even commanders for that matter.

His draws had allowed him to strength his bases, by deploying defensive structures such as Missle defenses against the future coming air units, meanwhile the rest were simply basic units, like miner teams, riflemen squads, spies...

Elias's only hope was that upon ranking up the rewards for his monthly draws would get better, opening up the avenue to further expand his forces otherworldly nature by accessing the alt-world technology of the Tiberium verse.

But his role was not to stand at the front rank.

He could afford distance now.

Better still, he could afford patience.

Three months, the ledger had said.

Three months, and the credits would be enough to purchase the upgrade.

He had reviewed the cost a dozen times, even tested what it would do to his reserves if he spent early, but the conclusion remained the same: wait.

The 1870s held promise beyond imagining—bolt-action rifles, combustion engines, the first currents of electricity.

If he leapt too soon, he would condemn his men to fight the Ottomans with muskets still, to die as they had in Crimea.

But if he waited, if he let the miners dig and the reserves accumulate, he could wield weapons that the world had only just started to develop.

A commander could not ask for better odds.

And so Elias resolved himself.

He would travel while the system worked, unhurried.

The bases would grow, the credits would climb, and when the storm finally broke over Montenegro, he would command from afar, wielding his power like a true supreme commander

His quill scratched against parchment as he began to sketch a plan.

Three months in Montenegro.

Enough to see the miners secure, to confirm his spies' reports, to gauge the pulse of the people.

After that, he would depart.

A tour of Europe first, perhaps, to observe how the great capitals licked their wounds after Crimea.

Paris, Vienna, Berlin, London—cities humming with intrigue and progress, where his agents could benefit from his presence even if he played the role of idle traveler.

And then westward.

The Americas.

The thought tugged at him like a tide.

He knew well what was coming.

The United States simmered with tension, its politics and press foaming with the question of slavery.

Within a handful of years, it would erupt into a war unlike any the modern age had yet seen—vast in scale, brutal in nature, resulting in the loss of over half a million men.

A perfect crucible, for Elias to further temper his ambition.

Not only to test the new weapons, but to forge something beyond the Iron Hand.

A foreign legion, perhaps, drawn from the same wellspring of the system but dressed not as Russians, instead this time he would have his men join the losing side.

The unions victory over the confederacy was an assured thing, since they had an advantages, in industrial capacity, economic might, and available manpower to draw upon.

But while the confederacy's fate would be sealed regardless, Elias could make the Union bleed more for it, slowing down Americas reconstruction and reintegration of the southern states into its being, overall weakening America, and opening it up to intervention by Britain and France.

He imagined it clearly: ranks of men armed with bolt-action rifles, pouring fire into blue uniformed militia.

If Crimea had been the trial, and Montenegro would be the rehearsal, then America would be the unveiling.

The thought brought a rare smile to his lips.

He pushed back from his desk and stood, stretching stiff shoulders.

Dawn light was breaking across the jagged ridges of Montenegro, painting the valleys in shades of silver.

For all its backwardness, the land had a stark beauty.

It would fight hard for its independence, and with his guidance, it would win.

But his gaze was already beyond it, across seas and continents.

He could walk into that future now, freely, and the bases would hum on without him.

The hum followed him as he stepped from the chamber and out into the cold air.

The future was already whispering, somewhere across the ocean.

For now, he would walk the mountains, see to the mines, and wait.

When the system chimed its signal and the upgrade became available, Elias would seize it.

Montenegro would have its independence.

The Balkans would shift.

And then—then he would step onto a ship, bound for a continent already primed for fire.

The Americans believed their war would decide the fate of liberty, slavery, and union.

Elias knew better.

It would decide the fate of the century.

And his hand would be upon it.

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