CHAPTER 282: CHAPTER 281: WANT TRUTH? TRACE THE BLOOD

Otto von Habsburg, heir to the Austro-Hungarian throne, became a key figure in founding the European Union. Yes, the EU. The so-called beacon of modern democracy had Habsburg fingerprints smeared on its genesis.

"Who better to unite Europe," the system said coldly, "than those who once ruled it?"

Otto’s children didn’t live in crumbling castles or wear jewel-encrusted crowns for tourists. They lived in discreet Swiss mansions, ran NGOs with immaculate reputations, sat on the boards of energy consortiums that spanned the continent, and whispered into the ears of intelligence think tanks in Brussels. They didn’t have ceremonial thrones anymore, but in exchange, they had something far better, influence without accountability.

The Bourbons were no different. Officially, they were relics of history, a Chapter closed in dusty textbooks. In reality, they had married into Spain’s financial aristocracy, embedding themselves in the highest levels of banking and real estate. They didn’t need to hold office; they owned the men who did.

The Grimaldis of Monaco, the tiny glittering principality that was nothing more than a tax haven with a flag... played the long game. Through shell companies, discreet investment funds, and centuries-old ties to France’s old money, they could move billions across borders without a single bank flagging it.

Even the Romanovs, the bloodline supposedly extinguished by Bolshevik bullets, still walked the earth. The descendants didn’t fight for thrones; they ran cybersecurity firms in Zurich, biotech companies in Tel Aviv, and quietly held patents in advanced surveillance technologies. They had adapted perfectly to the new century, trading crowns for algorithms and assassins for lawyers.

Rex leaned forward, his breath catching in his throat. The connections weren’t complicated... they were terrifying in their simplicity.

The system’s voice was almost amused. "You think kings vanished, Rex? They just stopped wearing crowns. Now they wear suits."

Do you think the Cold War was fought by strangers?" the system suddenly asked. "They were family playing a dangerous chess match. A game for redistribution of resources. The pieces died. The players did not."

...

Then, to Rex’s disbelief, the map shifted again... zooming across continents, flying over the Atlantic like a ghost through history.

It landed on the United States of America.

The land that claimed to be the "Land of the Free" glowed beneath him. But this time, the system showed no red, no blue... just strings of gold. Threads. Bloodlines.

A bloodline tree bloomed on the screen. At the very top: European nobility. Rooted deep in monarchic soil. Branching out into names Rex recognized, not from royalty textbooks, but from American classrooms.

George Washington. John Adams. Thomas Jefferson.

The Founding Fathers.

"Almost every one of them descended from European aristocracy," the system echoed. "They didn’t escape the crown. They brought the crown with them."

Rex’s lips parted.

Jefferson, the writer of the Declaration of Independence, traced back to Welsh and English landowners. Adams descended from Puritan elite families who had once ruled colonial courts. Washington... America’s first president, had blood ties to English nobles, landowners, and knights who once served under Henry VIII.

The system did not blink.

"You thought America killed aristocracy. In truth, it simply put it in better clothes."

More names appeared. Some expected. Some shocking.

The Roosevelts... that mighty American Dynasty, weren’t just products of hard work. They descended from Dutch merchant elites and connected to the Delano family, whose wealth came not only from railroads and real estate... but from opium trade routes in Asia.

Rex clenched his jaw. This wasn’t in any history book he had read.

The Bush Family... long painted as all-American, oil-rich, Texan aristocrats, traced back to British nobility through the Pierce family, early governors and political barons.

George H. W. Bush wasn’t just a former president. He was a product of interlinked bloodlines who held land, traded arms, and funded empires long before he ever joined the CIA.

And then came the Kennedys.

At school, they had been called outsiders. The Irish Catholic underdogs who defied Yankee elites. But the truth?

"They married into the same old blood," the system declared. "They didn’t rebel. They were accepted."

Joseph Kennedy Sr., a businessman and ambassador, married his children strategically. JFK, Robert, and Edward mingled with Boston Brahmins... the Protestant aristocracy of New England, whose roots went back to English land grants and mercantile fortunes tied to colonial opium, slave ships, and East India trading vessels.

Even in rebellion, the blood remained royal.

The screen turned darker.

Two more faces appeared. Polar opposites.

Barack Obama.

Donald Trump.

And yet, once again... the blood connected.

Obama, through his mother Ann Dunham, descended from a line of English immigrants who traced back to William the Conqueror’s court. Minor nobility, but nobility nonetheless. Some branches were tied to Mayflower passengers, the earliest settlers in America who had once been landowners in the Old World.

And Trump?

The flashy, orange-skinned billionaire? His paternal ancestry stemmed from German merchants, specifically from Kallstadt, a village where many wealthy traders and vineyard owners had sold goods across Europe. But more surprisingly, his mother, Mary Anne MacLeod, came from Scottish lairds, minor nobles from the Isle of Lewis. Landowners. Clansmen. Blooded aristocracy.

Two men. Same stage. Same script. Different masks.

"Democracy wasn’t the end of monarchy," the system whispered, almost coldly. "It became its camouflage."

Rex’s mind reeled. This... this was insane. He remembered being taught that America was the land of freedom, the beacon of equality. A meritocracy.

But the map told a different story.

Names started appearing, one after another. The Rockefellers. The Morgans. The Carnegies. The Du Ponts.

He had heard them all. Industrial legends.

But now, their family trees branched backward, not forward.

Rockefellers → Rothschilds → British Royalty.

Morgans → British banking elites.

Du Ponts → French nobility, survivors of revolution.

And then the most disturbing thread:

Bush → Pierce family → British aristocracy → European monarchic bloodline.

Roosevelt → Delano family → Opium trade.

Kennedy → Yankee elite through marriage → tied to Boston East India syndicates.

The system made it all so clear. The so-called American elite didn’t defeat the old world... they were its inheritors.

"Names change," the voice said, "but the blood remains."

Rex’s eyes drifted over the web, now sprawling across the digital globe.

The United States hadn’t been created to break the royal system.

It had been built to preserve it, but under a new flag.

One that gave people the illusion of choice, while the same ancient families ran the board from behind mirrored glass.

From political dynasties to banking titans, Hollywood moguls to Ivy League powerhouses, every ladder led to the same ceiling.

"The illusion of upward mobility," the system said, "is the most powerful leash of all."

Rex watched still.

Everything he had ever been taught about history... shattered.

He didn’t know whether to feel betrayed or enlightened. He didn’t know whether to laugh... or scream.

But one thing was clear.

This knowledge wasn’t something you could forget.

The roots of American power weren’t democratic.

They were feudal.

They were ancient.

They were blood-soaked.

And they were still alive.

(End of Chapter)