“So, you are describing a business that doesn’t exist, funded by money that isn’t there?” Manasseh asked, his voice trailing off as he processed the sheer audacity of the scheme.

“The money certainly exists,” I corrected him. “Once the word spreads, more and more capital will come flooding in from every corner of Europe.”

“But when the flow of new investments stops… ah.”

“Exactly. We simply vanish before that happens.”

Manasseh fell into a long, profound silence. It seemed the sheer weight of twenty-first-century financial chicanery was a bit much even for a scholar of his caliber.

“I… I see,” he whispered finally. “It is an astounding plan. Truly grand, utterly cunning… Good heavens, I finally understand why the other rabbis were making such a fuss. They saw the divine spark in your deviousness.”

I leaned back, warming to my topic. “By draining the treasuries of the European monarchs in this fashion, we will effectively cripple their ability to wage war. When the mercenaries stop receiving their wages, they’ll turn into a lawless rabble. Eventually, they’ll exhaust even their capacity for looting. When that happens, a voice will rise from the depths of society—a demand to end this madness.”

I was banking on public opinion forcing a peace.

My memory of the Thirty Years’ War from historical comics was a bit fuzzy, but I was fairly certain the original conflict hadn’t unfolded with such synchronized chaos. In the history I knew, the interventions were sequential: first the Bohemian revolt, then the Danish invasion, followed by the Swedish landing. Even Britain had remained largely on the sidelines.

But this timeline was different. Everyone had charged into the fray at once. Powers like Britain and the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, who had originally been minor players or non-combatants, were now fully entangled. This meant the intensity of the war was far higher than it should have been. Even without France’s active participation, the sheer exhaustion of the continent would soon reach a breaking point. Peace was inevitable.

Or so I thought. Manasseh ben Israel tilted his head, looking troubled.

“It is a brilliant strategy, Sire, but I fear it may not unfold as smoothly as you hope. While it could end the war, my mind conjures a far more horrific alternative.”

“A more horrific alternative?” I asked, my brow furrowing. “What are you thinking?”

Manasseh murmured to himself for a moment, his eyes searching the air as if reading an invisible script.

“I do not believe these monarchs will abandon the war simply because they are drowning in debt,” he said. “This conflict is too vital to their survival and their souls. If their treasuries run dry, they will only become more desperate. They may grant their mercenaries even greater license for cruelty—authorizing total destruction and systematic plunder as a substitute for wages.”

“I’ve considered that possibility,” I replied. “But a desperate mercenary company is far easier for our agents to manipulate than a well-fed one.”

“Can you manipulate every single mercenary in the Empire?” Manasseh countered.

I hesitated. “Well… no.”

“No monarch will abandon their throne just because they are bankrupt,” Manasseh continued relentlessly. “In fact, they will simply declare insolvency and ignore their debts entirely.”

“Is that even possible?” I started to ask, before the truth hit me with the force of a physical blow.

Of course it’s possible. This wasn’t the twenty-first century.

In my modern mind, I had assumed that a state bankruptcy meant a total shutdown of the national machinery. I thought it would at least place limits on a ruler’s ability to hire foreign armies or fund overseas expeditions. In a capitalist society, credit is everything.

But 17th-century Europe was only just witnessing the first sprouts of capitalism. The very first joint-stock company was barely thirty years old. This was an era where political power could ruthlessly crush the influence of capital. If a sovereign declared he wouldn’t pay, who would dare demand their rights as a creditor? This was an age where a monarch’s debts were a suggestion, and the threats of moneylenders were nothing more than a punchline.

Using a Ponzi scheme to bankrupt the kings and stop the war? It might work for a time, and with a staggering amount of luck, it might even bring a resolution. But if luck failed?

It would be exactly as Manasseh feared. The armies, funded through the ‘legal’ and ‘appropriate’ means of absolute pillage and destruction, would continue to slaughter one another in a landscape even more wretched than before.

I couldn’t stop the Ponzi scheme now, and emptying the royal vaults would certainly have some effect. But it wouldn’t be the killing blow. To kill this monster of a religious war, I needed to drive a dagger straight into its heart.

I needed another move.

“Ultimately, we cannot force the monarchs to act, can we?” Manasseh asked gently, noticing my grim expression. “We are doing our best. If the vaults are truly empty, surely they will at least consider a truce…”

I tried to relax my face, chewing on his words. It was a bitter pill, but he was right. There were limits to our influence. I wasn’t a telepath; I couldn’t make the Emperor and the princes hold hands and reconcile. We were doing everything we could. Public opinion didn’t carry the weight it would in the 19th century; war was decided by the whims of a few dozen men…

Wait. Is that true?

The printing press had been a reality for over a century. Martin Luther’s Ninety-Five Theses had saturated every corner of Germany through ink and paper. I’d even heard that magazines of a sort were beginning to circulate in the German lands.

If we could move public opinion meaningfully, we might be able to trigger an actual political shift.

“That was an excellent point, Manasseh,” I said.

“Pardon? What do you mean, Sire?”

“Even if we cannot move the monarchs directly, we can move the masses. We need to flood the public with writings demanding a swift conclusion to the war—a call for a ‘decisive short-term campaign’ to end the suffering. If we can shift the narrative, we can create meaningful change.”

Simple pacifism wouldn’t work; in times of war, the voice of peace is often branded as the voice of a traitor. Instead, we would frame it as a demand to end the war more clearly and more quickly. The specific justifications could be figured out later.

“But wouldn’t we need a man of great learning for such a task?” Manasseh asked.

“Learned men are everywhere,” I replied, gesturing to him. “I have one before me, and we have dozens of rabbis who share our cause.”

“Still…”

“What we really need is someone with the specific literary talent to sway the common folk. Do you know anyone with that kind of silver tongue?”

Manasseh hummed, his eyes narrowing as he thought. We sat in silence for a few minutes.

“Well, if no one comes to mind, it’s fine,” I said, breaking the quiet. “The Coven has its reach across all of Europe. Someone in the ranks will know the right person. Let’s set the heavy talk aside for now and get back to your Yiddish studies.”

“Ah, right,” Manasseh said, shaking off his thoughts. “Let’s start with basic grammar, then—”

“No, no. Just bring me any Yiddish book and read it aloud to me.”

“Sire?”

“Just do it. But remember: read every sentence slowly, twice.”

Manasseh looked confused but complied. He opened a volume and began.

“Ikh hob lib dem Har.”

The first read. I flipped my language cheat on.

“Ikh hob lib dem Har.”

The second read. In my mind, the Korean translation rippled across my vision like subtitles: ‘I love the Lord.’ I nodded, signaling him to continue to the next line.

This was the power of my language cheat. By listening to the translations in real-time, I could study a foreign language as if I were watching an overseas drama with the subtitles toggled on and off. It was the only reason I had been able to master over a dozen tongues without breaking a sweat.

And so, months bled into years, and we reached the middle of 1630.

***

By May 1630, Paris was once again in bloom. People were out for spring strolls, enjoying the leisurely pace of the season. By then, I had become quite proficient in Yiddish—which was remarkably similar to German—and the Coven had finally produced a candidate for our writer.

The guest had arrived at our Paris estate through a secret passage, and we were now having tea in the curtained drawing room. He was a Master-ranked rabbi who had recently escaped from the Empire to France.

“As requested, I have brought a popular writer from among our members,” the rabbi said. “He has a magnificent pen and knows exactly how to capture the public’s imagination.”

“Excellent,” I said. “How did you find him?”

“He was a volunteer. He was quite famous in Prague, but the threats from the Protestants became too great to ignore. I heard the Jesuits even burned his books in Poland and Austria.”

“A Jew, then?”

The rabbi nodded sadly. “Indeed.” He paused, a look of hesitation crossing his face. “Please… be careful, Your Highness. The man is a bit… unique.”

“Unique?”

“I don’t wish to instill a prejudice,” the rabbi added quickly, “but even the other Masters and Grandmasters who recommended him were… concerned. Please try not to judge him too harshly.”

What is that supposed to mean? I wondered. I looked at Oitotan, who was also tilting his head in confusion.

“If he’s that troublesome, I don’t see why we didn’t just find someone else,” Oitotan muttered. “There must be hundreds of writers in Europe.”

I was inclined to agree. As I started to shake my head, a loud commotion erupted outside the drawing room doors.

“Hey! I told you to let go! Are you going to let go or not? I don’t understand why you feel the need to grope a man’s body so thoroughly—!”

“Sir! Please! If you would only consider the nobility of the person you are about to meet—!”

The bickering outside made Oitotan, the rabbi, and Manasseh—who had practically become a fixture of our household—all scowl in unison.

I gave a nod, and the servants threw open the doors. A stranger was in the midst of a heated verbal spar with the guards.

“Do you have any idea who I am? To demand a body search! It’s offensive!”

“No, sir, that’s not it—!”

“Wait until I tell your master about this! You think you’ll keep your post—? Oh! The doors are open!”

The man spotted us and began to stride into the room with an energetic, rhythmic step. The rabbi who had been explaining the situation buried his face in his hands.

“That,” the rabbi whispered, “is the writer we’ve brought to meet you.”

Thud.

The doors clicked shut, and the man came to a halt before us.

“Greetings, Leader of the Order! I am Gershom ben Eliezer Edels of Prague!”

He looked to be in his thirties, with the distinctive features of a Slav. He greeted me with a boisterous bow and a wide, toothy grin. I took his greeting with a sense of mounting bewilderment.

“Greetings. Might I ask what that was about outside?”

“Oh, that? Hahaha! Those thick-headed guards kept insisting on a search. They claimed the left side of my coat was bulging suspiciously. Quite a stubborn lot!”

I looked down. He was right; the left side of his coat was indeed protruding as if he were hiding something large and heavy.

“Are you curious?” Gershom asked, a mischievous glint in his eye.

Feeling like I had to play along, I gave a reluctant nod.

“Would you like to come closer and see?”

What could it possibly be—

Something glinted.

“It’s this!”

Shit, that’s a hand axe—!

WHOOOOSH!

THWACK!

I barely, and I mean barely, managed to throw myself to the side.

I stared in shock at the hand axe now embedded in the wood of the wall exactly where my head had been a second ago. Manasseh reacted instantly, lunging forward to grab Gershom by the scruff of his neck and tackle him to the floor.

As Gershom sputtered and struggled under Manasseh’s weight, Manasseh roared at the cowering rabbi. “You madman! How could you introduce an assassin to our Leader?”

“I… I… the background check was thorough!” the rabbi stammered, his voice trembling. “He was loyal to the organization! Truly!”

“Mis… misunderstanding!” Gershom choked out from under Manasseh. “It’s a mis—urk!”

“What misunderstanding, you vile creature?” Manasseh spat. “Speak before I snap your neck!”

Go on, Manasseh, I thought. Kill the bastard. I was suddenly very grateful for my daily exercise routine; my reaction speed was the only thing that had saved me. Oitotan, who was now just a frail old man, was staring at the axe in the wall.

“Do you know how much this wall cost?” Oitotan muttered, leaning in to try and pull the blade out.

Meanwhile, Gershom managed to shout one more time. “Just once! Please!”

Everyone went still.

“Just once… let me split the Messiah’s head open with my axe!”

We all stared at him in a stunned, heavy silence. Is this man actually insane?

Gershom looked up at me, his eyes wide and pleading. “Messiah, surely you can grant me this one request?”

“…Pardon?”

“I beg of you.”

His voice was suddenly calm and incredibly polite, which made the whole thing ten times more terrifying. Before I could find my voice, Manasseh spoke for me.

“What kind of madness is this?”

“Are you that Manasseh ben Israel?” Gershom asked, his tone almost academic. “The King’s tutor?”

“I am.”

“Then use your head, man,” Gershom said with a patronizing sigh. “If the rumors I’ve heard are true, it doesn’t matter if I split his head open. If he’s the Messiah, he’ll just stand back up. If he dies… well, then he was just a fraud.”

…

Yeah, he’s definitely insane.

Either that, or there was some obscure Jewish tradition of attempting to assassinate kings upon meeting them. I was leaning toward the “insane” theory.

Is there a curse on the Jewish people I keep meeting?