Mystery Detective of the Steam World

Chapter 400 The End
The fall of Port Dreyfus came sooner than Lieutenant Lawrence had anticipated.

After the command post was captured, the defenders of the Port Dley fortress, caught in a pincer attack, decisively surrendered. As the sun rose, the imperial flag was already flying over Port Dley.

Soon, news of the fall of Port Derlai spread rapidly throughout the continent, shocking all nations.

At the start of this war, the main focus of the various countries was the conflict between the Sasha Alliance and the Principality of Seth. In the eyes of most countries, the Principality of Seth had already fought two battles, and its men and horses were exhausted, lacking in military pay and weapons. Even if the Principality of Seth were to mobilize its entire force, it would only have 40 men. Facing the Sasha Alliance's 200 million troops, it would almost certainly have no choice but to surrender.

However, the seemingly exhausted Duchy of Seth unexpectedly displayed remarkable resilience, managing to withstand the attack of the Sasha Alliance's army.

This alone was enough to surprise all the countries, but what surprised them even more was that the empire, which had been silent and unassuming before the war, had suddenly and swiftly defeated the 12-strong vanguard army of the Kingdom of Krant, and even occupied the port of Delai in the far north, aiming its sword at Deburg, the second largest city in Krant!

This sudden turn of events completely stunned Krant!
You have to understand that when they devised the Double-Headed Eagle Plan, they never imagined that the Empire would attack them first!
Now, Krant is facing a three-pronged attack from the Western European Empire, Francis, and the Empire. Especially after learning that the Empire had occupied Port Dre, Francis and the Western European Empire are even more eager to attack, and the situation on the front lines is becoming increasingly dire.

If things go wrong, the whole thing will collapse!

The Twin-Headed Eagle Plan is obviously doomed to fail. What's the point of fighting Tiris now? We should be grateful if we're not wiped out by the Empire!

As a result, Cront, Francis, and the Western European Empire all had to redeploy their plans due to the current war situation.

Taking advantage of this lull, Li Wei and General Hao returned to the imperial capital to give a war report.

On the surface, this was a great victory for the empire, but it was not without its hidden dangers.

First, the Empire still lacks effective defenses against Krant's Firebird (a name learned from prisoners), and Livy has proposed two solutions.

The first method is to develop a timed fuse, which involves firing a shell and setting a timer to detonate it, using the shrapnel from the explosion to destroy the birds.

However, this takes time and requires repeated experiments.

The second method was one that Li Wei had seen in a movie. Since the shells rotated, he thought that two blade-like objects could be placed on both sides of the shell. When the shell was fired, they would pop out and fly forward like propellers, enough to turn the birds into mincemeat.

Of course, this only works at close range.

The Military Technology Department stated that it would immediately study Li Wei's proposal.

The second question is about Krant's tunnel warfare.

This is truly troublesome because the Empire's equipment is primarily designed for naval, land, and air operations, lacking specialized equipment for combating underground threats. It's conceivable that the Krant will attempt to retake Port Drey, and they will undoubtedly resort to the same tactics they used against Tiris's Sun Fortress—secretly digging tunnels underground and launching an attack.

The empire doesn't really have a good way to deal with this right now, but... fortunately, the country where Li Wei was born has a long history of tunnel warfare since ancient times, so they naturally know how to deal with it.

The method involved digging a deep and long trench outside, then burying a large urn inside, covering it with leather, and having someone specifically assigned to listen in. This was called a "listening urn" and was frequently used in ancient times to monitor tunnels. Because blind people have sensitive hearing, these listening personnel were usually blind themselves.

Because sound travels fastest through solids, and although Krant's chimeras can dig very deep tunnels, they must get close to the surface if they want to launch an attack on the ground, so they will definitely be detected.

In this way, the soldiers could predict the location of the enemy's cave entrance in advance and then wait there for the enemy to come to them.

As for dealing with tunnels, you can use water to flood them or blow smoke in with a blower... Hmm, these are methods used by our ancestors, so they're reliable.

Before Li Wei returned, he had already instructed the expeditionary force responsible for guarding the area to do so. The soldiers did not object to it, as digging trenches was something they were supposed to do anyway. Although burying a few large urns inside was a bit strange, they just did as instructed.

Whether it will be useful or not, we'll see later.

Of course, if it were just such a minor technical detail, it wouldn't have been enough to make Li Wei and General Hao come back specifically. The reason Her Majesty the Queen summoned the two back was very simple—to discuss the Empire's next military strategy!
As mentioned before, this was the first large-scale war between nations during the steam industrial revolution on the entire continent.

So the question arises: nobody knows what warfare will look like after the steam industrial revolution. Will the focus be on the navy? The army? Or the air force?

The navy is naturally an indispensable cornerstone of the empire, so what remains are the army and the air force.

In fact, just look at the land cruisers and airships built by the Empire. Since the navy can only stay in the water, the Empire must build warships that can penetrate deep into the land.

But is it better to be able to fly or run?

Nobody knows.

So the Empire equipped one warship with legs so it could run around freely, and another with a propeller so it could fly freely in the sky. To put it bluntly, they were rich and didn't know which route was better, so they just tried both and saw what happened. They weren't afraid of making a mistake.

Now it seems that flying everywhere is really useful!
The military briefing given by Li Wei and General Hao was actually quite simple: the Sky Eye would first lock onto the anti-aircraft positions, then the Cyclops would unleash a barrage of long-range attacks to destroy the enemy's air defenses, followed by armored airships dropping bombs relentlessly, and finally, the ground troops would advance to clean up and finish the job. Simple, direct, and always the same routine.

But the thing is, this system is really good!
This happened three times in a row, not only defeating Krant's 120,000-strong vanguard army but also capturing Port Dlai. After reading the briefing, Her Majesty was already quite inclined towards this route. While land cruisers did indeed have stronger firepower than air cruisers (due to weight considerations), they were highly dependent on terrain. Furthermore, in situations like this, Cyclopes could fly directly to reinforce, but land cruisers, unable to enter the Duchy of Tiris, could only circle the border.

This made Her Majesty the Queen very... unhappy.

Her Majesty then summoned Livy and General Howe back and specifically inquired about their thoughts and opinions. In response to Her Majesty's question, Livy explained the key points regarding the air route.

Air supremacy!
The key is air superiority!

In Li Wei's time, the strategy for attacking air defenses was to first use missiles to target enemy radar bases, then bomb the air force and air defenses, and finally launch a ground offensive. Ultimately, the goal was to gain air superiority before any ground advance could be carried out; it wasn't about foolishly engaging the enemy in a direct confrontation.

At this time, Leviathan had not yet developed missiles with particularly long ranges. Although missiles were shown in Leviathan's briefings, no one, including the Queen, paid them much attention. In their view, these were at most cannonballs that didn't need to be fired from cannons and would fly on their own, with a relatively short range.

It's somewhat interesting, but not particularly interesting.

Li Wei was helpless in this regard. After all, only by actually building what needed to be built could he gain Her Majesty the Queen's approval. Mere words wouldn't suffice. Moreover, the current missiles were essentially just rockets to others; only in Li Wei's hands did they possess guidance capabilities… well, they were indeed unsuitable.

Of course, Li Wei knew that this would be bad news for the army. Her Majesty the Queen had decided to build several more airships similar to the Eye of the Sky, as well as aerial warships like the Cyclops.

So where will the funding come from? Of course, it will be cut from the poor Army... Hmm, it seems that the Land Cruiser will soon be a thing of the past.

Who knows, maybe one day the Queen will take a dislike to it and just put a propeller on it and send it flying into the sky...

Li Wei could only shed a crocodile tear for the army in this situation. Besides, he wasn't wrong; with air cover, the army's casualties would be greatly reduced, wouldn't they...?

Many believed that after capturing Port Drey, the Empire would continue its rapid advance, attacking the interior of Crant.

However, Her Majesty made a different decision. She ordered General Howe's Royal Navy Third Fleet and Levy's Thistle Knights to withdraw from the front lines, leaving the Fifth Fleet and the First Expeditionary Force to defend Drey. She also dispatched an engineering corps to begin repairs there, acting as if she owned the place and intended to turn Drey into an imperial military base!
As for the reason... Li Wei had already guessed it.

That's right, the Empire and the Duchy of Tiris have signed an alliance agreement.

But the Empire didn't sign any agreements with Francis or the Western European Empire.

The Empire and the Krant are fighting each other, and you think you can take advantage of the situation? Dream on.
Other countries saw this as a harbinger of the empire and Francis, the Western European Empire, dividing up the crown.

But... is it necessary for the Empire to divide things up with you?

Why don't I wait until you guys are fighting to the death with Krant before I go and take advantage of the situation?
When that time comes, Krant will belong to the Empire, and Francis and the European West won't be able to escape either!
On the other hand, it's about training troops.

The location of Port Delai is extremely crucial. It's a vital part of the Kingdom of Krant's international shipping routes and is very close to Deburg, the second largest city. If Port Delai isn't reclaimed, Krant must constantly fear a potential imperial attack on Deburg. Therefore, the Kingdom of Krant will undoubtedly try every means to take Port Delai back.

For Her Majesty the Queen, this is naturally... the best possible outcome!

The Empire was determined to fight this war precisely to allow its army to quickly accumulate experience in modern warfare. Therefore, in Her Majesty's view, as long as Port Derlai doesn't fall, winning or losing is irrelevant; what's more important is for soldiers and generals to become familiar with warfare in this new era!

Now that Livy has demonstrated an effective military strategy for the empire, the way to ensure that the entire empire's army is familiar with this strategy is through repeated practice in actual combat.

Furthermore, the Queen decided to modify the Empire's existing reconnaissance airships, using the Eye of the Sky as a benchmark. Li Wei naturally welcomed this, as while other observers didn't possess Li Wei's [Soul Vision] to cheat, they could at least pinpoint the location of enemy targets from high altitudes.

Incidentally, this world currently lacks any cover measures against air raids. In other words, the air defense positions don't even use leaves, branches, or camouflage to conceal themselves. As long as the airships fly high enough, they should be immune to anti-aircraft gun attacks.

It's impossible for me to do all the frontline reconnaissance myself. No matter how great Li Wei is, he's only one person. It's fine if he fights important battles, but he can't really fight the entire battle himself.

Now that the Queen has decided to assign other people to take charge of high-altitude reconnaissance, Levi can simply pack up and leave the front lines to go home and sleep.

Of course, he didn't forget to hand over the codebook to the intelligence department, who were overjoyed as if it were New Year's Day. It could be considered that Li Wei did them a favor.

So, after a series of troubles, including the military conference, Li Wei finally dragged his tired body home.

As long as there are no changes at the front lines, the Empire should not ask me to go to the battlefield again in the short term.

(End of this chapter)