Steel, Explosives, and Spellcasters

"Wow! It's the statue of a Sabine woman! How did the ancients manage to carve the texture of light gauze from stone?" Anna, with a comical little mustache stuck to her lips, wandered happily through the mercenary colonnade, "And this one here, look at the lines of her body, so beautiful!"

However, Winters seemed somewhat distracted at the time, responding with noncommittal "hmms" whatever Anna said, his hand on the hilt of his sword, protecting this girl dressed as a man by her side.

The Guard's Colonnade was a section next to the Parliament Square, constructed during the imperial era. In the past, the emperor's messengers would read out decrees from atop the colonnade, and meet petitioners within its confines.

Because this colonnade symbolized the emperor's majesty, it was not only built very high, but also housed several statues created by famous artists. Next to the colonnade was the former residence of the royal guards, hence the name Guard's Colonnade.

After the Sovereignty Wars, the Republic of Vineta inherited this colonnade. Although some major public ceremonies—such as the swearing-in of administrative officers—still took place here, usually it served merely as a spot for citizens to relax and cool off, no longer the inviolable sanctuary of the royal domain.

Elizabeth, who loved stirring up trouble, happily became the messenger relaying messages for Anna. As a reward for providing her with the patterns, Anna had asked Winters to meet her precisely at nine o'clock that morning outside Lady Anguisola's studio, with two horses in tow.

And so Winters waited for Miss Anna, who had arrived dressed as a man and sporting a small mustache.

"I skipped class!" Anna's eyes were full of excitement, "Take me to the Guard's Colonnade! Did you bring the horses?"

"I have, but I didn't bring a lady's side-saddle," Winters said, apologetically, "Shall I find a carriage for you?"

Riding astride was considered very unladylike; hence the special side-saddle for women. But Anna happily mounted the horse, "No need. I've been wanting to try riding astride for a while now."

In that moment at the Guard's Colonnade, Winters watching Anna admire the statues, suddenly felt a sense of unreality, as if the horrific battle at Haidong Port the night before had been just a dream.

On the street, laborers pushing wheelbarrows argued noisily with merchants driving mule carts; a lady curiously peeked through the curtains of a rattling carriage; and impeccably dressed gentlemen, indifferent to the commotion, rode past leisurely on their horses.

While passersby bustled about their daily lives, Anna lost herself in the world of sculpted art. It was another ordinary day in Sea Blue City, yet soldiers could already taste the increasingly pungent odors of gunpowder and blood.

When cleaning up the battlefield the night before, over six hundred bodies were tallied. The attackers, entrenched in the shipyard, tried to escape to the sea in small boats, but the majority were caught by the cavalry and cut down from behind.

Without need for torture, the captives gave up a name: Captain Drake. A notorious member of the combined council of captains and plantation owners of Tanilia, and a dreaded pirate of the Inner Sea.

It was a well-planned surprise attack; the pirates took advantage of the high tide to come ashore in small groups, hiding in the forests to the east of Haidong Port. Two days later, on a night when the south wind howled, they launched their assault.

A gang of pirates mounted a noisy feint attack on the pier, and when the defenders at Duckbeak Bastion went to support the pier, another gang of pirates hidden outside the bastion seized the opportunity to capture it.

Following that, the two groups of pirates pinched the defenders between them, overwhelming the guards.

Then the pirates began setting fires at the docks and seizing the warships anchored in the harbor.

After returning to home port, most of the sailors from the warships had already gone ashore to rest. With only a few crew members left on guard, there was no organization strong enough to mount an effective resistance.

The brave sailors aboard three of the warships repelled the pirates, attempting to navigate their ships out of the harbor. Two of them were sunk by the heavy cannons of Duckbeak Bastion at the narrowest exit of the bay, while the third vanished after passing the bay, ambushed by pirate ships waiting outside in the sea.

The sailors of another warship held fast in the cabin; they couldn't sail away, and the pirates dared not go down. In cruelty, the pirates eventually set fire to this warship.

In the shipyard, two warships that had been hauled ashore for cleaning their hulls from barnacles could not be dragged back into the sea by the pirates, who simply burned them as well.

The sailors aboard the remaining four warships were killed by the pirates, who, riding the strong southerly wind, drove these four warships away from Haidong Port.

In just two hours, the Vineta Navy had lost four of its ten warships anchored in Haidong Port, while the remaining six were burned.

The last intact warship in the harbor turned out to be the imperial warship "Virtue" that Winters was responsible for welcoming that day. A few dozen loyalist soldiers aboard the Virtue fought off the pirates attempting to seize the ship, breaking their teeth in the attempt.

Meanwhile, the captain of the Virtue coolly assessed the situation, choosing not to blindly leave the bay. Since the bastion had changed hands, most of its cannons must have been aimed at the entrance and exit of the bay, leaving few pointed toward their own harbor. The captain of the Virtue determined it was better to deal with the bastion in the bay than head into the sea with unknown enemy positions.

Indeed, by the time the cavalry from the eastern camp arrived at Haidong Port, most of the pirates had already fled. To have captured a real warship was a major coup; any pirates who managed to board a naval warship had only one thought: to get the ship out.

Ultimately, the pirates left hunkering down in the shipyard were those who had not managed to board the ships; they continued looting and setting fires in the port until they turned around to find all the ships gone. Most of them were trapped in the shipyard, with only a few left at the bastion.