Ironclad warships, boarding.
The two terms were utterly incompatible in this pre-dreadnought era.
In theory, if one wanted both ironclad warships and boarding, one would have to wait until the StarCraft era, when civilizations fought one another across the stars and the stronger side sent assault troops to decapitate the enemy.
Yet in Artificial Divine Realm 1909.
After Lan Yi had brought forth the unreasonable existence known as Spirit Cultivation Practitioners, boarding became a possibility. Moreover, with the Spirit Cultivation Practitioner faction lagging far behind in the tonnage, speed, and firepower of its own ironclad warships, it was the only way they could defeat the foreign fleets at sea—and the choice they desperately needed in order to prove that they could deal with invading enemies on the ocean.
Martial Heavenly General Huo Yuanjia.
Ghost Heavenly General Geng Liangchen.
Both Spirit Cultivation Practitioners were Human Aspect experts. Their mental attacks covered wide areas and could be sustained for long periods, making them extraordinarily effective on the battlefield. Thus, Lan Yi had dispatched them to sea with the fleet at an early stage.
Zhao Jian had complained bitterly about this.
He knew that his mental power was unsuited to naval warfare, and he had no way to physically withstand naval guns with such outrageous calibers and powder charges. All he could do was vent his resentment through the continuous screening and purges of the territory under his rule. In any case, a batch of Blood Droplets or members of the Sticky Rod Department sent from the north had happened to be lurking there, providing this muscular ferocious beast with ideal prey.
Against ironclad warships.
Geng Liangchen was confident.
The Yangtze Fleet had been captured by him alone through the use of hungry ghosts.
For ordinary soldiers hidden beneath the iron armor, facing mental power that spread and seeped throughout the narrow, gloomy cabins, their fear could only be described as reaching its absolute limit. It was comparable to encountering an alien aboard a dark spaceship in outer space. In their sudden panic, forget about fighting back—even surviving without being frightened to death counted as a blessing.
However, Geng Liangchen soon discovered that he had been wrong while out hunting.
An ironclad warship moored in port and a dreadnought maneuvering and dragging out a battle across the boundless sea were two entirely different things!
There were differences even among ironclad warships.
The ironclad warships of the Yangtze Fleet captured by the Spirit Cultivation Practitioner faction all belonged to the second and third classes of cruisers. It was not that Xinghan had never possessed good ships or large ships. It was simply that during the humiliating naval war against Dongyang, those ironclads had either been sunk or shamefully captured.
As for new ships, due to a lack of money, the loss of control over the local regions, the hemorrhaging indemnities, the disastrous state of tax revenue, and other reasons, there was now no way to buy or build them.
However, after the Spirit Cultivation Practitioners and the Party members took control of the Liangjiang region.
The Jiangnan General Ship and Machinery Bureau had resumed work.
It was said that they intended to work with the foreigners to build Immortal Master Lan Yi a giant warship capable of conquering the four quarters!
Back to the matter at hand.
The sunlight was gentle, and jade-green waves rose and fell. On the vast sea, where there were almost no reference points, it was nearly impossible to feel oneself racing across the surface. Standing at the prow, Geng Liangchen rose and fell with the waves. The upper half of his face was hidden in shadow, making his slightly bared teeth stand out with an especially conspicuous and sinister gleam.
The Spirit Cultivation Practitioner was watching the northeast.
There.
Roughly thirty thousand meters away, at the outer limit of a martial artist's vision, the Punishment Fleet that had come south at the foreigners' command had already appeared. The other side had clearly also noticed Xinghan's fleet floating across the sea in a line.
The two sides' ironclad warships were on entirely different levels in both number and quality.
It was like a child squaring off against a strong man, preparing to exchange blows.
Yet the strong man's side was extremely cautious. They showed no intention of approaching to artillery range, instead trailing far away and probing with occasional maneuvers. The child's side, meanwhile, was a newborn calf unafraid of tigers, constantly trying to charge forward and provide the Spirit Cultivation Practitioners with enough distance to sprint across. Unfortunately, they were too slow and could not stay on the enemy ships' heels.
Ironclad warships had a top speed of around twenty knots.
The dreadnoughts opposite used the latest expansive steam-boiler technology and could reach twenty-five knots at full speed.
In other words, even if the Spirit Cultivation Practitioner side ignored damage and risked bursting their boilers, the foreigners could still shake them off at a distance of more than twenty-five meters per second.
"These white skins have learned their lesson," Geng Liangchen muttered.
Everyone learned and improved. No one remained a stiff NPC forever, standing still in place.
The Spirit Cultivation Practitioners' record in Puhai had been dazzling. The foreign powers naturally could not ignore a group that possessed supernatural martial strength, and they had investigated its general circumstances.
The Spirit Cultivation Practitioners' strength, their resistance to firearms, the damage inflicted on them by shells, and even the strange abilities of Spirit Cultivation Practitioners had all been investigated by the agents of the foreign powers, whose penetration into Huaxia was riddled with holes. Naturally, the information had also leaked to the foreigners.
Lure the Spirit Cultivation Practitioners out.
Use more advanced warships to maneuver around them and sink them on the open sea, then attempt to capture one or two Spirit Cultivation Practitioners alive for study.
That was the true purpose of the Punishment Fleet's expedition.
The foreign powers were extremely curious now.
What kind of power could allow these frail Spirit Cultivation Practitioners to stop fearing guns and cannons? More importantly, could this power be seized and used for themselves?
If the Qing Imperial Court had not been so useless and incompetent.
Then this expedition would not have involved merely more than fifty warships sailing south.
It would have been a combined army of land and sea forces helping the Imperial Court suppress the rebellion, capture the rebels, and exterminate the demon-men!
"Good news. The Spirit Cultivation Practitioners created by that mage do not appear able to fly, and they are not as fast as us," the foreign commander said, lowering his binoculars.
"Do not let your guard down. Those idiots in Puhai were too arrogant and careless. They allowed these martial monsters to get close, causing the Empire to lose its entry point for controlling the Far Eastern economy," another foreign officer warned.
"Strange hallucinatory abilities, terrifying physical strength, and superhuman reflexes. Those should be all their trump cards. Using naval guns against them is like using cannons to shoot mosquitoes—not a viable approach."
The foreign commander tapped his fingers rhythmically against the porthole.
Capturing them alive looked exceedingly difficult.
Even if they sank Xinghan's ironclad warships, recovering corpses or prisoners would require them to take enormous risks, let alone bringing them aboard.
Since that was the case...
"Draft a telegram and send it to the Yanjing Command. The hope of capturing them alive is slim. I will not send my soldiers into close contact with a group of monsters. At most, they will obtain corpses... or a pile of minced meat." The foreign commander ordered the signalman.
He then issued another command.
"Order the First Squadron to engage the enemy."
On the open sea, the ironclad warships that had originally been sailing in formation began turning and rearranging themselves one after another upon receiving the flagship's order. Seen from directly above, the formation that had previously resembled an iron chain stretching across the river transformed after some changes into a T-shaped formation, with the crossbar of the T facing the enemy.
Tens of thousands of tons of steel peaks advanced in neat, measured ranks, like mountains marching in step!
The imposing sight made it hard not to hold one's breath!
Huo Yuanjia gazed into the distance and, upon seeing this, let out a breath.
"They finally couldn't hold back. Fifteen to twenty thousand meters. If only I could sit on a shell and fly straight over there—it would make things so much easier. As expected, we still need to build ships, big ships!"