The wait is killing me.

We can't assault any more Imperial bases since the Fabricators haven't found anything worthwhile yet. And something tells me that I'm going to be disappointed even if we somehow discover where all the Imperial scientists escaped. On the other hand, we have to monitor the Empire and its numerous enemies carefully. We have to make sure that we are not going to send our men in the middle of a deadly battle.

The Organization is also something I still think about, even if its priority is lower on the list. They also didn't do anything since their first attempted assault. I might be slightly interested in their technology, but seeing the current state of our Fabricators really dampened my seemingly insatiable hunger for new technology. The Organization's World Code sounds like a useful tool, and the implications of it are enough to warrant researching it as thoroughly as possible.

However, winning the war is more important.

The Empire must be gearing up for total war, and it most likely will begin to move against the Coalition. We don't know yet if they began to attack. But it would make sense considering their public declaration which was broadcast on every channel available to the local magical community.

We have to wait and see for now. If we are lucky, then this Coalition will be nothing more than a paper tiger and will be easy to handle. But the Beelzebub Incident taught me that cornered Enforcers drunk on power would not stop at anything to win.

I'll also have to keep an eye on the Freedom Movement. Steve and his cohort have been unusually quiet as of late. They must be preparing to assault an Imperial facility, or they must be bolstering their defenses. After all, it would make sense that the Enforcer Coalition would target Steve's group once they are done with the Empire. To them, any challenge to their authority warrants the immediate use of as much deadly force it takes to wipe out the rebels.

The next big unknown in all of this is the Oracle. I know that she must have been helping other factions, but who? As far as I know, nobody pulled out a 'super-weapon' or exhibited insane, by Hidden World standards, capabilities. I know the Empire would have boasted that they had such a thing, and made use of it on the battlefield. Our missions would have gone far differently if the Empire had access to weapons of the caliber of the Oracle's railgun.

In fact, it wouldn't be a stretch to say that the war would already be over. Anyone with overpowered Oracle-given gifts would become the de facto winner of the war... That is unless the Oracle purposely gave very good, but not completely insane, weapons to the ones she decided to help. Or maybe she helped some unknown rebel group with the purpose of sowing even more chaos.

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I can't help but shrug. I don't pretend to understand the mind of an insane immortal who likely destroys planets for fun. All I know is that she's hellbent on making life as difficult as possible for me. At least I know that she doesn't want to kill me for now or she would have blown up our Shard or killed everyone in it in an instant. But she could change her mind on a whim, and it would be disastrous for us. Our only hope in such a situation is the hypothetical Phase 4, but only time will tell if it exists and is usable for more than a fraction of a second.

Sometimes I think that all of this, all I've done is useless; that we are destined to fail no matter what. I know that the Rewinder would help me make the situation somewhat better, but it's not always going to be the case.

I have to wait and see and hope that everything will work out. So far we mostly had resounding successes with a few failures here and there, but our records have been overwhelmingly positive so far... And I intend to keep it that way.

Determination floods my body again; I will do whatever it takes to win this conflict, and the one that is bound to follow soon after.

...Daredrick's PoV...

"Your majesty, the reports for the ongoing battles!" a secretary hands me a stone tablet, and I snatch it out of her hand before shooing her away. She lowers her head and disappears from my sight in an instant. I frown as I scroll through the data contained into the enchanted item.

According to the reports, we are in a stalemate at the moment. The Coalition is not making any real moves. It just sends under-equipped and under-trained soldiers to crash against our defenses until they are wiped out. This strategy makes me want to scratch my head; there is no logic behind the actions of the Enforcers. They are wasting soldiers for no gain, and they keep doing it despite everything saying that they are making a mistake. But I shouldn't complain too much; if our enemies want to throw away the lives of their men, then I'll gladly let them.

But what makes my blood boil despite everything is the actions of the Order Of The First Flame. We lost an insane amount of men to them, and let's not talk about all the military infrastructure they destroyed and all the supplies they stole. That group of rebels is by far the faction that has done the most damage to us. Our researchers are working overtime to find a countermeasure to the deadly weapons they are using.

It would be easier if we somehow got our hands on a sample of those weapons. But I can't find anything on the black market despite my good connections. It seems that not a single soldier in the Order has secretly sold weapons for a quick buck; it's unheard of in a rebel group. It's not too uncommon in certain Families, I heard about it in my younger days. I even purchased a secret weapon from a rival Family back when we were still under the Wolfheart.

But it looks like a group of previously unknown rebels has more discipline than the Enforcers.

I can't help but make a wry smile at the situation, but it disappears as soon as it appears. We lost a lot of men and some crucial facilities. The most notable one being the research lab. At least they shouldn't have access to our research since the personnel has been trained to destroy anything in the unlikely event of an enemy attack.

The loss of a good chunk of the personnel due to sabotaged Gates is where it stings the most. My Empire is not as devoted as I first thought, and I'm doing my best to stop any more betrayals from happening.

There's also reports about the Freedom Movement, but these idiots are of no consequences. They haven't done anything of note, and they are bolstering their meager defenses to resist the assault of the Coalition. I wonder how much time they'll hold before being crushed under the boots of the Enforcers they loathe so much.

The last report makes me raise an eyebrow. Apparently, a small group of high-ranked officers in a small outpost just dropped dead in an instant; a large hole formed where their heart was.

I grit my teeth; this sounds like yet another wonder-weapon of the Order. I put some of my best scouts on trying to find their location, but we found nothing so far...

I take a deep breath and lean back.

It's time to unleash some of our new projects. They are not as thoroughly tested as I would like, but it will do. We need to push back with all the strength we can muster before we are mired in an even larger multiple-front conflict.