To be honest, the sudden establishment of the Spanish Republic left Franz confused. After all, in his mind, this was supposed to be a plotline from decades later.
And as for this Ferrante Duway, Franz had absolutely no impression of him. Even within the Austrian Empire's intelligence system, this man's presence had been extremely low.
Judging from the intelligence the Austrian Empire had gathered so far, the French had put in great effort toward the establishment of the Spanish Republic. As for whether Ferrante Duway had been arranged by the French, that still required verification.
However, judging from Ferrante Duway's various actions after taking power, there was no doubt that he was scum, but he was also a qualified president—at least much harder to deal with than Isabella II and Carlos VI.
At this moment, there were many roads before the Austrian Empire, but Franz chose the most direct one: declaring war.
It was not only because Ferrante Duway was preparing to join hands with the French to drive the Austrian Empire out of Spain. The appearance of the Spanish Republic was even more of a slap in the face to the Holy Alliance.
Ferrante Duway's inhuman methods might seem like decisive killing to some people, but in Franz's eyes, they were nothing more than kidnapping the people and the nation.
The original purpose of establishing the Holy Alliance had been to prevent a repeat of the French Revolution. Now, not only had revolution broken out in Spain, it had even executed its king just like France had.
Whether Carlos VI was truly dead or falsely dead was not important to the Austrian Empire.
As one of the founding members of the Holy Alliance, the Austrian Empire naturally could not shirk its responsibility. More importantly, monarchy was one of the