Tyranny of Steel

Emperor Asha sat upon the back of a war elephant in the rice fields of the Kingdom of Ava. For nearly two years now, the Bengal Army had marched in a not so glorious campaign against their eastern neighbors. From the mountainous regions of Nepal and Bhutan all the way into the dense tropical jungles of Myanmar, the soldiers of the Bengal Empire conquered all who stood in their path.

Though the Bengal Army was equipped with new weapons which were purchased from the Japanese Empire, they were forced to rely on maintaining a complex logistics network all the way back in the ports of Bengal.

Because of this extensive supply line, they had suffered many losses early on. However, the army had been tempered through these conflicts, and had become far more ruthless in the pursuit of overwhelming victory.

Currently, the soldiers of the Bengal Army raised their Lever action rifles and pointed them towards the skulls of the kneeling captives. The people of this village had harbored the enemy and in doing so incurred the wrath of Asha, who ordered their execution.

"Kill them!"

With the pull of a trigger, each soldier of the Bengal Army fired their weapons into the skulls of their victims, splattering their brains into the rice patties. The women and young girls of the village, who had been tied up, cried out in tears as they witnessed their husbands, brothers, and sons mercilessly slaughtered by the Bengal troops.

Among these survivors was a young woman no older than twenty who sat within the lap of the Bengal Emperor as he fondled her bountiful breasts through her dress. She was crying just as much as the other villagers did, or perhaps more so. When she had woken up this morning, she had never expected that she would become a foreign emperor's plaything.

Due to her beauty, Asha had chosen her to be his latest concubine. Something he did in every village his army passed through. As for the rest of the women and girls who were currently held captive, they would be given to his soldiers, where they would follow the army and service the men. Unlike Berengar, and Itami, who came from the modern world, this Indian Emperor had no qualms about taking sex slaves.

To villages like this, who resisted his rule, there was only one penalty that they could face. The massacre of all boys and men, and the captivity of all women and girls. With each passing second, another volley of shots was fired towards the villagers, whose bodies were mercilessly dumped into the rice fields, as if to act as fertilizer for future crops.

Even the Japanese Advisors who accompanied the Bengal Emperor did not flinch when watching the ongoing slaughter and rape of the villagers. Though that was not so much out of agreement with the actions taken by the Bengal Army, instead it was more of desensitization, having witnessed roughly a dozen of such events over the past two years.

After the male villagers had all been killed, Asha gave the order to move onto the next village. He would not stop his conquests in the east until he had taken Dagon, which was known in Berengar's past life as Yangon or Rangoon.

"Forward march!"

With this, the Bengal Army was on the move once more, while the women and girls of the village that had just been wiped out were forced into carriages, to accompany the Bengal Army on their conquests.

Further to the east, in the city of Heian-kyō which was the current capital of the Japanese Empire. Itami was sitting in her room reading over intelligence reports from the various theaters of war that her armies were personally involved in, as well as those her pawns were playing at.

Despite keeping a set of eyes on Asha and his army at all times, this was the first time she had received a report about the Bengal Army's war crimes. News was just now reaching the Japanese Empress's ears of Asha's war crimes after nearly two years of conquests. Why was that? Because at least one Japanese Officer sent to advise the Bengal Army could no longer stand by and watch the atrocities unfold.

Unbeknownst to Itami, many of the troops she had deployed to Hokkaido, and the Ryukyu Kingdom, had resorted to some rather underhanded methods to quell the local unrest. Because of this, the officers who were advising the Bengal Army had stubbornly refused to report Asha's war crimes for two primary reasons.

Firstly, the Japanese Officers did not want the Empress investigating the potential war crimes committed by the Imperial Japanese Army within their own colonies. After all, they knew of how she would react to such news. As for the second reason, it was of the opinion of many of these Japanese officers that it was simply not their responsibility to stop the Bengals despite supplying them with the weapons that allowed them to behave so atrociously.

After reading these reports, the Japanese Empress had to admit, she had made an error when arming a man like Asha. She knew little of his background, his beliefs, or how he treated others prior to making a deal with him. Itami simply saw the man as a valuable pawn, one which was now acting out of control. If this was how he waged war in Nepal, Bhutan, and Burma, then how would his troops acting in the central regions of India?

Having learned who Asha really was, and what he was capable of doing, she despised the man and everything he stood for. So much so that she reviled after thinking about the way he looked at her during their first and only meeting. Though Itami felt this way, she still needed the Bengal Empire to act as a proxy against Germany.

After thinking about this, Itami sighed heavily. She was at a loss for what to do. If she tried to demand the Bengal Emperor cease such criminal behavior, he might call her bluff, thus weakening her bargaining power overall. However, if she sat back and did nothing more innocent people would get hurt because she had sold a villainous figure powerful weapons.

Before Itami could find an answer to her current predicament, the door to her room slightly crept open, revealing her little sister, who had a smirk on her face. The young woman stealthily approached Itami and was about to grab ahold of her when Itami's stern voice stopped her movements.

"I know you're there Momo..."

The teenage beauty known by the name of Itami Momo immediately sprinted towards her elder sister and glomped her. Causing Itami Riyo to sigh in defeat before lecturing the girl on her errant behavior.

"Momo, I don't have time for this."

Despite saying this, Momo had her pinned to the floor, where she commented on her gloomy expression.

"I'm sorry, but it looked like you needed a hug. What's wrong?"

Though Itami did not want to stain her sister's innocent mind with the horrors of war, she felt as if she had nobody else to talk to. If she even mentioned her feelings to any of her advisors, they would take it as a sign of weakness and try to remove her from the office.

Itami Riyo needed to present an image of masculine authority, despite being a woman. Such constant pressure had caused the albino beauty to have many doubts over the years. Ultimately, she sighed once more before telling her sister about her thoughts and feelings.

"I've enabled a monster to do terrible things and I don't know how to stop him..."

Momo looked at her elder sister with an innocent expression as she tried to understand just what Riyo had meant by her statement.

"A monster? You mean like a big scary Oni?"

This naïve expression caused Itami to giggle bitterly. She clutched Momo's head to her breast and stroked her jet black hair while lecturing her on the reality of human nature.

"No Momo, I'm talking about the most dangerous monster of all, a man..."

The adolescent girl's eyes lit up with excitement as she heard this, completely misunderstanding what her sister was trying to tell her.

"Oh, is this the same man from that time you were sulking in the bath? The one who made you suffer a loss? My future brother-in-law?"

Riyo's cheeks flushed red as she heard this. Ever since suffering her first loss to Berengar in North Korea, she had been interested in the man more than usual. However, what information she could gather on Berengar was completely unreliable. I mean, seriously, there were travelling merchants who claimed that they had seen the man light himself on fire and survive without a single burn on his flesh.

Depending on who you asked, Berengar was either a living saint, or a devil in human flesh. Either way, regardless of the perspective, everything she heard about him was so exaggerated it was practically mythical. Itami quickly tried to explain what had happened, but she was so flustered it came out wrong.

"No, not that man, someone far worse!"

Momo rolled her eyes when she heard this. She could not believe her sister was already two-timing on her future husband. No matter what Itami might say, Momo was aware of her condition for getting married, and whoever this mysterious man was, he was the only person she knew of that met the harsh requirement. Momo was so disgusted by her sister's scandalous behavior that she felt compelled to scold her.

"You know, Nee-chan, it's never acceptable for a woman to cheat on her man, even if she is an empress. What would brother-in-law think if he found out you were behaving so shamelessly behind his back?"

Upon hearing this, Itami's face grew even redder. Just what the hell was this little idiot thinking? Cheating? On who? Berengar? She had never even met the man. How was she cheating? Itami took a deep breath before pulling on her sister's cheeks and lecturing the girl on her choice of words.

"Cheating! Whose cheating? I've never even met the man. How can I be cheating? And just what the hell do you mean by your brother-in-law? Since when am I getting married? Stop joking around! I'm trying to be serious here! You know what? Just forget I ever said anything. Clearly, you're not willing to listen to my actual problems!"

Momo could only sigh and leave her sister's room. It was clear to her that Itami was not in the mood for teasing. However, just before she closed the door behind her, she left once piece of serious advice.

"You know, if you have enabled a monster to do horrible things, then it is your responsibility to stop him..."

In response to this, Itami remained utterly silent. Causing Momo to sigh once more before shutting the door behind her. Though Itami didn't say anything, she took her little sister's words to heart. She had decided in that moment that she would write a strongly worded letter to the Bengal Emperor, informing him to cease his criminal behavior, or suffer the consequences. Whether the man would call her bluff or not remained to be seen.