Empire of India: Rise of the Ruthless Prince

The city of Batavia, or Jayakarta (former name of Jakarta), was one of the main hubs of the Dutch in the Southeast Asia route. They and the Portuguese controlled the Southeast Asian routes using their influence in Malacca and Batavia, respectively.

It was an island lying to the northwest of Java and one of the most populous places. Naturally, it was a trade hub in the area and very lucrative due to its spice abundance, like the subcontinent.

The Dutch captured it from the Sultanate of Banten, trying to put a monopoly on the spice trade route. Although largely unsuccessful due to the existence of the Empire. They still maintained considerable influence in Java.

They sourced high-quality timber, rice, textiles, and spices like cloves and nutmegs at cheap prices from the local populace for the European markets. They sold it in Europe at huge margins, making their control over the island highly lucrative.

Opium was usually traded for the local goods. They also bought exotic products to sell to the wealthy in the subcontinent and China. They hold on to Batavia, which gave them an edge over their counterparts like the Portuguese, Spanish, and English.

The local populace was exploited like all of the Dutch colonies for their personal gains and profits. Batavia had a large amount of population. The Dutch created food shortages and opium addiction. They offered food and opium as wages for the local people to work for them. The addiction was bad and spread through the ranks of the societal structure of the island.

This made the local people slaves to the Dutch to a certain extent. There was a little dissent but unlike the other colonies, they rarely gained support.

The Dutch general Johan van Dijk was responsible for maintaining control over Batavia. He was a ruthless man, known to crack down even on a small protest of dissent. This created an uncanny fear of the man in the hearts of the rebels.

Capital punishments, public flogging, and beheading were taking place for the rebels previously in the heart of the city. This showed the local people the plight of the rebel that wanted the Dutch gone from the island.

There was also no support to the rebels from the neighbors like Banten, Mataram, Cirebon, and the surviving Hindu-Buddhist kingdoms near present-day Bali. There was a reason for this. The Dutch engaged in supporting local rivalries in Java, ensuring these sultanates fought against each other to keep themselves in check.

They lent military aid covertly to both sides to keep them from turning on them by forming a huge alliance. It would spell doom for him. Although recently the local rivalry tactic on the small Hindu-Buddhist kingdom failed, and they managed to unite under a single leader. The Dutch didn't care since they were an insignificant part of Java.

They focused on the main players in Java; that was the three sultanates.

Johan Van Dijk recently got the letter from the Dutch base in Hambantota in Lanka. Mark Hendriks sent him some important news. Johan personally didn't like Mark Hendriks due to his haughty attitude but he was forced to work together with him as part of the venture in the region.

With a visible scowl on his face, he glanced at the letter. He was quite reluctant to open it.

He didn't want to get roped again into one of Mark's schemes.

Yet, he broke open the seal to take a look at the contents of the letter. He sighed and unfurled the letter to read it.

The details were articulated simply by Mark Hendriks. Although he didn't like him, he was appreciative of his simple and straightforward letters.

"What now?" He sighed. "The Portuguese were what?"

Johan's eyes widened at the contents.

The rumors about the Portuguese losing Daman were true. The general Barnabas was onboard to Malacca. They needed to act now and begin their operations and show off power in Southeast Asia. This was going to flip the table for the upcoming talks of the Iberian Union between the kingdom of Portugal and the Habsburgs.

"That man got defeated." He gasped. "This must be a stroke of luck for us."

"But... let me read the rest of the letter."

Johan read the rest of the letter filled with information about the battles in the region and the ouster of the Portuguese. Mark Hendriks also sent a trade deal to the Marathas to show their good relations with them. He crafted the deal to suit their agenda to gain a bigger foothold in the subcontinent.

The Dutch wanted a small piece of Surat but they also didn't mind settling with just the trade deals. They knew sooner or later chances would come for them to establish a base in the subcontinent and get access to their massive wealth.

"A trade deal, and he wants me to do a show of power with extensive patrols, intimidation, and other things in the region to the Salt-eaters." Johan grinned. "That sounds enjoyable." Enjoy new adventures from empire

For the first time, he felt somewhat happy to receive the letter from Mark. He liked bullying the Portuguese. The talks of uniting with Spanish rubbed Johan the wrong way. Spain was their sworn enemy. The Portuguese talks uniting with them meant that they didn't care about the Dutch influence and took their lightly.

So Johan was out to take the most of this situation and harass all the Portuguese ships with extensive patrol checks.

'Take that, you salt-sucking bastards.' He grinned and called in his assistant to issue orders.

The assistant entered and greeted him with a slight bow.

"Go and order them to check all the Portuguese ships heading to Java and any of the regions under our jurisdiction." He said. "I don't care how you do it. Harass them however you want."

"They can't do anything."

"Yes, my lord." His obedient assistant said with a wry smile.

'I shall await the good news now.'

Meanwhile, at the port city of Malacca, a heavily guarded Portuguese cargo ship set sail towards the kingdom. It was guarded by a lot of third-rate and second-rate ships along. It was headed to the kingdom.

General Barnabas stood atop the ship in the middle, scanning the horizon. The preparations had been done and Rodrigo managed to provide him with these many ships that were lying idle in Malacca.

Barnabas wanted to depart from this area before the Batavia base of the Dutch sent in their patrol ships. He didn't want a confrontation. Hambantota didn't have the capacity to take on their fleet but the base in Batavia could do that.

He knew about Johan, a ruthless man. So he wanted to avoid all confrontation and head straight to the kingdom. He already anticipated that the Dutch commander would send a message to Batavia about their passage.

Fortunately, everything was in place due to the quick thinking of Rodrigo and they managed to depart with the big nobles from Daman and some merchants back home. His mind was on another matter, pertaining to the Castro family.

The recent stint with Antonio getting fooled by the third prince of the Empire and giving them the Portuguese Culverins did take a significant hit in their influence. The other nobles preyed on this family and tried their level best to pull them down.

Unfortunately for them, the head of the Castros was competent, though highly unlikable. He managed to claw his way back. He had to give that old stubborn fool his due credit for that.

'It might be better to talk to the head unlike fools like Antonio.' Barnabas thought. He didn't need to contact Antonio, the fool who couldn't even see through the facade of the third prince who was disowned by the head of the Castro.n/ô/vel/b//in dot c//om

Castro's support wasn't enough. He decided to contact another house for their support as well in the Royal Council.

It was the House of Meneses; they were notably known for their military prowess and supplying of high-ranking commanders for the battles in Africa. They were a powerful house in the Portugal political sphere since the inception of their new head. They have remained quite docile politically compared to their previous head.

Their previous head was known to expand his political sphere of influence aggressively, but now they were not expanding much. They were focused and heavily involved in the military movements of the Portuguese in Africa.

'Meneses seems to be the ideal support in this endeavor.'

But he still had a challenge. Unlike the Castros, the Meneses didn't have any bad blood against the Empire. He needed to give them some reason to support his cause in the Royal Council.

Barnabas had a general idea of the situation in the political sphere in the kingdom. He needed to delve deeper into the political side to know the needs of the Meneses house so that he could cater to them in his request.

So he already planned to meet a noble friend of his, who would be able to give him some genuine information about this matter.

'The Empire of Vijayanagara needs to be contained.'