Seven Seas Beacon Fire

"We could consider drafting an article accusing the Ursus Federation first. If some royalist members really did escape from Moscow Fortress with the crown prince and princess, then hopefully they can leave the border of Ursus. Then we can help them establish a government in exile... If only we knew where they were going, we could start preparing to receive them..."

Lloyd George muttered to himself as he walked toward his study. When he reached the door, he turned to his secretary and said, “Well, you can tell Sir Leonard that I have time to see him now, but you should let him know beforehand that we will absolutely not start a war with Ursus at this time.”

"Are you meeting with Leonard now because you feel you need someone to give you bad advice at this time?"

“Yes, although that guy always makes a mess of things, things are already a mess now, so let him come and stir things up.” Lloyd George’s lips curled up slightly: “It’s a good use of him.”

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"Breaking news: The bodies of Princess Olga and Princess Tatiana have been discovered in Ursus..."

Li Renxu looked at the telegram in his hand. It was first-hand news from the embassy in Ursus. After reading the telegram, he passed it down. The cabinet members of the Tang Dynasty in Yingtian Prefecture once again gathered in the Wuying Hall today. The news from Ursus these past few days has been like a TV series, and the countermeasures that have just been put forward here may be outdated by the next day.

"According to the telegram, the bodies of the two princesses were found from two different directions... and quite a distance from Moscow Fortress." After reading the telegram, someone tentatively speculated: "Could it be that the princesses and the crown prince evacuated separately?"

"To be precise, they used several princesses to attract the attention of the Ursus New School, and their goal was to send Alexei out of the country." Mr. Fifth stood up and went to the map, where he drew two circles on the map with his pencil. The place names circled in these two circles were the places where the bodies of the two princesses were found.

"The Tsar and Empress were killed by accident. Both sides claim that the other side accidentally shot them during the exchange of fire. So how did these two princesses die?" The Minister of the Court of State Ceremonies felt that there were many strange things going on. "Were the bodies of the two princesses found directly when they were discovered, or did they become corpses after they were discovered?"

"You mean, the Ursus Federation is now planning to wipe them out completely?"

"It's not surprising that they're so ruthless, is it?" Someone shrugged. "The new school of thought in Ursus did give them a chance, but the Tsar's family and those royalists did this. Are all the new school of thought in Ursus just nice guys?"

"We need to further verify the specific circumstances of these two princesses through other channels. If the two princesses were killed directly during the pursuit, then we can determine the current attitude of the Ursus Federation towards the former royal family."

Fifth Mr. said, "However, one thing is certain: compared to letting the crown prince and princesses escape the country under the protection of those royalists, the current Ursus government would rather exterminate them than give other countries the opportunity to establish another Ursus puppet government abroad."

"Would they really do that? Even now, that Tsar still seems to have a considerable number of supporters and sympathizers in the country, right?"

"What else can we do? Not to mention that Nicholas II is dead, even if he were still alive, the superficial cooperation that the two sides had been barely maintaining could no longer be sustained, right? So, what follows is naturally a life-or-death struggle." The Minister of the Court of State Ceremonies' tone sounded casual, but it revealed a chilling sense of dread.

Everyone realized that Ursus was likely to experience a bloodbath in the country.

"No wonder Polonia dared to provoke Ursus before; it seems she must have known something beforehand."

“That’s right. No matter how you look at it, it seems like the Victorian Empire is behind it.”

“Alright, everyone.” Li Renzhi interrupted the cabinet ministers’ free exchange: “Now that things have happened, it’s no longer important whether the Victorian Empire was behind it. Even if Victoria didn’t plan all of this before, they will definitely take this opportunity to do something now, and the most likely thing is probably to get the Crown Prince Alexei and the two princesses who are still missing.”

Chapter 324 Heading East

When Anastasia opened her eyes again, she found herself in the swaying truck bed, feeling the cold wind seeping in through the gaps in the tarpaulin. Her summer clothes were very thin, but fortunately she was wearing a coat that belonged to someone else, so she instinctively wrapped the coat around herself even tighter.

The girl observed the truck bed with her amber eyes. For a girl who was only 19 years old, she had never experienced such a situation in the past 19 years.

Needless to say, the princess's life of luxury was once extravagant. Even after her father was forced to abdicate and her family was placed under surveillance, she still had servants at her beck and call, her own personal servants and cooks, and lived in a rather luxurious manor.

Anastasia hadn't experienced cold for the past 19 years, but now the biting wind was seeping in through every gap in her clothes, the icy chill penetrating to her very bones.

It's summer now, and it's only rained a little, but Anastasia has never felt so cold before. Even the coldest winters she's experienced in the past can't compare to this bone-chilling cold.

Anastasia.

Anastasia heard someone calling her name. Turning her head, she saw her older sister Maria, who was also curled up in the truck bed. It seemed that Maria had just woken up. Maria, who was the third oldest in the family, still looked terrified from her expression. However, she tried her best to comfort her younger sister with the warmest smile.

If Maria had a mirror, she would probably find that her smile looked worse than a cry.

Anastasia glanced around the wagon bed; besides herself and her sister, only Alexei lay on a pile of hay.

Anastasia crawled over to her younger brother. Alexei had been in poor health since childhood, suffering from severe hemophilia. Two days ago, when boarding the train, Alexei had accidentally fallen off and his knee wound had not yet completely stopped bleeding. Back in the palace, no matter what kind of medicine or that mysterious sorcerer, Alexei always managed to turn the tide in such situations. But now, on the run, they couldn't even change the bandages.

Anastasia placed her hand on Alexei's head. Sure enough, Alexei had developed a fever, and if this continued, his condition would become quite dangerous. Anastasia turned to look at her sister, but her sister could only offer a smile that looked more like a grimace to comfort her.

“Your Highness, we have no way to buy medicine right now. All the New School’s henchmen throughout Ursus are hunting us down. We must at least leave the border to be safe.”

Inside the truck bed, a middle-aged woman who had been protecting them all along spoke apologetically. Anastasia looked at the burly Ursus woman and said, "Aunt Raisa, can't we really stop at a village or town along the way to buy some medicine? Alexei can't hold on like this. If Alexei dies... then what's the point of sending us out of the country?"

Although Anastasia and her sisters may have been naive little girls in the past, after the changes of the past few years, Anastasia has matured a lot compared to two or three years ago. Although she, her sisters, and her brother were forced to go with the flow during the changes of the past period, Anastasia now understands many things.

For example, these guards who are escorting them out of Ursus are people she, her sister, and her brother can absolutely trust and rely on right now. However, these people are certainly not simply loyal to the Romanov royal family.

The ultimate goal of these people is probably to support their younger brother in establishing a government-in-exile in Ursus. Although their younger brother is still young, he is the most influential person among the royalists in Ursus, as the crown prince of the Romanov royal family.

Anastasia didn't want her brother to get involved in this mess, but seeing him with a high fever, she could only use this to remind the guards that their pursuit of wealth and status should at least be based on the premise that her brother was still alive.

To Anastasia's surprise, Aunt Laisa, a burly woman resembling a Siberian hamster, sitting in the truck bed, simply sighed, moved an MG08/15 light machine gun from her lap, went to the window behind the driver's cab, and knocked. Then, a bearded man in the passenger seat opened the window and peered into the truck bed: "What's wrong?"

Raisa relayed Anastasia's words to the bearded man, who simply shook his head with a wry smile. Raisa then looked at Anastasia and Maria, saying, "Princess, I'm actually very pleased that you have such mature ideas, because it means you've matured. If any unexpected events occur during your journey, with us covering your retreat, your chances of escaping will greatly increase. However, I must say that you may have some misunderstandings about our intentions."

“I’m sorry, Anastasia is actually…” Maria was about to speak when the bearded man interrupted her, “Princess Anastasia’s ideas are very mature. This is commendable and praiseworthy. Because in the future, apart from us, the people you come into contact with will definitely not have the same pure intentions as us. Haven’t you noticed which direction we are heading?”

"direction?"

Anastasia and Maria exchanged a glance. To be honest, having been out at night and sleeping during the day for the past few days, the two girls had no idea where they were, let alone which direction they were heading.

"Aren't we heading west? Or... are we heading south?"

Whether heading west or south, it's basically the shortest route out of Ursus. Logically speaking, the longer we stay in Ursus, the more dangerous it becomes, so we should leave this land as soon as possible.

“We’re neither heading west nor south.” The bearded man sighed. “Anyone can see that these two routes are the shortest, most convenient, and fastest way to leave Ursus. So the New School’s talons will definitely set up layers of obstacles in these two directions. Our goal is too obvious. Whether we go west or south, it will be difficult for us to leave the land of Ursus.”

"But when the two older sisters parted ways with us, didn't they say that they..."

“That was a pretext devised by the two princesses to draw your attention,” the bearded man said. “One princess was heading west, and the other south, while we were heading east.”

"East?!"

Both princesses exclaimed in surprise upon hearing this. How could they not know what was to the east? To the east lay the vast Siberia. Even though Ursus had lost the easternmost coastal region of Siberia in the last war, what remained was still one of the most expansive lands on the planet.

Most of Ursus's population lived west of the Ural Mountains. It could be said that Siberia at that time was an absolutely desolate place for most Ursus people. Anastasia knew very well that her father had liked to exile people to Siberia, and most of those people did not live long in Siberia.

Apart from a few exceptional individuals who repeatedly ventured into and out of Siberia and later genuinely believed that Siberia could educate people, few Ursusians would consider it a good thing to rashly enter Siberia, especially since they had to avoid crowded places along the way, avoiding both train travel and overnight stays in large settlements.

It's just that it's not winter now, otherwise people would really be asking for trouble.

Going east means...

“We will keep heading east, and after traveling a certain distance, we will turn south and head towards the Tang Empire,” the bearded man said. “Right now, most people in the world think we will either go west or south; very few people think we will go east.”

"But that would make the journey even longer... Alexei's body..."

“Your Highness, haven’t you understood yet?” the bearded man said. “We are entrusted by someone, and we simply hope that you can survive. We will try to go into the villages and towns we pass through to get some herbs.”

"Alexei's current condition requires better treatment; the herbal remedies and traditional medical practices found in ordinary villages are probably insufficient..."

“Your Highness, given our current situation, the only option we can choose is to ensure the survival of as many of you as possible. Therefore, we cannot go to large hospitals in big cities. We have no intention of leading you to establish a government in exile... So, Your Highness Alexei can only rely on himself.”

The implication behind the bearded man's words was quite clear: if they intended to use these men to establish an exiled Ursus regime, then Alexei's survival was crucial. However, these men did not share this intention, so Alexei could only do his best and leave the rest to fate.

After the bearded man finished speaking and closed the car window again, Anastasia and her sister Maria exchanged a glance. Anastasia felt an unprecedented sense of helplessness at that moment. She knew that she could not and should not blame the people who were protecting her. They had indeed done their best. Hemophilia was difficult to cure even in many large hospitals in this world, and in order to hide their whereabouts while fleeing, they could not risk going to large hospitals in big cities.

But this feeling of helplessness was very real, especially when she thought of her father and mother who had died a few days ago, and then of her two older sisters who had been missing since they parted ways. Anastasia and her sister Maria looked at each other, and then the two girls moved closer to each other and began to cry.

After crying for a while, Anastasia let go of her sister Maria and turned to Aunt Raisa again: "Are we really going to go to the Tang Empire like this? Father and that country have been fighting for many years. Will they do anything to harm us?"

Anastasia's impression of that ancient country in the East was still based on the Ming Dynasty. Therefore, Anastasia couldn't help but feel a little uneasy. After all, the relationship between the two major land powers was usually not good. Although the Tang Empire and the Ursus Federation were both newly established countries, the Ming Empire and the Ursus Empire, which they inherited respectively, were old enemies.

How would they treat me if I went to a country that was recently an enemy? After all, in some ways, my father was still there. In their eyes, I was also just a bastard who started wars at will.

Anastasia had heard some rumors from the palace maids about the East, that the emperors of the East would have 100 concubines, and that they would punish the disobedient concubines by hanging them up at night and whipping them with leather whips.

But if Li Che knew about this strange and inexplicable stereotype, he would definitely protest speechlessly—what the hell does this have to do with anything?

“Princess, you don’t need to worry too much about this,” Raisa said. “The Tang Empire in the East now is different from the Ming Empire of the past. And do you know the status of the wife of the Tang Emperor’s grandson, the concubine of the Crown Prince of the East?”

Anastasia, who had been under house arrest, was naturally unaware of recent international news. Therefore, she was ignorant of some things that were widely known. So, Raisa explained them to her:

"The wife of the Crown Prince of the East is the former Princess Yongning of the Ming Dynasty. Your Highness, the current royal family of the Tang Dynasty can even marry princesses from the previous dynasty of the Ming Dynasty. Judging from their attitude towards Princess Yongning, if they treat their own former princesses this way, they certainly won't harm us... Once we arrive in the East, I believe everything will be alright."

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PS: There's actually a lot to write about in this part, including the original plot where the three brothers, Li Renchi, Li Renxu, and Li Rensui, had many scenes of mutual antagonism, but I basically cut all of that out.

On the one hand, it's to avoid a regency, and on the other hand, my book is essentially a naval fantasy novel. Few readers are probably interested in this aspect of the plot, so I'll make a slight transition here. The focus will now be on the naval development during the treaty period.

This arrangement... I hope everyone has no objections?

Chapter 325 The First to Eat Crab

The last remaining bloodline of the Romanov dynasty was making a difficult journey toward Siberia. Although almost the entire world was now paying close attention to the whereabouts of Crown Prince Alexei and the two princesses, intelligence agencies and special agents from many countries had already made various arrangements and preparations before any further information was revealed.

However, the world will not stop turning just because a few people are missing, and political leaders and high-ranking officials of various countries will not stop their work just because there is no news about these people for the time being.

In Europe, the sole remaining Lyon-class battleship in the Kingdom of Gaul is undergoing outfitting work at a leisurely pace. Although the Kingdom of Gaul has preserved this 3-ton battleship with the most main guns in the world—a total of 16 main guns—for the sake of national prestige, the construction progress of the Lyon battleship can be described as snail's pace.

This was naturally intentional on the part of the Gallic Navy. With the development of naval vessels in various countries now on hold, there is no need for countries to worry too much about their warships still being outfitted on the slipway becoming outdated before they are launched. Therefore, the construction of ships can proceed slowly.

This is partly to save money. As we all know, during wartime, in order to speed up the construction of warships, shipyards often have workers work in three shifts. This requires hiring more shipbuilding workers than usual, and the money for overtime is all part of the cost of building warships. Even in the 21st century, the shipbuilding industry is still a labor-intensive industry, and labor costs account for a large proportion of its costs.

If construction is slow, only the most basic workers can be hired. They can clock in and out on time every day, and it is normal for a ship to take 5, 6, 7 or 8 years to build. Historically, there are many countries whose warships literally took ten years to build.

This slow construction progress is somewhat like an installment loan. Although the total cost may be a bit higher (after all, it takes much longer), the annual investment can be much lower, which puts less pressure on the finances.

Of course, more importantly, due to naval treaties, once these battleships on the shipyard are completed, the navy will not start construction on any more of these large capital ships until the oldest battleships in the navy's equipment inventory reach the point where they can be replaced.

Although in theory, shipyards of various navies can maintain orders and production by building treaty cruisers, as of now, no country has actually prepared what kind of treaty cruisers it wants to build, and the design work has not even begun. Therefore, the ships on the slipway will naturally be built more slowly.

The economic problems following the war are an objective reality for all countries. The large number of veterans entering society and the resulting job opportunities have already caused headaches for governments. If labor-intensive enterprises like shipyards go bankrupt and cause a large number of shipbuilding workers to lose their jobs, it will naturally worsen the already pessimistic economic situation of the country.

Compared to the three superpowers that focused their main efforts on building large surface warships, Gaul was one of the first countries to shift its main naval development focus to cruisers.

Like the Colombian Navy, the French Navy also lacks high-speed capital ships, so the French Navy has put forward higher speed requirements for their cruisers. They hope to acquire a heavy cruiser that can reach 35 knots.

This speed standard is undeniably high, especially considering that we've only just entered the 2020s. Even for some CAs in another world during the 1930s, such a speed standard would be a challenging benchmark. However, the Gallic Navy had no choice but to do this.

After all, the old rival, the Royal Navy of Victoria, had six battlecruisers with a speed of 30 knots (in reality, their speed was only slightly more than 29 knots; speeds exceeding 30 knots could only be achieved under light loads). If we also consider that the speed of a 10,000-ton warship decreases more significantly in rough seas than that of a 30,000-40,000-ton giant, then even a speed of 32 knots would not be safe.

In fact, since the Colombian Navy also had two Lexington-class battlecruisers that were even faster, the French Navy had actually discussed whether to build cruisers with speeds exceeding 37 knots and take the high-speed cruise at sea to the extreme.

However, during the technical demonstration process, the naval design department stated that even with a target of 35 knots, the need to cram a large number of boilers into the middle of the hull would cause the length and size of the entire ship to be stretched to an unexpected extent. Therefore, not a single ton of the entire cruiser's weight could be used to lay out the traditional armor belt. We could build a ship that could run at 37 knots, but the tonnage had to be controlled to no more than 1 tons. That would probably require Archimedes' coffin planks to build the ship.

After much deliberation, the Gallic Navy realized that Colombia was not their hypothetical enemy, so they did not pursue any further extreme specifications. However, even so, before other aspects of the warship were finalized, the design department informed the Gallic Navy that they might need to prepare to receive an "unprotected cruiser".

How many years has it been since the Age of Dauntless Warfare that the Gallic Navy built an unprotected cruiser?

However, times have changed. The lack of armor is not a particularly unacceptable problem for the Gallic Navy. After all, according to the Gallic Navy's plan, these treaty heavy cruisers did not rely on armor for their main function.

Although the design work for this treaty cruiser has only just begun and there is still a long way to go before the final design is finalized, the fact that the Gallic Navy was the first to prepare for the construction of this treaty cruiser has attracted great attention from navies around the world.

Prior to this, navies of various countries had not built warships with such similar positioning and performance indicators under such unified standards. This kind of pre-defined assignment can maximize the expression of different design styles and capabilities of navies of various countries.

Unlike the arms race before the outbreak of the World Wars, where the construction of a new type of warship would be initiated by one country and then followed by other countries, each afraid of falling behind in the competition if they were too slow, during the naval treaty period, once one country took the plunge, no other country's navy followed suit in a short time.

After all, everyone wanted to see how the Gallic navy built heavy cruisers and what kind of heavy cruisers they could make.

Although ships like the Hawkins-class of the Royal Navy of the Victoria were classified as heavy cruisers according to the treaty, these heavy cruisers, which were developed before the treaty was signed, were essentially still traditional "CLs with larger caliber guns." Their 190 mm gun caliber was significantly different from the eight-inch or the treaty limit of 210 mm.

To put it simply, due to the gap between 10,000-ton heavy cruisers and capital ships, these heavy cruisers already had some of the characteristics of capital ships compared to traditional light cruisers. At this time, the navies of various countries had not yet decided whether to make their heavy cruisers more cruiser-like or semi-capital ship-like in terms of design style.

Since no one knew the correct answer, everyone wanted to see the Gallic Navy's answer first.

After all, the Gallic Navy was quite good at operating cruisers.

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While navies around the world were focused on the design of the first truly treaty-style heavy cruiser by Gaul, the main focus of the Tang Dynasty navy was not on cruisers.

A major event that has drawn the attention of both the Tang Dynasty Navy and the Tang Dynasty Army is currently under intense discussion.

That is, should we establish a dedicated, independent air force?

In the last World War, if the naval aviation of various countries could only be considered a small test in the fighting, then the army aviation of various countries became so important in the later stages of the war that it could determine the balance of the battle.

In Europe, the Victorian Empire, having deeply recognized the value of air power during wartime, established a separate Royal Air Force two years prior, making it one of the first countries in Europe to do so.

Other European countries have different attitudes on this matter. The Kingdom of Syracuse has a strong desire to establish an air force. Some reports have already confirmed that the Kingdom of Syracuse has begun preparations for establishing an air force. It is expected that in two or three years at most, the Kingdom of Syracuse will separate its air force from its army.

However, creating a new branch of the military is no less than dividing a cake within the army, and the size of the army determines how difficult or easy this task is.

As the saying goes, a small boat is easier to turn around. If a country is smaller and its total military is smaller, then it is easier to establish an air force.

Or they could simply follow the example of the Ursus Federation and build their forces from scratch. Since they didn't have much of a burden beforehand, it would be relatively easy to establish an air force that wasn't subordinate to the navy or the army.

However, for both China and Colombia, both army and navy aviation involve too much of the pie. From the perspective of the army and navy, they certainly do not want their air force to be separated.

As for whether or not to establish an air force, with the military reforms being carried out by Li Zongdi, this matter has naturally been put on the agenda, and has been the subject of intense discussions among the top military officials for several days.

Should we change the original army and navy to a three-service army, navy, and air force?

In the long run, the air force is definitely a necessary branch of the military, since its operational concepts and nature are fundamentally different from those of the navy and the army.

However, when should the air force be established? This is a question that is not so easy to answer.

At this moment, Li Che was wearing a naval uniform as part of the naval representatives. He remained silent at the discussion meeting on whether to establish an air force. In his ears, he could hear the fierce debate between the army and navy.