"You're saying that my entire fleet has been annihilated!? You want to tell me that all of my 70 warships... first-grade warships! Have all sunk!?" The King of the Taren Kingdom sat on his throne, shattering the glass in his hand on the floor.
The grand hall wasn't particularly glittering with gold, nor were the Kings of Taren known for their extravagance. They seldom renovated their palace because they invested a significant portion of their income into fostering their fleet.
Therefore, the number of warships in the Taren Kingdom was very high. In addition to first-grade warships, there were hundreds of second-grade warships and armed merchant ships to secure their trade routes.
The King who had just spoken now stood up in anger, walked up to his Prime Minister, and asked furiously, "Those were 70 warships! 70 warships! Those ships were enough to destroy a kingdom! Yet you tell me they've all gone... all sunk! Have you gone mad, or are you a fool?
Hmm?"
"Your Majesty! The situation is likely as such! Our fleeing soldiers have brought back some prisoners who were sent back by the enemy, which has confirmed they indeed belonged to our fleet," said the Prime Minister, his face also looking dreadful, but he had no choice but to speak up. Chapter Experience:
Although unwilling to accept reality, he knew that if they didn't immediately think of countermeasures, this kingdom built upon the sea was quite doomed.
As a Prime Minister, he certainly did not wish to see his king taken prisoner, nor did he want to witness the destruction of the kingdom he served. Therefore, he had to do his utmost to help this madman before him overcome the crisis.
"Your Majesty! Now that it has come to this, we must think of a way to face the crisis at hand," a navy General could not help but speak up at this point as well.
The surrounding Ministers were buzzing with discussion, as they too had just learned of the news that the fleet that had sailed out had been completely sunk.
Those were 70 warships! Almost the entire wealth of the Taren Kingdom. Such a loss was not easily borne.
The King's face remained unpleasant as he looked at the speaking navy commander and questioned loudly, "What can be done? What can you do? Hmm?"
"We, we need to, need to, replenish, replenish warships! More warships!" the navy commander answered nervously.
His answer was not satisfying as those warships had been sunk, and hastily launching a few new ones wouldn't change anything.
The disparity in the strength of the two sides was too great, the enemy's quality advantage could not be compensated with a numerical advantage, which was the most fatal issue.
It was obvious that the Great Tang Group had very formidable new warships, which was also a definite piece of information obtained from the prisoners sent back.
These prisoners had all experienced that naval battle, and their memories of the enemy's terror were fresh. They brought back very important news, news about ironclad warships.
The Great Tang Group's possession of steel-made warships was no longer a secret; after all, the captured sailors had witnessed those powerful ships themselves.
They were interrogated separately, yet provided almost identical intelligence: the enemy ironclad warships could fire at ease from a distance of 1000 meters, sinking sail warships.
This message was also corroborated by the land forces: during the attack on Hotwind Port, they faced unprecedented shelling, with the enemy using very powerful cannonballs, even more powerful than those provided by Shireck.
However, the senior officials of the Taren Kingdom were unaware of this, and they immediately imagined the enemy fleet's presence at Hotwind Port as the enemy commander's prescient decision-making.
Thinking along these lines, these decision-makers of the Taren Kingdom found it even harder to comprehend the speed of Great Tang Group's information dissemination.
"Hiss... Did the enemy know we were going to Hotwind Port?" One Minister asked incredulously, looking towards his colleague.
The colleague spread his hands and shook his head, "It must be an intelligence leak! Such a large-scale operation, it's impossible to keep completely secret."
Mobilizing troops, assembling the fleet; if the enemy really had spies within Taren, they would definitely transmit information ahead of time... The question was, how did they manage to deliver intelligence so swiftly?
"But the enemy's preparation is too thorough, right?" The official who raised the question was somewhat resentful as he asked again.
"It's very likely that Shireck had launched an offensive in another direction first, raising their alert!" another Minister explained.
"And the enemy could actually halt their own fleet at any time?" This time it was the naval commander's turn to be incredulous.
The Prime Minister's face darkened as he snapped, pulling the discussion back on track, "What's the use of talking about this now?"
The King too was restless and anxious, looking at his Ministers and repeating the Prime Minister's words, "Yes, what's the use of talking about this now? What are the solutions? Speak solutions!"
"Gather, gather the remaining fleet?" one Minister proposed.
The naval commander shook his head and said, "Gathering all of our warships now may not even add up to 150."
"There are still that many warships; should be enough to put up a fight, right?" The Minister seemed somewhat reassured after hearing the number.
The naval general looked at this Minister as if he were looking at an idiot before responding sarcastically, "Are you joking? Do you know how many islands we need to defend, how many ports we must protect?"
"Then speak! Apart from those we can't mobilize, how many warships can we gather?" the Minister retorted defiantly.
The naval commander thought for a few seconds before giving a despair-inducing answer, "Of these remaining warships, we may not have even 30 that we can gather."
The officer continued with a complaint, "The fleet that General Valen took with him was pretty much all of our mobile strength."
"That damned bastard Valen, couldn't he have run if he couldn't win?" Suddenly, some Ministers, who didn't understand naval warfare, started berating the now dead naval General Valen.
Since the dead cannot argue back, whatever they said now could be refuted by others, but cursing that damned Valen wouldn't be questioned by everyone.
Of course, they had already forgotten that General Valen had once been a famous and formidable admiral at sea. They also forgot that Valen had led the fleet to a small-scale naval victory before, seizing a small island from another kingdom.