Munitions Empire

More and more soldiers crawled onto the beach. Some removed their shoes to shake the gravel out of their boots, while others went back to help the sailors push the boats back into the sea.

Soon, nearly 200 men had landed ashore, but thereafter the speed of the troops landing began to slow down.

Many boats were stuck near the beach, returning at an incredibly slow pace, and most of the troops landing later hadn’t even brought weapons and equipment with them.

A 105-mm howitzer had been brought to shore, but the ammunition and the truck to tow this big gun were nowhere to be seen.

The first car to reach the shore was ruined after being unloaded too soon—the entire vehicle sat in the water, its engine completely wrecked.

On the contrary, the signalmen and their mounts were much more active. Not only could the horses make it ashore on their own, but they could even help to haul small items of supplies to land.

"Who told you to be in such a hurry to get the cars ashore? The soldiers are not even up yet. What’s the rush with the equipment? Huh? What’s the rush?" After resting for about fifteen minutes, the commander of the 1st Company finally remembered his job. Pointing at the wrecked vehicle, he shouted at the sergeant in charge of unloading.

"I don’t know what happened, sir!" said the sergeant, feeling wronged; he wasn’t in charge of loading or unloading goods, after all—who knew exactly what had happened?

Perhaps the whole thing was the sailors’ doing and had nothing to do with the army soldiers. Who could blame them when the landing process was so chaotic that no one understood the situation?

"Where are the scouts? Have they dispersed yet? Are there villages nearby, any local residents? I know nothing. How can I give commands in this situation?" The commander of the 1st Company sighed and turned to ask the officer beside him.

The officer also looked troubled: "Commander, the reconnaissance platoon directly under the company command hasn’t landed yet. Those horses belong to the messenger soldiers of the 1st Platoon..."

"What about the machine gun squads? How many have landed now?" It was the first time the 1st Company commander had encountered such chaos, and he was a bit bewildered himself.

Under normal circumstances, his unit was always complete, the troops moving as directed without any possibility of such a situation occurring.

The officers below were all equally confused—the commander of the 2nd Platoon had not even found his own unit yet.

"We have seven machine gun squads ashore..." the officer answered truthfully.

"That many?" The 1st Company commander was pleasantly surprised upon hearing this. If he had seven machine guns, he could almost establish a defensive perimeter around the landing zone. This could at least ensure that the subsequent troops landed without fail, which was good news.

"Commander, their machine guns haven’t landed yet, or maybe they weren’t even loaded onto the ships..." The officer spread his hands in embarrassment, dousing his commander with a figurative bucket of cold water: "Currently, there is only one machine gun on the shore..."

"They boarded the ships empty-handed? And then just landed like that? Without weapons, what are they going to fight with? Huh?" The 1st Company commander was somewhat overwhelmed.

"I asked around. The 2nd Company was given orders to land men first and send equipment later… So they landed the fastest, but without weapons. Oh, it’s not that they were completely unarmed—there were seven or eight people carrying S3 pistols," the officer hurried to explain.

"What use is that?" The 1st Company commander went pale. He caught sight again of that impressive, yet utterly useless 105-mm howitzer without ammunition and felt increasingly unwell.

Now, the landing troops of the Great Tang Group were truly a mess, a mixed bag with soldiers from the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd Companies.

At the same time, the branches of the military included combat infantry, engineer corps, signal corps, transport troops, and cook troops. There were more officers than soldiers, more people than weapons...

The troops were not subservient to each other, officers couldn’t find their soldiers, and soldiers couldn’t locate their commanders; the scene was so disorganized it was heart-wrenchingly chaotic.

This was merely a small-scale landing of fewer than 2000 people, yet it had already descended into such disarray. If it were a large-scale landing involving tens of thousands of people, they could probably cause enough trouble for themselves to suffer heavy losses.

"You, with the gun! The machine gun team with a gun! See that high ground? Go there and set up a defensive position!" Without a map, the Battalion Commander could only roughly deploy his troops based on what he could see.

"Get the people from 1st Company, 2nd Platoon that landed to head over as well, and set up cover barriers on the flanks of your defensive position! Understood?" He pointed in that direction, ensuring his subordinates comprehended his arrangement.

"But...Sir...there are no enemies here.." the officer reminded tentatively.

"Carry out the orders! Follow the standard procedures!" The Battalion Commander glared at him fiercely, "Now go!"

"Yes, sir!" The officer quickly saluted and then went to find the only machine gun team that had landed with weapons.

In the field of vision, two more boats approached the shore, and dozens of soldiers jumped off them. The Battalion Commander was relieved to see that these soldiers were all armed.

In the distance on the sea, a Wolf-class cruiser belched black smoke as it roamed the periphery of the fleet, while many of the boats that had landed earlier still struggled on their way back.

"Commander, you better come have a look at this..." A squad leader with a Thompson submachine gun ran up unsteadily to the Battalion Commander.

Panting, he pointed into the distance, "There’s a path over there, and on the other side... it seems to be abandoned farmland."

The presence of farmland and a path indicated that people once lived here, which put the Battalion Commander on high alert. He furrowed his brow and raised his hand, signaling the squad leader to come with him to take a closer look.

The two of them pushed through the shrubbery, climbed what was barely recognizable as a roadbed, crossed a dilapidated path, and saw a field overgrown with weeds in front of them.

At the end of the field, they could faintly make out collapsed walls, the ruins of thatched huts. Clearly, there were signs of past human activity, but for some reason, it had been abandoned later on.

After putting down his binoculars, the Battalion Commander looked at the squad leader who had brought the news, "Did you find any locals?"

The squad leader shook his head.

The Battalion Commander rubbed his nose and thought for a moment, "Let’s go back! We’ll talk after all the troops have landed."

They weren’t professional scouts and couldn’t discern the finer points, so it was better to go back and wait for the follow-up troops to arrive. Let the professionals have a look—it would be more effective.

This trip wasn’t in vain, though, because they confirmed at least one thing—the landing site was near traces of human activity. If the other side noticed them, it could very likely attract nearby enemy soldiers.

They didn’t have much time left. Read exclusive content at empire

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I guess this could count as an extra update, I’ll continue tomorrow.

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