Emperor of Steel

“Fleet to the south! The number is over 100!”

At the announcement from the sailor, Luke went up the mast and inspected the fleet.

“Is that the Yemaek navy?”

As the sea was on the Yemaek side, it was in obvious doubt, anyone would have thought like that.

Moreover, just a day back they had met with the ships of Yemaek and were guided to the Phoenix castle.

But Hwang Bo-sung who was next to Luke shook his head.

“Master, that is a ship from the Song Empire.”

“Song Empire’s Navy?”

“Yes, it is a typical Song Empire ship with a square structure at the bottom. A battleship with three sails. And its transport vessel is more than five.”

At the words of Hwang Bo-sung, Luke noticed why the Song Empire fleet appeared there.

It must be to cross the sea and hit the rear side of Yemaek.

“What should we do?”

When Hwang Bo-sung asked, Luke spoke with a sneaky smile on his lips.

“Do you have to ask? We need to smash it.”

They were on their way to help Yemaek.

So, if they meet a ship of the Song Empire on their way, they need to smash it down.

At Luke’s command, Auster and the Yemaek ships which were guiding them ahead, entered into combat maneuvers.

The Yemaek sailors lowered their sails and pulled out a number of oars from the sides.

They aimed their guns at the enemies who wanted to invade their nation.

Accordingly, even the Song Empire pushed their battleships ahead.

Kwang! Kwang! Bang!

As the distance between the fleets narrowed, the ships began to breathe fire.

The fleet of the Song Empire was much larger, however, the Yemaek fleet had the upper hand in terms of firepower.

As a result, the battle proceeded tightly.

That was until Symphonia Royal ship, Auster joined in.

“Wh-what is that?!”

“What ship is that huge?!”

“That looks like an island floating on water!”

As the ship Auster approached them, the sailors of the Song Empire began to panic.

It seemed unrealistic for it to be that huge, but the ship which was in the center of the enemy fleet as it continued boasting its dignity, which was ten times more than their flagship.

Besides, it wasn’t just huge.

It was very fast, the surprising thing being that the ship had no sails of oars.

“The Turtle ship! That needs to be the turtle ship!”

“If we don’t hurry up and run…”

As some of the superstitious soldiers made a fuss, the Navy general, Mak Dong-chung pulled out his sword and shouted.

“Calm down everyone! We have the number in terms of battleships! Don’t be afraid just because of one huge enemy ship!”

The screams on the deck subsided at his orders, however, the morale of the soldiers and sailors didn’t rise.

Mak Dong-chung immediately hurried and prepared for the battle.

Honestly, Mak Dong-chun too was afraid of the huge battleship which stood at the vanguard of the enemy fleet.

However, the battles weren’t based on the hugeness of the ships.

In most cases, the game could be taken over by strong skills and firepower.

In terms of that—the Imperial Dragon Ship, the flagship of the Song Empire wasn’t that behind.

It was because the upper deck and the sides were covered with iron and the guns that were loaded with 100 openings; both small and large.

If the battle could be carried on calmly, the Song fleet could win the war.

Pung! Pung! Pong!

The guns fired at once from the Imperial Dragon Ship.

Dozens of steel shells flew into the sky, to strike the huge enemy ship.

“Woah! Hit it…!”

The faces of the Song Empire’s troops who were shouting with joy upon hitting the enemy ship went stiff.

They never thought that the huge enemy ship, which was as huge as an island would sink right away after being hit.

However, they thought that it would suffer from damage, however, the ship was fine.

‘What just happened? It surely had no iron armor around it, then why?’

Mak Dong-chung seemed flustered.

From what he saw, the Auster wasn’t covered with iron plates on the hull.

It was because the iron plates would only end up adding huge weight and slowing down the speed.

At best, the meaning of installing the Screw below would disappear.

Instead, Luke increased the defense by engraving the shield magic circle on the hull of Auster.

Mak Dong-chung, who wasn’t aware of the situation, tried to encourage the sailors who went stiff.

“What are you doing?! Reload the shells and attack the ship at the same point!”

There was no indestructible thing in the world.

No matter how huge the ship was or how great armor it had, if the shelling was focused on one spot, then it was bound to break.

The time when the nervous sailors understood what the general was saying, they began to move.

They started for a counterattack on the huge enemy ship.

“The leading guns from 1 to 10 still converged on the enemy flagship. From the 11th to 100th we will support the surrounding Yemaek fleet!”

Luke looked at the battle situation and gave the orders to the captain of Auster.

With the flagship of the enemy fleet, he considered the 10 guns to be more than sufficient.

Any more guns than that would be like cutting a dead hen with a cow-cutting knife.

While remodeling Auster, Luke had replaced the leading guns with larger firepower.

It was five times larger and more powerful than the existing guns, it had that much severe recoil.

If it was any other ship, it would have sunk with the recoil, however, Luke made it easy by engraving magic circles to reduce the recoiling effect.

In addition, the existing guns were replaced with fort cannons which had twice the power.

So, the number of Auster’s guns were cut by half in number, but the overall firepower was stronger than before.

The reason why the Grenada Navy didn’t make such an artillery improvement in the battleship was that they considered their existing guns to be strong enough.

Moreover, the advantage for Auster wasn’t the long-range artillery on board.

It was the onboard battle and navy Gigants.

Kwang! Kwang!

The guns at the forefront of Auster, spew fire with loud sounds which could tear off the eardrums.

In front of the Imperial Dragon ship, large splashes of water soared.

“Tch, did it miss?”

Luke wasn’t getting his hopes up.

It was the first time for the Symphonia sailors to use such long-distance and powerful guns in action.

It was something that was bound to happen and they had come for the expedition without any proper training.

“Well, next time we’ll hit it.”

While Luke was relaxed, Auster was ready to get hit by the Song Empire’s battleships which were coming their way at full speed.

Kwang! Kwang!

Two Song empire battleships moved courageously and advanced forward while they collided with Auster and ended up shattering.

The sailors of the Song Empire as well as the Yemaek soldiers were shocked to see the two ships shatter like eggs.

And the Auster began to perform its strength from then.

Pung! Pung!

“Kwaaak!”

“Ughhh!”

When the ships which hit Auster were trying to gain balance, Auster immediately fired its guns in all directions by rowing in a circle, the entire formation of the Song Empire fleet collapsed in a matter of seconds.

When he saw that, Mak Dong-chung struck his fist on the ship’s railing.

‘Ugh! It is a lot more troublesome than I thought!’

Not knowing that such a situation would happen because of one ship, he bit his lip.

The most important aspect of a naval battle was the formation of maintenance.

It was because effective power could be projected by focusing the guns based on the formations.

However, the Song Empire’s fleet turned out to be unable to maintain their formation due to the movement of stirring Auster.

Despite their superiority in numbers, the ships scattered away, trying to avoid the shelling from Auster.

The ships which were busy trying to run ended up falling into the line of shots for the Yemaek fleet.

“Reorganize the line! What are they doing?! Signal the fleet with a flag…”

Pung! Splash!

A water column rose right next to the Imperial Dragon ship and swallowed the words of Mak Dong-chung.

The expression of the sailors turned blue as the shelling kept closing in on them.

No matter how strongly the iron defense was built, it seemed that if they were struck by the enemy’s guns, they would sink for sure.

“This is dangerous, we need to step back…”

It was when Hwang Bo-jangcheon, who was terrified, was about to signal a retreat.

Mak Dong-chung shouted with a loud voice.

“Everyone! Attack the huge enemy ship! All attack it!”

Experienced in the navy battles, he knew that if he retreated without taking any measures, he would only end up creating more damage to his side.

It seemed better to go straight for the enemy’s ship and conclude the battle in close combat.

When Mak Don-chung’s orders fell, the man in charge of signaling the ships, waved the flag fiercely.

Seeing the Imperial Dragon rush boldly while signaling, the other ships regained their forms and began to rush towards Auster at the same time.

Of course, Hwang Bo-jangcheon jumped at it.

“Eh! Are you crazy?! Step back right away!”

“Shut up! If you can’t understand sea battles, step back!”

The polite man screamed at the young man, Hwang Bo-jangcheon, whose face was burning with anger and drew his sword.

The moment he was about to slash the head of Mak Dong-chung from the back, a shell shot from Auster hit the Imperial Dragon.

Kwang! Crack!

The heavy shells hit the deck.

The shell, which had been made to smash a Gigant, struck through the hull which was covered with iron armor.

“Hiik!”

Frightened with the enormous power of the enemy, Hwang Bo-jangcheon and his men ran away from the hull thinking they lost.

Whether they lose or not, Mak Dong-chung didn’t take his eyes off Auster.

“Master! The enemies have targeted our ship.”

“Hehe. I am seeing that.”

At the words of Hwang Bo-sung, Luke smiled widely.

The enemy surely used his head, yet, it was like a moth flying towards the fire.

“Get ready to hit the enemy!”

Taking the orders from Luke, Hwang Bo-sung immediately went to relay the orders to the knights.

It was until then that the sound of Gigant’s core engine rose from under the deck.