Of Pride and Power - 29. Chapter 27: “Preach the need to change, but never reform too much at once.”

Over the next three years, Robert and I made several trips to Avalon located in Greenland. The discovery of the treasure trove of cores was by itself instrumental, but the equipment and notes that Merlin left behind were even more important. The two-hundred-thirty-three cores had been depleted over a thousand years by the facility supercomputer and twelve guardians, whose consciousness existed in one core and consumed a core every 60 years. Merlin had left very little room for error because the geothermal failsafe mechanism within the facility was a few weeks away from activation, which would have destroyed the entire island and buried the cores in magma. If I had not found the coded rune message in Glastonbury in the Spring, Gard and his comrades would have died in vain. Additionally, the revelation that Merlin was complicit in numerous deaths due to the irradiation defense system of the facility that bordered the town. I know my partner never intended to cause mass deaths, but he had to prepare a wide range of weapons in case various opposition parties wanted to seize the important cores in his possession. The Viking settlement probably triggered the weapon system by accident. It was a regrettable side-effect of my partner’s cautious personality.

The gains were immeasurable, beyond the anticipated acquisition of 233 cores; though most of them were depleted, I could recharge them all using my displacement ability. We also gained an elite fair folk military unit known as the Second Knights of the Round Table, geothermal electric generators, and several enhanced genetic resequencing and body modification equipment for creating Omegas based on my biology as a template.

Gard’s group were artificial androids, living machines with human consciousness. I could appreciate their sleek construction, while humanoid with a head, two arms, and two legs, they were composed of enhanced composite armor plates and weapons components that could be exchanged for specific engagement roles. Essentially, Merlin made mech warriors, which I can’t help appreciating like any Otaku with a slight interest in the genre. While only 12 of them existed, their offensive and defensive capabilities were equivalent to a modern army corps of 10,000 troops due to inhuman strength, reflexes, perception, and weaponry. However, by giving up their humanity in exchange for such an existence, Gard and his comrades were a special kind of soldier with absolute loyalty and belief despite their quirks.

Gard had pleaded to join me in England, but a dozen seven-foot-tall mech warriors in London would have raised major issues for both domestic relations from the nobles at court and foreign policy for the emissaries visiting from opposing nations, who were wary of my growing power. I also wanted to keep these mech warriors as a closely guarded secret only to my trusted military personnel and fair folk leadership; even ministers like William Cecil and William Paulet would not be told of their existence. I did agree to bring six of the knights, but they had to pretend to be statues. Robert covered their bodies in stone and clay, so they resembled gothic demonic statues, like the famous Gargoyles in medieval churches.

Geothermal electric power generation was another major discovery at Avalon. While on paper, our diesel generators could produce electricity as well, there was no easily accessible source of oil or a refinery for fuel in Greenland at this time. The cores could be used for power, but they would be better served in military deterrent vehicles like the Dreadnaught and large-scale industrial complexes, which the steel foundries and factories of Aberafan in Southern Wales had proven within a few years of use. Still, it took nearly three thousand workers and several square miles of improvised refining, manufacturing, and assembling plants. Like my opponents in the Habsburg empire, I could not fully utilize the amazing energy that a single core could generate due to limited materials. However, in comparison to the cumbersome Sky Fortress and armored personnel carriers with industrial materials equivalent to 1920s levels of quality, our industrial equipment and the finished products had superior quality, equivalent to 1940s-level materials. My allies and I understood that our key advantages against the Habsburg Empire and Roman Papal state were due to Robert’s materialization and my encyclopedic knowledge abilities working in tandem with raw materials and cores.

At Avalon, our abilities were magnified with the presence of late 20^th century and early 21^st century equivalent electronics technology that could improve output through the input of electricity. Geothermal energy required a massive upfront investment and a special seismic active location, which were met at Avalon. With some construction and engineering work by Robert, who built 10 additional pools and generators, the facility's electricity production went up from 600 Kilowatts to 3.6 Megawatts. As 600 kilowatts would be required to power a single Electric Arc Furnace, or EAF, at Aberafan, a core was needed to draw power for the three EAFs and other equipment since we couldn’t spare that much-refined diesel to generate electricity. In contrast, natural geothermal energy was able to sustain a similar energy output. In addition, Avalon had automated fabrication and refining equipment, which operated with electronics based on silicon and rare earth element components, whose limits exceeded the crude analog equipment at Aberafan. In my mind, I drew a comparison between two similar-sized factories: a Ford Motors factory from 1923 producing 320 vehicles per day versus a Tesla Motors factory in 2023 producing 1,714 vehicles per day. Automation and electronic components inherently have a massive advantage. Sadly, we couldn’t reproduce transistors or semiconductors to replicate even a fraction of Avalon’s efficient equipment at that point. Still, even by only improving Avalon alone, we increased our national industrial capacities which would have taken decades of work in a manner of weeks.

The most important discovery was the transition equipment to create Omegas. With the successful transition of Takechiyo into an Omega, Merlin’s process authenticity was confirmed to the fair folk who heard about the expedition when we returned to Bristol. The impressive equipment for Omega conversion was the fulfillment of the ancient promise, but the machinery could not be moved from Avalon to England due to their integration with five cores performing genetic resequencing, biochemical balancing, body reconfiguring, brain sustaining, and biological analyzing functions. As a result, the process of creating Omegas would have to occur in Greenland for the time being until scientific developments progress to the point when the technology can be replicated. Since the procedure requires five hours, it would take a year for the entire queue of fair folk seeking Omega conversion to be met.

As such, a permanent presence would be needed in the area, so I chartered the creation of the first English colony in Greenland. The area in my history should not be colonized until 1721, when the Kingdom of Denmark having integrated with Norway would begin colonization of the subcontinent. As the land is cold and harsh with geologic instability, it was not considered an ideal place for colonization in contrast to North America or South America. I had considered the possibility of colonization when I first awoke as Elias Tudor, but unfortunately, there were very few locations for settlement. In contrast with my timeline, the Habsburg Empire with component Spanish and Portuguese territories had not only completed their conquest of South America, but they had also expanded into most of sub-Saharan Africa and the Middle East. In addition to those circumstances, the Roman Papal State with component French and Italian territories had already acquired most of the land that would have formed the eastern and western seaboard of the United States. Thus, future English colonial establishment would be limited to lands further north in Canadian territories, Alaska, Iceland, and Greenland, so I did not prioritize English colonial efforts in my initial plans. However, the existence of Avalon had made it a necessity to expand into the northern tundra.

Creating a colony is not a simple thing, especially in the harsh conditions of Greenland. Even five hundred years later in my timeline, this large island only held a population of under 60,000 people. Very few people wanted to move to inhospitable land, where arable land was sparse and crop varieties were limited. The first Omega settlers and their partners only numbered a few thousand; even with an Omega's greater ability at reproduction than women, it took six generations to equal the population of my era. While people now may think Greenland is a winter wonderland for the Omega majority population and Parliamentarians have passed a Dominion self-rule status, many hard decisions had to be made.

In 1560, when I was dealing with the ramifications of Avalon’s discovery, I was confronted with my first major issue as ruler of England. The dislocation caused by Mary’s policies led to a humanitarian issue throughout England, Wales, and Ireland. Various minority populations had been dislocated and many Protestant believers were fiercely repressed under her reign. These people demanded new homes and vengeance against their Catholic English oppressors. In my history, there should have been three major religious factions in England at this point: Anglican Protestants, Puritan Protestants, and Catholics. New laws had to be enacted, which under the current circumstances could not be like the 1559 Religious Settlement between Catholics and Protestants that Elizabeth I had. While I had no real love for Christianity in either form, being a nominal foe of Catholicism’s current leadership and being labeled an abomination of a future Protestant sect, there would be civil disorder if I allowed Protestants to persecute Catholics as they were once persecuted. I ruled a nation that had no context for ideological pluralism just as my historical counterpart.

In addition, the fair folk’s beliefs in me as a divine figure and their focus on scientific experimentation became another flashpoint. They held a good alternative compared to the dueling world systems, but these were foreign concepts to most medieval mindsets with low literacy rates and agrarian cultures. Several breakthroughs were made in western England between my military and industrial workers, who were influenced by religious leaders loyal to me like John Knox. My military forces were all taught and indoctrinated to an extent by the fair folk as well, which I grudgingly accepted to maintain discipline and loyalty. As protestant priests in western England were far too conservatively minded for my taste, I had John Knox send some of his disciples from Scotland to perform sermons and services. The new Scottish religious migrants in western England created an atmosphere for cultural exchange, reducing what little affected Mary’s ethnic English policies. Due to these changes, the rise of a new religious sect, Via Veritas Vita, based on scientific knowledge, truth, and Omegas replaced the creation of a Puritan faction. The protestant nobles were unhappy with this development, but since they were loyal to the English crown, they tolerated these followers up to a point. The breaking point was Omega transitions, which would violate the fundamental tenets of their scriptural faith.

To the Protestant scholars, if God created man and woman, how can I or others defile his divine plan by creating another vestige of humanity? When I first heard this line of argument from so-called religious experts, it took all my fortitude not to throw out these useless scholars, who uttered it in front of me. It was a backhanded insult to me. However, many members of my Privy Council and the Parliament at large would be angered by such actions, so I had to accept the religious filth.

As there was no tradition of respecting minority groups or civil rights at this point in history, the supremacy of nobility and wealthy landowners was dominant. The majority protestant representation among nobles and landowners had a significant influence on laws and ordinances. To secure support for my claim on the throne, William Paulet and William Cecil offered favorable conditions such as returning autonomy to nobles for administration, which Mary had taken away. As monarch, I could override the objections of nobles, but, like Mary before me, it would make ruling very difficult as nobles controlled the various administrative and logistical aspects of the kingdom, including major urban population centers in eastern England and mineral rights in northern England. Even in my timeline, England did not develop a centralized bureaucracy to support its government organization, preferring decentralization through its nobles for centuries. It was a legacy issue that became a major impediment for the fair folk and others, who wished to become an Omega.

During this period, despite their nominal alliance with Mary and England’s Catholic faction, Catherine de Medici and Papal legates were making overtures to ambitious English Protestant nobles. This kind of political juxtaposition was like how Protestant German princes were made to fight one another by a similar foreign policy after the peace of Augsburg. Like the German princes in my timeline, the English Protestant nobles were also interested in gaining power in their own right, especially those with blood ties to the throne. My foreign opponents sent support in the form of modern weapons and newly designed vehicles including tracked tanks, which I could not prevent or forbid due to nobles' independence rule.

My allies in Western England did not take this impasse lying down either. While the nobles may dominate government posts and territorial governance, the military and scientific arms of the government were firmly in favor of allowing Omega procedures for the public. In addition, due to Mary’s purges in Ireland, the depleted population was interested in the possibility of reviving their numbers through the Omega conversion despite the religious consequences, since the gestation time for an Omega was only five months versus nine for a woman. A counter-petition led by Oberon and various leaders from the West came to me in London, to push support for Omega transitions. Due to our innovations and industrial productivity, western England was a major economic center in England. Additionally, most of the modern military forces, training camps, and munitions factories were located there. However, western England lacked the necessary population that resided in eastern England. I thought beyond religious reasons, Protestant nobles opposed Omega transitions due to the fear that western England could displace other regions' importance. They weren’t wrong and I did want to eliminate hereditary roles of nobility in England to be replaced with meritocratic appointed officers.

A major societal settlement was going to be needed.

In my timeline, Elizabeth I had used troops to secure various priests and nobles of Catholic and Protestant faiths in their rooms until both sides agreed to a religious settlement. As the city of London still had a garrison of three thousand royal army and one thousand royal marines troops, I borrowed the same playbook; though, I did house my allies in nicer rooms in the newly rebuilt Hampton Court and Whitehall palaces versus housing Catholic and Protestant representatives in less favorable accommodations in the Tower of London. I had my preferred outcome just as my historical counterpart at gunpoint if needed.

Between 1560-1563, a long series of debates and compromises were made between all three factions. While this process occurred, a small group of soldiers, fair folk, and refugees settled in Greenland near Avalon. The fair folk and refugees, who wished to undergo the Omega transitions, were allowed to proceed on their own accord. Luna and Phoebe were programmed to support their health and transition process, so it was not an issue. As Omegas were not legally recognized in England at this time, these first Omegas could not return to England or its recognized territories like Ireland. As the Greenland settlement was a nominal military installation under my direct command, I used the tricks of extraterritoriality and military operations to begin the process without a budget or additional people. However, due to the tundra nature of Greenland and the limited farming land for food crops, we couldn’t support a large population near Avalon. They became the first settlers.

In the meantime, several laws were passed in England that were reminiscent of their historical counterparts. The first was the Act of Unity, which corresponded to the historical Act of Uniformity in codifying beliefs and rituals. To stabilize the realm, religious practices would be based on common observances and local rites at the discretion of individuals and their lords, who may or may not provide the means for the practice of the individual's faith but cannot deny them the right to observe if it does not interfere with the normal course of business. Wine and wafers, for example, may be served during Sunday services, but the local lord may or may not offer the means for individuals to obtain such items. Common religious holidays such as Easter, Christmas, and Thanksgiving were installed as national holidays, along with secular holidays such as Founders’ Day on October 14^th, honoring the Battle of Hastings, which would be granted to all commoners and nobles. Saturday and Sunday would be days of rest, honoring the different interpretations of the Sabbath, while a day of work would be set by each noble for their territory. Priests would be organized and nominated by their religious orders, parish, or congregations, but in the eyes of the state, all religious sects are equal in status for protection and obligations such as taxes and drafts. As the Veritas sect held equal status with Anglican and Catholic factions, their practices were also protected under this act. Finally, the Act of Unity forbids religious sects from taking oaths or orders with external leaders or sources, not recognized by the English monarch. This effectively cut off the Catholic Church’s believers from Rome’s control, while allowing them to practice individually. Essentially, I wanted to create a split that was akin to the Episcopal Church and Anglican Communion. This act achieved what the original Act of Uniformity did, codify religious order and end the chaotic English Reformation.

The Act of Supremacy was removed by Mary I in 1554 as it was in my history, but she had gone further in actively hunting Protestants and non-English peoples within her domain. A new Act of Supremacy would not be enough to reverse what she did. Thus, the Act of Primacy was created; ironically, I used the Declaration of Independence as a template for the writing.

“In the chronicles of human affairs, when it becomes requisite for a people to affirm the primacy of governance under a sovereign monarch, and to establish the tenets upon which such governance shall rest, it is fitting to declare the reasons for an Act of Primacy to support necessary principles and duties.

We, the Parliament, and the People of the realm hold these truths to be self-evident, that all individuals are endowed with innate rights bestowed upon them by Divine ordinance, and amongst these are the preservation of life, liberty, property, and the practice of one's faith without undue coercion.

In recognition of these truths, we, the Parliament, and the People of the realm submit to the authority of the Crown as the supreme arbitrator, acknowledging the necessity of a central authority to safeguard these rights and maintain societal order.

Furthermore, we, the Parliament, and the People of the realm acknowledge that under the patronage of the Crown, the preservation of life, liberty, property, and faith shall be secured against all adversaries, be they foreign or domestic. We avow our allegiance to the Crown and pledge our unwavering support to uphold its authority in matters of such defense.

Furthermore, we proclaim that any other form of governance enacted before this act that transgresses or suppresses the liberties of its subjects shall be deemed unlawful and subject to resistance by those who uphold the precepts of this Act of Primacy.

We vow our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor to the defense of these precepts and the perpetuation of a just and equitable realm under the auspices of the Crown.”

It may not be as eloquent as the source material from my timeline due to various wording compromises between my advisors, but it became the basis for the first constitutional rights within English law. However, to enact this act, I had to make major concessions with Protestant nobles, including the removal of the garrison around London and northern England. In exchange, their troops would be used to protect these areas, being granted the honor of “Royal Troops” and having access to advanced firearms. Among all the things that I have done in my long life, I regretted this concession most of all. Not only myself, but my advisors like William Cecil and William Parr hesitated with the idea of removing my loyal military forces. William Paulet, leading the moderate faction, made the argument that none of us could refute.

“How can Aelfric Elias Tudor reign with a sword at the throats of the very people, who this act professes to defend?” he asked me.

William Paulet, despite what many may say about his true intentions in various histories, was just trying to maintain a semblance of the old order. He wanted the idealized version of nobility and monarchy that famously was portrayed in literature and poetry, where monarchs protected noble interests and did not interfere with their affairs. Nobles in turn would pledge loyalty and defend the kingdom for such protection and freedom. He spent a lot of time persuading hardliners to accept the Act of Primacy and should not be faulted for his genuine efforts. His faults were in his naïve notions that a rapidly progressing nation like ours could maintain such quaint notions. People like him are good advisors to temper excess idealism, but moderates have a fatal flaw when their altruism is used by more extreme factions.

In contrast to moderates like William Paulet, William Cecil was a true pragmatist and realist in my service. He sided with William Paulet to stabilize my reign and to mollify the nobles. Then, he shifted his opinion and got support from traditional military commanders like Willam Parr and Edward Clinton against the military concessions. Even though the latter move could not sway noble opinions, Parr and Clinton’s support was useful. I used my authority and support from them to construct military bases in Norwich and Harwich. On paper, there should only be a small garrison of 500 troops at Norwich and 2 frigates at Harwich until the fortresses were built. The workforce for the construction project of the fortresses would be composed of 10,000 troops acting as combat engineers. The combat engineers were the culmination of a decade’s worth of graduates of the Seahawk training base in Cornwall. As you know, combat engineers are in truth Royal Marines in reserve, who are on passive duty during peacetime engaging in construction and industrial projects. However, in the 1560s, the knowledge of this reserve designation for these troops was not well-known to anyone except military commanders like William Parr and Frances Howard. Placing them in Norwich, which was a day away from London, would allow commanders to send rapid response teams back to London even without access to motorized vehicles.

Naval transport would be handled by 12 new Auxiliary Cruisers, operating as normal cargo vessels. They could be rapidly re-armed with three 12-in. and three flak guns stowed below deck within twenty minutes on turret platforms. Movable deck guns were an innovation that improved the flexibility of warships; though mobile turret platforms had inherent weight and recoil damage limitations, so they could not compete with Dauntless-class cruisers or Dreadnaught-class battleships in terms of pure firepower. However, they were far more powerful than knave-class frigates, so Admiral Clinton and I classified these hybrid warships as Auxiliary Cruisers.

Even with these measures, I had radically reduced my total military force around England, creating an opening for the worst event in my reign.