by Soul is Sundered
1940. The Hanseatic Empire stands as one of the world's great powers, ruling its vast continent in the South Atlantic, they were determined to remain neutral as Europe descends into war. But neutrality offers no protection from matters of the heart. Captain Kylian von Reichsgraf has been raised for duty, ten centuries of family tradition have prepared him for diplomacy, protocol, and service to the crown. Sent to observe a crumbling Chinese dynasty's last desperate alliance with Japan, Kylian finds himself seated beside an imperial princess at a wedding meant to save her nation. In stolen conversations across impossible divides of culture and rank, he discovers something his training never anticipated: a woman whose intelligence matches her grace, whose convictions challenge his own, and whose very presence unravels everything he thought he understood about duty and desire. But while Kylian wages his silent war between honor and longing, the world erupts into open conflict. His closest friend, Wolfgang von Witzland, trades youthful idealism for cold vengeance, learning too late that righteous rage and monstrous cruelty can wear the same face. Meanwhile, Wolfgang's cousin, Elke von Witzland, a prodigy of the Hanseatic Navy Air Corps, climbs into the cockpit, seeing the coming firestorm not as a damnation, but as her divine right—a stage for the glory she believes is hers to claim. In a world where duty, honor, and hierarchy are paramount, love becomes the most dangerous battlefield of all. What to Expect: • A slow-burn, forbidden romance between a Hanseatic officer and a Chinese princess. A romance that moves slowly and carefully. • A large ensemble, told from an empire across two continents. • A political thriller of espionage and imperial intrigue, as world war closes in. • Naval combat and guerrilla warfare, waged with the full machinery of the modern industrial state. • Character-driven—moral compromises that exact real costs, from interrogation rooms to revenge killings to the weight of necessary evils. • A story where love isn't an escape from politics—it's the most dangerous political act of all. Volume I: Chapters 1 - 40 Volume II: Ongoing Update: Slow writer, long chapters, no fixed schedule. Updates always come.
