Redd Without stopping, he passed through the entrance wrapped in black rocks, walked down the outer stone steps, and headed towards the port's storage area and berths.
The wind in the port is stronger than in the city. Dark waves are rolling on the sea surface, and the crests of the waves appear with a layer of white foam under the sunlight, like countless small, breaking edges.
The wooden trestle of the pier made a slight creaking sound under the lapping of the waves, and small gaps appeared between the wooden boards and the iron nails due to repeated moisture and dryness.
When several sailors who were arranging the ropes saw his figure, they immediately stopped what they were doing, lowered their heads and stood aside, making way for him like water blown by the wind, making way for him when he passed by, and then restarted their actions after he walked over.
The air in the cargo storage area is mixed with the smell of tar, hay, rust and hemp rope. Occasionally, there will be a gust of wind blowing from the direction of the bay, which lumps those smells into a ball and is dispersed by the new wind.
Douglas met him halfway.
The dirt road leading to the port was lined with sparse dwarf trees, their branches and leaves glowing with a dull gray-green color soaked in salt in the sunlight.
The footsteps of Douglas had already come from behind the row of short trees before they approached Redd. They were rapid but not too panicky, and the soles of their boots made a dull and compact sound on the dry soil.
He walked out of an open space where lumber and spare ship planks were piled. He was wearing an old dark gray leather armor. The belt around his waist had been worn for many days so that the edges were shiny. There was a thin hemp rope wrapped around his left arm to fix the cuffs.
When he saw Redd coming from the other end of the road, he paused obviously, then quickened his pace, stopped a few steps away, bent down, and moved steadily and neatly.
"Your Highness, you came earlier than expected. I was just about to pick you up."
Redd didn't stop, just glanced sideways at him and motioned for him to follow. "Go to the port first."
Douglas immediately turned around and walked side by side, following Redd half a step to the right, and the two continued walking along the dirt road towards the dock.
Occasionally, there are a few crushed stones and dried mud on the dry soil surface, which make a fine crunching sound under the boots.
The sea breeze became more and more frequent, bringing with it a coolness that could penetrate the fabric of clothing, mixed with the smell of tar and sea water, and rushed over from the berth.
When the pier and ship shadows of the pier could be clearly seen through the gaps in the buildings, Douglas spoke, his voice lower than before, but the speed of his speech maintained the clarity and rhythm that should be used in a report.
"The progress of material hoarding is generally moving in the expected direction, but there are some discrepancies with the plan."
Douglas adjusted his steps slightly when his boots stepped on a loose stone slab, but his voice did not pause, "Weapons and armor are all in place and have been put into storage since the day before yesterday."
The polishing and replenishment of crossbow arrows, spare bow strings, and swords have also been completed. The rest is mainly food.
Most of the grain allocated from other City-States is transported by water.
Currently, only half of the planned quantity has been shipped to the port.
Some of the remaining half are already on the way, but some are still waiting for deployment in various City-States warehouses."
He paused for a moment, looking to the right side that Redd couldn't see, as if he was going through the next half of the sentence in his mind for the last time before letting it slip out. "Transportation losses were larger than expected. Several batches of grain were already in shortage when they were shipped. It is said that the gap was caused by improper storage or unclear records during the transfer. The specific reasons are still being investigated.
At present, the scale of this loss has exceeded the scope of normal transportation losses. It is not likely to be caused by weather or ship conditions. It is more likely that something went wrong during the warehousing or shipment counting stage."
Redd did not respond immediately.
He continued walking along the road, neither speeding up nor slowing down.
The outline of the dock was becoming more and more clear in front of them. The tops of the masts were like thin needles inserted between the sky and the buildings, standing one by one above the piled canvas and cargo stacks.
Douglas can feel that Redd is listening. You can tell from the rhythm of his steps and the inclination of his shoulder line that he is listening, but there is no urging in that kind of listening, as if Douglas is letting Douglas finish the rest of the words by himself.
"I have had someone re-coordinate a batch of rations and dried meat from the recent City-States, but that batch will also take time to be dispatched.
Volantis Local grain stocks are not enough to make up for the entire gap."
Douglas added, his tone did not mean to defend himself, but more of a frankness that he was already trying to solve the problem, but the problem itself has not been completely solved. "The time is tight, and we have to transfer food from City-States, which is farther away, there will be a window period in between, and the number of supply ships will also squeeze the transportation space of other materials."
The grain stocks that have been transported so far, plus those that have been confirmed to be on the way, can probably support the advance team and the Dragon Army until the scheduled third supply cycle.
But if subsequent ships do not arrive as planned, or there is additional consumption, the quota may need to be cut in advance or the route changed."
After he finished his report, he didn't say anything else. He just walked quietly half a step back to the right of Redd, waiting for his response.
Redd After walking that section of the road, we stopped at a high platform on the north side of the pier.
From here, he could overlook the layout of the entire storage area and the activities of most of the berths. After his eyes swept across the neatly arranged stacks and the handling team at work, he still did not turn around to look at Douglas, but kept facing the dock, as if to match what he saw with the schedule he already had in his mind.
"Since the fleet started exploring, I have asked those City-States to raise food for me."
His tone was calm, as if he had laid out a problem on the table, "It took more than half a year to squeeze out half of the target number.
The work ability and efficiency are much better than I expected.
Everyone was so full of food that they sat in the accounting room and tasted wine in front of the account books. The supplies that were supposed to arrive were delayed again and again, and the loss reported was more than the actual delivery volume.
The original intention of keeping them was to let them do things for me, but now it seems that some people are no longer worthy of occupying those positions."
Douglas stood there, neither answering nor lowering his head to avoid it.
He could hear what the dissatisfaction in those words was directed at, and he could also feel that the dissatisfaction had gone beyond simple impatience with delays - it had sunk to a lower temperature.
He knew that not every one of the nine City-Statess had sufficient grain stocks, and he also knew that some governors did not try their best to load the ships when the first batch of transportation orders arrived. Those people were waiting and watching, delaying, and testing whether they could handle this round of transportation at a smaller cost.
And Redd has obviously passed the stage of giving another chance. The stack of goods delivered this time and the excess loss in that column have marked the number of heads that need to be counted on the edge of Redd's map that is slowly closing on the dock.