Munitions Empire

"Oh, everything here really is annoying, even the bugs are bigger than the ones back home!" A soldier from the Taren Kingdom complained while clearing a vine with his machete and continuing to walk forward.

Traveling in such an ill-fated place is not an easy task; everything here is still in its primitive and undeveloped state, making it extremely difficult to find a proper path.

Another soldier squashed a bug that was passing by and cursed with equal disgust, "Damn it, we’ve been walking for a whole day and night, and we haven’t caught that bastard who fired at us, nor found a decent road… Is there really a town here at all?"

They had been wandering in the forest for a day and a night without reaching their destination, and already dozens of them had lost their way, vanishing into this mysterious, dense jungle.

The plan to ambush that damned, nameless town seemed to have failed, or rather, it could only be left to the Navy’s warships to accomplish.

Now, what they needed to do was to hurry over there, replenish their supplies, give the troops a rest, and enjoy themselves in the new town.

Surely there must be plenty of women in a small town, right? Or boys would do—after all, they weren’t picky.

Besides, there must be Gold Coin in the town, and some treasures, and perhaps even a wealthy member of the Nobility.

As long as they looted, there would always be a way to strike it rich. With the reward for pioneering the land, this journey would not have been in vain.

With that thought in mind, they quickened their pace. Housen stood in an area that could barely be considered open, supervising his Troops as they slowly snaked through the jungle.

This was completely contrary to his plans, for he had never prepared to fight a nonexistent enemy on Dragon Island.

His troops had only brought limited supplies and not much ammunition, and since they had traveled over the ocean, they hadn’t brought any cannons.

These Soldiers, already traveling light, hadn’t even brought tents and had stumbled into the forest in a daze.

And then, the Soldiers of the Taren Kingdom were taught a lesson by nature. Without any camping equipment, they spent a night in the jungle.

That night cost them three Soldiers, with another seven or eight missing. Along with the ones who had fallen behind or scattered during their journey, they hadn’t seen a shadow of the enemy yet and had already lost over thirty men.

With an additional twenty Soldiers left to guard the landing site, Housen’s assault force was reduced to less than 450 Soldiers.

"Commander! Commander!" As the Troops struggled to slowly advance through the forest, Housen’s aide-de-camp approached him from behind, his face a mixture of excitement and anxiety.

Seeing this expression on his subordinate, Housen realized something was amiss, but still asked, "What’s wrong?"

The aide-de-camp stepped aside, leading Housen along a hastily cleared path to the bank of a small river.

The view was more open here, and the ground was relatively high, allowing one to see the forest on the opposite side of the river. Pointing to not too far away, the aide-de-camp said to Housen, "You, you better come have a look at this."

"Hmm?" Housen followed where the aide-de-camp was pointing and saw a sight that surprised him.

He could hardly believe his eyes and hesitated to accept that what he was seeing was real: "What is… this?"

When he saw the chimneys of the refinery on Dragon Island, one after another, emitting rolling black smoke at the edge of the forest across the river, he was baffled.

He had never expected to encounter a factory here, a factory whose purpose he did not understand.

In the Taren Kingdom, there were naturally factories too, or rather, in their homeland, such places were referred to as workshops.

Those that emitted black smoke, operating day and night non-stop, were not common; most were Shireck’s munitions factories!

As a military officer, he had never seen a workshop of such a massive scale, prompting him to reassess his opinion of the so-called small town on the island.

"What a joke, such a workshop must have at least a thousand workers…" The aide-de-camp murmured from behind him, "If you include the town, they might well have 2000 people, or even 3000…"

"Perhaps they also have a substantial Army." For the first time, Housen began to doubt his own judgment, questioning whether he had the capability to immediately take control of the entire island.

Defending those many chimneys, the force was probably at least 300 strong. Fighting such an Army, even if his troops emerged victorious, it might still be a costly victory.

Now he had only one advantage, which was the possibility that his troops hadn’t been discovered yet, that no one knew of their arrival.

Moreover, the Navy’s Fleet must have reached here before them, so the enemy must have shifted their focus out to sea.

Perhaps the town had already been taken, the warships had destroyed the enemy’s port, the enemy’s Fleet had been annihilated, and the troops on shore had all been redeployed near the coastline.

There’s a possibility that as soon as he launches the attack and the enemy gets caught in a pincer movement, they’ll collapse instantaneously, and then he would be able to claim victory in this battle.

After assuming a lot of possibilities, he felt he should attack on time—this was also the era of poor communication, which is mostly why commanders launched seemingly nonsensical, suicidal attacks.

According to the plan, several armies were to converge in a coordinated assault, but in the end, only one troop arrived on time. The commander, unaware of the other troops’ delay, launched the assault and was easily crushed by the superior enemy forces.

By the time the other troops arrived at the battlefield, the one that had attacked prematurely had already been annihilated by the enemy.

Now, Housen was in exactly such a situation, utterly unaware of what had occurred and not daring to change the battle plan he had previously devised; hence, he could only faithfully execute the strategy he had laid out earlier.

So, he issued the order to attack, instructing all soldiers to prepare as quickly as possible to strike those facilities that appeared to be very advanced.

…

In front of Housen indeed stood Great Tang Group’s refinery, which produced daily gasoline and other products, supplying around 2000 vehicles on Dragon Island and Brunas.

In terms of scale, this might currently be the largest refinery in the world, and its technology was also the most advanced.

Even Tang Mo had a small plastic workshop here, producing some petroleum-based products to meet many needs.

It was an important production base for the Great Tang Group, so it was also a key defensive target for them. Normally, two platoons of troops were stationed here, and now they had all entered their defensive positions.

In fact, compared to the defensive bunkers constructed previously in Brunas, the defense here seemed very rudimentary.

The defense troops of the Great Tang Group simply built a defense line on the surrounding high ground and arranged for people to be stationed, considering it a completion of the defenses.

After all, there were no external enemies invading here on a regular day; the most common task of the garrison was to drive away wild animals that accidentally entered the factory area.

Moreover, because the factory could need expansion at any time, building peripheral defense works would be a complete waste of time.

The cement might not even be set before the factory would need to use the land occupied by these defenses to expand its own buildings.

Therefore, Roger agreed with Tagg’s most cost-effective method—build trenches and simply set up a few fire positions.

They believed that as long as they detected an invasion by the enemy, having their own fleet destroy the enemy’s naval forces would ensure the safety of Dragon Island. Constructing defensive works within the island was a total waste of time.

A soldier on guard duty at the position walked up to his comrade, who was about to be relieved, leaned his rifle against the edge of the trench, and asked, "How’s it going? Any movement?"

"I’ve seen jack shit…" The soldier on duty put down his binoculars, rubbed his sore eyes, and complained.

He handed over the latest model of binoculars to his replacement and said disdainfully, "Maybe they never came, or maybe they got lost... or perhaps they went to another defensive line... Anyway, they are late." noveℓ.com

Based on the standard marching speed of the Great Tang Group, they should have sighted the enemy more than five hours ago. But evidently, they had overestimated the enemy; the opposition seemed unable to achieve the march speed of the Great Tang Group’s security forces.

Now it was noon, and the enemy had still not shown up. They didn’t even know if the enemy had taken the wrong path. Enjoy exclusive adventures from

"Hey! Look! Birds!" The new guard, who hadn’t even raised the binoculars, saw a flock of birds startled from the jungle.

He looked through the binoculars towards the still-smoldering edges of a forest that had been burned down seven or eight days ago. The Great Tang Group was continually clearing land, burning the forests piece by piece and converting them into factory land or farmland.

At the end of those dark, ash-colored lands, from the bushes, emerged a soldier carrying a weapon. Then behind this soldier, came a second person, a third... a fourth...

These people stood at the edge of the woods, waiting for more to emerge from the forest before they formed up at the edge of the cleared land, seemingly preparing to attack.

The soldiers of the Great Tang Group’s security forces stationed in the trenches had already entered combat readiness. Shielded in their concealed trenches, they observed the unsuspecting enemy through gaps in the weeds.

"Just this few men?" The lead platoon commander looked somewhat awkwardly at his deputy as they seemed to be waiting in vain for more enemy troops.

His deputy glanced at the Maxim heavy machine gun nearby, along with two gunners, and made a facial expression that said "I’m just as helpless": "The telegram did indeed say... that there were less than 500 of them."

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Dragon Spirit wrote slowly late into the night, everyone can read Chapter Two tomorrow morning.

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