The battle was over before it had begun. The Ottoman Empire’s only army stationed within Eastern Thrace, or left to defend it after all sides began to crumble around them, stood slaughtered. They had chosen to die rather than surrender, not that Bruno would have given them the option to do so.
The signature red banner with the white crescent moon of the Ottoman Empire lies tattered and broken among the men who defended it to the last breath. Riddled with bullets and torn apart by shrapnel and explosions alike.
Their bodies were as humiliating as the bolt of cloth they had fought in vain to protect, and the ideals it stood for. While Bruno was generally a man who respected the virtues commonly found within martial societies, the Ottoman Empire was not one of them.
An Army of slaves, pressed forward to their deaths by slavers unworthy of the power they wielded. These were the men who had built the Ottoman Empire, and though they had done much to modernize over the course of the last century, when built upon such shameful foundations, how could one have much respect for their empire?
It was perhaps because of this that Bruno wrenched the standard away from the hands of the man who had died with it in his arms. But even with having been claimed by Azrael, this soldier refused to let go of the banner, causing Bruno to step upon his already shattered arm, and forcefully removing the grip from the shaft of the banner.
An act of mutilation that his soldiers witnessed him perform. All the while, Bruno gazed over at Heinrich, who was looking at him curiously before asking a question he did not expect.
“Have a smoke I can borrow?”
A smoke? Didn’t this man just begin quitting the habit? Was he really giving up now? Even so, smoking wasn’t something that was entirely looked upon as a filthy and unhealthy habit in this era, and because of this, Heinrich quickly reached into his pocket and handed Bruno a cigarette, along with a lighter.
Having decided to make his last smoke one of legend, Bruno lit the Ottoman Banner aflame and used it as the means to light his cigarette, where he then took a long drag with one hand and expelled a large plume of smoke, before tossing the blazing standard into the pile of corpses in front of him.
Corpses which had been doused with gasoline and diesel. The bolt of crimson cloth which represented the flag of the Ottoman Empire was consumed in a burst of flames, as were the soldiers who had died defending it.
The burning stack of corpses was gazed upon by the German 8th Army and the Austro-Hungarians who accompanied them, while Bruno turned his back to the massive pyre, disregarding the dead men who had fought against his advance as if their only worth was to light his cigarette in dramatic fashion.
After which he began his speech to embolden the men on their final push to liberate Constantinople after nearly half a millennium of occupation by a foreign power.
“It is the end of an Era… The Ottoman Empire burns, as it rightfully should. For centuries, our ancestors have held the ground against the Turks and their relentless aggression into our lands.
When the Romans fell in 1453, the task fell to all of us here… German, Hungarian, Russian, Czech, Slovakian, Polish, Croatian, Serbian, whatever ethnicity you claim, and denomination you follow, our people have together fought and bled as much against each other as we have these roaches.
For five hundred years, we have endured the tide of the east after the guardians of Constantinople died defending their city. Today we honor them, and our ancestors alike, by finally driving the Turks out of Europe once and for all! For God, For Glory, for Rome we march to liberate the Holy City and the Hagia Sophia for this day, and all days that follow! Ex Gladio Libertas!”
A rough English translation of the Latin Phrase Bruno had just stated would be, “Liberty comes from the sword!” A statement that each and every man present to witness his speech reiterated in epic fashion as they raised their rifles and flags to the air.
Bruno’s next move was to march on Constantinople, while the world watched as the Ottoman Empire burned to the ground.
Whatever remained of the Turkish Nation state after this war was over would not be something that they, as a people, would determine. Rather, they would be granted whatever lands their conquerors would bequeath unto them after they had seized what claims they themselves held onto for centuries.
Either way, the removal of the Ottoman Empire as a power in the Mediterranean would forever change the landscape of the world and its history. In ways that even Bruno could not fathom. Especially if Turkey did not maintain control over the Bosphorus straits, or the lands directly to the east of it.
It truly was the end of an era, one that, from Bruno’s perspective, had persisted for far longer than it should have. And he would be the one to drive the sword through the heart of the Ottoman Empire, ending its centuries long reign of terror over the Balkans once and for all.
It was simply a matter of time at this point, thus. After making his speech, he and his men disregarded the mass pile of flaming corpses, leaving its disposal in the hands of God as they marched east to finish this theater of war before the leaves fell from the trees.
All the while, the Russian Army, or its main host I should say, continued to advance through Anatolia and the Arab Rebels through the Levant. There was no place in this world that was safe for he who bore the banner of the Ottoman Empire as soon enough their last refuge would fall, and they would be hunted like rats by those whose grievances were far too grand in quantity and scale to reasonably bear for much longer.