Chapter 429 — Cecil's "Warship"

There were few people Lady Ropeni Glan could trust, and the steward before her seemed to be one of them.

"I am honored to serve my lady."

The steward of Glan Castle bowed deeply before Gaoyang, his manners impeccable—deferential yet never losing his air of grace.

"Then serve your lady once again," Gaoyang said with a slight nod to the steward. "You are to make a trip to Boulder Fortress…"

The steward kept his head lowered. "What would you have me do?"

"Deliver a message—say that the Cecil army has already taken the Glan territory…" Gaoyang began, then veered mid-sentence. "By the way, how good are you at acting?"

The steward raised his head and said calmly, "Eleven years ago, when those bandits stormed the castle, I was there. I hid the burned young master in the woodpile, then leaned against it and played dead—played dead under those bandits' very noses for a full day and night."

He paused there, and a confident smile spread across his face. "My acting is excellent."

…

Cecil Territory, north bank of the Whitewater River.

Two large river vessels lay moored in a newly built dry dock. Scaffolding clung to their hulls and craftsmen bustled about the dock—signs that the two ships were undergoing urgent refitting. On a platform beside the dock, Tyr, in her sea-serpent form, propped herself up in midair with her long tail, watching the two vessels' every detail with open curiosity.

She could tell these ships were not newly built but rather refitted from something else; their prototypes differed little from the large cargo ships she habitually saw on the Whitewater River. To a siren's eye, those so-called "cargo ships" were nothing worth boasting about—what interested her now was only the structures that had been modified and added.

She saw craftsmen reinforcing the ships' vital structures with metal sheathing and alloy frames, and great holes cut into the decks to install metal braces and pipe systems of unknown purpose. She saw that most of the sails had been stripped away, and into the freed space many spread metal frames like wings had been installed, covered all over with human magical runes.

What a strange refit this was. Tyr was fascinated.

Knight Byron was also in the dock inspecting the refits, his face full of pride. He pointed at one of the ships and boasted to Tyr, "Both of these were captured during our bombardment on the Whitewater River—nearly every ship we took was damaged, but these two survived intact."

Tyr caught the boastful look on Byron's face and asked, curious, "Is that impressive?"

"These were built in the Peibo region—the finest shipwrights in the Southern Realm!" Byron flung out an arm. "The biggest ships in the Southern Realm all come from them! Don't these two look splendid?"

"Ha… I suppose," Tyr said vaguely, flicking the tip of her tail as she kept eyeing those wing-like structures spreading to either side of the hull. "I'm more curious about how Gaoyang means to refit them…"

"I'll take you aboard to see," Byron said, remembering what his lord had instructed. He knew this siren was to be the "power source" that would deliver these two "freak ships" to the north, so he was especially enthusiastic now. "I'll explain as we go."

Once aboard, Tyr realized Gaoyang's refits were even more drastic than she had imagined. She saw the decks already largely covered with thin metal plates etched with magical patterns, connected to those spread wing-like frames; beneath the decks she could see pipes, alloy skeletons, and magical mechanisms. Outwardly the ship still looked like a traditional river cargo vessel, but in its bones it had long since become some manner of arcane construct. A refit of this scale clearly hadn't been done in a day or two, and she couldn't help asking, "Did you start refitting this ship the moment you towed it back?"

"Honestly… yes," Byron admitted without concealment. "After the Whitewater River bombardment, the lord ordered the two most intact ships to undergo arcane refitting. At first he planned to mount arcane-crystal railguns on them—we reinforced the decks for that and added plenty of extra frames inside. Look over there—some of the smaller secondary cannons are already mounted. But now we're swapping the planned main guns for that 'prismatic ray device.' It's bigger than even the largest arcane-crystal railgun, and its weight is terrifying. We had to cut the two main guns down to one, and strip out half the secondary cannons already installed, just to keep the ship from sinking…"

As he spoke, Byron led Tyr down toward the lower deck, pointing out the refitted sections along the way. "Good thing the magic-net interfaces are universal—the arcane-crystal railgun's power supply works for the prismatic ray device too. See these magic-net units? Not just on the deck and this cabin—they've laid a whole layer down in the hold as well. The whole ship is like a small factory's magic-net packed into its belly, so it can supply its own energy…"

Tyr undulated along behind Byron, eyes wide as she studied the advanced arcane structures crammed into this "backward wooden ship." At last she couldn't hold back: "Why not just build a new ship? Piling such advanced things into such a backward hull—how awkward is that?"

"…Because our shipbuilding isn't good enough," Byron said, spreading his hands helplessly. "Shipbuilding is skilled work. The best shipwrights in the whole Southern Realm are those Peibo folk, and the ships they build are exactly what you see before you. Anything more advanced… the lord is researching it, but who knows when that'll bear fruit. And even if it did, building a new ship from scratch would take who knows how long—the enemy at Boulder Fortress won't wait for us."

"Tch…" Tyr clicked her tongue as if about to say something, but in the end kept silent and only poked a nearby wooden post with the tip of her tail.

Watching the siren lady's reaction, Byron secretly pursed his lips and continued, "Let me show you the bottom of the hold—it's an unfinished place."

The two reached the bottom of this "warship." In the hold lit by arcane-crystal lamps, Tyr saw a metal mounting frame clearly meant for some large piece of equipment, along with some magic-net units not yet connected. Curious, she asked, "What goes here?"

"Power," Byron said. "A problem not yet solved."

At the word "power," Tyr remembered what Gaoyang had asked of her and nodded at once. "Oh—right, your lord brought me here to help solve the power problem. He said these two ships can't move themselves now, so he needs my help…"

"Exactly," Byron picked up. "You noticed we stripped the sails from the upper deck? That was to install extra magic-net and auxiliary rune arrays. And to fit the water pumps and their piping, the rower stations this ship originally kept were squeezed out too. So by traditional means this ship simply can't move now—as a replacement, the lord designed a sort of 'oar' driven by a mana engine, but as you can see—it's nowhere near finished."

Knight Byron pointed at the empty space in the hold meant for some large piece of equipment and said with regret, "Mr. Egg has been researching it for a long time, and there's still no finished product."

The more Tyr heard, the deeper her frown grew. At last she jabbed the nearby wood with her tail tip—thump, thump. "What kind of refit is this… after all that, the ship doesn't even have power…"

Byron waved a hand. "According to the plan it has power—it just isn't installed yet!"

"Shouldn't something like that be designed early on?" Tyr planted her hands on her hips. "Do you even know how to build ships?"

At that, Byron couldn't help sighing. "Alas, that's just what I mean about our shipbuilding falling behind—traditional river boats, sure, you can hire craftsmen at a high price to build those, but this new type of ship that uses arcane technology—who'd know how to build it!"