Chapter 34: The War that began in the Wrong Season.

The war that everyone expected to happen soon occurred at an unexpected time and in a surprising place.

At least in Henia, it was something to be taken as a shock.

Since the southern part of the New Continent is located below the equator, its seasons are opposite to the Old Continent. It was generally expected that the war would start after summer in the Old Continent, which would be after winter in the New Continent.

Although winters in the southern New Continent are not as bitterly cold as in the Old Continent, they are seasons with large daily temperature ranges and frequent rain.

The jungle area is hell in itself, and it was judged that the plains would also turn into mud, making marching impossible.

Moreover, it was the season when typhoons raged in the sea.

Both Henia and Petan lacked the capacity to conduct war solely with resources from the New Continent, so support from the home country was essential.

Therefore, it was taken for granted that the war would start at Portus Island, which occupies a key position on the route to the New Continent. At least in Henia, that is.

Petan broke everyone’s expectations and invaded Henia’s territory in the winter of the New Continent.

Without any declaration of war.

Petan’s surprise invasion was an unconventional act breaking established precedents, and the facts known belatedly were sufficient to receive criticism from the Old Continent nations.

However, the international community’s mere verbal criticism couldn’t push back Petan’s army.

The parliament, which belatedly received information that Petan’s army had already reached near the mines, hurriedly devised countermeasures, but advancing the naval departure scheduled for late autumn by only about two weeks was the best they could do.

It was because the route to the New Continent was already occupied by typhoons.

When the typhoons barely calmed down, the departing navy set a route circumventing Portus Island far away.

It was a strategy not to let Petan know the location of the reinforcements, and an enormous number of transport ships followed behind the warships.

Merchants cheered. If they supplied even one of those many military items, they could make a tremendous profit.

To be honest, we also had a foot in the door.

Precise watches were essential for navigation, and naturally, watches were important for war too.

Wristwatches made for officers were approved by the parliament and supplied.

In the process, appropriate greasing was mobilized for high-ranking military officers and parliament members.

I was confident in the functionality and cost-effectiveness of the military watch I designed, but I had learned enough in Han Jay’s life that good quality and reasonable price don’t guarantee selection.

If it’s defense corruption, I had even tasted it directly while serving as a regular infantryman. The taste of water in the canteen used in the Normandy landing operation is not easily forgotten.

The King must have been twisted inside by the fact that this country is a constitutional monarchy, not an absolute monarchy. Especially regarding the fact that the right to vote on the budget lies with the parliament.

Wouldn’t he have cursed William III, who lived extravagantly enough to cause a national default in the past and eventually handed over the budget voting rights to the parliament?

Or conversely, he might envy him. Since William III was a King who truly ran to the end of luxury. The ruby nicknamed ‘King’s Heart’ embedded in the current crown was also one of the achievements, or non-achievements, accomplished by William III.

Westell, a major producer of wheat as well as watches, could clear out old wheat at once. Mills ground wheat day after day, and the smell of baking biscuits permeated the bakeries.

Hard ship biscuits, baked three or four times to dry out moisture completely, filled the transport ships along with salty salted meat.

It was the cheapest and longest-lasting traditional combat ration. The expensive cheat key called magic was not a means that could benefit even the bottom-rung soldiers.

I couldn’t bring myself to try the tooth-breaker whose notoriety I had heard well of. Wondering if it could really break bricks, I swung it with all my might, and an absurd result came out where both the brick and the ship biscuit broke together.

[Ah, if you shove that in a warehouse for about a year, it gets harder. Then only the brick will break.]

I couldn’t find words to retort to the interference from Paul, the passing coachman. I couldn’t even ask how he knew the change in hardness of ship biscuits over time. Since it’s clearly not an ordinary story.

Anyway, Henia was filled with the clamor of lobbying and corruption related to the production and supply of military supplies, those who already profited from the wartime boom, those denouncing Petan’s cowardice, and those optimistic about the golden future to be gained by punishing evil.

After rounding Portus Island to blind Petan’s eyes, the fleet’s goal of attacking Petan’s port in the southern New Continent and developing a new port simultaneously was only half achieved.

While enduring the lengthened route by bypassing Portus Island, 1/3 of the fleet was lost due to the influence of typhoons still remaining in the distant sea, and the naval fleet attacking Petan’s port suffered devastating damage, with all ships except six half-destroyed ones being submerged among about 50 ships.

Since they pioneered a new port with the remaining ships, they called it half a success. Absurdly, they say it’s thanks to the ships sunk in the port blocking Petan’s ships from departing.

[The 2nd Fleet must be excited. Since the path to promotion is wide open.]

This was the comment of the Duke who saw the newspaper reporting the news that the 2nd Fleet was preparing to depart, highlighting the pioneering of a new port.

Not a single line was written about the fact that more than half of the entire fleet that departed Henia sank into the sea in the article covering up mistakes and continuously conveying only golden hope. Also the fact that a tremendous vacancy was created in the navy thanks to that.

According to what was known later, when the ships departing from Henia were sinking into the sea, news came that Petan had already pushed right up to the mines on land.

So the army collapsed the entrance of the mine they hadn’t dug much and hid into the jungle.

However, just as Henia tasted the limitations of the season bitterly, Petan also had to pay a heavy price for ignoring the winter of the southern New Continent.

With the diamond mine they desired so much right in front of them, their feet were tied in the mud.

Until the Henia side, which had retreated into the jungle, learned that fact belatedly, came out of the jungle again, and fired magic cannons.

If they had fired the explosives that collapsed the mine entrance toward Petan, they would have achieved greater military results.

At this point, one might wonder if this is the greatest rivalry of idiots on earth, but not necessarily. There were countless similar cases on Earth too. If incomprehensible stupid developments appear in alternate history novels, wouldn’t they call it historical verification?

Although the incompetence of the higher-ups plays a large part, the biggest reason was the inadequacy of reconnaissance and communication technology.

Since not everyone in the military is a fool, communication technology relying only on messengers was developing rapidly.

Whether thanks to that, or because incompetent people could no longer keep their positions for various reasons, subsequent battles unfolded fiercely.

Many died, and just as many headed to the battlefield again.

The front line repeated advance and retreat, and eventually, pushed by numbers, gave up the vicinity of the mines to Petan.

The Henian army entered the jungle just like at first, and the subsequent guerrilla warfare inflicted greater damage on Petan than field battles.

In conclusion, the mine remained collapsed for over a year.

“I don’t know what the diamond price will be tomorrow right now.”

Palmer said with a perplexed expression.

Every time the war situation changed, diamond prices fluctuated wildly.

If the stalemate prolonged even a little, words from unknown sources shook the prices. It wasn’t a market that a few big hands could control anymore. Although I couldn’t know the detailed inside story, even the King or the Prime Minister couldn’t guarantee only successful investments.

The Duke’s diamond investment has achieved great success so far, but there were also several failures in detailed timing. It was now a market dominated by madness, not a predictable market.

It’s just regrettable that we haven’t completed the synthetic diamond manufacturing method yet.

On Earth, synthetic diamonds are produced using high-temperature, high-pressure processes or chemical vapor deposition. The latter, also used in semiconductor manufacturing, uses gaseous carbon as a raw material. While it’s possible to produce 50 to 60 diamonds at a time, the process is by no means easy.

I believed that the high-temperature, high-pressure method, which involves adsorbing solid carbon, or graphite, onto a seed and growing it, would have a greater chance of success with the technology of the day.

While I believe my judgment was correct, hearing about continued failures was not pleasant.

Initially, what I expected was not high-quality gem-grade diamonds but industrial-grade quality.

Lab-grown diamonds are grown by injecting various catalysts to reduce the formation process, which would take over 1 billion years in a natural state, to a short period of about 2 weeks.

Therefore, impurities weren’t filtered out completely, making it easy to be made in brown, the least valuable color. Inclusions were also easy to form.

To make colorless diamonds of FL grade without inclusions and D grade, post-processing was absolutely necessary. Since it’s not an easy process, synthetic diamonds gaining value as gems and reasonable price competitiveness happened only after entering the late 2010s.

I’m not Kim Cheom-ji looking for scorched-rice water in a well; I had absolutely no expectation that gem-quality diamonds would pop out at once. Nor was I an expert in synthetic diamond manufacturing methods.

I only taught the rough concept. And actually, I thought that change in perception was the most important factor, and I was optimistic that industrial diamond-grade quality could eventually be created even through some trial and error.

However, the overall technology of this era was lower than I thought, so making a chamber that could withstand 5-6 GPa and 1,300-1,600°C for over 2 weeks was a hurdle from the start.

It could be completed somehow using magic, but then there was no meaning in making synthetic diamonds. The preconditions were completely different from when making sapphire crystals. In synthetic diamond manufacturing, economic feasibility was the most important factor.

Thanks to that, the mages recruited for synthetic diamond manufacturing were conducting research closer to materials engineers than gem experts these days.

The Duke didn’t reduce research funds just because their results were meager. He also knew it was worth investing in even if it took a long time.

Surely a satisfactory result will come out someday. It’s just regrettable that it’s not this moment.