Raya Shipyard, Mangaluru


    It is a busy month as cargo moves in and out of the shipyard on the coast of the Arabian Sea, located on the outskirts of Mangaluru City. The Raya Shipyard is working at full capacity, with all of its dry docks upied by battleships and warships under construction.


    Most of the battleships under construction aremissioned by the Navy of the Bharatiya Empire, while the remaining are export versions of the Pune ss Battleship, built withpartmentalization technology.


    Although the Pune ss Battleship is almost three years old, it is still a fairly new shippared to how long battleships of its calibre remain in service. Adding to the fact that the Pune ss Battleship is an excellent ship, famous both locally and abroad, the demand for the Pune ss and its variants has not dropped.


    Not to mention that the Raya Shipyard, which has the most dry docks in the empire, has not stopped taking orders; even the remaining three shipyards in the empire are continuing to manufacture these ships for the Bharatiya Navy and for the Europeans.


    In such a situation, where the production capacity of all the major shipyards is almost fully upied, the task of producing the prototype of the five swords was like a bolt from the blue, pushing all shipyards in the empire to their absolute breaking point. Given that the prototype had to be built within 60 days, these shipyards were already in a state of overdrive and overheating.


    In such a tight schedule, a tense atmosphere is naturally formed, where everyone in the shipyard is hurrying toplete their job. The workers have turned into emotionless manufacturing machines, their hands turning into tireless robotic limbs.


    In the Raya shipyard, where everything seemed to fit in ce like an intricate puzzle, there was an unusuallyrge istion barrier made of cloth covering the main dry dock of the shipyard, standing out like a sore thumb.


    This dry dock is currently thergest in the Bharatiya Empire, right alongside the dry dock in the Shivaji Shipyard, both capable of constructing ships with discements of up to 3,000 tonnes.


    Currently, in thergest dry dock in the Raya Shipyard, arge behemoth of a ship is being constructed. Its gigantic size, imposing presence, and military might could already be seen from the shape of its hull alone. Just from a nce, there was no doubt that this ship was at least 2,000 tonnes, easily bing the biggest ship the shipyard had ever built.


    This is naturally the Delhi ss Battleship under construction. For a ship of such scale, which is bound to be the gship of the Bharatiya Navy for years toe, adequate precautions have been taken to ensure no secrets about the ship are leaked.


    For one, unlike other ces, the mechanics working on this particr ship all wore white uniforms without any pockets to prevent the workers from mistakenly or maliciously stealing anything from within the istion barrier.


    For two, a whole squadron of Bharatiya Commandos was stationed outside the istion barrier, not only to stop any threats that maye from outside but also to protect the advanced technology of the Bharatiya from within.


    For three, all the elites involved in the construction of the battleship, be it the chief designer, chief Builder, their assistants, the scientists, or the engineers, have been provided with separate work quarters, which are isted further from the area where the actual ship is being built.


    This decision was made to ensure that no sensitive information—whether it be blueprint designs, drawings, or anything else, can leave the isted rooms and reach the construction area, where it would be exposed to the danger of leakage. Even though all the workers of the ship have undergone background checks, there is no such thing as being too careful.


    "Sir Danior, this design I feel is too unfriendly and not practical, as this beam right here woulde under a lot of stress during extreme storms, so it is not right to ce another beam on it to attach the cannons.


    It’s better for you to find another suitable ce," Vedant Iyer, the chief builder of the ship, wiped the sweat from his forehead andined with an annoyed expression to Danior Boswell, one of the two chief designers of the battleship.


    Vedant Iyer had be fed up with the various impractical designs in the finalised design blueprint. Even though he knew that Danior Boswell was someone very important and not to be provoked, he still couldn’t help but express his dissatisfaction from time to time.


    Vedant knew that this was not good for him since the designer held more weight in the naval industry than he did as a chief builder, but there was nothing he could do, as unfortunately, due to the stress he had umted over thest few weeks, his considerations had be less and less. He had be fed up trying to find ways to implement the design ording to the blueprint.


    Initially, he had expected something simr to happen, and he had already guessed that his task wouldn’t be smooth sailing like the previous tasks. He was responsible for taking charge of the construction of the Vinayak ss Frigate, Hampi ss Sloop, and Pune ss Battleship, so he had a wide range of expertise in bringing the things in the blueprint to reality despite hardships.


    But the Delhi ss Battleship he was currently working on was on a whole new level ofplexity, evenpared to the Pune ss Battleship, which had already given him a lot of trouble.


    Danior Boswell, looking at the muscr man who had be a little thinner since he started working with him, felt helpless. He had been hearingints from Vedant ever since the ship started its construction about impractical designs. Danior Boswell was powerless in this situation, as there were indeed some impractical designs in the final blueprint of the Delhi ss Battleship.


    But what could he do, no matter how well they tried to simte the construction of the battleship using whatever mathematical and physical knowledge they had, they ultimately failed to ount for all variables. As always, the blueprint had to be adjusted ording to the conditions of reality, and it could ultimately only serve as a general guide for constructing the battleship.


    Simr to Vedant, Danior Boswell also had a lot of trouble with the construction of the Delhi ss Battleship on his theoretical side, as the number of impractical designs in the blueprint was staggering.


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    For example, starting from the way the keel was built in the blueprint, a single Himyan oak tree with a height of more than 40 meters was deemed sufficient toy a solid foundation for the hull. However, when the design team was very confident in the theory, they were all dumbfounded when it was put into practical use.


    The faces of the designers turned white as the timber could not withstand the weight of the hull being built on top of it and began to show hairline cracks. So, they had to improvise ande up with a way toposite multiple trees, invent a method to piece them together, make it watertight with a new chemicalpound, and finally use bronze nails to prevent rust.


    They also decided to apply copper ting to the keel to increase its lifespan.


    This was only one of the many troubles Danior Boswell had encountered. For this reason, Danior Boswell did not take any offense at the harsh words of Vedant Iyer. Both of them were sincerely invested in thepletion of the Delhi ss Battleship, so it really did not matter if Vedant did not politely remind him as he had at the beginning.


    Danior calmly exined his consideration, "Vedant, if I ce the cannon tform in other ces, it will affect thebat effectiveness of the ship. You have to find another way to make it work." Danior indeed found that if the cannon was attached to the beam previously thought of, the beam would not withstand the pressure of both the turbulence and the recoil force of the cannon.


    However, changing the location of the cannon tform would mean giving up the best attack angle while sacrificing the spots excellent defensive security.


    Surrounding workers, looking at their two biggest bosses quarreling, didn’t seem surprised.


    "Hey, the boss is quarreling again."


    "How long do you think the quarrel willst?"


    "30 minutes."


    "One hour."


    "10 minutes."


    "Alright, ce the bets. The person with the nearest guess wins all the money."


    The quarreling between the chief designer and the chief builder was a favorite pastime for the workers, as it allowed them to feel momentarily like humans again. They looked for the ultimate dopamine stimtion within a short time span and began to ce bets on how long Danior and Vedant would quarrel.


    This had be a daily urrence for them; as each part of the ship was built only after the quarrel between these two had ended. The entire Delhi ss Battleship was constructed based on thepromise between the theoretical design expert, Danior Boswell, and the practical construction expert, Vedant Iyer.


    Raya Shipyard is not the only facility facing such problems; Shivaji Shipyard is also experiencing simr issues as it constructs the Gwalior ss armed merchant ship alongside three other vessels.


    Although Leonardo has never designed or built a ship of 2,000 tonnes, he hails from The Republic of Venice and possesses knowledge and theoretical experience umted from Venice’s rich shipbuilding heritage. Overall, he took far fewer detours than Danior Boswell and Gana prabu Berunda, but since hecked real practical experience, running into problems was inevitable.


    His quarrels with the person in charge of building the ship, Raghav Snki, had be a daily urrence at Shivaji Shipyard. The same could be said for Reliance Shipping and Shipbuilding, which had taken on the task of constructing the modr attachments for the C and CR series of the Gwalior ss armed merchant ship.


    Secret constructions were ongoing in nearly all major shipyards of the Bharatiya Empire, and the naval industry had be exciting once more. Local manufacturers supporting the major shipyards realized something significant was about to happen after receiving orders for various parts with increased requirements.


    Some brave manufacturers began nning to expand theirpanies to secure as many orders as possible for the uing naval expansion.


    The booming naval industry was prominently featured in Bharatham Daily by The editor in chief Meera, Which brought the attention of the southern part of the empire to the Naval Industry


    In fact the reason for the news being spread through the newspaper was not entirely to promote naval expansion; Vijay had his own separate motivations, as he was the one responsible for the news being published. He aimed to direct a significant portion of the empire’s attention toward the naval sector while discreetly starting the weeding n he and Selvan had discussed.