Chapter 230 : Declaration of War
Chapter 230: Declaration of War
Aside from the Kingdom of Suria, the pressure on the Ernesto Republic had also continued to increase.
Although the forces led by Yadov had previously achieved a comprehensive victory, the time since then had been short, and it had been followed by the campaign to purge the nobles.
Within Ernesto, the Noble Landlords harbored a deep-seated hatred toward these emancipated serfs—one that reached into their very bones. It could be said they gritted their teeth in hatred.
They did not dare confront Ernesto head-on, but they dared to sabotage it from the sidelines. While Ernesto was facing immense international pressure, they colluded with former officers from the Roshek Tsardom era, reclaiming control over their respective states.
Due to the heavy casualties caused during the early uprising, the entire nation was in a state of ruin awaiting reconstruction. The proportion of young and middle-aged men had already dropped to extremely low levels.
As a result, a large number of soldiers who were no longer of suitable age had been reassigned back to their hometowns—to reclaim farmland or to work in factories supported by the Seris Alliance.
This led to a situation where, aside from key hotspots, there were very few stationed troops in other affiliated states.
And this, in turn, gave the old nobility an opportunity to rise again. Responding to the Tsar’s call, they began engaging in conflict with the local forces within their respective states.
Even if they did not achieve significant results, they successfully contained the stationed forces, disrupted industrial production within the states, and restricted the circulation of food supplies.
And this was only the internal crisis.
On the international front, Ernesto’s fundamentally different ideology had made it a natural enemy of other imperialist nations, and this external threat was constantly hindering its development.
The Seris Alliance was relatively manageable—after all, it was far away, and it had an Empress.
But Ernesto’s success constantly exposed just how absurd their doctrines of divine-right monarchy were—claims such as working like cattle in this life to accumulate blessings for the next, or blaming one’s misfortune on poor geomancy.
They feared that Ernesto’s red flames would one day spread to them. Thus, they either sought to destroy it—or at the very least, to completely isolate it and turn it into a pitiful example.
The surrounding nations, whether intentionally or not, imposed trade blockades that forced Ernesto to rely on supplies transported from the Alliance thousands of miles away. Not only was the distance vast, but the volume of transported goods was also limited.
With Ernesto’s population in the tens of millions, the daily consumption of food alone was an astronomical figure. It had to possess a certain degree of self-sufficiency in production.
But unfortunately, the war had only just ended that year. The planting regions had been devastated during the spring and summer, leading to poor harvests in autumn. By winter, they could only rely on supplies transferred from the Alliance.
Food was insufficient, winter clothing was lacking—and now they had to wage war. This was nothing short of a hellish starting point. Soldiers needed to eat—so where would the food come from? It could only be taken from the people.
Even Yadov could not imagine how to explain this to the populace.
“Didn’t we say that after rising up, everyone would live better lives? Why is it that after rising up, life has become even harder for us?”
Having infiltrated Ernesto and taken the position of Minister of Logistics, Veronica was also full of worry. The Alliance had not sent little food—but Ernesto’s infrastructure was simply too poor. The losses during transportation were enormous, like a bottomless pit that could never be filled.
Thus, Veronica’s coordination plan with the Alliance was to split supplies evenly between industrial equipment and daily necessities such as food, salt, and oil—prioritizing agricultural machinery manufacturing technology, workers, chemical fertilizers, and high-quality crop seeds.
But once war began, all agricultural machinery factories would most likely have to be converted, halting production to focus on survival. All prior preparations would effectively be wasted.
In truth, whether it was the rebel forces led by the Tsar and former officers, the food shortages and famine, or the encirclement by coalition forces—
Any one of these alone would merely be troublesome, not impossible to handle.
But the fatal issue was that all three had overlapped.
It was impossible to both deny people food, demand they produce, require them to enlist and bleed, and expect them to watch their families starve. That would be tantamount to destroying one’s own popular foundation.
The logic behind the allied nations supporting the Tsar was simple: overthrow Ernesto. And even if they could not, they would ensure it fell into chaos—cutting off its development and seizing as much of its land as possible.
By destabilizing Ernesto, they prevented it from interfering, allowing them to focus their main efforts on swallowing up the Kingdom of Suria and preparing for the Alliance’s counterattack.
As the war progressed smoothly, during an internal allied meeting, the imperial prince Ardashir even declared:
“I believe His Majesty the Tsar of Roshek will win, and I also believe Prince Belam will be crowned king. After all, what matters is not the size of the ‘dogs’ in a fight, but the scale of the dogfight!”
His meaning was clear—what mattered was not strength, but the scale of the war. Ardashir believed the allied nations would inevitably emerge victorious.
Although they had previously reached an understanding with the Seris Alliance not to escalate the war involving the Roshek Tsardom, the current situation proved that they had long been prepared for a large-scale war from the very beginning.
Just as Mitia had predicted, the cruisers exported abroad were assembled by the allied nations into a massive joint fleet of hundreds of warships. This fleet cruised near Alliance waters, obstructing and denying passage to Alliance cargo ships—even opening fire to forcibly intercept them.
They even approached Coparac Port and bombarded the docks, causing hundreds of casualties and losses amounting to billions in Alliance currency.
However, since the Alliance had to defend surrounding ports and harbors, it could not immediately assemble a large fleet for a decisive battle. Engaging under such conditions would be unwise.
Especially with battleships yet to arrive, temporary restraint was for a better future.
But now that all pretenses had been torn apart, the peace faction within the Alliance completely abandoned its unrealistic illusions. The pro-war faction gained full dominance, achieving complete internal unity of thought.
The Seris Alliance, on September 1st of the year 3300 in the Continental Calendar, officially issued a multi-channel announcement—declaring war on the allied nations.
In her subsequent nationwide broadcast speech, Mitia concluded:
“Perhaps those representatives of the allied nations, who calculate strategies over a chessboard, lack a true understanding of a war that stretches for thousands of miles in bloodshed. They treat agreements and treaties as mere jokes.”
Rows of wide-plate trains sped along the rails carrying tanks, transporting them to Coparac Port for assembly and shipment. Meanwhile, large numbers of soldiers boarded troop trains, heading toward nearby docks to await transport ships.
“They will not feel even the slightest trace of humanity from Seris in our limited bombings—instead, they will mistake it for weakness.”
War-preparedness airfields across various states were reactivated from semi-mothballed status. Aircraft stored in hangars began undergoing maintenance. All leave was canceled, and pilots resumed adaptive training.
The first two dreadnought battleships to mobilize sailed into Bonwich Harbor City via waterways for resupply and reorganization, joining warships that had long been waiting to form the Alliance’s First Fleet.
“Once war begins, politicians are no longer its masters, but slaves to an unpredictable future and uncontrollable events.”
“The allied forces will not have time to dig trenches—and until the very last second before death, they will not believe that a new history is arriving!”