The streets of Vienna had become an open wound, festering with blood, smoke, and the unrelenting echoes of gunfire. The Werwolf Brigade's purge had begun in earnest, and though their campaign had already shattered the city's criminal underbelly, the battle was far from over.
The resistance was not composed of a singular, organized faction. Instead, it was a chaotic web of brigands, criminal syndicates, and ideological revolutionaries. Ethno-nationalist separatists waged war in the name of their own fractured visions of sovereignty, religious fanatics saw the collapse of the monarchy as a sign to enact their own holy war, and Marxist revolutionaries—emboldened by the chaos—sought to turn Vienna into the first stronghold of a new socialist order.
These groups did not fight for Austria—they fought for themselves. And in doing so, they ensured that the empire's fall would be even bloodier than its slow, inevitable death.
