Black Sails-Chapter 59: Mid-Gate Duel

As the anti-corrosion hatch for the ship cannon was thrown open, the pirates on board braced themselves and pushed the wooden carriage rollers beneath the cannon, drawing the barrel close to the ship’s side.
A thirty-two-pounder, a terrifying 15.9-centimeter caliber, painted jet black — eighteen of them in total.
This was no cheap pirate knockoff.
It was bought with heavy losses by Li Site in Heaven’s Port after a big shot there had blasted apart a provincial governor’s sail battleship and unloaded its cargo. Compared to the jury-rigged cannons other pirates scavenged, the firepower of the Fumark-class was practically in a different dimension — akin to a doomsday-grade strike.
Marcus was blind in both eyes, relying entirely on spiritual sensing to perceive his surroundings. He had already detected the military police’s absolute terror, and the cultists summoned from around Linden City did not look particularly steadfast in their faith — nearly half of them were wavering.
Those who didn’t know what was happening were still scrambling for cover;
those who did were already praying.
Besides, this sea-eroded limestone cave was literally a hollowed cliff face;
there was nowhere to hide. These heavy cannons could shatter fortifications, let alone this poor-quality eroded rock.
On the current Western Continent, cannon ammunition mainly came in three types: solid shot, grapeshot, and chain shot.
There were also explosive shells with hollow chambers for gunpowder, but impact-fuse technology was immature, and seven or eight out of ten would be duds — the Black Sails Pirate Crew never used them.
Even just those three standard types were terrifying enough.
Solid shot needs no explanation;
it made trebuchets seem trivial. One hit could pulverize a target — if not reduce it to dust, then certainly erase it.
Chain shot consisted of two solid balls linked by chain, meant to increase destructive radius and tear through masts and sails.
Then there was grapeshot: essentially a thick iron canister filled with dozens to hundreds of small lead balls. When fired, the canister burst open and scattered the shot in a fan-shaped spread — a weapon purpose-made for killing.
Morrison’s role as Gunnery Master was a slack position, even more idle than Wolman’s warehouse duties;
out of thirty days a month, twenty-nine could be spent slacking off.
Still, he did his job well enough — all eighteen cannons were in excellent condition, ready to fire at a moment’s notice.
Fen had ordered grapeshot loaded the moment he heard the warning.
“Fire!”
At Fen’s shout.
All eighteen heavy guns roared. The cavern, already echo-prone, detonated like a gathering of thunderbolts;
iron canisters burst from the barrels, splintering open and covering the entire shoreline in a fan of shot.
It’s hard to describe the scene and the lethality in full measure.
If pushed to compare, it was like two thousand musketeers firing in unison, but magnified more than tenfold in destructive force.
The Eternal Sect enforcers Marcus had brought and the elite military police could not even finish nocking their arrows.
Those small lead balls packed enormous piercing power, blasting through multiple bodies in succession without stopping.
Nearly two thousand lead shot particles detonated across the coast.
All of this happened within two seconds.
About two hundred people on the spot were turned into limp, shredded meat by the relentless barrage. Their blood didn’t look like it had been pumped out — it looked squeezed out;
in an instant the tearing of flesh burst into a crimson mist that filled the cavern.
It was a literal blood mist, drifting on the wind, immediately turning into a rain of blood that soaked the ground.
Dozens of droplets spattered onto Fen’s robe;
two drops hit his spectacles. On that cold, feral face, there was no trace left of the refined scholar he once had been.
Over two hundred slaughtered in a flash. The survivors were also peppered with shot but not completely dead, writhing and screaming on the ground. Only sixty or seventy had hits on limbs or grazes and could barely move.
The hulking, dim-witted giant became an even easier target;
dozens of lead balls embedded in his body. He bled like a sieve and knelt, howling in pain.
Reloading and firing heavy cannons is an involved process;
it’s not simply ramming a round through and pulling the trigger. You must extinguish residual embers, use a ramrod to seat the projectile, and consider other safety steps. Even a well-trained royal navy crew would need at least a minute to complete it;
Fen didn’t expect these pirates to reach that speed, but he estimated they could manage a minute and a half.
“Load chain shot and fire next! Wolman, Haywood, deck crew — everyone up on deck, stop the remaining men from boarding. Buy us at least ninety seconds!”
Fen still considered Marcus and the twenty-odd priests. Those priests wore ultra-heavy plate a few centimeters thick;
even after that blast they stood firm, though their armor bore dents.
Oddly enough,
Marcus seemed blessed by some kind of luck — he had not moved an inch from the start and had somehow not been hit once.
“Fire all the rockets.”
Marcus held his scripture book in both hands. Even with two-thirds of his men rendered useless in an instant, he showed no anger — his composure verged on demonic.
The remaining military police saw their psychological defenses in this human inferno collapse, but the leather-armored enforcers Marcus had drawn back only hesitated briefly. These fanatics’ minds were not to be trifled with;
where their bows and arrows were unbroken, they hastily nocked and loosed rockets toward the ship.
Fen let out a cold sneer.
The Arcane Academy in Pedan Kingdom was a bulwark against religious power;
within the Tower Alliance of mages, Pedan alone held about a fifth of the seats.
As one of Pedan’s top all-purpose talents, Fen knew exactly which spells to use and when — he was even one of the co-authors of the university text "Fieldcraft for Mages."
That book was still in print and used by the Arcane Academy in Pedan, though someone’s name had been excised.
Fen was supposed to have had his portrait painted and hung in the academy halls;
yet he had wound up here.
Elemental magic is indisputably the simplest form of magic. Casting via magic-energy materials and casting through one’s own power represent two difficulty tiers.
The former is the lowest;
it can only summon limited elemental force and consumes enormous “focus.”
Fen called it focus, but in the countless systems across the Western Continent it had countless labels.
Reaching the latter level is true mastery. For Fen, everything had root origins, like invisible strings hidden within existence. Pluck those strings and you can influence the present from deeper dimensions — the possibilities are infinite.
Fen did not need to chant prayers like Carolso, nor did he strictly cast through his own body. He used the strings embedded in natural elements as a medium;
by plucking them he tuned parts of nature to his will.
Outside the cavern a fierce wind and storm howled.
Seventy or eighty oil-cloth-wrapped, burning arrows were loosed toward the ship.
Fen merely raised his hand toward the air and gave himself a mental cue, concentrating his focus without reserve.
In an instant, a dozen or so invisible blades swept in from outside the cave;
a gust of wind passed through, and the arrows all shattered in midair before they could hit. The remaining fragments still tore through a few people, leaving bloody messes.
Marcus’s thinking was clear: if they were allowed to reload again, it would be over.
“Everyone, advance toward the pier. Once they’re under the ship, they’ll have no way to use their weapons!”
At Marcus’s command,
the priests, weighed down by their cumbersome armor, moved without clumsiness, hefting spiked maces and rushing forward.