Reborn In 17th century India with Black Technology-Chapter 1196: WWI: Siege of the Americas (9)

Vijay stood on the Maharaja Rama Chandra Class battleship, stroking his chin with a thoughtful expression. It was not that he did not want to pursue the retreating European fleet further, In fact, he really wanted to completely wipe out the fleet that had caused so much damage to his Atlantic Fleet and nothing more. However, the moment he thought about pressing forward, the sense of danger multiplied several times over, making him hesitate.

It was a sense of danger strong enough to make his heart palpitate, which rarely happens. So, despite the opportunity he had to completely wipe out the European Mediterranean fleet, he chose to have the battle group halt until he could determine where the lingering threat was coming from.

Vijay looked at the rear admiral, "Get me a map", he ordered.

The rear admiral was confused as to why his majesty, the emperor, ordered the battle group to stop the pursuit, but still, he followed the Emperor’s orders and had his subordinate bring a map of the surrounding geography.

Vijay looked at the map, and his eyes lit up, ’So that’s how it is. ’He seemed to understand where the threat was coming from.

The battle group was very close to the Macaronesia island group, an island group formed from a collection of four volcanic archipelagoes, currently under the control of the Spanish Empire. Interestingly enough, some of the volcanic ash that was imported from Europe during the early stages of the empire, in order to create Roman cement, came from the Macaronesia island group.

With his eyes squinted, he circled the islands with a red pen. He was confident that the threat he was feeling was coming from these islands.

"The European Atlantic fleet might be lying in ambush here", he muttered in a low voice.

Most officers could not hear his words, but the rear admiral definitely did. The confusion that was apparent in his mind disappeared, and even his brow lines softened, but soon the frown returned to his face, and it only became deeper. ’How did his majesty, the emperor, know?’ Since the rest of their fleet was still behind, they were not equipped with any reconnaissance vessels.

Even though the original Atlantic Fleet had reconnaissance scattered over the northern Atlantic Ocean, the reinforcement fleet, which they were on, did not make contact with the main fleet to handle the integration of communication. So how did his majesty figure out that the Europeans were lying in ambush around the island chain?

He thought for a long time but could not come up with a plausible reason, so in the end, he gave up thinking. ’If the Europeans are really lying in ambush, then it makes sense to stop the battle group,’ he nodded in his heart. Even though the European Mediterranean Fleet and the European Atlantic Fleet were leagues apart, like one being an own son and the other adopted, the Atlantic Fleet still fielded a force of over seven hundred warships.

Now, granted, among those seven hundred warships, nearly two to three hundred were merely merchant vessels retrofitted with naval guns, and the number of true battleships was only around forty to fifty. Even so, it was still a force his battle group could not contend with. After all, despite his fleet being composed entirely of battleships whose firepower far surpassed that of the enemy, battleships alone could not win a war.

Just as smaller ships require battleships to shield them and draw enemy fire, battleships also rely on the damage-dealing ability and flexible operations of smaller vessels. Neither can function properly without the other. Only when battleships, frigates, and clippers work together does a fleet truly come alive.

Without smaller warships, even the mightiest ships could be entangled by lighter vessels and end up capsized in the gutter.

"Let’s retreat", Vijay ordered.

"We need some time to recover, after which we can think about taking on the Europeans once again".

The rear admiral, having thought through everything, nodded in understanding and commanded the fleet to retreat.

In such a way, several months passed, and both sides tacitly strengthened their forces and avoided conflicting with each other. Thanks to that, the Northern Atlantic Ocean was extremely calm and peaceful, but the same could not be said of the Americas.

Being so far away from Europe, the European strongholds had suffered greatly for the last year since the battle began.

The naval bases of the European navy in the Pacific Ocean were taken over by the Bharatiya Navy within the first month the battle commenced, and a few weeks later, hundreds of landing operations took place across the western coast, leading to the loss of port cities, towns, and major strategic islands. A few weeks after that, Native American revolts kicked off, starting from the western coast of the Americas, and the fire of revolution spread throughout the continent.

And with the Bharatiya Empire’s direct involvement, the resistance of the Native Americans only became more intense. They now had better guns, they had better logistical supplies, they had no shortage of ammunition, and most of all, they owned the wilderness. There was no geography on the land that they could not take advantage of.

The Native Americans were so effective that they, who were acting as supportive forces to the Bharatiya Empire’s conquest, turned into the main forces in several parts of the continent, and the Bharatiya Empire took on the position of logistical support and material support.

Of course, the victories were not easy. Each and every victory was paid for with the blood of hundreds, if not thousands, of Native Americans. For the last 12 months, the research and analysis wing of the Bharatiya Army and Navy both predicted that anywhere from 115,000 to 125,000 Native Americans had been killed, and more injured, leading to a loss of over 10% of the entire Native American population on the western coast of the Americas.

Even so, the number of native tribes that contacted the Bharatiya military did not decrease. If anything, it increased exponentially. Tribes that were thought to have gone extinct contacted the empire. Even medium to small-scale tribes with fewer than 1,000 people contacted the Bharatiya military and volunteered to join the revolutionary army assembled by the Bharatiya military.

All of this was very surprising to the new sergeant, Ramesh Roy, who had just arrived from Surya Nagari, a kingdom in Suvarnadwipha.

"Comrade, I heard your tribe only has 800 people in total. Why would you volunteer to join the army? Wouldn’t it be enough to move your tribe to the protected zones mentioned by the empire?" He could not understand. Shouldn’t the first order of business of a tribe that is about to go extinct be to preserve itself by all means necessary? Then why are the people of the tribe so eager to join the army and risk losing their lives?

He himself only joined the army in order to increase his rank and earn enough money to pay for the expensive liver operation of his bastard father, who drinks too much. Otherwise, he wouldn’t choose to be deployed in the Americas, which has become a meat grinder.

Although he heard that it is only a meat grinder to the Native Americans, whose ability was no different from civilians who are relatively good at wielding cold weapons suddenly switching to advanced firearms without any knowledge of formations or regulations, but even for a trained Bharatiya soldier, the death rate was surprisingly high, as high as 20%, meaning if he travels with his platoon on a mission, then nearly one fourth of the people on the carriage wouldn’t be coming back alive, and a lot of them would even be injured.

The soldier who comes from the Cora tribe smiled when he heard the question, his gaze peaceful. "This is our motherland, comrade. If it isn’t us that fight for it, then who will? I may die, but I’ll die a righteous death on the battlefield. It will be a heroic death that will be meaningful enough for me to enter the abode of the mountain lord."

"Before, even if we wanted to fight, we had no chance. Fighting against those white devils was no different from a child fighting against an adult. Where can there be any honour in this battle? And even if we fight, disregarding everything, there is no chance for our victory, so our tribe could only go from one place to another, hiding our traces, trying our best to not attract any attention from the white devils, but now it is different. Thanks to the eastern empire’s help, we have the ability to fight back, and that is enough."

"As for death,"

"heh."

"My people laugh at the face of it."

Ramesh Roy was silent for a long time. He was completely shocked and overwhelmed. He never expected such a kind and gentle-looking man would say such a thing. He never expected that there were people in this world who take death as their home. He had read legends about the Vikings finding honour in battle and death, but this was the first time he was seeing it in real life.

He now understood how, despite the number of troops being sent by the empire reducing month on month, the war was progressing steadily, and more strongholds like Monterey, San Diego, San Blas, Acapulco, Mazatlan, Realejo, Panama, Paita, Arica, Valparaiso, Chiloe, have all been occupied in the last few months.

Inspired by his Native American comrade, after returning home from deployment, paying the medical fees, and successfully saving his idiotic father, he wrote a book about his experiences, which made a huge splash in the local literary circle. A few decades later, when the Native Americans, once divided into hundreds of states, formed a proper federation with a unified federal government, the Bharatiya Empire established diplomatic ties with this new state. As part of fostering friendship between the two nations, the Empire promoted much of the literature produced during the American War of Native Independence.

Amid this wave of promotion, the book written by Ramesh Roy unexpectedly became a massive hit. So much so that, a few years later, it was not only nominated for the Kavya Award, an honour considered equivalent to the Dharma Award in literature, but went on to win it that very year.

His work, "My Cora Comrade", went on to be adopted into dramas, plays, and musicals, garnering a lot of praise and respect. When the age of cinema kicked off, its copyright was even purchased by an up-and-coming production house and made into a movie. Although the movie could not become the biggest blockbuster of that year, due to its innovative storytelling and a pioneering way of shooting, it garnered a lot of attention and made a lot of profits. The story was reshot multiple times, and in the end, even received a Devaraya Cinema Award, equivalent to the Dharma Award for cinema.

However, all of this happens far into the future. The current Ramesh diligently put on his safety gear as he set off to the battlefield, completely ignorant as to what life had in store for him.