You couldn’t beat Yun Ye to death and make him believe an aircraft carrier would lose to a small sampan. The Great Tang’s shipbuilding industry was already the world’s finest, much less when Yun Ye manufactured these three warships—they were the crystallization of the Tie Family’s several hundred years of craftsmanship. The ships carried bombs propelled by eight-ox crossbows, a full three sails, not counting the triangular sails at the stern.
The timber used in shipbuilding had exhausted all the good lumber Yun Ye had accumulated over these years. Building one such ship required enough material for seven or eight warships of the same size. It had eliminated all places unrelated to combat. Every area was heavily fortified with mechanisms. Ordinary boarding combat had not the slightest effect on it—it could only be seeking death.
Not to mention Li Tai had specially manufactured large quantities of gunpowder in Lingnan—barrel after barrel stacked in the cabin. As long as they were tied to eight-ox crossbow arrows and hit an enemy ship, that ship’s fate would be nothing but pulverization. If the gunpowder explosion didn’t kill them, there was another type of eight-ox crossbow arrow—the thick arrow shaft was full of gasoline. Once ignited and fired, the domineering flames mixed with sugar frost and debris couldn’t be extinguished by a bit of seawater.
If he didn’t even have this much confidence, where would Yun Ye dare to lead Li Tai wandering aimlessly all over the seas? Once something happened to Li Tai, Yun Ye’s fate absolutely wouldn’t be good either. Unless both were finished—no matter who remained, their future days wouldn’t be pleasant.
Liu Fang’s eyes glowed bright as will-o’-the-wisps in a graveyard, staring at Yun Ye and saying, “Have you considered combat in rainy weather? Firearms are very effective on clear days, but in rain they’ll be at a great disadvantage. This old fellow knows your flames don’t fear rainwater—just don’t know if your gunpowder also doesn’t fear rainwater.”
Yun Ye brought Liu Fang to the Princess’s deck and said to a sailor, “Demonstrate the rainy weather combat mode for Master Liu to see.” That sailor acknowledged with a sound and skillfully opened a box-like thing in front of the eight-ox crossbow. After several folds, Liu Fang discovered a small wooden room had appeared—the front completely open, the other three sides tightly shielded by wooden boards. Most importantly, this entire small house could actually rotate following the eight-ox crossbow’s rotation. The sailor extended a crank handle into a piece of wood and cranked it twice—a thin iron plate rose up in front. Except for observation and firing ports, the sailor was immediately completely shielded. Another sailor connected a tube to the wooden house.
“This tube is specially used to transport various crossbow bolts. Special logistics officers await the captain’s orders. Whatever weapons need firing, they’ll deliver the corresponding crossbow bolts to the sailors in the house. During combat, such a house should have three sailors. As long as needed, they can fire continuously.”
“As for weapons, these three ships fundamentally lack nothing. The Gongshu Family’s masterpiece! I never imagined the Gongshu Family would create such a thing. Initially, I merely requested their family design protection for the sailors.”
Liu Fang nodded, quite happily descended to the cabin. Before leaving, he said to Yun Ye, “No need for any plan. Without considering the merchant ships’ conditions, you can play however you wish. Since you must care for the merchant ships, then the strait truly is a good place to fight. Old Wu She, Little Ying, and Xi Tong—they should be separated across the three ships. As long as you can handle the experts among them, there’s no problem. That He Tianshang—you should still be careful. Don’t let him see some excessive things. He should be the prerequisite for His Majesty to confidently let you act willfully in Lingnan.”
“He’s on a merchant ship as backup personnel. The merchant ships also need some experts. I don’t believe experts on the great sea would be more numerous than those on our own ships.”
Liu Fang smiled and disappeared into the cabin. Before absolute strength, any conspiracy or trickery was laughable. As long as these three terrifying warships weren’t affected, no matter how many pirates came, they’d only be delivering themselves to death. Since Yun Ye said boarding couldn’t handle these three massive warships, who knew how many vicious methods were waiting for those pirates?
Li Tai was collecting his timber. He wouldn’t allow the slightest loss of his war spoils. Many merchants would rather compress their own cargo to help the prince transport goods. They couldn’t earn the prince’s word of thanks—just having the prince’s captain of guards show them a smiling face and cup his hands was enough.
It took a full three days to adjust the cargo. When Li Tai patted the King of Java’s head saying he’d come back next time to help him unify all of Java, the King of Java nearly wept with excitement, vowing he would definitely catch all the birds of paradise in the forest to present to the most honorable prince. Some shrewd merchants specially left behind personnel to get a head start on preparations. Everyone knew Marquis Yun and Prince Wei would live in Lingnan for several years and absolutely wouldn’t come to Java only once. Host and guests parted with tears, and the giant ships raised sails to return east.
Qiu Ranke never believed robbing Yun Ye on the great sea was wrong. The sea was a place beyond the Great Tang Dynasty’s jurisdiction. The gratitude for Yun Ye treating his illness—that jade pendant was sufficient compensation. At worst, he just wouldn’t kill Yun Ye. His family was wealthy—just extorting some would do. He’d even already determined the amount.
Twelve warships had already allowed him to dominate these waters for several years. News came from Daming Temple, telling of Yun Ye’s atrocities in Yangzhou. This eliminated Qiu Ranke’s last psychological barrier to dealing with Yun Ye.
Only true men could gain a firm foothold on the ocean. Qiu Ranke, like an iron tower, wore only short pants, bare-chested, standing on the mast gazing at that narrow strait. This was Yun Ye’s inevitable route. Waiting a while without seeing Yun Ye’s fleet appear, with one flip he grabbed the cable and slid down from the mast, standing steadily on the deck, his body stable as Mount Tai following the waves’ undulation.
Twelve burly men wearing red headbands stood with legs spread behind him. Sea wind blew through these strong men’s crotches, wave after wave of fishy foul odor drifting over. Qiu Ranke was very clear—these were true sea men. He very much disapproved of Yun Ye’s behavior of covering his mouth with a handkerchief even when spitting—that was a woman’s manner.
No matter how arrogant Qiu Ranke was, he still didn’t underestimate Yun Ye. Anyone who could create a fleet dominating the great sea—no matter who—wouldn’t be underestimated. If this time Yun Ye brought his massive fleet to sea, Qiu Ranke would definitely run as far away as possible. He’d suffered losses from the Lingnan Fleet not just once or twice. He originally had eighteen brothers—now only twelve. Five of them had already been hanged alive by those bastards from the Lingnan Fleet, their corpses mounted on Crab Island as a warning.
To steal back his brothers’ corpses, Qiu Ranke himself piloted a small boat and secretly went to Crab Island, this forbidden place in sea travelers’ eyes. There were too many corpses on the island—he had no way to find his brothers. After everyone died, skeletons all looked about the same.
Thinking of another so-called brother, Qiu Ranke’s heart filled with fury. He’d executed the previous batch of brothers who betrayed him—couldn’t he execute another?
The bastard! A perfectly good iron man actually crawled through a woman’s crotch like that. If you wanted women, Yangzhou had plenty. As long as you brought out gleaming silver, what kind couldn’t you have? He had to debase himself looking for that woman, and she was a Japanese woman at that.
“Yun Ye is about to arrive. What kind of person he is, I don’t need to tell you—you know yourselves. This time he’s overconfident, daring to come to the South Seas to act tyrannically with just three ships. Does he think the South Seas are uninhabited?”
“This old man once competed with Yun Ye on land. Honestly speaking, this old man’s martial arts are higher than his, but I still lost utterly and completely. There are brothers who came from Zhoushan—you probably also know Ding Yanping. A generation’s martial arts grandmaster, just such a hero was forcibly tormented by Yun Ye until he died without a burial place.”
“Saying all this is to tell you—don’t be careless. Although this is the great sea, that fellow also eats ocean rice. His familiarity with the ocean even exceeds ours. What I want to tell you is our powerful crossbows and catapults aren’t as numerous as theirs, so we must board. As long as we jump onto his ships, we’ve won. This fellow is a great wealthy man. Once captured, don’t kill him—finding his wife to demand gold is the real business. Now our kingdom is just beginning to recover—we need large amounts of wealth.”
A thin, dark man wearing scholar’s robes stepped forward and said, “Leader, we’re not the only ones eyeing this fat pig. The Japanese and Goryeo people are also nearby. That fellow Kui Liu has also appeared nearby, indicating that flirtatious woman is also in these waters. I’ve also heard the Arab Zhamuli has taken a fancy too. With so many maritime heroes gathering, even if Yun Ye has heaven-reaching abilities, he can’t escape. But how to divide the wealth still requires the leader to produce regulations. At that time, whether Arab people, Japanese, or Goryeo people—all must follow these regulations. Leader, you are the ladle boss of these seas.”
Qiu Ranke laughed wildly, saying to the pirates surrounding the deck, “Naturally! This old man wants to use this opportunity to establish a rule on the seas—that is, this old man has the final say!”
One sentence stirred up the pirates’ blood courage. In chaos, they waved the weapons in their hands, shouting nonsense about “this old man has the final say.”
In comparison, Yun Ye’s fleet was much calmer, ignoring the Arab fleet falling far behind, unhurriedly advancing according to their predetermined route.
Yesterday, fishing for sharks, they hooked an enormous sea turtle instead. Yun Ye abandoned the plan to cook sea turtle soup. This thing’s meat was both fishy and tough—there was simply no way to eat it. If it were a small sea turtle, it could be tolerated, but this fellow as big as a tabletop truly couldn’t stimulate one’s appetite.
Sea turtles had great differences from land tortoises. Yun Ye set up a table on deck, preparing to paint a sea turtle picture. Wu She, Liu Fang, and Han Zhe all watched from the side. Yun Ye painted an excellent turtle—this was famous in Chang’an.
With just a few strokes, a lifelike turtle leapt onto the paper. Liu Fang stroked his beard, continuously praising. Han Zhe also came over and discovered that without using color, Yun Ye simply used appropriately shaded ink to express a huge sea turtle’s characteristics thoroughly and vividly. Even though he himself was skilled in painting, he had to say the word “good.”