As a leader who was exceptionally good at uniting disparate factions, President Keith Nishita felt that his staff and cabinet were full of fools produced by compromise and checks and balances. Yet Yang Mingzhao, who had joined his team only two years earlier, was always the most capable of them all.
Though Yang had come from the Spirit Research Society and had to be kept at arm's length, as a president skilled at uniting every faction in the country, Nishita felt he ought to at least secure him a future as a senator or a star-sector governor.
But that had all been before the war.
The war had destroyed his dreams and his career. Was it going to destroy his scruples now, too?
At that moment, President Nishita's heart was filled with indescribable sorrow. But facing everyone's gaze, he still managed a solemn expression that was clearly the product of professional training. "Fate has been thrust upon us by the times. I am prepared to die, and of course my colleagues are as well. History will remember their sacrifice."
A qualified political leader, naturally, had to hold himself up as a paragon of morality at all times. From that perspective, President Nishita was certainly competent at his job. But whatever the case, his actions had objectively sold out the Earth government. The more he extolled morality and character now, the uglier he looked.
So Mrs. Nishita took out another large stack of high-value bearer bonds issued by the Libra Galaxy and handed them around. These bonds could be exchanged for legal tender or an equivalent amount of precious metals at any Libra Bank branch. They could be used freely anywhere in the known universe, even in the Great Freedom City of the Abyss Nebula or the lawless regions along the