November 29th, 1655
The city of Indore, Mughal Empire
The Crimson Flame at the southern end of the city of Indore did not show a sign of dying down. Unfortunately, even though the bombardments of the cannon had already stopped, there was still plenty of fuel for the fire to burn.
Hence, Vijay, who understood this truth, did not wait around for the fire to calm down before going through the breach, instead, he decided to take the initiative and launch the attack first.
"Birbal, how many troops remain battle-ready?" Vijay asked Birbal Singh, who had completed the troop organization just a few moments ago.
Birbal, hearing the question, didn’t hesitate before responding, "Your Excellency the Lieutenant General, since we haven’t engaged in direct combat with the enemy, our casualties are relatively low. The majority of our losses occurred during the digging of trenches and the construction of artillery positions, which inflicted significant damage.
Otherwise, we could have minimized casualties even further. Currently, out of the 40,000 troops dispatched from the western front, we still have 32,150 battle-ready soldiers. Additionally, over two thousand three fifty troops are injured to varying degrees and are still recovering."
Vijay nodded, lost in deep thought for a few moments before formulating a plan. "Take a division of troops along with the light artillery and rotate to the northern flank of the city. The cannons of the Mughals should now be pointed towards the south. The Mughal general might have thought many of us died in the bombardment," Vijay said, his eyes radiating a chilling aura.
"Unfortunately for him, that is clearly not the case. On the contrary, his actions have only strengthened our resolve to end his pathetic life."
"So you will do your part and destroy their offensive capabilities at the north wall, right?" Vijay asked, making it clear that he wouldn’t accept no for an answer.
Birbal recognized the magnitude of the task assigned by His Majesty, yet he felt neither pressured nor intimidated. On the contrary, he felt like his blood was boiling with anticipation. This task was precisely what he desired, and he was determined not to back down. With resolve in his heart, he clenched his fist, saluted Vijay by thumping his chest, and replied, "I will do it, General."
Vijay nodded in approval.
Soon, a battalion of around 12,000 soldiers quickly moved away from the central battle group, embarking on the mission to flank the city of Indore from the north.
Vijay, not idle either, commanded the rest of the troops to follow a similar path as Birbal and his men, though their final destinations differed. Aware that reinforcements were approaching from the north, Vijay decided to leverage his heightened senses, which allowed him to detect life-threatening danger, to navigate the harsh war conditions he now faced.
A few hours Later...
Inside the city of Indore:
"Your Excellency, the general: bad news. The enemy has appeared at our northern perimeter, and the bombardment has already started."
Islam Zaheer, who was feeling very comfortable and proud after killing all the enemy troops, was suddenly taken aback by this news. "Did the plan fail?" he thought to himself, but he quickly denied it as there was no hindrance for the Bharatiya troops from entering the city when he gave them the opportunity. Why would they not come?
So in doubt, he inquired, "How many troops could you see that are engaged in this enemy force you speak of?"
The lieutenant thought for a while and replied, as he also realized something, "Your Excellency, there are only around 30%-40% of the troops we saw at the southern wall."
Hearing this, Islam quickly relaxed his body as he leaned back into the chair with relaxation. He inquired again, just to be sure, even though he had already concluded from the previous answer that most of the Bharatiya Empire troops had died in the bombardment.
"What type of cannons are they using? Are they using that long-range cannon that shoots out projectiles capable of piercing the rock wall?"
The lieutenant had a happy expression on his face as he replied, "No, your Excellency, smaller cannons are being used."
However, the smile on the lieutenant’s face quickly faded as he remembered the important matter and continued, "But your Excellency, our cannons and artillery at the Northern Wall are taking a lot of damage. Because we did not expect anyone to survive, we did not reposition the cannons. Now these cannons have become sitting ducks, and even if anyone tries to reposition them, they are being shot at.
What should we do?"
Islam, upon hearing about the current situation, remembered that it was indeed the case: the cannons were really not repositioned. He felt the situation to be tricky, but soon he remembered something and replied with a smile on his face, " Don’t do anything, just leave them as they are. The reinforcements are only a few kilometres away, isn’t it?
It will only take at most 30 minutes for them to arrive, and with the reduced offensive capabilities of our enemy, we can easily hold them off until then. So don’t let this remaining force, this 30% or so, run away after seeing our cannons repositioned. Let them fire as much as they want. Their lives will end very soon since it is the northern part of the city where the reinforcements are coming."
Islam couldn’t help but have an amused expression on his face as he felt like he had outmanoeuvred and outsmarted the Bharathiya general.
8 kilometres outside the city of Indore, to the north, Vijay and his troops are travelling through the forest. They disguise themselves by attaching surrounding leaves and plants to their military suits, making a makeshift Ghillie gear.
Although this makeshift camouflage couldn’t provide true invisibility, it would suffice for the current situation, especially since it was still dark outside. The Mughal Empire, lacking experience in troop movement in the dark, should also have reduced scouting capabilities in this environment.
While the situation is similar for the Dakshin Bharatiya Empire, it is slightly better than that of the Mughal Empire.
Thanks to Vijay’s danger-sensing Ability, his army could barely operate without scouts in this dark environment due to his power.
Vijay, along with his division of troops responsible for the offence, moved carefully through the forest at a steady pace. They finally encounter the first Mughal scout, who was inspecting the surrounding areas for the reinforcements to pass through.
This scout is quickly taken care of by the soldiers as everyone becomes alert, and Vijay begins to carefully observe the surroundings.
As Vijay was still inexperienced in how to utilize his sixth sense so to speak, he began his experiment by making firm decisions to rush in one direction to launch the attack. He initially imagined it to his left, yielding no results, then 30 degrees forward, yet again with disappointing outcomes. This pattern persisted for several minutes, with the results remaining consistently disheartening.
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Vijay was on the verge of giving up, feeling that his approach to using his instincts was futile. However, suddenly he sensed a danger similar to the inferno he felt back at the southern city wall. This not only let Vijay know about the general direction of the Mughal reinforcements but also proved his theory correct.
Vijay intently stares in the direction 120 degrees to the north. He can now confirm that the enemy troops should be somewhere a few hundred meters to a few kilometres in the direction he is looking.
And recalling the terrain of the area at 120 degrees north, in order to take advantage of the situation, he came up with a place that could work.
’Shipra River,’ he muttered to himself, a river that was flowing in the direction of his sight, which comes near the town of Kshipra.
Theoretically, he could lodge an ambush in this location, but Vijay immediately denied this option as this was actually one of the sacred rivers that flows through the city of Ujjain where a grand sacred ceremony for Lord Shiva is held once every 12 years. As the river is a main part of the ritual, he did not want to bloody it with enemy corpses.
Hence, he began to think Of other possibilities.
After a few minutes of contemplation, Vijay came up with a plan. Since he knew which direction the enemy was located and their destination, he could map out the optimal route they would take. With this thought in mind, he quickly issued orders.
"Split into two groups. We will lay ambush on the path 2 kilometres towards our left," Vijay commanded.
The major generals who were following Vijay could not understand how His Excellency, the general, came to this conclusion, but since they had seen the general predict the fire attack on the city of Indore, they silently followed his commands.
His division of troops quickly moved under the rustling of the forest. Currently, Vijay commanded one division and Birbal commanded another, while the rest of the troops acted as logistics support for both of these battle groups, which were fighting separately in different locations.
Thanks to this strategy, they reached the position for the ambush quickly and gathered whatever supplies they needed.
The path they were observing resembled a canyon, but it was quite narrow, allowing only 10 columns at a time to pass through. Even though the ambush would likely be successful, Vijay suspected that his 12,000 troops could not battle against whatever remained after the ambush.
Hence, Vijay came up with the plan of diverting as many troops as possible from each other in order to deal with them separately. With his instincts, it should be possible to take on these 50,000-strong enemy troops.
Now, all that remained was a game of cat and mouse. As for who would be the cat and who would be the mouse, it still remained to be seen.
P.S. Sorry, Only 1 today, had some work on the farm