Empire Conquest

Chapter 497 - 493: Each Has Their Own Opinion

The Liangxia Navy Command issued the highest state of war readiness on the afternoon of the 21st, local time, and the two Special Mixed Fleets in the East Ocean had also entered a state of combat readiness.

According to the deciphered message, the two Special Mixed Fleets would leave their anchorage at dawn on the 22nd.

If all went as expected, the third fleet, which was the Landing Fleet anchored at South Liuhuang Island, would set off in the early morning, just a few hours later.

The key piece of information was that there was also intelligence suggesting that the Liangxia Navy was preparing to attack Transfer Island.

However, these pieces of intelligence had not yet been confirmed.

Here, we’re dealing with an intelligence war between the two sides.

At the end of last year, shortly after the Northwest East Ocean Battle, the Newland Intelligence Agency, through a defected Saiyi intelligence agent, obtained a set of Liangxia Navy communication codes. Although the Liangxia Navy would change their codebooks monthly during the war, the pattern of the codes had become traceable, which allowed the interception of messages and provided bits of information to roughly predict the Liangxia Navy’s movements.

Never underestimate these bits of information.

Even if only a single sentence or a few words were decrypted, they held immeasurable military value.

For instance, at the start of the year, it was through a deciphered message that the Newland Intelligence Agency deduced that the Liangxia Navy was about to dispatch troops to attack Lion Spring City. Following this prediction, they persuaded the Bulan Authority to send reinforcements to the Fan Flame Ocean, leading to the subsequent formation of the Joint Fleet heading there.

After the Southwest Fan Flame Ocean Battle, the Newland Intelligence Agency noticed a location codenamed "001" mentioned in the routine communications of the Liangxia Navy.

At that time, the Newland Intelligence Agency suspected that this "001" referred to Transfer Island.

To verify this hypothesis, the Newland Navy deliberately failed to deliver desalination equipment parts to Transfer Island three times in a row—specifically, an essential consumable item—resulting in one desalination unit being unable to operate normally, forcing the garrison on the island to restrict fresh water supply.

During this period, the frequency of "001" appearing in the Liangxia Navy’s messages had noticeably increased.

Of course, the Newland Navy also used other methods suggested by the intelligence agency to prove that the Liangxia Navy had set its sights on Transfer Island.

For example, they would send bombers to Transfer Island periodically, and the Liangxia Navy’s communications within the same time frame would certainly contain related content.

All these signs confirmed that the Liangxia Navy was indeed preparing to attack Transfer Island.

However, one problem remained without a reasonable explanation.

The Saiyi Imperial Kingdom had already been defeated and the captured Saiyi intelligence agents were under the control of the Liangxia Empire; surely, the Liangxia Intelligence Agency knew that the Navy’s codes had been leaked? The key point was that the set of codes provided by the Saiyi intelligence agents was obtained before the war, and there were quite a few insiders, some of whom remained in the Imperial Country, still working for the Liangxia Intelligence Agency.

Moreover, why would the Liangxia Navy use the same set of codes continuously?

Changing codes was not a complicated matter.

Besides, following the defeat of the Saiyi Imperial Kingdom and the entry of the Newland Federation into the war, as the scope of the conflict widened, the Liangxia Navy would surely have had to change their codes.

Additionally, referring to Transfer Island as "001" was too blatant.

It seems that all this was intentional, as if the Liangxia Navy was worried that the Newland Navy wouldn’t guess their strategic intention to attack Transfer Island.

Not just Hal, even Nizi thought that this was a ploy by the Liangxia Navy, aimed at getting the Newland Navy to strengthen the defense of Transfer Island, in order to launch a surprise attack on Wei Island.

But Spur did not agree with this view.

For him, there was just one reason.

After the combat on Sai Island concluded, the Liangxia Navy did not withdraw their Marine Corps; all four Marine Divisions that took part in the attack on Sai Island remained in the East Ocean, with two divisions on Sai Island, one on Liuhuang Island, and another in the Landing Fleet anchored at South Liuhuang Island.

This deployment was highly unusual.

If they meant to allow the troops to rest, they should have been pulled back to their homeland, or at the very least, sent to the Saiyi Imperial Kingdom, not left on the frontier isolated islands.

Being sent to the Fan Flame Ocean would have been reasonable, given that the Liangxia Empire still aimed to take control of Boss Bay.

Remaining in the West East Ocean and still deployed on the frontier islands could only mean that the Liangxia Navy was preparing to launch an assault in the near future.

So, what target would require the mobilization of four Marine Divisions?

It must be noted that even when assaulting Sai Island, at most three Marine Divisions were deployed, not four acting simultaneously.

In the initial phase of landing on Sai Island, only one Marine Division was used.

According to statistics made by the Newland Navy, during the Sai Island siege, the actual ground forces of Liangxia fighting on the front line consisted of just one Marine Division.

It wasn’t a matter of not being willing to commit troops; the battlefield was simply too small to accommodate too many soldiers.

Based on these factors, Spur still believed that the target of the Liangxia Navy was Transfer Island, not Wei Island.

Strictly speaking, it was the entire Howay Islands; assaulting Transfer Island was just the beginning, and after securing Transfer Island, they would continue to push eastward.

It would only be necessary to deploy four Marine Divisions at once if they were to attack several islands in succession.

Although four Marine Divisions surely wouldn’t be sufficient for capturing the entire Howay Islands, the Liangxia Navy would definitely reinforce their numbers during the campaign.

Theoretically, four Marine Divisions should be enough to seize two to three islands, thereby establishing a solid defensive system.

That being said, if the Liangxia Navy managed to take three islands on the western side of the archipelago in one go, they would be in a position to envelop the enemy, and the Newland Navy would be powerless to recover.

As for the codes, Spur thought it was a feint.

On that account, Spur made a very bold speculation.

If the Liangxia Navy’s target was Transfer Island, not Wei Island, then the two Special Mixed Fleets anchored at Liuhuang Island and North Liuhuang Island would set sail simultaneously, with at most a few hours apart, and the 21st Special Mixed Fleet to the south would depart first.

The reason was quite simple: the journey to Transfer Island was about the same distance from both Liuhuang Island and North Liuhuang Island.

Conversely, the distance to Wei Island differed by hundreds of kilometers.

In that case, the 22nd Special Mixed Fleet, presumably anchored at North Liuhuang Island, should set sail first.

As for why the 21st Special Mixed Fleet should depart first instead of still having the 22nd Special Mixed Fleet lead, Spur was gambling on luck.

Simply put, he felt that Bai Zhizhan was in the 21st Special Mixed Fleet.

There wasn’t any particular reason; it was just Spur’s intuition.

Of course, this could be considered a habit.

In the words of Tanimoto, the Liangxia Navy was more likely to adhere to the usual conventions when numbering their fleets, unlike the Newland Navy’s capricious ways.

Precisely for this reason, whether the two Special Mixed Fleets set sail together became the key basis for determining which island the Liangxia Navy was planning to attack.

However, obtaining accurate intelligence was far from easy.

For Spur and the other senior generals of the Newland Navy, all they could do at present was to wait patiently.

In fact, the problem of intelligence had always been there and affected both parties in the conflict equally.

In Spur’s words, many times their number one enemy was not the Liangxia Navy, but rather the chaotic intelligence that often failed to arrive in a timely manner.

If they had timely and reliable intelligence, winning battles would not be difficult.

Regrettably, no one dared to guarantee the provision of timely and reliable intelligence.

Indeed, it was precisely because there was no guarantee of obtaining timely and reliable intelligence that the talents and capabilities of commanders like Spur and Bai Zhizhan could be showcased.