The Black Sails of the Ming Dynasty

Chapter 28 Arc-shaped route
"Order the Holy Justice to fire on the deck of the large sailing ship!" Alonso ordered his soldiers.

"Yes, Your Excellency!" The soldier stood at attention and then ran off to relay the order.

As per his previous orders, the Holy Justice had now blocked the bay's exit from the sea, making it impossible to hear shouts; the messenger could only stand on the port's high platform and use flag signals.

Just then, the sun was rising in the east. From the perspective of the Sacred Justice, looking east towards the port, all that could be seen was the sun's blinding light. The messenger on the high platform was just a blurry figure, and the flag in his hand was impossible to make out.

Therefore, the messenger signaled with flags more than twenty times, but the Holy Justice remained unmoved.

"What's going on? Why are you disobeying orders!" Alonso roared, his temples throbbing.

"They must be too far away to see the flag signals," one officer analyzed.

Alonso roared, "Then send a ship over and give the order verbally!"

Ten minutes later, a small rowboat slowly paddled toward the Sacred Justice.

"Your Excellency, look! A large sailing ship is sailing toward the shallows!" a soldier exclaimed.

Alonso snatched the binoculars from his servant, stretched the lens, and looked at the large sailing ship. Sure enough, he saw it sailing straight toward the shallows.

On the gunwales, a dozen or so pirate sailors were furling the sails.

Unlike the simple operation of Chinese hard sails, the soft sails of large sailboats cannot be furled in a short time by pulling a few ropes and using a pulley system.

If it doesn't change course, it's only a matter of time before the large sailboat crashes into the shallows.

Large sailing ships are absolute behemoths at sea. To increase sailing stability, the keel of the ship is sharp and pointed. Once it runs aground on shallow water, the hull will suffer enormous damage due to its own weight, and the keel may even break directly.

But compared to losing both the ship and its cargo, running aground was the best possible outcome.

Alonso knew that the pirates would not be able to remove the rudder lock, and that the large sailing ship was bound to run aground.

"Idiot!" Alonso put away his binoculars and cursed fiercely.

In his view, their ignorance was even more abhorrent than the illegal acts of Lin Qian and her gang.

Alonso told his officers, "Once they're stranded, try to capture them alive. I want to see them hanged with my own eyes!"

After saying that, he casually tossed the telescope to his servant.

Catherine took the telescope from the servant and anxiously looked into the distance, her knuckles turning white from gripping it too tightly.

Through the telescope, the large sailing ship was getting closer and closer to the shallows, and the sailors on deck were as anxious as ants on a hot pan.

At this point, only the mainsail and the mainmast sail were furled, while the sails on the foremast and mast were still full of wind, propelling the sailboat forward quickly.

Catherine knew that at such a close distance, even if all the sails of the large sailboat were furled now, the ship would still run into the shallows due to inertia.

It was inevitable that the project would be stranded.

Catherine herself didn't realize that she subconsciously hoped Lin Qian could remove the rudder lock and maneuver the large sailboat to turn smoothly.

But her reason told her that in the decades since the Manila Galleon came into existence, there had never been a successful case of forcibly removing the rudder lock.

The rudder lock is the brainchild of Spain's top shipwrights and could not be cracked by a pirate in a short time.

“Damn pirate, the gallows are here.” Catherine closed her eyes.

A moment later, the surrounding crowd gasped in surprise.

Catherine was both surprised and delighted. She opened her eyes wide and could see with the naked eye that the large sailing ship had inexplicably turned hard to port, so sharply that the ship tilted sharply to starboard. "This is impossible!" Alonso's eyes nearly popped out of their sockets. "There's a rudder lock, how did he turn? Did he remove the rudder lock? This is impossible!"

"Where's the telescope? Give me that damn telescope right now!" Alonso yelled at his servants behind him.

The telescope was in Catherine's hand. In the distance, on the sea, a large sailboat barely grazed the shallows, leaving a perfect arc in its white foam trail.

Catherine's red lips parted slightly, and she couldn't help but gasp in surprise at this extremely risky act.

She moved her binoculars, focusing her gaze on the ship's rudder on the stern deck. A man was forcefully straightening the rudder; his upper body was bare, his muscles taut, forming extremely smooth lines.

“Lin Qian…” Catherine murmured.

"Give me that damn binoculars!" Alonso roared, snatching the binoculars and frantically peering into the distance.

The two square sails that had been furled earlier were now lowered one after another. Facing the wind from the side, the large sailboat veered to the right, with its port side raised high. The bow cut through the waves, and it sailed swiftly across the sea.

"Where is the Holy Justice? Why isn't it firing?" Alonso shouted. "He's letting the enemy run free, that's a crime!"

"Boom! Boom! Boom..."

As if in response to Alonso's words, the Sacred Justice on the sea finally fired a series of cannon shots.

However, after the cannon fire, the large sailing ship was completely unharmed, and not even a splash of water was seen around it.

Alonso searched the sea and finally saw several columns of water splashing up on the sea about eight hundred paces to the starboard side of the large sailing ship.

The cannonballs all bypassed the large sailing ship and landed on the sea surface further away.

Although whether a warship's cannons could hit their target in the Age of Sail was entirely up to God's will, gunners should at least have aimed their cannons at the enemy ship, not at the sky.

This firing was not aimed at the large sailing ship at all.

"Boom! Boom! Boom..."

Another round of cannon fire rang out, but this time the impact point was even farther than before.

"Damn bastard, what is he doing!" Alonso roared.

"Your Excellency, you ordered the enemy ship's deck to be bombarded, and the Holy Justice is faithfully carrying out your orders," the officer explained.

The large sailing ship had a high hull, and in order to fire at its deck, the cannons of the Holy Justice had to be raised, so if they missed, the shells would land more than a thousand paces away.

"Damn it! That's an outdated order. Can't he see the galleon is about to leave the bay?" Alonso roared furiously. "This is aiding the enemy! Damn it, is that captain's head glued to whale fat?"

The officer said with some dissatisfaction, "Your Excellency, what you're saying is somewhat unfair."

Then another loud cannon shot rang out from the sea.

It wasn't the cannons of the Holy Justice that fired, but the cannon fire of the large sailing ship.

Although it missed, it made the Holy Justice feel the danger and dared not get any closer to fire, so it could only keep a distance of 500 paces when firing.

"One shot! Just one shot and the Holy Justice is intimidated! What a coward!" Alonso laughed in fury, then said to the officer, "Go and requisition the fastest civilian sailing ship. I want to board the Holy Justice and command it myself!"

"Yes, Your Excellency."

(End of this chapter)