A Casual Conquest

In an ‘alternative history’ scenario in which Eighteenth Century Europe is reminiscent of South Asia in the dying years of the Mughal Empire, a young man from Japan starts his first job in a distant colony at the Honourable West Europa Company in Antwerp. Soon he is accompanying his boss on a mission to Hamburg, where he listens to the itinerant Mozart Minstrels and is seduced by the Duchess of Holstein (Catherine the Great in ‘real time’). His next journey takes him to the Shantungese colony of Britain, where he sees an altarpiece painted by Gainsborough and helps a young runaway nun escape to Antwerp. At a Council meeting he hears his bosses debate whether a trading company ought to take responsibility for governing failed states. Before long he is sent to observe a war between ambitious rulers of petty principalities; and he meets a famous native poet and philosopher. Soon he begins to miss the British girl he left in Antwerp, and wonders if she will welcome his return.