This was Li Wei's first time meeting the Queen of the Empire-Victoria II.
She was tall and athletic. Rather than sumptuous royal robes, she wore a military uniform paired with a red cape, looking every bit the imposing battlefield warrior.
Li Wei had read a few accounts of the Queen, and Her Majesty was indeed formidable. She had gone to war against foreign enemies at sixteen and repeatedly routed forces invading the Empire. After becoming Queen, she had hardly taken things easy, carrying out a series of sweeping reforms.
The most important among them were advancing the steam machinery revolution and reforming the Empire's bureaucracy.
In fact, the Empire had already been heading down this road before Victoria II, but it had been far from smooth sailing. The conservative nobility had been extremely powerful. Back then, the Empire had been much like the Kingdom of Francis: the nobles refused to recognize the emerging bourgeoisie and actively suppressed them.
Naturally, the conflict between the two sides had grown increasingly bitter. Without a good solution, the Empire would have erupted just as the Kingdom of Francis had.
Her Majesty had taken over the Empire and become its ruler in precisely those turbulent times, when the conflicts surrounding reform were at their sharpest.
But the Queen had not sat idle. Immediately after taking power, she had begun making sweeping changes.
First, she had completely reequipped the imperial army, phasing out its obsolete equipment and replacing it with the latest steam-powered weapons and armaments.
Once she had ensured that the Empire's military power was firmly in her hands, Her Majesty's next step had been to overhaul its education system. She had made education widely available, ensuring that most ordinary people could receive schooling as well. Then she had promoted a group of reform-minded officials