The Birth of a Fleet
Three hundred men had defeated five thousand. And they had done so without suffering a single casualty.
Never in the history of the Empire—indeed, in the entire annals of warfare—had there been such an overwhelmingly lopsided casualty ratio, such a flawless victory. The South was whipped into a frenzy by the sheer scale of this encirclement and annihilation.
Winning a battle was one thing. History occasionally birthed brilliant commanders who overcame tenfold odds to secure a victory. But to successfully execute an encirclement and carry it through to total annihilation was deemed nigh impossible in imperial military science. Encirclement and annihilation were two entirely different concepts.
Paradoxically, an encirclement is often completed by not fully enclosing the enemy. There is a saying about fighting with one's back to a river. When soldiers are trapped with death on all sides, they fight with the desperate, savage ferocity of cornered beasts.
Therefore, when a numerically inferior force attempts an encirclement, they usually leave a golden bridge—a deliberate escape route—to let some of the enemy flee. Under normal circumstances, expecting three hundred infantrymen to completely encircle and contain the desperate struggles of five thousand men would be utter madness.
Yet, the Southern Army had achieved exactly that. It was the precise moment the military doctrines developed over the past millennium crumbled before the might of overwhelming technological superiority.
Everyone in the South knew exactly whom they had to thank. The pioneer of the South: Kyle Leopold. Because of this, there was no need for elaborate propaganda. It was the most perfect victory imaginable—one so absolute that it required no exaggeration.
While the citizens rejoiced in the triumph, the industrialists salivated over the "spoils of war" Kyle Leopold had brought back: thirty-five hundred prisoners of war from the Western Army.
"These prisoners are the ones who were most active in the West's campaigns of indigenous extermination, and those who invaded Sarcen with the intent to slaughter our citizens."
"Which means...?"
"They are not citizens of our South. Therefore, Southern laws—including the Labor Standards Act—do not apply to them."
For factory owners already plagued by recent labor shortages, prisoners of war who required no legal protections or fair wages were the ultimate labor resource. Their loyalty to Kyle Leopold, who had delivered such a windfall with their interests in mind, soared to new heights. Naturally, public support for the war effort surged alongside it.
The number of young men volunteering for the military swelled, and any opposition to the tax hikes levied under the guise of increasing defense spending vanished. The dazzling illusion of victory had blinded the populace. Just like the people of the twentieth century during the height of imperialist madness, they became intoxicated by national triumph.
For generations, the people of the South had been despised, ignored, and unilaterally beaten down by the other regions. Now that their deep-seated resentment had finally found an outlet, no one dared to speak out against the taxes or the war.
"That concludes the summary of the public opinion polls."
"...I see."
In all of the South, there was only one man who could not bring himself to smile: the Archduke of the South, Kyle Leopold himself.
"Is something troubling you?"
"Was it that obvious?"
"You have a habit of growing quiet and unnaturally calm when you are anxious, Your Grace. Your words become sparse, and you tune out the voices around you."
Only then did I realize I hadn't uttered a single word during Lucilla's lengthy briefing. How did she pick up on a habit I wasn't even consciously aware of? Is this just what happens when you grow up with a childhood friend? I wouldn't know, having lacked one in my previous life. Wanting to break the heavy silence, I offered a lighthearted joke.
"At this rate, your future husband is going to be terribly jealous. He'll complain that you pay far more attention to the Archduke of the South than to him."
"Ah, you needn't worry about that."
Her reply, however, was unexpectedly heavy.
"Just as Your Grace has married the South, I, too, am already wedded to it. After all, are we not comrades in the revolution?"
As I stood momentarily dazed by her sudden, sharp response, Lucilla let a faint, rare smile grace her usually expressionless face.
"So, if something is weighing on your mind, you may share it with me. As your adjutant, as your revolutionary comrade... or, if those fail, perhaps simply as your childhood friend."
"Haha, when you put it like that, it's hard to keep it to myself."
With a wry chuckle, I let slip the anxiety I had been harboring.
"To be honest... I'm afraid."
Even as I overhauled the South, built up our technology, and churned out weapons of mass slaughter, I was still afraid. I wasn't talking about the West. The West didn't frighten me in the slightest. Nor did the East, which ruled the imperial seas, or the North, with its elite military forces. Not even the Empire itself.
The Republic that sought to devour the Empire, and the wave of demonic beasts destined to sweep across the world one day, were not objects of my fear either. The 'female protagonist' of this novel? She was a concern, yes, but not someone I would call terrifying. There was only one thing I truly feared.
"I'm afraid of being swept away by this tide."
I had secured two massive victories in a row. Because of that, the South's support for the war had skyrocketed, and the populace was practically clamoring for conflict. In the short term, this was an ideal phenomenon. Considering the enemies we would have to face in the future, having a populace that embraced war was a tremendous asset. But...
"One wrong step, and the end will be utter ruin."
How long would the South continue to crave war? The machine gun was originally invented as a weapon to end all wars. The creator believed that if humanity possessed a weapon of such devastating firepower that a single man could mow down hundreds, nations would be too terrified to ever wage war again. It was a monumental miscalculation.
Soldiers marched onto the battlefield carrying that very "weapon to end all wars." The name of that battlefield was World War I. Ironically, it was dubbed "the war to end all wars." And...
"The war to end all wars" became the catalyst for the most horrific conflict in human history: World War II. It took eighty million casualties before humanity finally realized that imperialism and extreme nationalism were catastrophic mistakes. It was the moment the runaway train of the Great Powers, hurtling forward without brakes, finally crashed into a cliff and ground to a halt.
"Right now, the South has no brakes."
The South possessed overwhelming technological power. They harbored deep-seated resentment from a millennium of discrimination by the rest of the Empire. That resentment had translated into fervent, absolute support for war.
And Kyle Leopold, the Archduke of the South, had ridden that wave of popularity to deliver a stunning victory. The situation was dangerously similar to a certain mustachioed art student from my previous world.
Moreover, there was no political force capable of stopping this runaway train. This territory operated under the absolute, one-man dictatorship of the Archduke of the South. Brakes? There were none.
"Because I was the one who destroyed them."
The moment I laid the keel for the Dreadnought, the ultimate symbol of a Great Power, I had effectively shattered the brakes with my own hands. But in this romance-fantasy world, where the fall of the Empire and the invasion of the Republic and demonic beasts were preordained, it was the only way to survive. What a ludicrous world. A world where nationalism and imperialism were the lesser evils.
"I feel like an engineer driving a train with no brakes."
To tear down the rotting corpse of the Empire, we had to maintain an overwhelming level of industrial output. To do that, we had to grind down the working class. But the more you grind down workers, the redder they become. If that happened, I would end up facing the revolutionary gallows, just like in the original novel. To keep the workers grinding away happily at their stations, I had no choice but to exploit nationalist sentiment.
In the end, for the South to survive, we could not abandon the methods of the Great Powers. Yet, the more we relied on those methods, the more the state would spiral out of control. And the end of that path was the same ruin that befell the empires of the twentieth century.
"That is why I must never let myself be swept away by this atmosphere."
There was only one thing I could do: maintain our current trajectory, but never allow myself to be consumed by the very power we wielded. I had to avoid becoming intoxicated by imperialism. I had to suppress toxic ideologies like eugenics and racial discrimination, keeping a tight rein on the South. I had to ensure we never committed atrocities like mass slaughter. I had to constantly remind myself that imperialism was madness.
"I am simply keeping myself in check. I have no intention of turning this land I love into a cruel empire of blood and iron."
Wielding imperialism without becoming an imperialist. It was the ultimate tightrope walk.
"...The very fact that you worry about such things proves you are a good man, Your Grace. I am certain you will succeed."
"Do you really think so?"
"Yes. And I will be right beside you to help."
Lucilla offered a faint smile.
"If we are both married to the South, then the South is essentially our child, is it not?"
It was a remarkably witty jest.
Unfortunately, I did not have the luxury of remaining lost in contemplation for long. I had never once believed that the Archduke of the West, Charles Raymonds, would simply take this lying down.
The mere existence of anti-aircraft artillery drastically devalued the Wyvern Knights. For the West, whose political leverage within the Empire rested almost entirely on those knights, this was an existential threat. If I were in the Western Archduke's shoes, I would probably be drawing up plans to bomb the Southern industrial zones.
"How many additional anti-aircraft guns have we produced so far?"
"Approximately one hundred and twenty guns, sir!"
Fortunately, we had succeeded in securing the minimum number of anti-aircraft guns required to defend our airspace. While this number wasn't enough to protect every square inch of our territory, it was sufficient to mount a proper air defense if deployed strategically with radar support. Thus, the anti-aircraft guns were no longer my primary concern.
No matter how sturdy your shield, without a spear, you are destined to be nothing more than a perpetual punching bag. And right now, our territory possessed only one spear: the Dreadnought. To hone that spear to an even sharper edge, we had spent the past month developing a new project.
"So, how is the destroyer construction project coming along?"
Destroyers. Literally, a class of small, fast warships designed to destroy threats to battleships. Was there anything capable of threatening an invincible battleship? Of course. The Wyvern Knights of the West, and the abyssal sea monsters of the East.
A battleship was a vessel that sacrificed everything to maximize its offensive punch in a decisive fleet engagement. Due to its lack of anti-air and anti-submarine capabilities, it could not venture out into the open ocean alone. It required escort vessels to serve as mobile anti-aircraft batteries and anti-submarine screens.
"A month ago, the shipyard halted further construction on the Dreadnought class to prioritize five one-thousand-ton destroyers. We estimate it will take about two more weeks until they are ready for launch."
Compared to building a battleship, constructing destroyers was a breeze. Armor? Size? None of that particularly mattered. Their primary role was simply to act as floating anti-aircraft batteries sailing alongside the battleship. Thanks to this simplicity, we were able to complete five of them in no time.
"Excellent."
With this, a proper "fleet" was finally assembled. Frankly, I couldn't be certain if the West would actually launch a full-scale assault. But if... if the West truly crossed the line, I had no intention of holding back.
I opened my desk drawer, revealing the operational plan drawn up by the general staff over the past two weeks.
Combined arms: the fleet annihilates, and the infantry occupies. A one-sided bombardment leveraging overwhelming technological superiority. Swift and decisive. It was an intuitive and highly effective operation.
Hoping the West would not force us to resort to such extreme measures, I quietly slid the document back into the drawer.