The first two years of the Regency were a blur of creation so intense it reshaped the very landscape of Russia. The chronic chaos that had defined the Empire for decades was systematically being replaced by a new, logical, and ruthlessly efficient order. Alistair the historian had dreamed of this; Mikhail the Regent made it reality.
The Northern Industrial Syndicate became the model for a nationwide industrial revolution. New foundries and factories, funded by the Russo-Imperial Bank and built on Mikhail's designs, sprang up in the mineral-rich Ural Mountains and the coal fields of the Donbas. Steel production tripled. Oil extraction in the Caucasus, once a haphazard affair, was reorganized into a vertically integrated state enterprise. The hum of new machinery was becoming a sound more common than church bells.
The land reforms, once feared by the aristocracy, proved to be a masterstroke of social engineering. Millions of new peasant landowners, fiercely protective of their private property, became a powerful conservative bulwark against revolutionary rhetoric. With access to state-sponsored agricultural education and modern equipment produced by Mikhail's factories, crop yields began to soar. For the first time in its history, Russia was not just feeding itself; it was on the verge of becoming the breadbasket of Europe.
Mikhail ruled from the head of his State Council, which he had forged into a cabinet of experts. Competence was the only currency he valued. Sergei Witte, his financial wizard, managed the nation's booming economy. General Denisov, the gruff but brilliant soldier, oversaw a complete overhaul of the army, equipping it with Volkovo-standard steel and tactics. Alexei, the boy who had once nervously stoked a single furnace, was now the celebrated director of the entire national steel program. Even Matvei Gromov, the union leader, had a place at the table as the head of a new Ministry of Labor, mediating disputes and ensuring the new industrial workforce remained stable and productive.
The great powers of Europe watched this transformation with a mixture of disbelief, admiration, and growing alarm. Ambassadors who once came to St. Petersburg to offer condolences for military defeats now came to cautiously propose trade agreements. In meetings, Mikhail was no longer the upstart baron, but a formidable statesman who spoke of global markets and industrial capacity with a knowledge that left them baffled. He calmly asserted Russia's new position, not as a wounded bear, but as a waking giant.
His power was absolute, his successes undeniable. Yet, in a private conversation overlooking the Neva, Princess Sofia brought up the one final, unresolved issue.
"You are the Tsar in all but name, Mikhail," she said, her voice quiet. "But 'Regent' is a temporary title. It implies a return to the old way. For the stability of the Empire, for the future you are building, there can be no ambiguity. The nation needs a new dynasty."
He knew she was right. His rule, for all its effectiveness, rested on an emergency decree. To make it permanent, to ensure his reforms outlived him, he needed to secure the succession. There was only one logical solution.
His marriage to Princess Sofia Trubetskaya was the political and social event of the decade. It was a perfect union, a symbolic merging of the old, legitimate aristocracy with the new, meritocratic power that now ruled the Empire. The Dowager Empress gave her blessing, seeing it as the only way to preserve a semblance of the world she knew. The people, who saw Sofia as a beautiful and intelligent partner to their pragmatic new leader, celebrated it.
The chapter concluded a year later. Lord Regent Mikhail Volkov stood with his wife, Princess-Regent Sofia, on a balcony of the Winter Palace. In her arms, she held their infant son and heir, Alexei Mikhailovich Volkov. Below them, the streets of St. Petersburg were orderly and prosperous. From the railyards, the sound of moving trains—his trains—carried on the wind.
He looked at his son, the heir to the empire he had forged. He had done it. He had navigated the labyrinth of corruption, survived the assassins, ended the war, quelled the revolution, and seized absolute power. He had saved Russia from itself.
But Alistair's memory knew that this was not the end. The year was now 1908. In six years, a Serbian nationalist would fire a pistol in Sarajevo, and the world would plunge into a Great War, a war of industrial slaughter on a scale no one could yet imagine.
Mikhail looked out at his new Russia—strong, industrializing, and efficient. It was no longer the weak, brittle empire of the original timeline. It was a formidable world power, his power. The coming war, he realized, would not be a disaster to be averted.
It would be his final exam. And an unparalleled opportunity to demonstrate to the world which empire was truly number one. The real work was, yet again, just beginning.