Chapter 1947 – Governing Council
John entered a small office.
One of the greatest advantages of concentrating power was that he did not have to interact with a whole lot of people. All that was needed for a session of the true rulers of Fusion was a round desk with a number of ornate chairs in the guest chambers of the Palace. Everything beyond that would have been specific planning with sections of the government or ceremony.
The Gamer headed to the most ornate of the chairs around the table. Once he was situated, he placed two slices of the Fusion crown in front of him, one of them belonging to him, the other to Rave.
The other four people at the table all had their own piece of the symbol of sovereignty. Momo was situated closely to his right, while the other three, Chemilia, Magnus and Emrik, sat equally spaced out around the other half on the table. There were some support staff in the room, those that operated the recording software for the meeting and those that would spread out emergency orders, alongside their individual aids, such as Ehtra, Ted, Nina and Marcella.
“A surprise to see you here – I see the recovery has gone well?” John asked.
“Still got… a bit of speaking problems,” Emrik’s wife answered, her voice raspy and dry.
One of the strokes of Gaia’s luck had saved the woman from succumbing fully to Lorylim corruption, in the form of a blank that just happened to be in the viewing area that day. Being cured had left her scarred, like so many others, a matter that Delicia was chipping away at.
“I wanted to… express my… thanks,” Marcella continued.
John smiled at the middle-aged woman. She was a common individual, with no political bone in her body. She certainly was here just to have said that. “I had nothing to do with it,” he told her, then stopped her from speaking further. “Rest your voice. I’ll accept your gratitude, I just want to say you don’t owe me anything.”
Marcella nodded and John glanced at the recording crew. “Make sure that is cut out,” he instructed them. “It was a private matter.”
Although he would continue to keep a lot of records for propriety, he now had no qualms about getting what he did not want to be seen removed. This included both intel that should not leak to the enemies of Fusion and matters he was for any personal reason uncomfortable with going to the public.
“Now, I believe we have a lot to discuss, beginning with Fusion’s territorial claims.” John gestured at a screen mounted on the wall to his left.
“These are our borders agreed upon by all relevant parties. The Grim Reaper has sworn not to disturb us as long as we do not disturb him. Romulus and the other great powers have let us know that further expansion southwards would be met with hostility.”
“And we will respect that?” Chemilia asked.
There was a claim to be made on Mexico, courtesy of Nahoa, but the answer John had for his foremost military advisor was a simple nod. “There is no need to expand further. We have enough territory and more than enough troubles. The Fusion Empire’s territorial ambitions have been satisfied.”
Emrik subtly relaxed upon hearing that. John wasn’t entirely truthful with what he had said. There was a part of him that would have loved to continue on south, then pressure the Grim Reaper into joining the empire in one way or another, just so he could claim the entirety of the Americas. This was an ambition far in the distance. Emrik had every reason to relax.
“Now that we have established the border of the territory that will be administered, we should consider the internal workings,” John said to everyone. “In which I do not intend to change terribly much and yet everything. First and foremost, after talking about it with my women, it has been decided that we will create imperial houses around each of them.”
“What privileges will they have?” Emrik asked.
“All of them.”
“We’ll hold each other accountable,” Momo assured. “You can trust this – or you can insist we aren’t trustworthy, but at that point I don’t care.” The sassy minx shrugged, arms crossed. “We’re the backbone of Fusion, alongside the brains and the hands. We’ll use this power as we think is best and we won’t be held back by any procedure on this. You can just talk to us though.”
“…Fine.” Emrik obviously was not convinced.
“Do you intend to create additional noble houses?” Magnus asked.
“On this, we did not reach a conclusion.” John folded his hands on his chest, deliberately putting on a relaxed posture to show that he had no set opinion on the matter yet. “I can see arguments for and against. I do not want to turn Fusion into an outright feudal state, nor do I think that, now that we have dispensed with the illusion of equality, that we ought to tell the people that have notably elevated power levels that they are the exact same as everyone else.”
“Tying nobility to power alone will lead to issues,” Magnus cautioned, an expected and valid throw-in from the weakest individual at the table.
“I agree, capability and money will play their own roles.” John shook his head. “That is, if a nobility is at all what we want.”
“I am against it,” Emrik stated outright. “We do not need to cut out extra legal privileges for the powerful. Those capable will rise to the top on their own.”
“I concur,” Chemilia stated. “If there is to be a nobility, I would suggest it be a ceremonial matter and nothing else. Titles for highly decorated soldiers and the like.”
“I… believe that a nobility should be established,” Magnus said, to the surprise of everyone else in the room. “Let me be clear, I do not wish to rest on my father’s laurels. I want his name to remain etched into the fabric of this nation. Other families should be granted that same honour, if they contributed much to the society.” He paused for a moment. “I believe the titles should come with limited, localized privileges.”
“Doing so will create a competition between the elected officials and the appointed nobility,” Emrik cautioned.
“I believe that may be healthy.”
John could see that point. Having two competing standards of governance could lead to the instruments of states remaining sharp by rubbing up against one another. It could just as well lead to them destroying one another though. As Hailey liked to say, that was more of a question of who was operating the system than the system itself.
That formulation also meant that the system could be better or worse.
Chemilia rubbed her chin contemplatively, then placed her hand on the table. “Magnus’ argument does convince me that a limited nobility may actually be useful. We should make sure the formulations are clear though, I am not in favour of Fusion balkanizing over time.”
“I agree that we should be very careful with landing people,” John said.
“How about this, then?” Momo spoke up. “We do it on a Small Lake Tournament model – without the tournament. There will be a set amount of land that can be distributed to the nobles and we will keep that land fairly small and it's tied directly to the title, not the family name, so it can be revoked if a family falls out of favour. Let’s say a maximum of 5% of the land area of each province can be claimed for that purpose?”
Which, in a country that was even larger than the mundane USA, was a metric fuckton of land still.
“How much of this land would each noble get?” Emrik asked.
“Subject to further calculations,” John cut the topic short. “Let’s not get lost in the minute details right now, none of this is getting put to paper today. In broad strokes: we will establish a nobility, this nobility will get their own plots of lands, the total amount and the specific areas of land the nobility can own in a state is greatly limited.”
Emrik had another question immediately, “Who has the right to elevate citizens to nobles?”
That one was a lot more pertinent to the structure of the state going forwards. “Me, the Imperial Houses, and my Viceroys,” John answered.
“Viceroys?” Magnus asked.
“My chosen method to have further power on the executive. In the previous structure of state, I had veto powers in the federal legislature and oversaw the federal executive, as well as suggested judges. Since I am going to assume more power to myself, I will be needing extra positions that I can fill with my people. Viceroys will be that position. They will represent me in one or several states and be equipped with the legal rights to command the local armies, among sweeping emergency powers.”
Emrik was clearly not amused by the concept, as was his duty as the representative of the elective system. “I assume you will hold them accountable as well?”
“That is the plan. I don’t think I will have more than half a dozen of them either. Consider them a position between me and the local governors.” John visualized the matter in his head. “In fact, I think we got enough of the building blocks sorted that I can put this to picture now.” He pointed them all at the screen again.
Much had stayed the same and much had changed. John’s appointed judges were no longer subject to confirmation, he could decree laws to the legislature, and the nobility had been grafted onto the structure as an additional lever of power for him and his women to exercise. In summary: he had a lot more power over Fusion and way greater sway over who held power in it. He now had the tools to assure that his empire would retain his vision.
‘For better and for worse,’ he cautioned himself.
“That illustrates the new state of affairs well,” Emrik stated. “What about the matter of the internal borders?”
“A matter for another meeting with the locals involved to bring up potential issues they have. I do not expect there needs to be much in the terms of redrawing though, only chartering of the new territory… which will not be pressing, since they are basically empty.”
“A state that will not remain for long, if the Re-Alignment continues on as it has,” Magnus added.
“Indeed. To that end, I will personally organize a ministry of introduction that will be entirely dedicated to finding newcomers to the Abyss and integrating them into Fusion. Chemilia, I will be speaking with you specifically on that matter.”
“As you say.”
“As for the form of local governance, I do not intend to impose any changes there either. I believe the democratic model will serve them best on the local scope, although I would be open to letting states experiment with alternatives. I will have to play that by ear.”
Not the most satisfying answer, especially to people like Emrik and Magnus who liked the existence of rules. At this level of political power, however, rules were a suggestion. There was no one left above John who could impose them on him, Gaia put aside.
“There is one matter left that I want your specific opinion on,” John then continued. “We relocated the Guild Hall here to serve as our supply base. I can move it once a month, so it’s not exactly a long cooldown. Still, for the sake of infrastructure, we probably should find a permanent place or at least one that will be regular for a while.”
“Any places you have in mind?” Magnus asked.
“I have two candidates. Eureka, California, or Hawaii.”
The choices raised some eyebrows. Hawaii would have been right out as the heart of an imperial administration, had it not been for the long range teleporters and the internet. Even with them, it was ambitious – for more reasons than one.
“You said you had no more territorial ambitions?” Emrik asked.
“All states of the mundane USA were said to be a legitimate part of Fusion, Romulus and all others agreed.” John smirked a little bit, fully aware he was being a bit liberal with taking advantage of the letter of the agreement here. “It’s too strategically important not to lay claim to it, whatever happens.”
“I am not fundamentally against the idea, but I will say that Fusion’s naval capacities will not be able to cope with the need to ship materials from Hawaii to the mainland USA,” Chemilia cautioned.
“Also, you may be able to get away with it, but people will have a hard time visiting you,” Magnus added.
“It was more of a pipedream,” John admitted. “Then what do we think about Eureka?”
“Why not LA?” Chemilia asked.
“Why not hell?” Momo responded before John could.
“I am genuinely tired of big cities,” the Gamer said a bit more diplomatically. “And since the Guild Hall is an economic force unto itself, we do not need to direct ourselves on anything else other than access to the mundane road network.”
“The weather will be nicer than New York,” Emrik said slowly. “It’s northern California, should not be too hot?”
“Very temperate, between 10 and 20 degrees year round. Jane will still have control of the thermostat though.”
There was much groaning.