Munitions Empire

Flying the Butcher Fighter through the skies, seated in the cramped cockpit, feeling the engine's vibration, enjoying the turbulence of the air currents, this was the job of the pilots from Great Tang.

Actually, they really liked to fly. That feeling of rolling in the sky, diving and opening fire on the enemy, watching tracer bullets draw beautiful curves, piercing through the enemy's wings, was truly captivating.

But such battles were few and far between. These days, the bulk of their work resembled their current mission, flying through blue skies and white clouds, looking down upon the land, yet without any sign of enemy fighters.

Helplessly, after a few slaughters, the pilots from the Dahua Empire finally realized their aircraft were not really planes at all, so they simply stopped taking off altogether.

Although the Tang Army ground forces often found several dozen Camel Fighters at some secretly built field airbases during their previous rapid advancement, these planes never took to the skies for combat.

They were neatly parked inside hidden hangars, with rooftops camouflaged with vegetation, but the buildings were deserted, with neither pilots nor ground crew to be found.

These pilots, who had once studied on Dragon Island or had been trained by graduates from there, finally understood just how formidable their teachers, or rather their senior mentors, were in the face of the brutal war.

Thus, the aerial combat between the Dahua Empire and Tang Country had become what it was now. Guided by hastily established ground radar stations, Tang Army planes patrolled the skies without finding any opponents.

What used to be interesting dogfights turned into tedious patrols, and in order to save fuel, the scale of takeoffs for Tang Army aircraft was reduced to the bare minimum.

Previously, Tang Army fighters would appear in groups, with dozens of aircraft densely filling the sky, presenting a frightening scene.

These planes would often carry bombs under their bellies, and in the absence of enemy aircraft, they would seek ground targets to attack.

But later on, as the Dahua troops grew more aware of air defences and anti-aircraft guns became more widespread, ground attacks by fighters were explicitly prohibited.

Despite some still engaging in it, at least within the Tang Country Air Force, commanders had come to believe that ground attacks were not the main role for fighters,

and the spectacle of dozens of planes taking off in formation gradually decreased, with the number reduced to patrols of eight-aircraft formations.

Later on, since even eight-aircraft patrols were unable to find the enemy, they began to reduce them further, down to groups of four.

Eventually, most patrol tasks were given over to two-aircraft teams: ground troops hardly saw any more cover-the-sky aircraft movements, only occasionally observing a pair of planes in the high skies circling above, indiscernible from the ground, like flies.

While fighter sorties became less frequent, the workload of Air Force commanders did not ease up. By General Ibrahim's orders, all pilots who were freed from their regular duties had to train more apprentices, cultivating more pilot seeds for the nation.

It was a huge project, for from the support for the southern region through air transport, everyone had seen the importance of air transport.

In the future, Tang Country aimed to establish the world's largest air transport force and a civilian aviation fleet of the greatest scale. All these required pilots to operate and a large ground crew team for support.

Therefore, apprentices were being trained frenetically at every airfield, with so many young people gathered together, playing with the world's most advanced and expensive flying machines, how could it not be a matter of great concern?

Now, the tasks of these unlucky front-line Air Force commanders were not to command aerial combat or provide ground support but to keep an eye on these youngsters, preventing them from causing trouble.

Keep in mind, even the cheapest Butcher Fighters are not inexpensive to procure, and crashing one would result in writing a plethora of reports.

Not to mention that if an apprentice pilot crashes and loses his life, the situation becomes far more serious. Compared to the aircraft, these reserve pilots, who have received over two years of education, are more precious.

Just the other day, an accident where a ground crew apprentice lost his arm to a propeller was enough to have several commanders in trouble up till now, creating a chilling effect whenever it's mentioned.

Compared to the front-line Air Force, the rear Air Force transport units are now so busy that they hardly have time to eat.

Taking off from various airfields, they are filled with food bound for the southern regions. In order to solve the food shortage in the south more quickly and efficiently, Tang Mo ordered all available C-47 transport planes to be used for transporting grain.

Even the paratroopers' C-47s were no exception, so these days, the Tang Army paratroopers actually have no way to participate in combat—unless they walk to the front line.

But walking to the front line has its difficulties too: the roads are clogged with infantry units traveling to the front, these troops crowd the highways, carrying all sorts of supplies, and anyone wishing to pass must get in line…

...

On a northbound train speeding along, there were carriages crammed with Dahua troops who had been taken prisoner. These captives were still in their Dahua military uniforms, the only thing missing were the steel helmets, left behind at Xicong.

The mood among the prisoners was stable—they had all been given a good meal before boarding the train, the first decent food they had had in over a month.

After this meal, they were to be sent to Luo Town, where they would have to work diligently for three years. Though no one knew exactly what they would encounter during those years, they saw something different in the Tang soldiers who were watching over them.

Each guard tasked with overseeing the prisoners repeatedly emphasized what they needed to be aware of while working in the factories at Luo Town.

The incessant repetition had made it clear to everyone what their future actions should be: the nagging was oddly comforting, as one wouldn't waste their breath on the dead.

If what these Tang soldiers had promised held true, and there would be three meals a day at Luo Town, then living as a captive in the Tang Kingdom for the rest of one's life didn't seem too hard to accept.

Most of the carriages were cramped, with barely any space to sit—and if you managed to sit down, standing back up was near impossible.

However, two carriages were comparatively spacious, filled with the wounded and some Dahua Empire officers.

Having surrendered, these officers had no intention of going back: the Dahua Empire wasn't kind to officers who surrendered, and it was very likely that their families had been dispatched and reduced to servitude. They had understood these consequences when they chose to surrender.

Qian Jinhang hadn't chosen to take a plane to Chang'an; he opted to return by train. On the one hand, because in those days planes weren't safe, and even Tang military officers would avoid flying if they could, and on the other, because Qian Jinhang wanted to see for himself what the Great Tang he was about to serve was really like.

To be frank, Qian Jinhang was terrified of certain Great Tang systems as he too belonged to the old bureaucracy and nobility, similar to Lu Qianshan and Bai Fei.

Therefore, he wanted to observe more of the Tang Country, to see what the real Tang Kingdom was like, and whether it was as those people claimed, the grave of the old world.

It was something he had to do because to convince himself to serve the new king, he needed to find something to sustain him.

The train raced across the wilderness, and they were soon approaching Sishui, Qian Jinhang's previous target of attack, a place he had failed to reach despite his best efforts, yet saw effortlessly after his surrender.

As they approached Sishui, the train began to slow down. It was said they needed to wait for a southbound train to pass before they could enter the station.

Following an unenduring wait, Qian Jinhang saw the platform at Sishui. Honestly speaking, he hadn't expected a train platform could be built so magnificently.

As one of the Tang Country's transportation hubs, the sheer scale of the Sishui railway station could accurately be described as massive. Southbound and northbound passengers, as well as some military personnel, crowded the platforms, giving the impression that the whole world had gathered there.

Qian Jinhang hadn't expected Sishui to be so prosperous, nor had he anticipated that those former nobility and landlords who described their world as "struck by disaster" and "the enemy of the world" could have constructed a state to such a degree.

If this were the enemy of the world, then what should those rulers who allowed their people to go hungry and unclothed be called?

But Qian Jinhang knew what they thought; in their eyes, individuals like Zhao Kai, Leines I, and Binghan the First were considered "wise and benevolent rulers," "models of a prosperous era."

To be honest, Qian Jinhang himself had always believed so too. He thought that for a general to follow a monarch like Binghan the First or Leines I, expanding the empire, was the ultimate achievement of one's life.

But now, he felt he had been wrong or perhaps the world had been wrong. Those nobles, landlords, gentry, and merchants, they must have gotten something wrong.

If they weren't wrong, then why was the world before him, the world that belonged to the Tang Country, so utterly different? They had advanced beyond everyone else in just a few years. If they were mistaken... why?

Qian Jinhang, silent, looked through the train carriage glass at the distant crowds, the people who packed the platforms, with smiles occasionally visible.

Those were smiles that came from the heart, filled with satisfaction and anticipation. Such smiles were rare in Dahua on an ordinary day, let alone during wartime.

It was as if these Tang people were unconcerned about their country losing the war, like the conflict that had cost Dahua millions of soldiers had nothing to do with them.

Qian Jinhang discovered that he... seemed not to see as clearly, or understand as intimately, as an ordinary passerby here.