The Second Coalition had assembled its forces, their armies marching toward France with newfound confidence. The British had shared their stolen knowledge with their allies, but their crude imitations of Napoleon's innovations were no match for the real thing. Manuel knew this. He also knew that even with superior technology, war was still won by strategy, discipline, and decisive action.
The Western Front: Britain's March
The first major assault came from the west, where British forces, supported by Spanish troops, launched an invasion from the Iberian Peninsula. Spain, once an ally of France, had switched sides under British influence, hoping to reclaim lost territories and regain their former glory.
Manuel had anticipated this move. He had ordered the fortification of key strongholds across southern France and positioned elite regiments armed with rifled muskets and mobile artillery units along the expected invasion routes. The British landed at Bilbao, pushing into southern France with an army of 50,000 men. They expected a swift advance, but instead, they met devastating resistance.
French artillery, now using explosive shells with deadly accuracy, decimated British formations before they could even reach the battlefield. The Spanish troops, unprepared for the sheer destructive power of modernized artillery, wavered under the relentless bombardment. When the British finally engaged in close combat, they found themselves outgunned by disciplined French sharpshooters, whose rifled muskets struck down officers and key personnel with terrifying efficiency.
By the end of the first major engagement at Bordeaux, Britain had lost nearly 15,000 men. The Spanish, demoralized and battered, withdrew further south. What was meant to be a bold push into France had turned into a costly failure.
The Eastern Front: Austria and Prussia's March
While Britain struggled in the west, Austria and Prussia launched their own offensive from the east. Over 120,000 men advanced into Bavaria, hoping to break through and force the French to fight on multiple fronts.
But Manuel was ready.
Using the railway system he had meticulously developed, he rapidly deployed reinforcements to key locations, ensuring that his troops could outmaneuver the slower-moving coalition forces. His mobile artillery units, mounted on train carriages, moved ahead of the infantry, bombarding enemy positions from unexpected angles. The Austrians and Prussians, accustomed to slow-moving siege warfare, were caught off guard by the sheer mobility and precision of the French forces.
At the Battle of Nuremberg, Manuel personally oversaw the engagement, directing the battlefield like a master chess player. He deployed flanking maneuvers using steam-powered vehicles to transport elite infantry behind enemy lines, cutting off supply routes and forcing the coalition forces into chaotic retreats.
Prussia, once thought to be a dominant military power, found its troops unable to cope with France's new warfare. By the time the battle ended, over 30,000 coalition troops lay dead or wounded, while France had suffered fewer than 10,000 casualties.
Russia's Approach and the Coming Storm
As Britain, Austria, and Prussia reeled from their failures, another danger loomed—Russia. Tsar Alexander I had pledged 200,000 men to the coalition and was marching westward. Though Russia was technologically behind, their sheer numbers made them a formidable opponent.
Manuel knew that fighting Russia in an extended campaign would be dangerous. Instead of engaging them head-on, he devised a bold plan: delay their advance, cut off their supply lines, and force them into a brutal winter campaign, much like what had historically doomed Napoleon's original invasion of Russia. But this time, it would be the Russians suffering in the cold, not the French.
As the First Coalition's forces regrouped and prepared for their next moves, Manuel stood at the heart of his war council, surrounded by maps, reports, and strategies. The war had begun, but he had no intention of letting it drag on for years.
Victory was not just a goal—it was an inevitability.
The world would soon know that Napoleon Bonaparte, the Emperor of France, was unstoppable.