Richmond, December 1862.
The city smelled of woodsmoke and fear.
Its streets bustled with soldiers, wounded and hale, gray uniforms worn thin by two years of war.
Horses dragged carts piled high with amputated limbs from the hospitals.
Merchants argued over the rising price of flour, their voices cutting sharp against the cold air.
Richmond was still the capital of the Confederacy, but it wore the look of a patient already resigned to its sickness, unable to stomach the true horrors of war.
Into this atmosphere rode Captain Rex, the commander of the Greybacks.
His column of aides and guards drew suspicious eyes as they clattered through the muddy avenues.
Men whispered of him—some with awe, more with dread.
For in the South, the Greybacks had become both talisman and terror: miracle troops who wer undefeated in battle, but also who were mired with stories of bloodshed against civilians.
At the President's mansion, Rex dismounted without ceremony.
A servant bowed stiffly and ushered him through echoing corridors, until he stood in the chamber of Jefferson Davis himself.
The President looked older than Rex remembered.
Davis's face, once pinched but firm, was gaunt now, his eyes hollowed by sleepless nights.
Papers lay in piles upon his desk, maps marked with ink and coffee stains alike.
The air reeked faintly of laudanum.
"Captain Rex,"
Davis said, his voice thin but steady.
"You are here at my order."
Rex saluted, boots snapping together.
"Mr. President."
There was a silence, broken only by the crackle of the fire in the hearth.
Davis rose, pacing slowly.
He stopped before a window, staring out toward the James where smoke from factories clouded the horizon.
"Your Greybacks have become the most infamous name in this war,"
Davis began.
"Our enemies curse you as devils. but at the same time our own people spread rumors of a less than tasteful nature. The tales coming in from Kentucky and Indiana… even here in Richmond, mothers hush their children by threatening that the Greybacks will come for them. Do you know what that does to our cause?"
Rex did not blink.
"It frightens the North into bleeding its own strength, sir. They flee the field of battle before it has even begun, giving us the advantage of being a force the north would not face if given the chance. That fear is worth more than ten regiments."
Davis wheeled on him, eyes flashing.
"Fear cuts both ways. Yes, you have sent wagonloads of supplies from your northern march into our hands. Yes, you have bought us months of breathing room because of them. But at what price? Our people are weary. They do not cheer for massacres of fellow Americans. The South will not be built on pyramids of corpses. You are undermining what little unity we possess. They can accept the death of soliders, as soldiers are always meant to die, but not civilians!"
Rex's jaw tightened.
He took a step closer, his voice low but unyielding.
"With respect, Mr. President, this is war. And war is no gentleman's duel. It is slaughter, it is fire, it is hunger. To refuse to fight with every tool, every cruelty, is to accept defeat before the first shot. The North will not be swayed by soft words or honorable conduct. They understand only ruin. I give them ruin."
For a moment, the chamber seemed to shrink, the two men standing eye to eye—Davis, the frail politician, and Rex, the hardened commander whose hands were already drenched in blood.
Finally Davis sank back into his chair, rubbing his temples.
His voice came soft now, tinged with resignation.
"And yet I am still the President. The war is fought not only on the fields but in the hearts of our people. Already, governors question my leadership. The Congress mutters of my failures. They do not trust me to keep this Confederacy whole. If I am seen to endorse your methods, Captain, I may lose not only my office but the nation itself."
He looked up, his eyes suddenly sharp again.
"Therefore, I must command it. The Greybacks will stand down. No more marches through Northern soil. No more massacres of towns. You may raid at sea, yes, but your army will not march again unless summoned. That is an order."
Rex's face betrayed nothing.
The firelight gleamed on the brass of his buttons as he gave the barest of nods.
"As you wish, Mr. President."
The words were obedience, but his tone was not submission.
Davis leaned back, exhaling as though a weight had lifted from him.
"You may go. And… Captain—pray that history remembers you kindly, though I fear it will not."
Rex saluted once more and departed without another word.
the entire meeting contents were relayed to Elias over the system link.
The Montenegrin master listened in silence as Rex recounted the meeting.
The order to stand down was no surprise; Elias had already suspected as much from the growing murmurs in Richmond.
Still, it forced a question upon him that he had avoided until now.
Was America worth the continued investment?
The war was far from over—three, perhaps even four years still remained in its bloody course.
But what remained to be gained?
Looting had enriched him beyond measure already.
The Union would only harden its defenses from here.
And the Confederates, though eager for his spoils, now recoiled at the very sight of his methods.
Perhaps it was wiser to let them bleed each other without him.
His fleets could continue their coastal raids, stripping the Union of resources and keeping their Navy in perpetual anxiety.
But his armies—his Greybacks—might serve him better elsewhere.
At home in Montenegro, the Greybacks were not merely soldiers.
They were settlers, landowners, a new aristocracy in embryo.
Their survival and their discipline could form the backbone of a new nobility in Elias's baronies, the start of a new police force and local garrisons to protect the newly won territory from possible Ottoman raiders.
His existing riflemen already serving as the Barons, and commisioned officers of the Principalities armies were known to the people with great renown.
And beyond the Balkans, the winds of Europe shifted.
The German lands teetered toward conflict, fractures in the Prussian and Austrian order promising new opportunities for those bold enough to seize them.
When the German Civil War came—and it would come—the Greybacks could carve out honor and power there, not as mercenaries but as kingmakers.
Or using the Civil War as a distraction within which to launch their own war to furhter expand the borders of the principality while reducing Ottoman lands, and possible emerging nations born of their decaying flesh.
He didnt yet have the force of arms, nor the economic growth to sustain a true nation, but with enough time, Elias would do as the system asked and conquer this world.
The Greybacks had spilled enough American blood.
Perhaps now it was time for them to claim a future of their own.