Building a Viking Empire with Modern Industry-Chapter 261: Siege of Wessex (6)

Zhao Feng raised his hand, instantly terminating the rival officer’s proposal.

"A night assault would simply result in another depletion of our infantry assets."

Commander Wei frowned, "Then what is our objective, General? We cannot simply occupy the mud while they sit safely behind their walls."

"We transition to economic strangulation," Zhao Feng declared, looking up at the towering silhouette of the inner keep.

"The sun is falling. We have successfully secured the outer perimeter, entirely severing their connection to the agricultural farmlands and the primary coastal docks. Tomorrow, we will construct a permanent, fortified encampment directly upon these ruins. We will blockade their maritime trade routes and intercept all local supply wagons."

The Viking firearms were lethal, but they could not manufacture wheat or fresh water from within a sealed stone perimeter. The Tang army possessed the stolen granaries of the Middle East. They would simply wait.

Lord Ealdred watched the Tang forces extinguishing the localized fires and organizing their supply trains instead of boarding their junks in defeat. The elderly Saxon noble quickly realized that the eastern invaders were preparing for a permanent occupation.

"Iron Father, they are not retreating! They are establishing a blockade! Our silos within the inner keep only hold enough grain to sustain the local garrison for a fortnight. If they trap us here, the militia will cannibalize the horses, and then they will turn on us! You must give the men hope!"

Ragnar found Ealdred’s constant need for emotional validation to be deeply tiresome.

"General Zhao Feng believes he is initiating a war of attrition," Ragnar explained, "He does not comprehend that his static encampment simply provides the factories in City Titan with the exact temporal window required to finalize the next production cycle."

Ealdred stared at Ragnar, "Production cycle? My King, we cannot eat factory output!"

"Let the Eastern dragon dig its trenches and hoard its grain. By the time their blockade is fully operational, the new rail lines will be completed, and the heavy munitions trains will arrive. I am perfectly content to let them sit in the mud while my foundries manufacture their extinction." Ragnar replied.

Hakon cleared his throat softly, hesitant to interrupt the sovereign’s intense focus. He leaned over slightly, attempting to decipher the chaotic web of chalk lines.

It vaguely resembled a map of the coastline, but intersected with strange parallel lines and circular nodes that made no geographical sense.

Are those supposed to be river tributaries? And what do those interlocking gear symbols represent? Before Hakon could ask, Ragnar suddenly snapped the chalk in half. He stood up abruptly.

"Hakon," Ragnar commanded, "Assemble the entire senior engineering staff and the Vanguard captains. Convene them in the lower war room immediately."

"Yes, Iron Father!" Hakon replied.

After Hakon hurried down the stone stairwell, Ragnar took one final look at the chalk diagram.

He allowed a wicked smile to touch his lips.

The lower war room was a cramped chamber hastily converted from a wine cellar. When Ragnar entered, roughly twenty high-ranking officers and master engineers were already crammed around a table.

They had successfully repelled the outer assault, but every man in the room was acutely aware that thousands of imperial soldiers were currently digging siege trenches just beyond their walls.

"Gentlemen," Ragnar began, "General Zhao Feng has officially abandoned his offensive maneuvers. He has anchored his remaining men in the outer courtyards and the surrounding muddy plains. They intend to leverage their captured Arabian grain reserves to starve us."

Ragnar paused.

"We must address this issue." Ragnar continued. "Even with strict rationing, we will exhaust our caloric reserves within fourteen days. Furthermore, our maritime supply chains are completely severed by the volume of their deep-water junks blockading the harbor. What is our optimal counter-measure?"

The room remained silent for a long moment. These men were brilliant mechanics and fearless warriors, but they were not accustomed to solving grand geopolitical supply crises.

Captain Ulf slammed his fist on the table. "We must break the siege! We have the repeating rifles and the fragmentation grenades. If we concentrate our firepower on a single point in their line, we can punch a hole straight through their encampment!"

"I concur with Ulf," Hakon added, nodding firmly. "The easterners are numerous, but they are terrified of our black powder. If we launch a high-explosive sally at dawn, we can shatter their morale and force a total rout."

Ragnar let out a laugh. It was not a sound of mockery, but of genuine amusement at their primitive thinking.

"Your tactical aggression is commendable, but your mathematics are severely flawed..." Ragnar corrected.

"Even if we break their lines, we lack the caloric stamina to pursue them. I have no intention of fighting a war of attrition."

Ragnar leaned forward, placing both hands flat on the table. "We are going to execute a total encirclement."

Encirclement?! The officers stared in disbelief.

"Iron Father..." the chief engineer began cautiously, "We possess a total defensive force of under four thousand functional men... It is impossible for a smaller force to encircle a massive host."

"Even if we coordinated with the surviving Wessex cavalry, we lack the logistical mobility to flank a stationary army of that magnitude without exposing our own supply lines." Ulf pointed out.

Ragnar unrolled a blank piece of parchment onto the table and produced a piece of charcoal.

Ragnar began to rapidly sketch on the parchment. "We are currently trapped within the walls of Wessex, yes. But you are all entirely forgetting the massive, steam-powered asset we established three miles up the coast before this invasion even began."

The officers leaned in closely, their eyes widening as Ragnar traced a series of lines connecting the coastal fortress to a distant ridge.

"The narrow-gauge railway," Hakon breathed out, the realization dawning on him.

"Precisely," Ragnar confirmed. "Before the eastern dragon arrived, our laborers finalized the tracks connecting the coastal iron mines directly to the northern ridge overlooking this very valley. We have three operational, high-pressure steam locomotives sitting idle in the upper rail yards."

Ragnar tapped the charcoal heavily against the map, marking the dense cluster of the Tang encampment.

"He has packed his entire army into the low-lying plains and the outer courtyards to maintain his blockade. He is completely oblivious to the fact that his army is currently sitting directly beneath an elevated transit corridor." Ragnar explained.

"By the gods," Ulf whispered, a savage grin spreading across his face. "If we position the heavy guns on that ridge, we will have a perfectly clear firing arc over their entire encampment. We can rain shrapnel down upon them from an angle they cannot possibly defend against!"

"It is an absolute tactical masterpiece, Iron Father!" the chief engineer praised, "We will convert the locomotives into armored artillery platforms.."

Ragnar held up his hand, demanding silence. "The implementation requires precision. Our primary hurdle is the initial deployment. We must load the heavy field guns onto the flatbed railcars without alerting their sentries..."