specialized template struct as base struct

I have looked around all the related questions but no luck. Maybe this is a little bit strange use case hence no one really discussed before.

I have a specialized template struct "base". Then I try to use a template struct "derived" inherited the base and use the member of it.

The code:

template <typename T>
struct base {
        char *type = "default";
};

// int base struct
template <>
struct base <int> { char *type="int"; };

// char base struct
template <>
struct base <char> { char *type="char"; };

// short base struct
template <>
struct base <short> { char *type="short"; };

template <typename T>
struct derived : base <T> {
   char n0 = type[0];    // get the first char of "type" in base
};


int main (int argc, char** argv) {

        struct derived<char> c_d;
        cout << c_d.n0 << endl;

        return 0;
}

The compilation error occurs

test.cpp:65:14: error: ‘type’ was not declared in this scope
    char n0 = type[0];
              ^~~~

If I specialized the "derived" struct as well, it works.

template <typename T>
struct derived;

template <>
struct derived <int> : base<int> { char n0 = type[0]; };

template <>
struct derived <char> : base<char> { char n0 = type[0]; };

template <>
struct derived <short> : base<short> { char n0 = type[0]; };

However, It seems silly to repeat the same code in the derived struct. My questions are, why am I getting error and is there a better way to do it?

Thanks