Published at 31st of January 2026 8:14 am

Chapter 849: The Heirs to the Empire

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While Bruno had petitioned the Kaiser for formal retirement. The reality was that he did not retire immediately after returning home.

He was needed after all for the great victory parade that the Kaiser had planned for the entirety of the Reich, and the world beyond to witness.

But such preparations took time, time to plan, time to organize, and more importantly time for logistics to be set up.

While Bruno was a master of logistics, he was retired in everything but name. And Heinrich who had followed in Bruno’s footsteps his entire life was on a similar career path.

If anything, the Victory parade and its completion would be the first major test of the Reichsheer and how it would function after Bruno had left it behind.

But none of that bothered Bruno; he was certain he had left Germany’s military in a place that would secure its future as the dominant world power and global hegemon for the next century.

Instead, he focused on his life at home, with his family, while the Reich celebrated its victory. For the first time in a very long time, Bruno allowed himself to sleep in well beyond the crack of dawn.

There was seldom a time in his life when he did not abide by a standard military sleep schedule.

It was a matter of discipline for him to uphold, even in hours of peace. As one never knew when war would break out, and he would need to resume his duties at a moment’s notice.

If anything, his lying in bed with his wife until well after 10 am was the first act of a man in retirement no longer needing to live his life in a state of permanent vigilance and dread.

It was only after Heidi forced him out of the bed for the morning that the two of them prepared for the day ahead.

And at the breakfast table, which was prepared especially late for the two of them, Heidi finally asked Bruno what he had planned.

"So... tell me, now that your retirement has unofficially begun. What is the plan for today?"

"That’s the thing," Bruno said around a forkful of Bauernfrühstück, savoring it properly before he continued. "I have nothing planned at all. I don’t believe I’ll even step foot in my office today."

Heidi paused mid-sip, studying him over the rim of her cup.

"Nothing?"

Bruno nodded. "Erwin is in Berlin. He’s handling the family business and the postwar contracts. Reconstruction schedules, rail expansion, energy allocations; he’s been buried in it for weeks now."

Heidi smiled faintly. "Of course he has."

"Josef sent word last night," Bruno continued. "The legal framework for the new concessions is already finalized. Protectorate administrations are being integrated, and the ministries are falling in line without complaint."

He shrugged, almost amused by it.

"Heinrich hasn’t left his laboratories since I returned from Korea. Apparently, the end of the war has freed up more funding than he knows what to do with."

Heidi laughed softly at that. "That sounds dangerous."

"It always is," Bruno replied, unbothered. "And Wilhelm..."

He trailed off for a moment, then shook his head.

"If there were anything I needed to know, I would already know it."

Silence settled comfortably between them. Not the tense silence of briefings and reports, but the quiet certainty that everything was being handled.

Heidi set her cup down. "So... they don’t need you today."

Bruno considered that for a long moment.

"No," he said finally. "They don’t."

The realization did not sting the way he had once imagined it might. There was no bitterness in it.

No sense of being cast aside, or the idea that he was somehow failing in his duties. Only the strange, almost disorienting understanding that the world he had built no longer required his constant presence to keep from collapsing.

For decades, every morning had begun with reports, production numbers, troop movements, intelligence summaries, casualty projections. Even in peace, his mind had remained at war.

Today, there was only breakfast growing cold between them, sunlight spilling across the table, and the quiet knowledge that the burdens he had carried for a lifetime were now resting on shoulders he trusted completely.

Bruno leaned back in his chair, exhaling slowly.

"I think," he said at last, "that for today, I’m simply going to be a husband."

Heidi’s smile softened, and for the first time in a very long while, there was no urgency pulling him away from it.

The two of them ate slowly and comfortably. They enjoyed each other’s company and stories over the meal in a way they never truly had the freedom to in the past.

When the plates were finally cleared, Bruno remained seated a moment longer than necessary, hands folded loosely atop the table.

Old instincts tugged at him, an urge to stand, to check the time, to ask after schedules that no longer required his approval.

He caught himself before any of it reached his lips.

Heidi noticed of course. She always did. How could she not, when she had known the man for nearly her entire life?

"You’re thinking again," she said gently.

Bruno huffed out a quiet laugh. "Decades of habit don’t disappear overnight."

He rose at last, not with the sharp efficiency of a marshal answering a summons, but with the unhurried ease of a man who had nowhere else he was required to be.

Crossing the room, he paused by the window and looked out over the estate grounds, paths he had walked countless times without ever truly seeing, gardens planted years ago that had grown without his attention.

Life, he realized, had continued in his absence. Thrived, even.

"They’ll manage," Heidi said, coming to stand beside him. It was not reassurance, only fact.

Bruno nodded. "They already are."

For the first time since his youth, the future did not present itself to him as a threat demanding anticipation or control. It simply... waited, patient, and unimposing.

Soon enough, there would be councils to attend, reforms to oversee, a realm to shepherd into an age that did not require constant war to sustain it.

He would wear another mantle before long, one of governance rather than command.

But not today.

Today belonged to quieter things. To shared glances, unhurried steps, and the unfamiliar comfort of knowing that if the world stumbled, it would no longer be because he had loosened his grip.

And for the first time in a lifetime, that knowledge brought him peace.

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