Unbending 2 (Patreon)

Unbending 2 - or ‘I shall not be King, but Emperor of the Earth' (Pre-ATLA, SI)

The Council of Five was the closest thing that the Earth Kingdom had for a General Staff and… it was quite bad.

Within the limits of this time’s mindset, maybe one could see it as a passable organization, but the current dire situation led me to take it as a bad thing in need of change.

The reunion of the chamber with the large map showing the known world in quite abysmal details was where the Earth Military would find itself revolutionized for good. Our enemies had the advantage because their military was one of quality and mobility, while ours was of scarce cohesion but impressive numbers.

We also had a lot of land which could be lost without severely impacting the economy, but it was a loss nonetheless and one that could not be forgiven. Hence why I wasn’t alone in this meeting with the five Generals, and why the giggling young man beside me was itching to reveal the content of his papers.

But first, I had to drop the naked troop to the calm-looking generals.

“The Earth Kingdom is losing this war.”

My statement acted both as a greeting and as an act of condemnation. If there was ease in them by the sight of my arrival, my words shattered that confidence as for many it was a case of discipline and to some of common sense to tense up and be vigilant-looking as I approached the large map.

“King Dafeng-”

“How long has the current status quo existed?” I interrupted with a sharp question, then unveiling the very map that depicted the current frontline and, coupled with the larger map with the original borders, revealed a very ugly truth of how things were going for us.

We lost roughly a quarter of the country. Considering the vastness of the kingdom, the limited supply of troops the Fire Nation can rely upon and the sheer lack of efforts to push them out… yes, this is a military suicide- one that had been unfolding for decades now.

I knew through the lore that it was meant to be bad- but I didn’t expect it to be so ugly while looking into the current borders.

“Y-Your highness, our progress has been slowed down by a general lack of… means to push out the invaders.”

Two generals nodded at that assumption as one of them spoke up in agreement.

“The Fire Nation is quite fierce and aggressive, rendering us unable to muster a solid defense.”

“Yes, about that. I have another question, this time on this very point- how come no one has tried to form numerous defensive lines and who declared that it was a smart idea to just hurl men at our enemies with the expectations of them cracking?”

That was a very fair and stupid question. Fair because common sense dictated smart people to inquire about this, and stupid because it should not exist to begin with.

To add some context on the topic: the military, as the country, was based on the Late Qing Dynasty. Its main strategy to yeet men into the battle and expect them to win by sheer numbers alone was an effort to effectively murder our armies.

The worst part is that China found a way to make it work in WW2 by actually relying on smart situational tactics to delay and defend from the Japanese assaults while handling internal issues.

We were literally throwing hordes to an enemy that can burn shit with a clap of hands!

“Ignoring the painfully obvious reason, I will be honest with all of you. I know some of you deserve this job, some don’t. And we are losing this war in a way that is just painfully humiliating for me- and I have just got hold of this crown so it says a lot,” I remarked dryly, keeping their attention on me. “So, I am going to give you a fair chance to prove that this role you have is not granted to you out of some bribery and spare me the need to have you all checked out for illegal businesses- I want this war over within the decade, even earlier if realistically possible.”

One of the men that kept quiet up to this point frowned at this. “Your highness, while I agree that things may be changed for good, I am genuinely worried this is not doable. The extent of land that was taken-”

“Is not as extensive as you may think it is,” I interjected calmly, while projecting a few maps I had worked on to establish some battle operations. “Not when there are only two priorities to expel the invaders: retake the major cities and cut their supply lines. The thing that keeps them moving is their logistics- remove them and they shall be broken.”

“Y-Your greatness, such a move would be bold and… isn’t it a bit too dangerous?”

I smiled and turned to the giddy researcher I had recruited for this very opportunity to out-tech the Fire Nation. “If it is a case of infantry against infantry, then yes. But we will not rely only on that.”

Confusion flashed on the Generals’ faces, but that’s where I moved to introduce a friend I made two years ago.

Arta or, how the show liked to remember him as, the Mechanist. The young man would have been the mind behind future Fire Nation’s equipment had I not got hold of him early on. Even at the ripe age of seventeen, Arta was a mad genius with a clear understanding that war machines were needed to break the stalemate.

And one of those machines was something he and I had worked for a full year about.

“Lord Generals, this here is Arta. He is an inventor, and someone that I have worked with for well over a year now in ideating something that could change warfare as a whole.”

Arta moved, a wide smile on his face as he offered some of the technical papers to the generals, with the two good ones actually frowning with curiosity over the project, while the others were merely confused by the overall complicated details the papers presented.

“I wish for you all to know of our project, the Armored Tank- a special vehicle meant to give mobility to siege cannons at the tiny expense of cleansed coal that is properly filtered through this tube and-”

And Arta went into deep mad scientist mode at this.

I kept quiet for a while, letting him have his share of promised fun as we both knew only some of the stuff he was bringing up would remain to them. Luckily for us, this was only the first part of a two-part presentation.

Once Arta was done chatting them up, it was time for a practical test through two perfectly-working versions of the first ever tank this world had ever seen. I had to bring the meeting outside of Ba Sing Se for this to unfold as we had set down some special target practice for the armored vehicles.

I had been having odd thoughts on the topic as I had been disgusted by how the original one for the Earth Kingdom was meant to work but… then I remembered the Mechanist created a supply truck with tracks via a design made by Sokka. And that thought- just that thought alone- it made me realize it could be done.

I just had to give it some time and actually look back on some of the notes I had dealt with in my late high school period when I was preparing for my last year’s exams. I had to bring a special topic to branch with other subjects, and I used WW1.

Physics was literally the study of the engines used for planes and tanks so… it was easy to work around that. Arta was also getting hooked on the topic and he was a bit of a mad genius- he was literally the one thing in the show that made science go nuts at how absurd his understanding rate was.

The real gripe was that due to how rudimentary the design was right now, what we got was a slightly-bigger tank to the French Char B1 with a bigger fixed turret meant to allow two men to quickly operate a very rudimentary cannon. A cannon that used explosive shells.

The point of the practice was split in two: the first tank was to display the mobility of the vehicle, which seemed to please the generals for a moment as they were surprised at how quickly such a ‘contraption’ could move.

But it was the cannon that surprised them. The barrel had been slimmed up and made longer compared to the standard cannons- the point being that it could be more precise through these changes, and the next test was literally proving how precise and quick the shots were.

Five targets made of woods, each set at different distances. They were all destroyed with deadly precision within a single minute. It was the ultimate confirmation that I needed as the Generals’ curiosity morphed in pure and focused awe at the firepower displayed in that moment.

“By the way, I have increased the military budget fivefold to allow fresh equipment and troops to be deployed. Three armies shall be created with twenty tanks each- these will be the spearhead we have been lacking up to this point.”

There was only shock, good shock at that, as the Generals could already tell by my words, display and smile that this war that was going for so long… may soon end up wrapping on itself through my reign.

And I was more than ready to make the Fire Nation bleed during their retreat.