"Okay. What're the requests?"

"Largely military, capital and support ships amounting to a sector fleet, automated factories and raw materials for same. Terraformed bases in strategic locations. Some cargo ships, to augment civilian shipping capabilities. Full details are in a file titled 'Imperial Requests for Epic'."

"What're the military forces going to be used to do?"

"Prosecute the war with the Republic in some fashion, one assumes. While the conflict is not quite at the fever pitch it was several years ago, neither has it subsided."

"Is there a way to not do weapons without losing the leverage we'll need later."

"Not easily or swiftly. My influence outside the Empire is unfortunately limited. Before now, I had not considered it a priority to cultivate such. I am moving to change this, but it takes time, and is aided by money. Until then, military contracts with the Empire will be most lucrative, though you may refuse any request at your own discretion."

"I think I need to know more about the war - how many people are getting killed, if I make the Empire powerful enough to totally win then what happens to the losing side -"

"I believe the current daily casualty average is on the order of several thousands combined. I would not wish the Empire absolutely victorious at this point, and neither would you. Fortunately, it is lagging somewhat, much as my colleagues may wish it were otherwise. Materiel will help some, but without more bodies in the field, the total impact will be necessarily limited and insufficient to totally upset the balance."

"I'll do the non-weapons stuff first and think about it. ...I have really excellent touch-range healing but that probably won't do much for a war happening primarily in space, people die too fast -"

"With our medical technology, any wound that is not immediately fatal can be healed in time. Healing at touch range is not the highest leverage use of your time. The military is not facing any kolto shortages, though it is worth investigating on the civilian side. I will make inquiries."

"Someday I'll get resurrection figured out and then everyone'll be okay. Kolto?"

"Extract of a certain species of seaweed, native to one planet and subjected to a classified purification process. It serves as a panacea. All third-party efforts to reproduce it have failed."

...he tries it.

It doesn't go.

"Counts as magic, yeah. Okay." 

And he does the not-military things on the list and then checks back in. "How efficiently are you guessing the money can be spent to do good stuff?"

"What units are you used to measuring that in?"

"I'm looking at the credits for the building the empire a fleet and trying to think if I can do more good with that money than I do bad by helping one side in a war."

"One sector fleet will not enable a new offensive push. From what I know of Mart, he will use it to strengthen defenses and buy time to get more out of you. Counting Imperial lives saved thereby and using median estimates from sector-scale humanitarian organizations, you'll come out ahead by a ratio of about 3:1 on this task."

"...okay."

He makes the sector fleet.

The Empire is suitably enthusiastic. They express their enthusiasm in the form of several million credits.

Does he want to make another?

He calls her up. "Too soon to say that my home society has rules of war and I'll make all the fleets they want if they'll sign on to those?"

"Yes. We are not quite independent yet. I advise putting that request on hold and setting up a few of the agricultural worlds that were added to the list first. They are more unambiguously beneficial, and by the time you finish we will have more options."

Nod. 

He does that. 

His holocomm pings while he's in the midst of that.

He answers.