The howling wind and thunder sounded together, adding to the atmosphere of this thrilling encounter.
"What's going on! Lorenzo!"
When Shrike rushed into the command room, it was already crowded with people, and he seemed to be the last one to arrive.
Being specialized in the art, Lorenzo handed over the command of the crew's emergency response to Captain Notar. He and the arriving Blue Jade discussed how to counterattack.
"We were attacked by a group of pirates." Lorenzo glanced at the sea. The fire flashed and another round of shelling caused the cabin to shake violently again. "I don't know how many there are, but in this situation
You really know how to choose the right time to attack."
"Do you want to speed up the evacuation? If the Morning Glory Advance advances at full speed, they will not be able to catch up with us." Lan Jade suggested. In her opinion, this is the safest solution.
"We can escape, but those cargo ships can't."
Lorenzo immediately rejected Lan Jade's words,
"Does the Morning Glory Advance have any means of counterattack?" Lorenzo asked Captain Notar.
"Yes, but none of the weapons have been used in actual combat at sea...at least not used in this situation." Notar was also shocked by the violent weather. "I don't know how effective it is in actual combat, and they are mainly used for
To deal with demons."
This was the first time Notar had seen this kind of battle. He was wondering if the other party was a lunatic. In such bad weather, normal people would try to find ways to escape from the storm, but the pirates chose to attack at this time.
It may be that the other party is really alert and has caught such misunderstandings. In short, Chenhui Advance is extremely passive now.
"If you can deal with monsters, you can deal with humans." Lorenzo shouted, "Get ready to fight back!"
"Prepare to fight back!"
Seeing this situation, Captain Notal could only bite the bullet and issue instructions.
The gray world flashed with fire again, and round after round of shelling washed the Morning Glory Advance. Fortunately, the violent waves made it difficult for the Black Fang's artillery to aim, and only a few shells hit the hull.
on the armor, but the good times did not last long. A violent fire ignited on the deck, and a cannonball hit it, splashing fireworks.
The hull of the ironclad ship was protected by solid armor, but the buildings above the deck were completely exposed. Notal turned the steering wheel vigorously and adjusted the angle of the Morning Glory Advance as much as possible.
The engine roared, black smoke rose from the huge chimney, and rising sparks drifted in the wind.
"Fixed artillery fire!"
Notar gave the order, but was stopped by Lorenzo.
"Wait! Don't fire yet."
Lorenzo stared at the Black Fang behind the raging waves, keeping a safe distance between it and the Dawn Advance.
"what are you up to?"
Notar didn't know what was wrong with Lorenzo, and he vowed to fight back, but at this critical moment he stopped again.
"Our inclination angle is not enough, it is difficult for the fixed artillery to hit. Opening fire rashly will only make the opponent wary. We have to show weakness now." Lorenzo showed a scary smile, "Show weakness, find the right moment, and kill with one hit."
In order to kill the boredom in this boring sea life, Lorenzo read a lot about ironclad ships, and constructed a new plan in his mind.
Today's ironclad ships in the world are basically equipped with fixed artillery, but fixed artillery has a shooting dead zone, and this is the problem encountered by the Morning Glory Advance. Some people have also tried to install rotating artillery on the terrace, but
The current hydraulic technology is not enough to support the rotation of dozens of tons of turrets. Even if it can be driven, the speed is extremely slow, and the gain outweighs the loss.
For this reason, the Perpetual Pump came up with a very interesting method. They installed the terrace artillery into the steel fortress. There is no need to rotate the turret, just rotate the artillery in the turret. There is a mechanical structure above the artillery.
For breech loading, the turret only needs four gunners to operate it and it can work normally. Although the top of the turret is completely exposed without any protection, these risks are exchanged for faster mobility. The technicians of the Perpetual Pump
I think it's worth it.
There are six such rotating artillery pieces installed on the Morning Glory Advance. They are distributed along the hull. One of them is more special. It was temporarily installed on the Perpetual Motion Pump.
"Reload Ascalon, I need it to kill in one hit."
Following Lorenzo's order, the ferocious steel slowly moved under the baptism of the heavy rain. A mechanical roar sounded in the tallest turret of the Morning Glory Advance, and a huge gun barrel was seen rising from the groove.
Dragging slowly, it was so heavy that the perpetual pump designed a slide rail along the periphery of the turret, and the moving steel on it supported the muzzle.
"This is a practical exercise. What we encounter in the Silent Sea will only be worse than now."
This is what Lorenzo thinks. Regarding the Silent Sea, all he knows is the stories told by others. He has never really been there, and he has no idea of everything that may happen.
Therefore, all Lorenzo can do now is to get everyone to adapt to all this and get used to fighting on the waves.
"Start loading!"
Notar didn't waste any more nonsense and shouted directly. Although he was a captain in his position, he was more like a housekeeper, managing the work and deployment of the sailors. When war came, his words could only be regarded as suggestions.
.
It's not that Notar doesn't have much experience in naval warfare, it's just that he has never faced such enemies, those monsters called demons, in his long service career.
Both Shrike and Blue Jade acquiesced to Lorenzo's order. Lorenzo was right, the leisure before was just the calm before the storm, and they needed to fight to warm up their blood.
"At least let me see what this Morning Glory Advance can do."
Lorenzo looked excitedly at the other end of the waves. Before he could finish his words, he was shattered by the roar of cannons.
Ascalon opened fire.
Along with the loud noise came an invisible impact. The raindrops all over the sky stopped slightly for a second. The dripping water on the portholes was changed. The crystal water droplets reflected the molten golden light. This glow
The moment it flashed, the Morning Glory Advance became heavier and heavier, suppressing the splashing waves.
Everyone has seen it.
It was a long spear, a burning and blazing spear. It was so fast that it flashed past and was pulled into a slender and dazzling light. The extremely high temperature penetrated the obstructing wind and waves, and the light was shining everywhere it went.
Brighten everything.
This is Ascalon. As Lorenzo, who has personally experienced the bombardment of this artillery, he is very aware of the power of this artillery. Judging from its range, when an enemy ship appears within Lorenzo's field of vision, it will
It is already within the strike range of Ascalon, and the rate of fire of this artillery is extremely fast, with almost no attenuation in a short distance.
Just as Lorenzo thought, Ascalon's attack at this distance could hardly be called a bombardment. The burning and speeding warhead was like a spear, penetrating the Black Fang's hull the moment it came into contact.
, all the steel wherever it went was melted, and the flesh and blood body had no time to react before being burned into ashes.
The expected explosion did not occur. The warhead was too fast and too hot. It penetrated the hull of the ship and fell into the sea, arousing raging steam and sinking to the bottom of the sea.
As for the Black Tusk, the blow directly plowed one side of their deck, and the mast and chimney collapsed. Lorenzo guessed that the blow might have penetrated the enemy's command room as well.
"It's really...the power of God..."
Notar looked at all this and marveled. He had never seen such a scene before, and it was hard to imagine that his ship was carrying such a huge weapon.
"Don't act like you haven't seen the world before. We have quite a lot of this kind of divine power on board." Lorenzo said with a smile.
"Is this the end?"
Shrike looked at the Black Fang. After Ascalon hit, the Black Fang fell into silence. A blazing fire could be seen on the ship, and then there were successive explosions inside, which might be fireworks.
It affected the ammunition and caused a fatal explosion.
"It should be over. Now we just need to wait for the storm to stop, and then go and collect the spoils and prisoners."
Lorenzo looked at the fire rising from the sea and won the first battle. He felt that it was not bad, but he was not happy enough.
"Wait... there's light coming on."
Lan Jade keenly observed something. She motioned to several people to look at the Black Fang, and saw a disharmonious light in the blazing fire. It flashed regularly, as if it was releasing some signal.
"What's going on? Notal." Lorenzo immediately asked the experienced Notal.
"This... is communication. Ships at sea lack effective means of communication. We will make semaphores during the day and use the flashing of lights as signals at night." Notar replied.
In order to prevent possible technological disasters, the nation-builders secretly restricted the progress of world technology, or to be precise, the progress of communication technology. Technologies such as communicators have been implemented in the Perpetual Pump and are used for purification.
Except in agencies, due to this terrible reality, this kind of technology still cannot be leaked out, so everyone uses large ships made of steel, but they still use such primitive methods for communication.
Lorenzo began to feel a sense of fragmentation in the world, and in the coming days, this sense of fragmentation would continue to intensify.
Human beings are like beasts trapped in a cage. The beast grows bigger and bigger until it fills the entire cage. Finally, it has only two choices, either to break out of the cage or to suffocate in the cage.
The builders of the country made a choice. They were unable to break out of the cage and could only continue to weaken the beast.
"It's so bad..."
Lorenzo couldn't help but sigh. This kind of loss did not last long, and he asked Notar again.
"Do you know what this means? Help?"
"I think..." Notar raised his telescope. The fire on the Black Fang interfered with his judgment. He hesitated for a while and expressed his thoughts, "I don't know. This is different from what I know."
, probably their internal communication language.”
"You mean...them?" Lorenzo said.
"Yes, this signal is not for us to see..."
As he spoke, Notar's voice slowed down, and he looked directly at Lorenzo, with the same answer in their eyes.
"Get ready for battle! There is more than one enemy ship!"
Lorenzo shouted loudly, and at this moment countless flames burst out on the sea. Not only one ship, but six ships approached the Morning Glory Advance under the cover of the storm.
They had been ambushing all around early in the morning, and Ascalon's attack not only failed to scare away these pirates, but instead aroused their greed.
Dozens of warheads hit the Morning Glory Advance. Even with advanced armor, it could not withstand such a sustained attack. The surface of the hull began to appear damaged, and some warheads directly hit a turret, putting it in the flames.
.
It is very difficult to directly hit the turret in a conventional naval battle, but the restless sea under the hull lifts each ship high and then smashes it down, making the ballistic trajectory difficult to predict during the bumps.
Subtle vibrations resounded from all parts of the ship's hull. It was much lighter than a cannonball hit, but it still caught Lorenzo's attention.
"What!" he asked.
"It's pirates, they're on board!"
The soldiers shouted, facing the violent storm, several hooks were thrown on the fence. They could see that pirates who were not afraid of death were actually approaching here on a warship. You must know that if they are not careful, they will be buried in the sea.
.
No... they were not the only ones. Six armored ships that had been lying in wait for a long time came over the waves. They stopped shelling and accelerated closer to the Morning Glory Advance. The front end of the ship's bow cut through the wind and rain with an icy collision angle.
It seems that they want to ram the Chenhui Advance. Judging from their tonnage, it is obvious that they cannot shake the Chenhui Advance, but they cannot withstand so many ships attacking together.
Thunder flashed, the dark flag danced wildly in the wind, and a sharp and pale tooth could be vaguely seen carved on it.
Seeing all this, Notar seemed to remember something, and he said uneasily.
"I think I know who they are. They are the Black Fang Pirates. After the civil war in the Viking Kingdoms, they were the largest group of Viking pirates. They did not obey the King of Ice Sea and have been running around in the Viking Kingdoms.
The edge of the sea.”
"Never mind who they are! All stationary artillery fire!"
Lorenzo didn't care about that, he shouted loudly.
The armor on the side of the Morning Glory Advance was pulled down, and the gun's muzzle was extended along the slide rail. After a few seconds, the first salvo was launched.
The artillery fire continued one after another, but it failed to stop these pirates. There were also sounds of fighting on the deck, but Lorenzo seemed not to feel it and stared fixedly at the ships on the sea.
"Their target has changed," Lorenzo thought clearly. "Before, these pirates might have been for the cargo ship, but I think they are now for the Morning Glory Advance."
"We?" Shrike couldn't understand.
"It's not us, it's the armored ship under our feet."
In Lorenzo's understanding, at first these pirates were trying to get goods off the street, but after seeing Ascalon's attitude, they changed their minds and prepared to rob the Dawn Advance.