Eastern diterranean, several kilotres off the coast of Dakshina Mukhi.
The European coalition fleet, composed of 800 warships, approached the Suez Canal and the ships guarding it like a group of insects slling sugar.
Agni’s expression was not looking good as he lowered the binoculars. He naturally understood the strategy behind letting the Clippers and frigates spearhead the fleet. It was simply a at shield to absorb the punishnt the Bharatiya fleet would be dishing out.
Knowing this, ’this will be tricky’, he said to himself. Not only was the enemy fleet spearheaded by low-value targets, but these low-value targets were also moving around like fish out of water, spasming as if their life depended on it, making it much harder to hit them.
Suddenly, a naval officer stood next to him and perford a standard military salute. "They are in range, your highness, " Vikram Das Chauhan, the Vice Admiral, inford.
Agni let out a deep breath. "Fire when ready, " he said, eyes flickering. Vikram was about to leave, but Agni’s voice rang out again. "Also inform Rajendra to use the torpedoes, all of them, after the enemy battleships co into range. "Vikram’s eyebrows jumped, but in the end, he nodded and left.
Agni stared at the enemy fleet, a hint of ruthlessness flickering in his eyes. The torpedoes were not ard on every ship; hell, they were not even installed on all the battleships. They existed only on the eleven capital ships that once commanded individual battle groups. Basically, torpedoes were only limited in number and were only supposed to be used in ergency situations, but Agni felt that there wasn’t a better ti than now.
You have to know each torpedo is a deadly weapon, capable of completely neutralising a battleship, no matter how massive it is. In this era, no one really thought about reinforcing hulls against such threats. So with the enemy still clustered at the front and no risk of friendly fire, Agni felt that this was the perfect mont to unleash the torpedoes.
Ti slowly passed, and the European fleet got ever so closer. And then, there ca a mont in the battle, a mont where it felt like ti itself had co to a halt. Agni could swear that he even saw a crow flying in slow motion. Everyone held their breath, and all hearts began to race.
The next second.
"BOOM!"
The first and second batteries of all the seventeen Delhi-class battleships and six Surat-class battle cruisers fired out in unison. The sounds superimposed and ford sonic waves, pushing the ships back and sending vibrations through the sea. Shells as big as a human head were ejected from the naval cannons, and the gunman, without a second thought, reloaded it and pulled the trigger.
"It’s here."
Edward Russell, standing on the deck of a Sovereign-class, was left shaken after looking at the cannons approaching his fleet like a teor shower. He even forgot to take out the smoke pipe from his mouth and ended up coughing.
At the front of his fleet, in a French Rochambeau-class light frigate, navigator Leblanc was scared out of his wits. His captain was screaming, "Portside, portside, portside, "on top of his lungs, as if his life depended on it.
Leblanc could have sworn the captain’s pants were a little wet, but he frantically turned the wheel as the sail operators changed the sails as fast as they could.
"Boom!"
The boat was suddenly rocked by an imnse force. ’Are we hit?’ Leblanc’s heart dropped, but the next mont the excited voice of his captain was heard, "Hahaha, it’s just the lookout, we have not been hit. " He scread, but the explosion that sounded from behind drew everyone’s attention.
It was the English ship that was tailing them from behind. It was up in flas, and it stopped in place.
Leblanc even saw a few mangled corpses right on deck that were on fire.
He turned his head, trying to rid his mind of the terrifying visuals, but when he did, horror greeted him. The sea had erupted into chaos. Ships scrambled desperately to evade the falling fireballs, creating utter pandemonium. So collided at full speed, others, failing to see incoming cannonballs, were engulfed in flas on impact. It was as if a royal rumble to the death had broken out, and he was right in the middle of it.
Sadly, Leblanc could not think anymore because the second round of bombardnts from the enemy was heard.
But this ti, Leblanc no longer stayed at the steering wheel, as he didn’t trust his captain, a son of a nobleman, to get them out of the predicant safely. So, ignoring the military punishnt, he took the matter into his own hands and got up and looked around in all directions to decide the next step.
After all, even to receive the punishnt, he should first be alive. Leblanc could hear the captain throwing a tantrum and roaring on top of his lungs, but he completely ignored him. On the left and right sides of the ship, he could see that two ships were on a collision course with his ship, and at the front, he could feel the cannonball approaching.
"Close the sails, " he roared on top of his lungs, "and stop the ship no matter the cost. "
The sailors on the ship were startled. Who do they follow? The second in command or the captain? But then they looked at Leblanc and the captain, who was screaming like a lunatic with snot and tears, side by side. They made their own decision and followed Leblanc’s orders.
Leblanc ran to the front of the ship, and his heartbeat jumped as he saw an Italian light clipper and a French light frigate collide into each other. And no sooner than his expectation, the cannonball ca hurtling onto the ships.
"BOOM!"
The cannonball wreaked havoc on the two ships that had already collided with each other, causing an explosion. Leblanc could even feel the heat of the flas emanating from the ships and the sll of burnt corpses. He could not help but retch out everything he had eaten.
The scene greatly shook the sailors, constantly drawing crosses in fear and gratitude, and that included his good-for-nothing captain, who had stopped sobbing and started to devoutly chant out Latin verses.
Leblanc shook his head and cautiously looked around to be prepared for the third round of bombardnt. ’We should now be able to hit back, right?’ He hoped, but sothing coming towards them under the water got his attention. He did not know what it was, but for so reason it made his heart palpitate.
"Hard right rudder, "he roared.
The sailors did not understand why Leblanc was so panicked, but since he was able to save them once, most of the people trusted him. The lookout, who had just gotten down since the lookout platform was completely obliterated in the first bombardnt, imdiately took the wheel and turned it frantically.
There was a ship to the side, so when they changed course, a collision occurred, but thankfully, both ships were going in the sa direction, so it was not that serious.
Leblanc could hear the English bastards from the next ship hurling abuses at him, but he completely ignored them and ran to the port side of the deck and peeked into the water to see what the thing coming towards them was.
"zzzzzzzzz"
This ti, he was sure it was definitely not a shark, because he saw the tallic sheen under the water. And more importantly, ’What kind of shark swims in a single path and so quickly?’
The tallic thing missed the back of his ship by a quarter of a tre and plunged into the fleet.
’Gulp!’ Leblanc let out a sigh of relief, but what happened next made him wide-eyed and he began fearing for his life.
At the back of the fleet
Understanding what was happening at the frontline, Edward Russell clicked his tongue in annoyance.
Although the orders he gave were greatly helpful and indeed very successful in wasting as much ammunition of the Bharatiya fleet as possible, he could not have accounted for the actions of the sailors in panic. Although, as he expected, the number of ships that were hit by the enemy artillery was low, the number of collisions that happened because of chaos was high. In the end, it was as if he shot his own foot.
"Dammit, "he cursed.
But suddenly, several muffled explosions occurred at the front of the fleet.
He did not understand what was going on, but the next mont, to his horror, over six battleships were beginning to tilt, and soon they capsized, followed by completely sinking into the sea.
His eyes widened. "What the **** happened?" He exclaid, but just like him, everyone looked forward with shock and bewildernt.
"Why doesn’t anyone answer? Is Everyone Deaf? What the hell...happened?" He roared. But alas, for no avail.
Thankfully, a few monts later, his commodore in charge of communication, John Benbow, ca forward and replied,
"Italian Supre Commander Marco Antonio Giustiniani suspects that it is an underwater weapon of the Bharatiya Empire. He also added that three of his battleships were hit by such a weapon during the war for Crete."
"He also added that the Bharatiya Empire couldn’t have too many of these weapons."
Edward Russell had not completely cald down, but his expression did relax.
He still had a lot of questions in his mind, but he knew it would have to wait for a later ti. "Rescue as many people as possible and," his eyes flickered, "hit back."
Agni was in a good mood because the strategy of the enemy backfired on themselves, and also because he was able to take down over six battleships. But the next mont, looking at the shower of flas, much larger than what his fleet could unleash, his expression turned serious.
"Boom!"
Cannonballs ca crashing down, destroying the decks of various ships and injuring or even killing the people on board.
Blood-curdling screams echoed, and anger ran deep.
"Fire, fire, fire, kill those bastards!"
The return fire swept the situation, and once again it devolved into a fight between heavyweights, exchanging blow for blow. But unfortunately, similar to the Battle of Crete, although the Bharatiya Empire could pack a punch and injure the coalition greatly, its endurance was not at the sa level.
Under the bombardnt of over 700 ships, the 240-odd ships of the Bharatiya Navy slowly began to lose combat effectiveness.
If 100% is the total combat effectiveness of the Bharatiya fleet, it had now dropped to 70%, while the opponent still had a combat effectiveness of over 80%.
Deep in his heart, even Agni knew this would happen, as emotions and morale alone do not win wars, but he still felt unwilling.
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