Reincarnated as the Crown Prince
Chapter 43: Terms of Surrender Part 2

Chapter 43: Terms of Surrender Part 2

The night air in Paris was crisp and still, carrying none of the fire or smoke that had once choked its streets in past revolutions. Instead, the lamps glowed steadily across every boulevard reclaimed by Aragonese engineers. The clang of steel and hammer continued well into the evening—not to raise barricades, but to rebuild them into rail platforms and telegraph stations.

Inside the Hôtel de Ville, the great hall had been reset.

Fresh candles lit the table where the Francois delegation now returned, no longer shrouded in pride. Their coats were neater, their expressions composed—resigned, even. Jules Tremblay led the way, a leather folio in his gloved hands. The others followed with slower steps, fatigue heavy in their shoulders.

On the Aragonese side, Lancelot remained seated this time. Alicia and Montiel flanked him. Two military scribes sat to one side, prepared to transcribe the final version of whatever agreement would be ratified.

Tremblay stood across from them and opened his folio.

"We have reviewed your demands," he said.

"And?" Alicia asked.

"We will accept them... with three requests for amendment."

Lancelot gestured for him to continue.

"First," Tremblay said, "you demand complete disbandment of all military forces. We request that five regiments—no more—be permitted to remain under local command to preserve order in the outer provinces, under Aragonese supervision. These units will be disarmed of artillery and limited to provincial gendarmerie duties."

Montiel gave Lancelot a nod. "Strategically manageable."

Alicia added, "On condition that officers are vetted. No republican radicals, no political appointees. Any found guilty of prior atrocities will be stripped of rank."

"Agreed," Tremblay said.

He continued, "Second: the reparations. Seven years of resource tribute will crush what’s left of our rural economies. We ask that the first year’s yield be returned to French markets for domestic sale, with Aragonese oversight. It will stabilize food prices and prevent riots."

Lancelot tapped his fingers on the table.

"Only if Aragonese trains are the ones to carry and distribute that food. And all profits beyond base cost return to the Reconstruction Ministry."

Tremblay gave a faint nod. "So long as the food reaches the people, we will not object."

He hesitated before unfolding the last parchment.

"And third: a symbolic clause."

Montiel raised a brow.

Tremblay looked up. "Allow the Provisional Republic to sign the act of surrender not in disgrace, but as a gesture of unity. Let us retain a ceremonial role—limited, honorary, but visible. Let the world believe this was transition, not eradication."

A long silence followed.

Lancelot leaned forward.

"No flags. No seals. No thrones for your ghosts."

He paused.

"But you may have a sentence."

Tremblay blinked. "A sentence?"

"In the charter," Lancelot said, "we will include this line: ’Signed with the mutual intent of restoring peace and order to the continent.’"

Montiel looked sharply at him, but Alicia understood. The Regent wasn’t showing mercy—he was giving them a page to retreat into, a curtain behind which their pride could hide.

Tremblay nodded, slowly.

"We accept."

Then, Jean Delorme stepped forward with trembling hands and laid a worn quill on the table.

"This was the Assembly’s ceremonial pen," he said quietly. "It was last used to ratify the Citizen’s Constitution. We offer it for this final act."

Lancelot didn’t take the pen. Alicia did.

"It will be preserved," she said. "In Lyon. In our national archives. As a record of what came before."

The documents were brought forward. Four sets.

The Francois signed first—Tremblay, Roux, Delorme, and the bishop. One by one, their names etched into history not as saviors or rebels—but as the last voices of a crumbling idea.

Then Lancelot stood.

He signed with a firm hand. Alicia followed. Montiel last.

And with the final stroke, the war in France was over.

The next day, Paris awoke not to cannon or mourning—but to bells.

Church bells, city bells, and even the newly repaired station clocks ringing in harmony across the capital. Crowds emerged cautiously, watching as Aragonese soldiers began removing sandbags from intersections and replaced them with guideposts, ration stations, and printed public notices.

One such notice read:

By Decree of His Highness Regent Lancelot, The Provisional Restoration Agreement is Now in Effect.

All citizens are guaranteed protection of life, property, and profession.

Former republican officials shall present themselves to the Hôtel de Ville within three days for amnesty or reassignment.

Aragonese law now applies within all departments of former Francois territory.

Public schooling will resume in one week, under joint curriculum oversight.

Curfews are lifted. Rail access will resume on a district basis.

At the Luxembourg Gardens, schoolchildren watched as Aragonese officers distributed readers and writing slates. One young girl asked her teacher what "syllabus" meant. The teacher, who had taught revolutionary poetry just weeks before, now read aloud from an Aragonese history text with a steady voice.

In the Grand Post Office, engineers finished wiring a full telegraph station by midday. Messages flowed outward—news of peace, terms of surrender, and instructions for regional governors to begin transition. Across Europe, the ripple effect was immediate.

In Glanzreich, the Kaiser’s War Cabinet drafted a bill to form a new Ministry of Mechanization.

In Britannia, public protests broke out in the port city of Dover. Veterans demanded investment in new infrastructure: "If Aragon can take a continent with coal and steel, so can we!"

In Sardegna, the king issued a royal commission to study railway integration across the Apennines.

And in the Ottoman Empire, the sultan’s advisers debated whether to open their ports to Aragonese locomotives—ostensibly for trade, but secretly to gain blueprints.

None dared challenge Aragon directly.

Not anymore.

Back in Paris, Lancelot visited the newly organized Ministry of Reformation, where French and Aragonese clerks now shared desks. Alicia handed him the first citywide census results.

"Population intact: 1.1 million. Refugees returning from the countryside. Markets reopening in every arrondissement."

He took the page, reading it quietly.

"They will not love us yet," she added. "But they obey."

Lancelot looked up, meeting her gaze.

"They don’t have to love us," he said. "Only trust that the trains run, the bread is warm, and the future is stable."

She nodded.

They stepped outside together onto the Hôtel de Ville’s balcony, where the flag of Aragon still fluttered beside the white banner of the City of Paris.

Below, Parisians moved with purpose—not as conquered, but as part of something reborn.

And Lancelot spoke, not to Alicia, but to the wind.

"The war was the easy part," he said.

"Now comes empire."

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