Water Magician-Chapter 643: Bombardment

Editor: Tseirp

“Enemy bombardment incoming!”

A lookout on the mast shouted.

Some fifty fire-attribute attack spells struck the Tenth Darwei Government Vessel.

But the barrier woven by alchemy protected the Tenth Vessel from the attack.

Countless lights of mutual annihilation flared into being.

“Mutual annihilation?”

Ryo murmured.

“What’s wrong?”

Abel asked, as if he had heard the murmur.

“No… I was just wondering how they could defend against bombardment from more than twenty ships with a . I’d heard

weren’t particularly strong.”

“Ah—I’ve heard that reported too.”

Abel nodded at Ryo’s words.

Whether

or , normally, they aren’t that sturdy.

Ryo, for his part, sometimes gathered information on existing magic.

It usually came up in casual conversation rather than through deliberate research… but he’d heard talk of it before.

“It seems the

don’t repel the attacks but rather receive them and vanish through mutual annihilation.”

“Wouldn’t that make re-deploying the

a huge burden?”

“Exactly. That’s why from the start they deploy dozens or hundreds of small barriers. By keeping the area of each one small, they limit the mana consumption. The design itself is for ‘to disappear together’ rather than ‘to repel’.”

“I see. There are a lot of ways to do things.”

Abel nodded, impressed by Ryo’s explanation.

Ryo noticed something else.

Beside Captain La Wu, who was directing things on the main deck, there was a half-sunken command seat.

Sitting there was the government vessel combat commander Lin Shin.

Her upper body was on the first deck, while the lower half seemed to be below.

“Under there is the second deck, right?”

“Yes. The alchemy tools for magic bombardment protruding from the hull are on that second deck.”

“The seat where Lin Shin is…”

“Usually that hatch is shut. Since she’s a combat commander, she might be directing both the second-deck magic bombardment and the interception lineup on this first deck from there.”

Neither Ryo nor Abel knew the Darwei fleet in detail.

They didn’t know Lin Shin’s exact role, but they could imagine it roughly.

“Alright, Lin Shin, that’s enough. Sink them!”

“Aye!”

Captain La Wu ordered, and Lin Shin—seated in that half-submerged pit-like command seat—nodded.

Immediately, Lin Shin’s orders were relayed to the second deck’s magic artillery.

“Aim for the first ship that came out from the island on the far right. As always, one meter to the left of the bow, above the waterline.”

Detailed instructions issued.

Ten seconds later.

“Aim! Three, two, one, fire!”

At the same moment, from the Tenth Vessel’s port side, twenty fireballs were launched.

They all landed at the same spot, at the same time.

The explosions characteristic of fire magic followed.

The enemy ship that had taken those hits—apparently suffering a large hole in the bow—began to sink.

“Amazing…”

“Unbelievable.”

Ryo and Abel fell silent, stunned.

“Next! Target the second from the right. Same as before—one meter left from the bow, above the waterline.”

Without hesitation, the second-shot directive was issued from Commander Lin Shin.

This rapid-fire capability was the strength of the alchemy tools for magic bombardment.

Again, ten seconds later.

“Aim! Three, two, one, fire!”

The result repeated.

At the same time, twenty fireballs from the Tenth Vessel’s port side struck one spot at the same time, producing the characteristic fire-magic explosion.

The second enemy ship hit by that barrage began to sink.

“Their discipline is incredible.”

“This consistency is the product of training.”

Ryo voiced amazement at the repeated result, and Abel pointed out that it was no coincidence.

With the government’s

functioning defensively and the magic artillery sinking enemy ships offensively.

The situation was, as far as one could imagine, perfect.

“If only we can slip away like this…”

“This is the Darwei vessel—we’re talking about their ship. The enemy knows roughly what it’s capable of too. Of course, they’ll have second and third waves.”

“Abel, you’re too pessimistic.”

“Better than kicking the bucket from being too optimistic.”

Ryo understood but still frowned; Abel, from his experience leading armies as king, spoke with conviction.

The captain shared that view.

“If the bombardment isn’t working, they’ll send ‘parachutes’!”

Captain La Wu barked.

“Parachutes?”

“What’s that?”

Ryo and Abel, of course, didn’t know.

Well—Ryo’s knowledge associated parachutes with parachutes in the literal sense, but…

“Enemy ships have fired ‘parachutes’! Number… ten!”

A lookout on the mast cried.

“Myan! I’ll leave the ship’s evasive maneuvers to you!”

“Aye!”

Captain La Wu instructed First Navigator Myan-Mar.

Myan, who received the order, went beside the helmsman and looked up toward the sky ahead.

“Something’s falling from the sky.”

“It’s on the ship’s course. That’s the ‘parachute’.”

Following Myan’s gaze, Ryo saw something descending toward the Tenth Vessel from above.

Abel, having also seen it, let out an exclamation.

It looked like a small parachute, but what hung from it was not a person.

“Bombs…?”

Ryo muttered.

They didn’t have the streamlined shape of bullets; they looked more like spherical bombs.

“Deck interception—each man fire!”

Commander Lin Shin’s command rang out, and the crew lined up on the main deck began operating their interception alchemy tools aimed at the sky ahead and opened fire.

Those interceptors were not magic artillery but seemed to be launching fairly small stones.

“A sudden turn to low-tech…”

“S-stones are probably more effective.”

Ryo was surprised in a different way, and Abel offered a tentative explanation.

The stones were being fired at a rate of about one every half-second.

With twenty men firing, a curtain-like barrage of projectiles flew through the air.

“See? Told you.”

“Abel, you’re lucky.”

“What do you mean?”

“Your soul was about to leave your body for a minute.”

Ryo, as if seeing through Abel, said that with the sort of smugness that implied he’d noticed everything.

For once, their usual roles seemed reversed.

When a stone struck the sphere suspended beneath a parachute it…

Boom.

It exploded.

“Huh? An explosion?”

Ryo was surprised.

Of course.

If it exploded, and it wasn’t fire-attribute magic, that meant gunpowder must have been used.

He had suspected they might be bombs, but to actually see it…

“ ‘Black powder’ has already been put into practical use in Darwei, then.”

Abel was not surprised.

The ‘black powder’ was gunpowder, produced in the eastern part of the Knightley Kingdom.

During the Kingdom Liberation War, a sizable stockpile had been taken by the empire, but production and research continued even after Abel ascended the throne.

It would likely be used in large-scale construction someday, but Abel understood that it would inevitably appear on battlefields as well.

It was a sad reality… but Abel was a king. A ruler.

His job was politics, not morality.

Even if sad, one cannot ignore realistic possibilities.

The large quantities of black powder that had flowed to the empire would inevitably show up on battlefields…

And in the Eastern Countries, in Darwei, they had simply appeared on the battlefield a bit sooner.

“Does the kingdom research gunpowder… black powder too?”

“Yes, we do.”

Abel answered Ryo’s question plainly.

“As… a weapon?”

“You can count on that.”

Abel did not lie, even though he knew Ryo would dislike the answer.

“Most research focuses on its use in large-scale construction, but use in warfare is also being studied.”

“Right…”

Ryo nodded at Abel’s reply.

It was the same history that dynamite had followed on Earth.

War uses whatever can be used.

That is the same whether on Earth or on ‘Phi’.

“If those spheres explode just from being hit by stones, then if one lands on this deck…”

“Yes, it would detonate.”

Pulling themselves together, Abel and Ryo returned their attention to the battle.

Yes, the fight continued.

“But the stone barrage is working quite well.”

As Ryo said, all of the parachute-dropped bombs were being intercepted.

Moreover, the simultaneous magic bombardment from the hull had been effective—six ships that had come out from behind the island were all sunk.

But sixteen ships from the harbor were closing in.

That was because the Tenth Vessel wasn’t particularly fast.

“They had to furl some sails to secure firing lines for the stone barrage.”

“Can’t be helped. If the stones pierced the sails, that would be a problem, and if the sails remained and blocked our view, we’d miss the ‘parachutes’. It’s probably their plan to slow us down with those parachutes.”

Ryo said, frustrated, Abel nodded in agreement.

“Here comes a salvo of ‘parachutes’—prepare!”

Captain La Wu shouted.

He called toward the speaking tube as well.

“Engine room, prepare the secondary engine!”

“Engine room here—secondary engine ready. We can go at any time!”

The engine room’s voice answered through the tube.

“Secondary engine?”

Abel muttered and glanced at Ryo, but Ryo, of course, didn’t know either.

He shook his head.

A large number of crew had come up from below on the first deck.

Likely those who had been manning the hull’s magic artillery until just a while ago.

Indeed, the six ships that had come out from the island’s shadow were on the port side.

So they had been sunk by port-side hull bombardment…all six.

The remaining ships that had exited the harbor were approaching from behind the Tenth Vessel.

In that case, hull-side bombardment would be hard to target them.

Of course, a

was also deployed at the Tenth Vessel’s stern, and occasionally they could see lights where the barrier nullified magic shots fired from the fast-attack ships.

“The men who came up from below…”

“Are standing by around the sails.”

Ryo and Abel watched the situation from the edge of the main deck to avoid getting in the way.

In their view, the crew from the second deck readied themselves near the sails.

“Salvo of ‘parachutes’ incoming!”

The mast lookout cried.

From the sixteen ships pursuing behind the Tenth Vessel, projectiles were fired that passed the Tenth Vessel and opened their parachutes ahead, slowly descending toward the sea.

If the Tenth Vessel continued on its present course, it would impact imminently.

But…

“Alright! Deck interception complete. Bring the secondary engine online!”

“Aye!”

“Full sail!”

“Aye!”

Captain La Wu issued orders in quick succession.

The engine room and the Tenth Vessel’s crew responded.

“Whoa.”

“The speed—it’s incredible!”

The Tenth Vessel’s speed clearly increased.

Presumably, a second alchemy tool—something like the wind generator—had been activated to boost speed, and the previously furled sails had all been set.

It felt to them as if the ship’s speed had doubled.

“We’ll pass beneath the ‘parachutes’! Look carefully, watch!”

“Aye!”

The mast lookout answered Captain La Wu.

The Tenth Vessel, now faster, cut under the ‘parachutes’ with considerable clearance.

“Won’t the pursuing ships increase speed too?”

“No, they don’t seem able to.”

“Huh? Why is that?”

Ryo tilted his head.

“If they increase speed, those pursuit ships will run into the ‘parachutes’ over them.”

“Ah…”

Abel’s remark made Ryo realize.

Yes—they would be driving straight into the very ‘parachutes’ they’d launched themselves… they couldn’t increase speed for fear of plunging into their own bombs.

Everything had been a trap set by Captain La Wu.

The Tenth Vessel had concealed its top speed… and at the last moment used the enemy’s parachute salvo to break away.

“Captain La Wu is amazing.”

“And the crew who can respond to him.”

Ryo and Abel were astonished.

Thus, the Tenth Government Vessel slipped through the snare and succeeded in escaping.

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