After sailing to Japan to fight the pirates, burning two ports, wiping out the largest pirate force, the Shimazu family, forcing the Hizen family and the shogun to surrender, burning at least a thousand ships and smaller boats, and securing exclusive trading rights with Japan, the Li family fleet was now sailing home across a calm, sunny sea, laden with countless treasures and precious goods.
Although the weather was beautiful today, the wind was against them. The Li family's fleet of ten enormous super clipper battleships could only make slow progress by tacking into the crosswind, moving at less than a fifth of their speed with a tailwind. The detour also lengthened their journey, so even after several days at sea, they were still sailing over open water. They had covered only about half the distance from Japan to Hangzhou.
The fleet wasn't in a hurry, though. They had nothing important to do, and were only returning to Hangzhou to resupply and deal with some of their spoils. At their current speed, even against the wind, they were sure to spot the Qiantang River within three to five days at most.
What they were more worried about was whether the docks at Hangzhou could even berth their massive ships.
And would the big ships run aground in the Qiantang River?
The crew knew that unloading cargo from ships this large would be a major problem. As for the vast quantities of gold and silver, they didn't need to worry about those at all. They weren't cargo, but money that could be used as-is. They could simply transport it to the fortified base on Little Ryukyu and store it there. The base had a deep-water harbor and plenty of large berths.
"Captain!"
"Something's up!"
"To the north!"
"There's a ship! Someone's