Nishinomiyako.
"Shi shit SHIT!, what the fuck are we going to do?!" An Argentine university student was walking in circles inside his cell.
"Stay still, you're making me nervous!" Another would reprimand him.
When the Parlpadians took over the city and noticed their strange clothes that looked nothing like the clothes of the third, second or first civilization they threw them all in the dungeon on suspicion of espionage.
"I knew coming here was a bad idea, I knew it!" One of the girls was on edge.
"Then what did you come here for, pelotuda?" Said one of her peers.
"Shut up that this was your brilliant idea! Going to a place we don't know anything about, how well your plan to finish your thesis worked out."
"Don't give me that shit about blaming me, you wanted to see feudal Japan as much as I did! Even the teacher wanted to come!" The student defended himself.
"Calm down everyone!" said the one who appeared to be the teacher. " Once they interrogate us and know that we are innocent they will let us go, we must simply be patient and cooperate."
"Professor! We were not captured by an army like those of the earth, they could torture us as in the inquisition!" One of the students was really worried that they would use medieval torture devices to force them to confess that they were spies and then execute them.
"Actually, if we talk about medieval interrogation processes, the inquisition was the softest you could find."
"Will you shut up already!" Said a Parlpadian soldier guard banging on the bars of the cell, with a jaded expression.
The prisoners had been arguing since they were captured and had had enough of the poor guard who had no choice but to listen to the whole argument. "They're more concerned with throwing accusations at each other than with the situation they're in." Said the guard to himself.
"Excuse me, but we have nothing to do with this war, we are just tourists!" Said a girl with tanned skin and long curly hair, quite beautiful.
"That will be decided when the interrogators come to question you." He said coldly, but could not help but pay attention to her beauty. "Besides, we found many strange things among your belongings, completely unknown devices and texts with a cipher language." He answered without knowing that the books were in Spanish, even a diplomat could have found out what the language of Argentina was but not a simple soldier who had only heard rumors about them.
"If I tell you what they are about are we going to convince you that we are not spies?" Proposed the girl. "We have nothing better to do while we wait for the interrogators."
"... I might reconsider the treatment you are receiving to a more comfortable one if you give us a private explanation~" Replied the guard looking down at her breasts.
"H-hey! Don't!" Said one of the students lying on the bunk, quickly getting up to hold the bars of the cell. "I'm warning you!"
"Or else what?" The guard smiled confidently.
"Just trust me, don't do it, you'll regret it."
"Pff, what a stretch." Said the woman crossing her arms and rolling her eyes at what her partner said. "If you first allow me to prove that those documents are not espionage stuff then I'll do what you want later. You don't have to use hints and euphemisms to demonstrate your position as an oppressive macho man as a way to protect your fragile masculinity due to your need to feel powerful in front of someone in a vulnerable position due to your insecurities because you belong to a lower rung in the social pyramid."
"...What the hell did she say?" With a confused expression without understanding half of what he said, turning to look at the young man who had challenged him.
"I told you, you were going to regret it." Is all he replied, looking at him with a sympathetic expression.
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Commander Bertran's military council.
"The enemy is approaching with approximately 40,000 men, our scouts estimate that they outnumber us in heavy cavalry." Said Captain Bafram in a somewhat annoyed tone. "Tell me please, without the line formations how can we expect our soldiers to cope with the cavalry charges? Being so spread out there will be no way to stop any charges and they will break through our ranks with extreme ease."
"That's simple." Commander Arma replied. "Our wyverns will be sure to attack the cavalry, while our cavalry will attack the enemy formation from the flanks."
"We are not sure that the wyverns could cripple their cavalry, they know this terrain and could hide a sizable group by taking advantage of the terrain. If that is the case our infantry will be vulnerable." Bafram refuted, "Besides we run a great risk in using skirmisher tactics, being far fewer soldiers on the front lines and more dispersed would make them vulnerable not only to cavalry charges, but also to massed infantry charges, it would not be uncommon for our troops to be overwhelmed. I propose that we rely on our traditional tactics and let the wyverns take care of the infantry while we advance in line."
"Impossible, we detected many ballistas in carriages in the core of their infantry, besides if we don't eliminate the cavalry it would be impossible to chase them to prevent them from regrouping. We must destroy their cavalry first so that nothing prevents our cavalry from being able to pursue them and destroy their army at once!"
Commander Bertran heard the arguments of both, however he had already decided on Arma's strategy, however he still had some doubts.
"Why attack now? Our reinforcements landed hours ago, giving them so little rest will be detrimental to their performance in battle."
"It is a risk we must take, we cannot allow them to reach the city and besiege us. If we allow them to build fortifications then we run the risk of taking time to break the siege and give Leiforia time to supply more weapons to our enemies and for Fenn to mobilize even more men, Besides, it is only a question of time before the falklanders discover and send those submarines, we would not receive any supply by sea." Arma was convinced that if they did not end this as soon as possible then the war would stagnate as with Altaras.
"Hmm... you speak the truth, we are not allowed to waste any more time. Order the men to march, we will intercept them here." Bertra was aiming at the location of some plains, where the enemy cavalry could not hide.
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NIshinomiyako dungeon
"This is madness! Redistribute the land?!" The guard was horrified to hear the contents of one of the university books he had confiscated. He had decided to wear a red book because he thought that book was something very important to be in such a striking color. "What is written here is treason! I knew you are spies! You want to foment riots and rebellions with such foolish ideas!"
"Azul!, why would you bring The Capital on a trip to see the feudal Japan?" one of the students asked the tanned girl.
"Because my thesis was about the original accumulation in Japan. And they are not foolish ideas!"
"The aristocracy like the royal family rules by divine mandate, it is the natural order of the world, we do not need these subversive ideas in our glorious empire." The guard was determined to turn a deaf ear.
This was bad, if she was not convinced otherwise the Parlpadian would present the book as proof that they were spies, she had to change the approach.
"Well... Communism speaks mainly of the bourgeois of the capitalist production system and not so much to the nobles. Marx, the writer of that book, did not contemplate a communist revolution without first going through capitalism." Azul said, grateful that she had not brought a book on the Russian Revolution.
"I have no idea what you are talking about."
"It means that it would happen when there is no longer an aristocratic system of government, or when these nobles have already lost all power."
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"Ridiculous! The nobility is an essential part of the functioning of the natural world, how could such a thing happen?" The soldier could not imagine the system falling.
"I think it's closer to happening than you think." She said looking at the uniform of the Parlpadian soldier, a uniform similar to that of the Napoleonic eras and which indicated to her that they were probably in the midst of the industrial revolution. "Common wealthy people, probably merchants, accumulating a fortune to such an extent that they can buy titles of nobility, or buying the lands of bankrupt nobles, slowly becoming more influential in society to the point of having a seat next to the aristocratic gatherings and even influencing the imperi family, am I right?
The soldier wanted to answer, but kept his mouth shut, he clenched his fist remembering as a child how one of those people bought their lord's land and expelled them from the lands his family had been working for centuries to convert sheep grazing lands, which forced them to go to the cities and work countless hours on a loom for a miserable wage, If an army officer hadn't seen his aim throwing dove-hunting stones and recommending him to a military academy, it's likely he was rotting in a factory right now and probably maimed by unsafe machinery.
Noticing a flash of hatred in the soldier's eyes, Azul knew where to direct the discussion and decided to make a risky bet.
"Let me guess, your grandparents, parents or you lived off the land but were expelled because now the land belongs to the oligarchs, they had to move to the city and to survive they had to work compulsorily for a factory receiving a miserable wage."
Upon hearing that, in utter shcok, the guard took his hand to his hilt, fearful that she is a sorceress with psychic powers, however he not pull out his saber. "H-how do you know that?!"
"It is the so-called original accumulation: People live on what they produce from their land or communal lands, unlike the nobles who usually ask for a part of the peasant's production and the rest belongs to him, the bourgeoisie takes over absolutely everything. They are expelled through violence forcing them to migrate massively to the cities. Being people who arrive in droves and desperate without any form of subsistence are forced to sell their workforce, the wage is excessively low due to the law of supply and demand. The lands that are in the possesion of the landowners supply the necessary materials to the factories to produce in mass, but that production is of the bourgeois and not of the worker, and the worker by no longer having land to produce what he needs to survive is forced to buy the products, filling the pockets of those who expelled them." She said so that anyone could understand. "... And those who cannot sell their labor power simply cannot survive, their fate is to perish, become criminals or be used as cannon fodder for that class of nobles and oligarchs to get richer."
"Tsk, cannon meat?! I am a soldier prepared to die for the glory of the Parlpadian Empire! Watch your tongue!"
It seemed that Blue had already caught him in her hands, but she pressed the wrong button and the guard was back on the defensive, she had to think of something fast.
"And what glory would it bring to the mighty empire to take this small island stuck in time?! These wars do not benefit the Parlpadian people, it is only a way to get cheap labor for the bourgeois in order to keep the wages of the workers reduced as possible. The more people enter the labor market the lower the price of wages, the worse it gets if they are slaves who do not receive any pay!"
"Are you saying that our Emperor is being manipulated by bourgeois thugs?!"
"It is the truth, both agricultural and industrial production is in their hands and these wars only help them to expand." Although this was pure shit, she had no idea if the bourgeois would have such control in the empire, but the important thing was to make the guard not tell the interrogators that they were spies seeking to create chaos. " I ask you again what kind of glory would you and your empire have for defeating such weak uncivilized countries? There is no way such a campaign can go down in history except in a little footnote, everyone who participated in it and died will be forgotten. In fact the only way that something like this is remembered is that, somehow miraculously, you are defeated. No glory to gain but the pride of your nation will be stained permanently if they lose."
The guard gritted his teeth in rage at hearing that, he wanted to deny it but saw that she was right about the glory, no one would remember the conquest of Altarus if it had developed smoothly, but as they were defeated in trying to invade they became the laughingstock of the second and first civilisation, even if the second attempt to invade is successful the whole world will remember that pathetic defeat over victory. Combining a lie with a truth will make it easier to believe the lie and the soldier believed the lie that the imperial family was being controlled by those same bastards who hurt his family.
The soldier looked at the book whose title was in a language he did not understand, and then saw the girl again with determination.
"You're saying this will keep them from taking over completely?"
"I don't know whether to stop them from taking over, but how to take control away when they have it." she replied smiling.
"Then tell me about this... communism."
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60km east to Nishinomiyako.
The Parlpadian wyverns made the skies over the battlefield their own, firing at Fenn's cavalry formations that were scattering to avoid taking damage. At the same time the infantry approached the enemy formations under heavy fire from the enemy ashigarus riflemen.
From spells such as creating smoke, illusions and flashes of light, coupled with being scattered, the Parlpadian musketeers were able to close in quickly, being supported by artillery fire that prevented the enemy from firing their salvos together, nullifying the advantage of the Leiforian Monique rifles, which were now unlikely to hit anything.
Once the Parlpadians reached 100 meters they began firing round after round at an impressive speed, eliminating the Ashigaru riflemen with extreme ease.
"Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck! Are these Parlpadians crazy?! They really jumped into combat as soon as they arrived?!" Exclaimed to himself the Sword King Shihan who had come out to command his troops.
The strategy was to arrive as fast as possible to the battlefield while the Parlpadians rested after the landing to dig trenches and keep them in this place while a new army was trained and new Leiforian weapons arrived, once well trained and equipped they would advance and corner the invaders who would have no place to flee thanks to the Altarian fleet and the Falklanders.
But the Parlpadians, as soon as they got off their ships they set out to face them and as soon as they saw them they rushed into battle!
"No, all is not lost yet... the enemy will hardly have rested before marching here... that added to the amount of magic they have spent to reach the range of their weapons..." The sword king was thinking of a way to inflict even some damage on those bastards.
"Heh, so long learning about modern war tactics... Everyone! Charge! Charge those damned imperial dogs and show them what we're made of in glorious melee combat!" He said drawing his sword, a Tachi, to run to the front with a battle cry.
Seeing this, all his men did the same. Taking their swords or naginatas to charge the Parlpadian infantry.
Although the Parlpadians were able to send some along the way, this had taken them by surprise and, added to the tiredness, made them unable to react in time, being able to make a couple of shots when they already had them.
It was like a tidal wave, though the Parlpadians struggled rather well hand-to-hand with energy wear that caused them to be no match for the tide of sharp blades separating their limbs from their bodies.
Artillery had stopped, using artillery like the Wyverns in that situation would cause friendly fire, which could cause morale to collapse.
The Parlpadian commander Bertran was furious to see this, it seemed that the battle could be won easily without many casualties but now, from one moment to another, almost two thousand of his men were massacred
However this one-sided slaughter would not last for long, the cavalry of cuirassiers had already begun when Fenn broke formation to charge them, managing to cross its lines with ease to dispose them... or that was the idea but again the exhaustion negatively affected the performance Parlpadiano, making that the horses could not cross them completely.
Even with the confusion, Fenn's soldiers did not lose morale, not after the festival of visors that struck their enemies. They rushed against the horsemen and their horses to shoot them down and massacre them, the cuirassiers tried to shoot them with their pistols but the heavy armor worn by the elite soldiers like the king himself made the weak gunshots ineffective, though they'd break a few ribs on impact.
"No no! Let me go you fucking barbarians!" Said a terrified cuirassiers when he was knocked off his horse, feeling as multiples wakizashi afiladso were nailed into the joints of his armor to cut the tendons of his arms and knees.
If a modern historian were in this place observing the battle, he would be very surprised that Fenn's soldiers fought more as berserkers than as graceful duelists.
Faced with this disastrous situation Bertran sent the rest of the infantry to save the cavalry, almost all of the Parlpadianian forces on the island went to fight.
Although the battle was a bloodbath, thanks to Fenn's soldiers being distracted massacring the cavalry, the infantry was able to deal with the situation by firing massive salvos that destroyed Fenn's ranks, It was only a matter of time before one of those shots hit King Shihan, thus ending the morale of the defenders causing them to disperse, but not before causing heavy casualties.
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Commander Bertran's tent.
"I warned you that such a plan would not work, without formations our soldiers are vulnerable to charges of any kind! we suffered five thousand dead!" Bafram bellowed insisting that he was right.
"The only reason why there were so many casualties was because our soldiers were in no condition to fight! Not even our heavy cavalry was in good shape to fight and that's why they are almost half the casualties!" Arma answered, confident of his tactics.
"Are you saying this is Commander Bertran's fault?"
"I say that this strategy was prone to a high casualty rate, a risk that all of us considered acceptable, and now we have a clear path to Amanoki without anyone getting in our way."
For his part, the commander was tired. " Arma, though your idea helped us suppress the threat of enemy rifles leaves us dangerously vulnerable to charges. Perhaps if our weapons had a rank similar to the Moniques that would allow us to neutralize the charges or at least give our soldiers enough time to receive reinforcements."
"I can see the shortcomings of my strategy, sir. Yet I consider it the right way to go. We need to develop a new doctrine for the army if we don't want to have a big disadvantage conta Leiforia in case a war happens, we'll make mistakes, if, but once we can reverse engineer the Leiforian Monique and implement it with the Karlslinger system we will be able to what we learned can be better applied and we will not take the bitter surprise of having to create a doctrine from scratch in full war against another superpower." Arma replied.
The commander watches his eyes intently and then sighs. " The only reason I allow you to continue that experiment is because it seems effective against firearms."
"I understand... now I must plan how to improve this doctrine and adapt it to the savages."
He said so the meeting would be over.
During the next few days the capital of Fenn, Amanoki, was captured and the kingdom of Fenn was completely occupied by Parlpadia.