Along the southern coastline of Villant Province, rafts and small boats lay stranded along the shore.
Mixed among the motley vessels were logs still covered in untrimmed branches and waterlogged crates. The chaotic mess looked like the aftermath of a shipwreck.
And in fact, that was exactly what it was.
Most of the Velanders crouching on the shore still looked traumatized. Some hugged their soaked shoulders and shivered, while others hung their clothes on branches to dry and sat by the fire sneezing.
Not far from them, people occasionally struggled out of the sea, staggering ashore with the help of their compatriots.
The sailors from Triumph City's coastal defense fleet had also disembarked and were doing everything they could to help, using rubber boats and ropes to rescue the poor souls swept into the waves and bring them ashore.
The Velanders huddled on the shore had gone through different ordeals in Bartoya Province, but their current plight was more or less the same. Every last one of them had been soaked through by seawater.
Because of Triumph City's closed-border policy, most ferries departing Bartoya Province for Villant Province had been held at docks in Villant Province.
The Southern Legion, determined to evacuate the population southward at all costs, could only requisition every available vessel. That included fishermen's boats and even washbasins stolen from private homes.
The overwhelming majority of Velanders had been swept into this march in the name of duty without any preparation whatsoever.
Those who got to board actual ferries were either one-in-ten-thousand lucky souls or the family members of commanders of ten thousand.
Many had simply been tricked into going to the northern docks of Bartoya Province, where they boarded hovercraft meant for landing troops.
Those hovercraft usually had small fuel tanks, and naturally the Southern Legion