Steel, Guns, and the Industrial Party in Another World

Chapter 336:

TL: Etude

To deal with the pirates entrenched in the Port West, Crystal Shine Fortress and its nearby areas were urgently mobilized. The joyful atmosphere that had been prepared to welcome the Day of Descent was completely dissipated, and the people cursed the despicable pirates who seemed to have appeared out of nowhere.

A troop of nearly 3,000 men was organized, led by Harrison Abbott, the eldest son of the Abbott family, ready to march westward to annihilate the pirates.

Families with members serving in Port West joined forces to petition the kingdom’s government, urging His Majesty the King not to rush into battle after deploying troops to Port West. Their loved ones were still unaccounted for, possibly still in the hands of the pirates and undergoing torture. Of course, they were not against the military campaign against the pirates. However, they requested the king to first negotiate with the pirates about the ransom of the captives. According to ancient tradition, they wanted to ransom their living relatives before the battle commenced. After all, pirates were primarily motivated by money.

To appease these people, King Rodney agreed to their request.

On the morning before the army was scheduled to depart, the sleepy guards of Crystal Shine Fortress opened the city gates, preparing to welcome the new day. Suddenly, they saw a man on a skinny horse galloping towards the city gate. The guards, sensing something amiss, immediately raised their spears to stop the man, ready to interrogate him.

“Let me through!” the man gasped, appearing distraught and disheveled.

“I am Viscount Wilin Dillon, the administrative officer appointed by His Majesty the King in Port West. I… I have important matters to report to His Majesty.”

His beard was unkempt, and he smelled as if he hadn’t bathed in a month.

The guards were confused. They were aware of the Dillon family of Crystal Shine, a notable noble house, but the man before them was hardly presentable. As for Port West, wasn’t it occupied by pirates? Where did this administrative officer come from?

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The guards insisted on handcuffing Wilin Dillon. As a noble, Dillon, humiliated, resisted fiercely. Emotionally volatile after several harrowing days, he cursed the city gate guards.

Just as the irate guards were about to draw their weapons for a confrontation, their captain, also a noble, recognized Viscount Dillon and freed him from the predicament.

“Quick, take me to see His Majesty. Magic! Oh God, they can use magic!” Wilin Dillon grabbed the sleeve of the captain of the guard, urgently requesting to see the king.

The captain filtered out the nonsensical parts of Dillon’s speech, patting his shoulder, “Calm down, Wilin. I’ll get a good horse to take you to the palace. But you can’t meet His Majesty looking like this. Take a bath and change your clothes first.”

Half an hour later, a hastily bathed Dillon mounted a freshly prepared horse, whipped it hard, and galloped away.

“Are you sure you don’t want to stop by your home first?” the captain of the guards shouted after him.

“No time!”

Upon reaching the kingdom, Viscount Dillon was quickly granted an audience with the king. Led by a court attendant, he arrived at the king’s council hall.

King Rodney the Seventeenth, along with Count Rupert, Count Merlin, and other ministers, were already seated inside. When they heard that an administrative officer from Port West had requested an audience with the king, Rodney, eager to know the situation there, immediately agreed. They paused their ongoing discussion, collectively awaiting Dillon’s arrival.

“Your Majesty!”

Dillon was somewhat nervous as he bowed to King Rodney. As an administrative officer of not very high rank, his opportunities to meet the king had been few.

“No need for formalities. Someone, get the Viscount a seat.”

“Thank you, Your Majesty,” Dillon hastily expressed his gratitude.

“Lord Dillon, how did you manage to escape? What is the current situation in Port West?”

Dillon appeared somewhat embarrassed as he spoke, “Your Majesty, I… I was actually released by the pirates. They sent me back with a message, demanding a sufficient ransom for the release of captives of noble status.”

He then produced a piece of paper that explicitly listed the ransom amounts for various noble family members. This wasn’t surprising to anyone; after all, it was typical pirate behavior. It was left to those families to worry about the ransoms.

What concerned everyone most was the strength of the pirates, and they asked Dillon to explain in detail what had happened on the day Port West fell.

A look of fear crossed Dillon’s face.

“I was so anxious to see Your Majesty to explain what I witnessed that night. My words might be a bit disjointed; please forgive me, Your Majesty and esteemed lords.”

“First, a personal opinion: we are not facing ordinary pirates. We must prepare thoroughly before engaging them in battle.”

His somewhat disjointed speech caused everyone to frown in concern.

“On the night of the pirate invasion, due to urgent requests from the front line, I was leading the administrative officers and some city guards in the warehouse district, overseeing the transport of supplies throughout the night. When we learned that the port was under attack and that pirates were invading, we immediately prepared to defend the warehouse district.”

“But then, a mysterious figure suddenly appeared before us…”

Here, Dillon’s pupils dilated with fear.

“He… Oh, Father in Heaven… he was a wizard, just like in the legends!”

“A wizard?” King Rodney and the ministers were taken aback, recalling discussions from a few days prior about a granary fire and a naval assassination attempt. Now there was this mysterious encounter?

“Yes, Your Majesty, and esteemed lords. I swear by the Lord of Light, I am not lying, and I did not see wrongly!”

“When he appeared, Captain Mark shot an arrow at him. It hit him right in the chest, but the arrow passed through his body as if it hit a phantom.”

Hearing Dillon’s description, the faces of those present grew even more solemn.

“…The pirates then closed in on us, and when we refused their unreasonable demands, a fireball suddenly appeared where our guards were clustered…”

“A fireball?” the people exchanged glances. Count Merlin asked, “Could you have been mistaken? Maybe there was a torch already there?”

“No!” Dillon’s somewhat distraught denial came out. He covered his head with his hands, speaking in a frightened tone, “I was not mistaken. It appeared out of nowhere, just like that, I was not mistaken… I was not mistaken…”

Dillon’s last words turned into a murmur, and the others looked at him with some sympathy. The young nobleman seemed to have suffered a significant mental shock.

“Then it grew larger and larger… and then, with a bang… it exploded!”

“Because we were packed too tightly, many soldiers fell on the spot. Even I, standing at a distance, was affected!”

“At that moment, one side of my body was burning in pain, my ears were ringing so loudly I couldn’t hear anything. All I saw were swarms of pirates coming towards us… That’s the last thing I remember from that night.”

Dillon continued to recount his experiences afterward, including being tortured by the pirates for information, and how he was eventually released to convey the message about the ransom for the captives.

After the young Viscount finished his story, the council hall fell into silence.

Finally, it was the King himself who broke the silence.

“Gentlemen, we can now say that the legend has become reality. The Kingdom of Ordo has encountered an enemy like never before, an enemy completely unknown and alien to us.”