As the saying goes, the greater the hope, the greater the disappointment. The royal capital had never given the war theatre such an efficient reply before.
On the 8th of the 1st January, command centre sent the first prince's secret order to the port communications department of Tyrrsim via falconry. It was then sent to Whitestag by Storm, which was then sent to the royal capital via falconry to be handed over to the ministry of the army.
Now, they had received a reply from the Ministry of the Army on the 2nd of March. This was already considered very fast. It had not even been two months, and no matter what, they were still two continents separated by the vast and boundless Silent Ocean.
However, what the generals in the theater of operations did not expect was that the reply regarding the First Prince's secret order was only a "Got it" and that was it …
There wasn't any hint of consolation. Instead, there was a hint of reprimand. It seemed like they were telling the generals in charge to behave themselves and not get any ideas they shouldn't.
The civil war in the kingdom would soon be pacified. Under the wise leadership of Stellin XI, Prince Wedrick, the ministry of the army was confident in wiping out the rebels.
It wouldn't have mattered much if that was all there was to the reply, but it seemed that reporting the first prince's secret order would only be asking for trouble.
Perhaps the bigwigs in the royal capital believed that the generals in charge of the war theatre didn't want to be left out of the limelight and wanted to join in the civil war. That was why they came up with the first prince's secret order.
The bigwigs in the royal capital didn't believe that Hansbach wanted to work with Shiks at all. Why would the first prince hand over Port Vebator and cede Cromwell and Balingana?
Just so Seaking and the Alliance could transport Thunderfeather and Monolith back to the kingdom?
What a joke. Prince Hansbach had Bluefeather and three standing corps under his command, totaling more than two hundred thousand soldiers. What he wanted to do was break through the Odin Mountains, not transport two second-line corps to the faraway continent of Nubissia and pay the exorbitant price of three territories. He was no fool.
So, the first prince's secret order that Claude and the others reported to the ministry of the army was nothing more than a lie in the eyes of the bigwigs of the royal capital. The purpose of the order was to get the royal capital to provide them with funds for development and construction in order to appease them. It was just another way of asking for money and wasn't worth promoting.
In addition to reprimanding them for making trouble out of nothing, the King's reply also mentioned that the Kingdom was currently facing financial difficulties and had no money to allocate.
Now comes the crucial question. Even if you're far away in the colonies, you should still share the kingdom's troubles.
Now that the colonial war was over, the ministry of the army didn't think there was a need for the colonies to maintain two corps of around a hundred and thirty thousand soldiers and requested to reduce the burden on the military.
The generals in the theatres felt as if they had been fed a mouthful of sh * t. Instead of pledging their loyalty to the royal capital, they received orders to reduce their own forces. None of them were willing to disband their own forces.
The royal capital's intentions were simple. Didn't they want funds for development and construction? Then, they should disband their forces and save up on military expenses.
Fortunately, the ministry of the army knew that the colonies were far away on Nubissia and Shiks hadn't given up yet, so they didn't plan on reducing Thunderfeather and Monolith to second-line corps. Instead, they gave them a number to reduce their forces to forty thousand each. That way, the two corps would lose fifty thousand men and save up to a hundred and fifty thousand crowns a year.
Claude swore that he would never play such tricks again. You would never be able to guess what the big shots were thinking. What you showed and what they thought were often the opposite.
Take the first prince's secret order for example. Claude and the others reported it to the royal capital to show their loyalty, but the big shots in the royal capital saw it as blackmail. So, they gave them a slap in the face and told the colonies to behave themselves.
Bolonik was now really frowning. He didn't think the royal capital would reply with an order to disband their forces.
To put it bluntly, Cromwell and Balingana had migrated more than two million immigrants. Among them, there were more than a hundred thousand young adults who were suitable for conscription.
And that was only the young men in their twenties. There were even more young men in their twenties and thirties.
Right now, they were eagerly waiting for the Thundercrash and Monolith Corps to start a large scale recruitment. They wanted to enlist and obtain a piece of land and property for their families.
If the theatre were to recruit a hundred thousand new soldiers, there would be five to six hundred thousand immigrants to settle down.
As the direct family members of the new soldiers, they would be able to manage the thirty acres of farmland or three hundred acres of pastures under the new soldiers' names. At the same time, it would greatly reduce the burden on the families of the new soldiers.
Of course, the theatre couldn't recruit a hundred thousand new soldiers. They only planned to retire ten thousand veterans whose terms of service were up and recruit ten thousand new soldiers to fill the gaps.
But now, not only did they retire ten thousand veterans, they had to cut another forty thousand soldiers.
Many of the immigrants had their eyes on the ten thousand retired veterans. They were waiting for one of their children to become a new soldier and contribute to their family's property.
If they found out that the recruitment spots were gone, who knew what kind of uproar the immigrants would cause? They had no choice but to work in the public fields.
"Tell me, how should we disband …" Bolonik asked weakly. The royal capital had given the order to disband, so they had to obey it.
They couldn't ignore it just because they were far away in Nubissia. Doing so would be akin to rebelling.
Eiblont stroked his chin and said, "The king's intention is very clear. He wants us to keep a full division in each corps, while the other division will remain as an empty shell until there's a war in the future."
Needless to say, the other generals knew what he meant.
The second line corps in the kingdom were mostly empty in peacetime. For example, a division would have four regiments and each regiment would only have one full battalion. The other three regiments would have no soldiers apart from officers.
Whenever there was an emergency, the full battalion would be mobilized, while the other three battalions were just there to watch the fun and cheer on …
The problem was that if Thunderclap and Monolith Corps were just empty corps, it would be easier to deal with them. However, each corps had two divisions. If one division was fully staffed while the other was empty, the officers who were assigned to the empty division would feel like they had been abandoned.
It was as if the empty divisions would never rise again and would easily give up on themselves.
The commander's attention would also be placed on the fully staffed Division and would not pay much attention to the empty Division. This would have a very negative impact on the unity of the army.
Marshal Michelic had once commented on the empty division in the advanced military academy. He believed that the most disadvantageous situation was having a full division and an empty division.
As the commanding officer of the army, he would often assign the most elite soldiers and the most outstanding officers to a full army, while the soldiers and officers of a lower rank would be assigned to an empty army. This artificially created a difference in the hierarchy of the two armies.
As time passed, the full division would receive more and more attention from the commander and resources would be focused on it.
On the other hand, the empty troops would be neglected more and more, and even the officers who stayed behind would be discouraged and lose the will to improve.
When the war broke out, even if the empty units were expanded, the combat power of the army would be very different from the full army. They would often become a burden, or even cause more serious harm …
"Forget it. Let's not talk about reorganizing. Think about what to do with the 50,000 soldiers. Are we just going to let them retire and go home?" General Bolonik began to worry about the soldiers he was about to cut.
To put it bluntly, these soldiers were members of the families of the 100,000 retired soldiers. They had migrated to Anfiston for two reasons. First, they coveted ten Mu of land, and second, they wanted to continue serving so that they could gain citizenship and raise their social status.
If they started to reduce the number of soldiers now, these soldiers would be the first to be cut.
Although they could still get 30 Mu of land or 300 Mu of pasture in Cromwell and Balingana, they would no longer be able to gain citizenship. This could easily cause trouble.
General Birkin did not care about the 50,000 soldiers who were about to be laid off. He thought that they could continue to serve.
It was very simple. Thundercrash and Monolith were both second-rate troops of the kingdom, so there was no difference between serving in the two armies and being a soldier in the local garrison forces. The war zone could easily transfer the reduced soldiers into the local garrison forces.
For example, Port Vebator, Port Patres, Wickham Castle, and the other three fortresses didn't have any local garrisons, and Monknad, the silver city that was about to be built, needed at least one local garrison.
General Birkin believed that apart from Anfiston, which had the garrison forces established by General Hazorak, there were no local garrison forces in Robisto, Balingana, Cromwell and Port Vebator.
The strategic locations of these four territories were currently being guarded by Thunderclap and Monolith Corps. From a certain perspective, this greatly dispersed the strength of the two corps, making it impossible for them to form a powerful counterattack.
Now that the royal capital had ordered Thundercrash and Monolith to reduce their military expenditure, they could transfer the reduced soldiers to the local garrison forces. The two corps could also hand over the task of guarding the four strategic locations to the local garrison forces.
Instead, they would be able to better deal with Shiks in the war theatre in the future.
It was a good idea. The reduced soldiers would have a place to go and it would be easier for them to serve in the local garrison forces. That was very attractive to the older soldiers in their thirties.
If each of the strategic locations reported by General Beckerlin was to deploy a local garrison regiment, the reduction of 50,000 people might not be enough …
However, this also brought about a problem. Even the local garrison forces needed military expenses and weapons. The problem was whether the theater of operations could gather enough military expenses and firearms and ammunition for the establishment of the local garrison forces.
According to General Skri's calculations, the few generals in the theatre of operations suddenly realized that if the garrisons of the four colonies were to be deployed first, then the theatre of operations would no longer be reducing their troops, but expanding their army.
The four colonies needed to form nine local garrison regiments. These nine local garrison regiments were made up of veterans from Thundercrash and Monolith. Adding on the ten thousand veterans who retired in the second half of the year, the two corps would need to recruit another twenty thousand new recruits to fill the gap. General Bolonik heaved a sigh of relief. The young immigrants finally had something to look forward to.
In the following month, the theatre was busy with the disarmament of the local garrison forces.
Which soldiers were to be transferred to the garrison forces and which officers were to be appointed as the commanding officers of the garrison lines had to be considered by the generals. They couldn't allow the fighting power of the corps to be affected, nor could they allow the garrison forces to become a motley crew.
According to Bolonik and Claude's plans, the garrison forces would become the reserve force of the two corps and be able to assist and supplement them in future battles.
In May, when the theater of war was preparing to set up the nine local garrison regiments, a piece of shocking news came from the kingdom. Everyone who heard the news was stunned.
In the second half of the second month of Year 592 of the Sacred Light Calendar, Prince Hansbach joined forces with Seaking and the Alliance to seal off Aueras' Dreadnaught in two port cities of Sidins.
It was an unexpected disaster for Dreadnaught. When Prince Hansbach led his army to Odin Mountain Range, he didn't even spare a glance at the coastal cities. That was why Dreadnaught let its guard down and didn't expect the first prince to suddenly target them.
Faced with a pincer attack, Dreadnaught was completely wiped out. Not even a dinghy managed to escape.
The following third month was the rainy season on Freia. Under normal circumstances, Dreadnaught would stay in its base and not go out to patrol. Given that the sea and land were sealed off, the royal navy didn't notice anything amiss.
When the rainy season ended, Prince Hansbach led Bluefeather and a standing corps to board the transport ships of Seaking and the Alliance and headed for the eastern coast of the kingdom.
On the fifth of the fourth month, Prince Hansbach gave the order to disembark at a shallow beach less than two hundred kilometres away from Ibnister Plains. The vanguard of the two corps rowed their dinghies ashore and sealed off the coastal area.
Prince Hansbach's supporters, who had been plotting for a long time, had placed hundreds of large, sealed wooden boxes near the beach. Seeing the arrival of the fleet, they pushed the boxes out into the sea and connected them with iron rings. Soon, a few pontoon bridges were built on the surface of the sea.
When the pontoon bridges connected to the transport ships, the large-scale disembarkation began.
From the fifth to the eleventh of the fourth month, Bluefeather and the standing corps came ashore unscathed.
The entire operation only lost three light infantry cannons and six soldiers. No one noticed that Hansbach had circled around Odin Mountain Range and appeared in the heart of the kingdom.
On the 16th of April, Prince Hansbach's army split into two groups and entered the Ibnister Plains. When they were less than two days away from the capital, the capital, which had confirmed the news of the enemy attack, was like boiling water that could not be controlled and was thrown into chaos.
No one expected Hansbach's troops to descend from the sky. In order to stop him on the other side of Odin Mountain Range, the royal capital sent the royal guard over.
Currently, there was only less than a division of the Imperial Guard stationed in the Royal Capital. Faced with an enemy of two legions, they were powerless to fight back.
Prince Wedrick, otherwise known as Stellin XI, once again displayed his advantage of long legs and quick reflexes. Before the big shots in the royal capital could decide whether to defend or retreat, he had already fled to Botarnia with his trusted aides and a dozen carriages full of treasures.
That was where the kingdom's ace field corps, Reddragon, was stationed. His father-in-law, Marshal Siegfeld, was the current chief of Reddragon. His safety was only guaranteed there.
On the seventeenth of the fourth month, year 592 of the Sacred Light Calendar, Bluefeather's vanguard arrived at the royal capital.
On the eighteenth of the fourth month, Prince Hansbach arrived at the royal capital.
On the 21st of April, the eldest prince entered the Imperial City. The Bluefeather Legion proudly held a military parade in the Imperial City …