Winter Lord: Starting with Daily Intelligence

Chapter 448 The Strength of the Fernando
The screams, artillery fire, and waves on the battlefield were swallowed up by another, more domineering sound.

“Woo——!”

It was a deep, rumbling sound, so low it made your teeth ache.

The fog was torn open, revealing the bow of the ship first.

It was essentially a moving black cliff.

As it advanced, an extremely pungent odor instantly filled the battlefield.

This is the smell of industry; it's asserting sovereignty over this sea area.

An unfortunate pirate two-masted ship happened to be blocking its path.

This ship used to be a huge predator in front of merchant ships, but now it's not even a speed bump.

The Fernando did not sound its horn, did not slow down, and did not even bother to turn its rudder.

"Click."

The wooden keel shattered into powder the moment it touched the steel bow, while tens of thousands of tons of steel continued forward with inertia.

Broken planks, tattered canvas, and dozens of pirates who were still confused about the situation were instantly swept under the huge black hull, leaving a faint trace of blood.

Faced with absolute quality, all skills and courage are a joke.

…………

Inside the armored command tower, it was as quiet as a bubble in the deep sea.

The thick bulletproof glass completely shut out the destruction outside; the only sound was the low-frequency vibration of the steam engine coming through the floor like a heartbeat.

The air was dry and warm, with even a faint aroma of black tea wafting through the air.

Fleet Commander-in-Chief Alwin stood before the nautical chart table.

His dark blue navy double-breasted uniform was pressed crisply, and the top button was fastened all the way up.

He held a command sword in one hand, tapping it idly against his palm.

Louis stood to the side, holding a cup, as if watching a well-rehearsed play, but he was actually quite curious about what this ship could do.

Orland, however, lost his composure somewhat.

The chief engineer's fingers were trembling, his face pressed against the glass, staring intently at the huge black ship outside.

Alwin saw the signal flags raised by the vanguard fleet and also saw the three large creatures trying to approach in the fog.

He turned around, speaking softly into the microphone as if ordering food at a restaurant: "Full ship, first-level combat configuration."

"Main gun crew, unlock." He raised his command sword and pointed out the window. "Clear those three rocks blocking the way..."

The Tyrant started moving, and in its brain, which had degenerated into a tumor, there was only one rigid command.

Unravel the earth's crust and shatter everything!
The yellowish-brown runes flickered wildly, and the rocks multiplied like living things, instantly creating a semi-transparent spherical force field outside the ship's exterior.

This tortoise shell withstood three salvos from the Royal Navy back then and escaped.

With this absolute defense, it charged straight at us like a reckless rhinoceros.

This is the tragedy of a puppet; it doesn't know that times have changed.

"Armor-piercing high-explosive shell, peel off its casing!"

"boom--!"

With a crisp tremor, the Fernando fired two specially designed pointed shells that tore through the air.

That supposedly physically immune earth force field is as fragile as a wet toilet paper in the face of the spiral kinetic energy of an armor-piercing projectile.

"puff."

With a muffled thud, the shell pierced the rock without hindrance, reaching the deepest part of the ship's ammunition magazine before the fuse was triggered.

The Tyrant was forced into a glowing sphere by the energy that exploded inside its belly.

The next second, the entire ship vaporized.

The rocks, steel, and the disgusting soft organisms that lived inside them evaporated instantly in the 3,000-degree heat.

All that remained on the sea was a huge crater emitting white smoke; not even a decent piece of wood was left.

What legendary defense? It's all insignificant in the face of sheer power.

The Shadow Serpent then surged out, frantically drawing S-shaped patterns on the sea surface, and black mist spread out, creating more than a dozen realistic phantoms.

It weaved through the illusions, as fast as a black lightning bolt, thinking it could outmaneuver the heavy iron ship.

“Fool…” Orland couldn’t help but laugh as he looked at the ship darting around wildly.

On the second deck, all twelve secondary guns were simultaneously leveled.

No need to aim, no need to predict, just fill this area of ​​the sea.

“Bang, bang, bang, bang, bang—!”

The ejection port opened, and scorching hot shell casings slammed onto the deck like a waterfall, producing an extremely pleasant metallic clang.

Thirty shots per second.

The dense barrage of shells was like a wall that had been pushed through, covering all sectors of the Shadow Serpent's operations without leaving any blind spots.

Those dozen or so phantoms were instantly destroyed.

Next is the main body.

Its speed, which it prides itself on, is meaningless in the dense network of bullet comments.

The first shell broke its keel, the second tore its sails apart, the third, the fourth... the hundredth.

The ship was torn to pieces in half a second.

It didn't even get within a kilometer of the Fernando before it was reduced to a pile of rotten wood floating on the sea.

Finally, there's the Deathwhisper, a ghost ship that never intended to return alive.

The thousands of deformed fish-men on the ship screamed simultaneously, and a mental shockwave surged forth like a tsunami.

At the same time, the catapults hurled countless fleshy spheres filled with corrosive venom and plague into the air, like a green rain.

It wanted to perish together with the enemy. Even in death, it wanted to spill plague and curses on the deck of the Fernando.

“It’s filthy.” Louis frowned, as if he had seen someone spit on the pristine white table.

Sizzle—!
On either side of the bridge, four multi-barreled rotary cannons emitted a piercing shriek like tearing fabric.

The six gun barrels blurred into afterimages.

A storm of orange-red metal wove a net of fire in mid-air.

Those flying fishmen who attempted suicide attacks were blasted into a bloody mist in mid-air before they even got close to the ship's side.

The fleshy spheres, poison sacs, and curse mediums were all blasted apart by high-density projectiles in mid-air.

Immediately afterwards, the flamethrowers below the ship's hull opened.

High-pressure pyrolysis oil gushed out.

call--!
A hundred-meter-high fire shield instantly rose around the Fernando.

The stray venom that escaped the fire sizzled and burned away instantly.

The flames even swirled back with the wind, like a giant fire whip, lashing fiercely at the face of the Deathwhisper.

The sail made of dead human skin burst into flames instantly.

The ship, filled with curses and resentment, was transformed into a giant torch at sea by the flames of industrial alchemy.

The fishman's screams changed from a mental attack to a simple scream, and finally faded into deathly silence.

Three minutes, just three minutes.

Three legendary ships from the old era, enhanced by deep-sea power, were reduced to ashes and charcoal.

The Fernando slowly sailed through the still-smoking sea.

The black hull was spotless, without a single stain.

Suddenly the sea became still.

The rhythmic lapping of the waves against the hull was gone, and the black seawater bubbled and gurgled like thick, boiled asphalt.

Then came the stench of a corpse that had been buried in a deep trench for hundreds of years being unearthed.

Black water surged, first a tangled mass of soft tissue, then a broken ship hull that had been forcibly squeezed into the giant octopus's tentacles.

The wood and rust had long since become one with the flesh and blood, making it impossible to distinguish which was the ship and which was the monster.

Where a mast should have stood, dozens of thick tentacles are now swinging, each sucker on them contracting and stirring up a cloud of murky black water.

On the hull, countless eyeballs opened.

The large ones were like shields, the small ones like coins, and they made a wet, rubbing sound as they spun, staring intently at the giant steel ship in front of them.

Then it opened its mouth.

The original bow area was split into a black hole filled with fangs.

The low-frequency roaring sound crashed against the armor plates, making one's periosteum ache.

Inside the armored command tower, Louis stood before the bulletproof glass, looking at the swaggering mass of rotting flesh, and frowned: "It's disgusting."

Alvin didn't waste any words, "Engine assembly, supercritical overload, main gun charging."

The red warning lights were flashing frantically on the bridge.

The floor beneath my feet began to shake violently, the roar of four vertical steam engines being pushed to their limits.

The pressure gauge needle struck the red zone, and the high-pressure steam in the pipe emitted a sharp hiss, as if countless ferocious beasts were rampaging through a steel cage.

The Fernando's main guns raised their heads.

Blue and white arcs of electricity surged wildly along the runes on the cannon, distorting the surrounding air with their intense heat.

emission.

A giant magic explosion shell shot out from the cannon muzzle, like a light blade with no thickness, and pierced straight into that roaring maw.

The seawater along the way instantly vaporized, and the water vapor was dispersed before it even had a chance to rise.

The fusion monster that had been so arrogant just moments before didn't even let out a scream.

The moment of contact, the tentacles, eyeballs, ship planks, flesh and blood—all structures disintegrated within a millisecond.

They were directly wiped out at the physical level by the high temperature.

It's like someone taking an eraser and rubbing it hard on the canvas.

The light dissipated.

Only a huge hole with a diameter of 100 meters remained on the sea surface. The surrounding seawater was stunned for a few seconds before rushing back with a rumble, crashing together and creating water columns tens of meters high.

As for the Prince of Black Lagoon? Not even ashes remained.

The deck of the Scorpion in the distance was deathly silent.

Miller's binoculars hit his foot, stinging, but he didn't react.

He slid down the side of the boat like a lump of mud, his mouth wide open, his lungs pounding, but he couldn't get any oxygen in.

He looked at the black warship that remained quietly stationary in the same spot.

The ship's hull was pitch black, with cold lines, and not a single piece of paint had peeled off.

What was that just now?
Was that magic? Or divine punishment?
He had always believed that the end for pirates was the gallows, or being devoured by an even stronger monster.

But he never dreamed that this would be the thing that would end them.

"This is no war..." Miller's voice was like two pieces of sandpaper rubbing together, filled with despair.

Those legendary pirate kings, those deep-sea monsters that struck fear into the hearts of the North, were nothing more than a worthy tragedy before this torrent of steel.

They are just stains.

And being erased is their only fate.

(End of this chapter)