Reincarnated as the Crown Prince-Chapter 52: Adopting

The thunder of iron hooves echoed through the cobbled plaza outside the Palacio Real, scattering pigeons and pausing foot traffic as the Glanzreich delegation arrived beneath a veil of heavy gray clouds. Their carriages bore the twin-headed eagle crest, burnished but austere—an empire that spoke in centuries rather than speeches.

Inside the war room turned planning chamber, Lancelot stood over a map of northern Madrid. Ink smudged the borders of projected sanitation zones, sewer lines, and work depots. Beside him, Alicia held a thin leather folio while Bellido, arms crossed and boots still muddy, stared flatly at a pile of translated inspection forms from Lavapiés.

"They’ll be colder than the Britannians," Alicia said, flipping a page. "They come from a culture that sees change as threat."

Bellido grunted. "They’ll see numbers. Pipes. Disease graphs. That’s what matters."

"No," Lancelot said. "They’ll see power shifting away from the estates. That’s what they’ll fear."

A sharp knock interrupted them.

"Your Highness," a steward said, stepping in. "The Glanzreich envoys await you in the east reception hall."

Lancelot adjusted his collar and turned to Alicia. "Let’s greet the old world, shall we?"

—

The Glanzreich delegation was fewer in number than Britannia’s, but denser in posture. Their leader, Baron Otto von Remlingen, was a broad man with deep-set eyes and the gait of a noble raised in stone corridors. Beside him were an engineer in black uniform, a church-appointed sanitary advisor in dull brown robes, and two secretaries with sealed chests of paper.

Introductions were stiff. Formal. They spoke Castilian fluently, but coldly.

"We are here," Otto began, "to assess the methods used in your urban reconstruction—particularly as they pertain to public health and social cohesion."

"In other words," Alicia whispered to Lancelot, "they want to know if your reforms are contagious."

They skipped the pleasantries and proceeded directly to the northern wards.

Unlike the southern quarters already flushed with activity, the northern expansion was a battlefield of scaffolds and organized chaos. Training grounds had been erected beside construction sites—half school, half factory. Dozens of young men, some still in dusty apprentices’ uniforms, repeated drills with chalk diagrams and filtration components. Their instructors barked commands like officers in an army.

"Your sanitation schools," Otto said, watching a mason-in-training assemble a gravel layer under supervision. "You’re institutionalizing labor."

"We’re professionalizing it," Lancelot corrected.

"Same root word," the Glanzreicher replied.

Bellido stepped forward, gesturing at a newly-laid tunnel mouth. "This entire block will serve as a prototype district. Work here not only builds, it trains the builders of the next. Within two years, half of Castile could have local teams trained in Madrid’s methods." ƒгeewёbnovel.com

"That," the church advisor muttered, "would be an unprecedented centralization of knowledge."

Lancelot raised a brow. "Would you rather we centralized cholera?"

The priest did not answer.

They continued the tour. The delegation scribbled notes, marked locations, and murmured in their native tongue. Otto remained silent for much of it, though his eyes never stopped measuring—the width of the tunnels, the number of workers, the age of the boys being trained.

Finally, back at the surface, the baron turned to Lancelot as rain began to mist over the clay-packed roads.

"We admire your efficiency, Your Highness," he said. "But not all nations are blessed with your... unity of command."

"Then unify by example," Lancelot replied. "Or rot piecemeal."

Otto gave a humorless smile. "Empires do not rot. They petrify."

—

That evening, the Glanzreich delegation was given a more modest reception—a private dinner in a narrow hall once used for military briefings. No orchestra played, only the soft clinking of utensils and the occasional scrape of a chair. The food was hearty, the wine sparse.

Otto set down his fork. "If you permit candor, Your Highness—your methods remind us more of industrial syndicates than sovereign rule."

"Because I do not decorate failure with lace?" Lancelot asked calmly.

"Because you prioritize output over inheritance."

The words hung in the air.

Alicia cut in. "And yet, you came to observe. That suggests something else."

"It suggests we must understand the disease before it spreads," Otto replied.

Lancelot stood. "Then let me be clear. If your world fears a city that builds, feeds, and cleans itself—then you’re not afraid of me. You’re afraid of a future without your leash."

The baron did not respond. But his priest looked away first.

—

Later that night, long after the delegation had retired to their quarters under watchful palace guards, Lancelot and Alicia returned to the war chamber. The model of Madrid now shared the table with a second one—unfinished, less detailed.

It was Iberia.

Lancelot traced the outlines. Valencia. Seville. Porto.

"We’ll need five more regional schools," he said. "One for each major basin. The central engineers can’t carry this alone."

"We’ll need new partners too," Alicia added. "If Glanzreich doesn’t bite, maybe Napoli. Marseille. Even Algiers."

Lancelot didn’t answer immediately.

He looked to the southern tip of the map. Gibraltar. Then north, where the Pyrenees marked the edge of old fears.

"The ones who watch will soon follow," he said. "And the ones who mock... will pay to catch up."

"Or try to tear it down," Alicia murmured.

He nodded slowly. "Then we dig deeper."

The map of Iberia remained spread out across the oak table like a battlefield awaiting conquest. Candlelight flickered against the edges of the parchment, casting shifting shadows over mountain ranges and coastlines. Prince Lancelot’s finger hovered over Zaragoza before tracing a slow path toward Valencia.

"There’s a water table here," he murmured, "too shallow for deep tunneling. But if we reroute the channels, build aboveground cisterns—"

"We’ll need to reinforce the foundations," Alicia finished for him. "And retrain every local crew to work with pressurized systems."

"That’s doable."

He stepped back and crossed his arms. For a moment, he just studied the map in silence—less a ruler and more a strategist staring down the stubborn shape of his country’s old bones.

"You know what frightens them the most?" Lancelot asked suddenly.

Alicia looked up. "What?"

"That I’m not demanding they believe in me. I’m demanding they adapt."

He turned toward the far wall, where a chalkboard had been filled edge to edge with names of municipalities, projected disease rates, labor estimates, and supply chains. It was a constellation of logistics, constantly updated by clerks, assistants, and engineers rotating in and out of the chamber around the clock.

Alicia rose from her seat, moving beside him. "You can’t plan every reaction, Lancelot. Some will resist out of pride. Others out of fear."

"Then we outlast them."

There was steel in his voice now—tempered, quiet, but absolute.

A knock broke the hush.

A junior officer stepped inside, hat in hand. "Message from Porto, Your Highness. The local council has voted unanimously to adopt the Madrid sanitation model. They’ve requested a delegation of engineers and an initial equipment shipment."

Lancelot smiled faintly. "That makes three cities this week. They are really adapting very fast, making it easy for me to rule over this realm."

"Four," Alicia corrected. "A rider came this morning from Cordoba. The mayor’s office has expressed interest—unofficially, of course."

"Of course."

The officer saluted and stepped out, leaving the two alone again.

"Then it’s begun," Alicia said. "The wave."

"It’s not a wave," Lancelot replied, walking back to the Iberian map. "It’s a tide. Slow. Relentless. And we’ll ride it."

He picked up a charcoal stick and drew a faint arc from Madrid to Lisbon, marking cities along the route with a soft tap.

"First the sewers. Then waterworks. Then power. We won’t stop until there’s a spine of infrastructure running from Gibraltar to Galicia."

Alicia hesitated. "And what of the court?"

Lancelot didn’t answer right away.

"They’ll try to check you," she said gently. "The nobles. The old families. They’ll say you’re overreaching. Acting like a king."

"I’m doing what they never dared to do," Lancelot said, his eyes hardening. "I won’t let this country rot from its roots just to keep their illusions alive."

He paused, then looked toward the windows. The sky outside had turned a deep iron-gray, the kind that carried rain and warnings both.

"But I will give them a choice," he added. "Join us—or be left behind."

As the candlelight flickered, he walked back to the war table and set down the charcoal. His gaze fell on the twin maps—Madrid and Iberia—side by side.

He placed a hand on each.

"We started with mud," he whispered. "Now we build a nation."

Outside, the rain began to fall in earnest. But beneath the streets of Madrid, the drains ran clear. The people slept easier, the air smelled sweeter, and the first great breath of a reborn Iberia moved silently through the tunnels below.

And in the palace above, a young regent with clay on his boots and steel in his spine prepared to carry that breath to the furthest corners of his realm—until the old world had no choice but to breathe with him... or drown in their decay.

Visit freewe𝑏n(o)v𝒆l.𝑐𝘰𝑚 for the best novel reading experience