Free Web NovelChapter 109: Point-Blank
Artillery shells shrieked across the bay, ripping the morning fog to ribbons.
Dozens of explosive rounds rained down from the rotating ironclad turrets.
Because Kaelia had fanned their forty unburnable hulls into a loose, shifting crescent, most of the volley plunged harmlessly into the ocean, sending geysers of boiling white surf high into the air.
One solitary shell found its mark, striking the prow of Thora’s ship dead center.
’Standard cedar would splinter into toothpicks,’ Kane thought, watching the fiery orange bloom completely swallow his first mate’s bow.
Instead of shattering, the glossy black resin drank the thermal output greedily.
Concussive pressure redirected outward in a harmless ripple, leaving the obsidian wood untouched.
Thora strode right out of the lingering smoke, laughing savagely as she leveled her weapon toward the nearest enemy paddle-wheel.
"Is that the best the Chancellor’s navy can do?" she roared over the surf.
"My grandmother hits harder with her soup spoon!"
"Keep your prow angled!" Kane shouted back from his own helm, grinning at her uncompromising lack of fear.
"We aren’t close enough to board them yet!"
"Then tell your rowers to put their backs into it, Chief! I assume they want to earn their keep before lunch!"
Down inside the lamplit cargo hold, Misha’s seraphic network sparked to life.
Her voice broadcasted simultaneously through the linked Milfheim communication crystals mounted beside every helm, layered with an eerie, dual-tone resonance.
"Three ironclads turning starboard at your two o’clock," the Princess stated, her tone entirely devoid of panic.
"Their boiler pressure is peaking. Target their midship exhaust grates."
’I reckon Grieselda turned the kid into the most dangerous oracle on this continent,’ Kane mused, thoroughly enjoying the supreme tactical advantage.
Leaning over the railing, he bellowed vector adjustments down to his forward ballista crews.
"Pivot thirty degrees starboard! Load the Sylvandar alchemical charges! Aim dead for the steam grates!"
Brass harpoons punched cleanly through the enemy vents.
Three localized, deafening explosions rocked the shallow shoreline as boilers ruptured from the inside out.
Superheated vapor swallowed the Menual gunners.
[Tactical Hit: Critical Boiler Rupture]
[Enemy Vessels Destroyed: 14/100]
"Good hits!" Kaelia called out from the secondary tier, furiously adjusting her naval charts.
"They are bottlenecking themselves against the ruined Elven piers! We have them trapped!"
"Then we close the jaws entirely," Kane ordered, drawing his broad-daggers.
"Full ramming speed. Break their rudders." frёeωebɳovel.com
Obsidian prows crushed through external steering gears with deafening crunches.
Unburnable cedar pinned the ironclads against the ruined stone docks.
Kane vaulted over the gunwale directly onto the deckboards of a Menual mortar-vessel, leaving Mjoldr strapped securely across his shoulders.
[Skill Activated: Berserker Rage Lv2]
Bypassing the armored mercenaries entirely, he drove his daggers straight into the exterior steam-lines running along the railing.
Pressurized mist sprayed across the deckboards.
Soldiers dropped their halberds instantly, shrieking as the vapor trapped inside their breastplates began cooking them alive.
Thora cleared the railing right beside him.
Her weapon took the heads of two stumbling officers in a single, fluid scissor-motion.
Bumping her blood-spattered hip hard against Kane’s thigh amidst the screaming, she flashed him a feral, breathless grin.
"Bet you never cooked dinner this fast in the fighting pits, Chief!" she yelled, entirely in her element.
"I usually prefer my meat roasted, not steamed!" Kane laughed.
Wrapping his calloused arm completely around her corded waist, he pulled her back flush against his chest as another steam vent blew nearby.
He didn’t care about the combat raging ten paces away.
Reaching down, he tilted her chin up and captured her lips in a highly vocal kiss.
Thora tasted of salt and blood, leaning her solid curves back into his thighs with unapologetic hunger.
She tangled her fingers into his red hair, tugging just hard enough to make a deep rumble vibrate in his throat.
’She fits me like a customized gauntlet,’ Kane thought.’
"You are going to get us killed acting like this during a boarding action," Thora said against his mouth, her breathing ragged and fast.
"I figure a real warrior can multitask," Kane murmured, biting her lower lip playfully before letting her spin out of his bicep to parry an incoming spear thrust.
"Keep your side of the deck clear! I want this vessel secured before the smoke lifts!"
"Always commanding," Thora smirked, burying her left axe into a mercenary’s ribs.
"Just make sure you save some stamina for my bunk tonight!"
Across the churning ocean gap, Seraphine claimed the elevated command bridge of an adjacent ironclad.
Surrounded by falling soot and burning rigging, she finally let go of her strict paladin restraint, unleashing the unchained output of her imperial authority.
A blinding, twenty-foot crescent of pure silver mana detached from her broadsword.
The brilliant arc sliced horizontally through the iron-plated smokestacks, completely cleaving the enemy captain’s wheel and the captain holding it, neatly in half.
’She’s making up for twenty years of polite manners,’ Kane reckoned, watching the severed iron smokestack crash into the surf.
’Genuinely lethal.’
[Enemy Vessels Destroyed: 41/100]
Standing amidst the ruined bridge, Seraphine lowered her glowing blade.
She slowly licked a stray bead of mercenary blood from her upper lip, her chest heaving beneath her leather harness as she looked across the burning wreckage to find Kane’s eyes.
Even separated by twenty paces of open water and screaming soldiers, the aggressive tension between them sparked like an open furnace.
"Enjoying yourself over there, First Blade?" Kane called out conversationally, casually sidestepping a frantic sword thrust and burying his dagger into the attacker’s throat.
"I figure these men needed a proper lesson in matriarchal law!" Seraphine yelled back. Her silver irises swam in a heated haze.
"Are you going to stand around admiring me, or are you going to help me sink the rest of this vanguard?"
"I’m on my way," Kane promised, his pulse hammering as he looked at his two partners systematically dismantling an empire’s vanguard.
"Try to leave a few alive for me."
"No guarantees!" Thora shouted back, taking another officer off his boots.
"Forward ironclad attempting to ram Commander Kaelia’s port side," Misha’s dual-tone voice chimed back through the crystal, completely unfazed by the flirtation echoing across the command channels.
"Distance: eighty yards. Strike their primary paddle housing now."
