War was in the air. In the tense expressions and frantic activity. In the tearful farewells. Roles had been assigned; plans laid. Soon I’d be aboard a ship – one of many headed towards the stretch of sea where we would intercept the inbound Shogunate fleet. All I could hope was that I’d be back in time to witness the birth of my younger sister and that my return would be a joyous one.

Father was going to be coming along with me while mother was going to stay behind onshore due to her condition. Something she wasn’t too happy about.

The volatile mood of a pregnant woman worried about her family going off to war, combined with her assignment as the head of the medical wing of the Eastern Armada… I just had to pray for the souls of our medics. May they never make a mistake. It might just be their last one.

I was currently located in a military outpost near the southern coast of our Kingdom. The command tent loomed in front of me. An imposing construct of steel and cloth that had been set up as the nucleus around which the war machine would revolve. The loss of the Southern District to the Shogunate meant that the established command infrastructure had been usurped by them, and given the amount of military force congregated here, the facilities weren’t enough. That was why we had this tent; as a stand-in until proper headquarters could be constructed.

Parting the curtains, I entered the tent and was met by the crowded gazes of its occupants, and as they recognized me, their military salutes.

“Welcome, Major.” They said.

I reciprocated with a salute of my own.

“At ease.”

Winning my Duel against Artemis had earned me a promotion from the position of interim Lieutenant to Major and I was still coming to terms with the degree of deference associated with that station. It was weird having men and women much older than me, and with way more experience, standing up to salute me with such admiration and respect in their eyes.

I turned my gaze to the centre of the tent where the twenty or so members who hadn’t stood up to salute were sitting around a sand table. The leaders of this engagement with the enemy. The ones in charge.

Walking up to the table, I took my seat at the empty spot reserved for me beside father.

Apparently, I was the last one to arrive as a petite blue-haired woman sitting in a chair behind General Kron clapped her hands once to draw attention and said, “Since we are all here, let’s get to it.”

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She was his secretary, his wife too if I was remembering things right.

General Kron reached forward and placed his palm on the rim of the sand table and the fine white sand filling it began to seethe. Structures began to form. The broad, undulating expanse of the Bay of Kings, the irregular coastline of Regiis, a thin raised line that demarcated the border between us and Shogunate occupied territory – the artificial stone wall that had popped up in the months leading up to this war.

With my newfound sensitivity to Earth mana, I could sense the threads of elemental energy delicately intertwining all throughout the sand, reshaping it into an intricately detailed map of our field of battle. It was a masterful display of magical control. General Kron was a very accomplished Earth mage.

He pointed to the two sections of coastline hemming in the Shogunate occupied docks.

“We have two fleets. The Eastern Armada and the Western Armada. The Eastern Armada has its base here, on the coastline of the South-Eastern Kingdom that now includes the Crimson Coyote territory as well as the former Eastern District of the South-Eastern Province. The Western Armada is based on the coast of the former Western District which has now merged with the Southern Province.”

As he explained, he highlighted the relevant features on the map by making them glow gold.

A large fleet of miniaturized ships formed at the far edge of the sand table and began to make its way across the map towards the Regiis coast through the Bay of Kings.

“This is the route we have predicted that the Shogunate will take.”

Two smaller fleets set out from the Eastern and Western Armada headquarters, merged together and set out to intercept the Shogunate fleet.

“And we will be in charge of blocking them.”

Yet another fleet set out from the Shogunate occupied coastline to attack the rear of the Regiis forces.

“As you can see, we need to guard against the Kirin fleet assaulting us from the rear.”

Two groups of miniature sand ships separated out from the Eastern and Western Armada to deal with these ships.

“We will branch out a rear guard to deal with them if they appear.”

The walls raised by the Shogunate on the map began to glow gold.

“If they do decide to commit troops against us, their land defences will suffer. That is an opportunity. An opportunity for us to reclaim what is ours. We have ground troops on standby and depending on how much our naval forces can pressurize the Shogunate, and draw the Kirins out of their lair, the chances of our ground forces succeeding will increase.”

He swept his gaze across the gathering.

“So, there are three broad segments in our strategy: engagement with the main fleet of the Shogunate, setting them at enough of a disadvantage that they are forced to call upon reinforcements from the first batch of invaders, and finally, a landed assault when their den is void and their forces stretched thin. Any questions?”

It was quite the simple strategy. Without any of the dramatic twists and strategic flairs popular culture would have us associate with war. All very practical and workmanlike.

And indeed, the best plans were those with the least complications. The ones that required the least number of steps and minimal computation. After all, the simpler the plan, the less chances there were of things going awry.

As the historical records of war I had perused would have me believe, if there was something that could go wrong, it would.