Victory (Part 2)

"Turn the helm six degrees, full speed ahead!"

"Wind speed, eight knots!"

"Maintain even speed!"

The sunlight was brilliant, but the autumn wind was biting. Ahead lay an endless expanse of azure sea, while the sailors on deck shouted without pause.

Warships surged across the sea, trailing sprays of water as they pressed steadily toward their destination. The sailors aboard were neatly and formally dressed, orderly in their bearing, and solemn in expression—each and every one a model soldier.

There was no other reason: they belonged to the Royal Navy, the force with the strictest discipline.

They were members of the Fourth Fleet, the Prince's elite naval force.

They had enviable origins and enviable treatment. Likewise, they had to hold themselves to strict standards and make themselves the elite among elites.

This time, they had been deployed to sea to carry out a pirate-suppression mission. Yet what puzzled them was that the Prince's orders had required them to first assemble on an island.

Perhaps it was to make unified arrangements before fighting, they thought.

"I wonder whether we can win this time. His Highness... desperately needs a victory now." A naval officer gazed out at the sea, still carrying a trace of worry in his heart.

He was one of the Prince's trusted subordinates, named Hande. Thirty-five years old and the deputy commander of the Fourth Fleet, he naturally understood the Prince's present difficulties.

Being born into the Royal House brought incomparable glory and noble status, but it was not without its drawbacks.

First, one had to contribute to the Royal House while enjoying its honors. Second, as an ambitious prince, one had to make every kind of effort to defeat the other competitors and become the final victor. Otherwise, one's final fate might be even more miserable than that