Chapter 1650 - 1556: Vienna Ablaze

Chapter 1650: Chapter 1556: Vienna Ablaze

A rough voice came from the doorway, actually drowning out the shouts of dozens of Stilz Faction members of Parliament: "And the nobles! They’re the most deserving of death!"

It was Adorno. He saw the figures of several nobles in the Parliament Hall. In fact, the number of noble members of parliament was far more than this, but he only recognized those who had openly appeared in City Hall Square.

Jaggen immediately responded, "That’s right! They are all the emperor’s lackeys!"

The Stilz Faction members of Parliament and the nearby sans-culottes once again raised a storm of angry roars, "They’re the ones who have been undermining Congress!"

"They even proposed inviting the emperor back a few days ago!"

"Execute these vipers!"

"These nobles are the enemies of the citizens! Arrest them!"

"Death penalty! All of them!"

On the long benches in the Parliament Hall, some people were slumped, bloodless, others attempted to argue, but were soon beaten bloody by nearby Stilz Faction MPs.

Speaker Steffens was still trying to call people back to reason, but his gavel had already broken, and he could only shout hoarsely: "Whatever your opinions, they should follow parliamentary procedure..."

"You damned traitor!" A student army soldier stepped forward, grabbed him by the collar, and dragged him roughly off the podium. With too much force, the old priest’s white wig fell to the ground, exposing his bald head, making him look extremely embarrassed.

"Baron Kemoller... Knight Steinbach... Count Kfinshler..."

As Lawyer Bergman read out the names of noble members of parliament, a group of sans-culottes immediately rushed towards the members’ seats in the direction of his hand, dragging the unfortunate fellow to the east side of the hall, thrown together with the Hilterists.

Before long, the east side of the hall was packed with people, mostly in disheveled clothes, and some with blood at the corners of their mouths.

Lucas raised his hand to signal everyone to be quiet, then solemnly took a document from his pocket and said loudly: "Please, all MPs, vote on the following bill—

"1. To ensure the basic living standards of all citizens, price controls on essential items like flour and salt shall be implemented immediately. Hoarders will be arrested upon report.

"2. Anyone supporting royal tyranny, opposing citizen rights, being hostile to freedom, and refusing to fulfill civic duties shall be deemed enemies of the citizens. Those unable to provide evidence of innocence will be arrested immediately.

"3. Establish an ’Emergency Committee’ responsible for the trial of citizen enemies. The committee’s verdict shall be superior to any court. For serious crimes, the committee has the right to bypass all judicial procedures for direct trial, and the accused shall not have defense attorneys nor the right to appeal.

"4. Citizen enemies may be indefinitely detained or sentenced to death, and all their assets will be confiscated by the National Assembly.

"5. The National Assembly may directly send any suspect to the Emergency Committee for interrogation without administrative approval, and MPs shall not have immunity.

"6. For crimes committed before the new law, the Emergency Committee shall have the authority to judge based on the new standards..."

The Stilz Faction MPs shouted in unison, "Agree!"

"Passed!"

The "Trade Faction" MPs—who are the neutrals in the parliament—initially kept their heads down, until they felt the piercing eyes like an awl upon them, then they timidly raised their hands.

The "awl" still didn’t disappear, and they froze for a moment, hurriedly raising their hands above their heads, "Agree! Yes, agree!"

All MPs with voting rights unanimously passed the proposal.

On the east side of the hall, Speaker Steffens, mustered the courage to say to Lucas, "Your actions completely violate the law..."

Beside him, a rifle butt from the student army slammed into his back: "Shut up! The will of the citizens is the law!"

The news quickly spread to Hofburg Square, where people waved black, red, and yellow flags, cheering and jumping excitedly.

The nobles and the capitulationists were cleared out of parliament, flour prices were legally restricted, and the future was full of hope!

The next day, after a very simple election, Adorno and 18 sans-culottes representatives, including the cobbler Favre, became the new members of parliament, replacing the Hilterist seats.

The other vacant parliament seats were almost entirely taken by the Stilz Faction.

At this point, the Radical Faction occupied more than two-thirds of the seats in the Austrian Parliament.

Three days later, under Lucas’s chairmanship, the National Assembly passed a proposal to dispatch 35,000 soldiers to reinforce Hungary, as well as to recruit 70,000 new soldiers immediately.

Meanwhile, General Kosport led troops to attack cities such as Linz and Graz. Although those places were temporarily under Royalist control, the people’s revolutionary fervor was very high, and the National Assembly judged that they could be easily captured.

On the other hand, in Vienna and the surrounding towns controlled by the National Assembly, an unprecedented scale operation to hunt down nobles and capitulationists began.

Indeed, there were no "moderates" anymore. Anyone not supporting the overthrow of the emperor or the reinforcement of Hungary was a capitulationist.

In less than a week, more than 4,000 people were thrown into prison. The nobles of Vienna fled in panic, but most were caught by the patrol teams everywhere.

The Emergency Committee also demonstrated high efficiency.

Initially, trials were conducted individually according to case files, but soon judges couldn’t keep up with reading them, and sentencing was done within minutes based on prosecution’s accounts alone.

By the fifth day, judges started trying cases with similar circumstances for groups of seven or eight people collectively.

In the cheering of the onlookers, the Emergency Committee judges were ruthless, with over seventy percent of the cases resulting in death sentences.

Without any appeal process, executions were carried out very quickly.

On the third day after the February bill was issued, nearly a hundred people were sent to the execution ground.

The Vienna government even had craftsmen replicate the French guillotine, increasing execution efficiency several times. Of course, no one mentioned anything about patent fees.

Still in the cafe outside Hofburg Square, Bergman excitedly whistled, "Clearly we should have done this long ago.

"2.3 million florins, whether for the new soldiers’ equipment and training expenses, or the military funds for reinforcing Hungary, it’s all there."

This money was seized from the assets of executed citizen enemies. It is foreseeable that as more nobles are arrested, the financial situation of the National Assembly will continue to improve.

Another young Stilz Faction nodded, "And the money in Vienna City Bank, if we had passed the confiscation bill earlier, those vultures wouldn’t have transferred away over 900,000 florins!"

He was talking about the Habsburg government’s tax funds temporarily stored in the bank, except for the portion secretly transferred by the Royalists, there were still 2 million florins remaining.

Lucas did not participate in the financial topic, but looked to Jaggen and said, "Next, we must strive for more countries to support the revolution. Especially Bohemia, where their national uprising fervor has always been high."