A Botched Pursuit

After drawing the treasure chest cards, the Ghost Dreadnought continued toward Chakaluo Port. Bai Xiaowen took the opportunity to deliver a rousing speech to the Freedom Corps' three thousand-odd members.

The name of Prophet Dio still carried considerable weight in the Black Tide Plane. Spurred by a sense of duty to defend their homes—and even more by the prospect of military honors, titles, and fiefs—many sailors chose to change course and serve as naval troops under him.

Quite a few held to their original decision to leave, however, and Bai Xiaowen could not force them to stay.

He regretted that the Peony Behind Leaves Painting was still on cooldown. Without its charisma bonus, his speech had not been as persuasive as he had hoped.

During the voyage, Bai Xiaowen selected troops from the sailors who had agreed to stay.

They were all eager to fight, but Bai Xiaowen could not put the elderly, the frail, or anyone too weak into combat units without dragging down the force as a whole. He had other posts for them. A ship that size needed cooks and other support staff...

When the count was complete, more than sixteen hundred people had agreed to be reorganized under Bai Xiaowen's command as the prophet.

Over a hundred elderly or frail members were assigned to support duties, leaving fifteen hundred combat troops. Once they had been formed into units, Bai Xiaowen looked at the force, whose bearing had visibly changed, and let out a quiet breath. This army would be one of his chief assets in the Black Tide Plane.

More than three hundred of those fifteen hundred troops were High Elite Tier, with quite respectable attributes.

Of course, these High Elite Tier sailors were weaker in actual combat, chiefly because of their skills. Bai Xiaowen had