During the time it took Zhou Xu's orders to arrive, the shipyard at the Southern Border seaport had built another large ship.
However, it did not have much of an impact. From then on, they simply followed the orders and devoted themselves entirely to building fast ships.
Aside from that, the appearance of enemies at sea also caused the Navy Department of Great Zhou to abandon its previous gradual expansion plan and rapidly increase its size.
According to their original plan, they had intended to proceed step by step. Once the corresponding sea ships had begun construction, they would start recruiting the required number of soldiers and training them.
The advantage of doing this was that it could save as much labor as possible.
After all, the labor force within Great Zhou was relatively fixed at this stage. If they conscripted people into the army, the number of laborers remaining at home would decrease.
But the situation was different now. The appearance of enemies at sea had given them a greater sense of urgency, forcing Zhou Xu to start pursuing greater efficiency.
The navy, which had originally numbered three hundred men, was expanded straight to one thousand in a single stroke. If that proved insufficient later, they could continue recruiting.
It did not matter if they temporarily lacked enough ships. Most of the newly recruited soldiers still had to start by practicing swimming and balance carts, so there was no need to rush them aboard ships for maritime training.
By the time they had more or less completed their basic training, the seaport shipyard would presumably have built more sea ships as well.
With this in mind, the seaport shipyard's workforce was undoubtedly expanded even further to improve shipbuilding efficiency, providing it with more labor.
And so, a single order