The plan that the three of them had worked on did not go according to their plan almost immediately after Baron got the attention of the hundreds of ships under Gou Shi. The next step would have been for Yue Fei and Guan Yu and all the other strike forces to sneak into the Ironclads, but that all went out the window when another group of ironclads came out of nowhere and completely surrounded Baron in only a matter of a few minutes.
This group of ironclads did not seem to be part of the original fleet from Gou Shi, instead, they had another flag that was different from Gou Shi's. Going by Baron's intuition, this new group had even more impressive ships than what Gou Shi had had. Everyone on Baron's side was completely shocked at the turn of events.
For the first time since this tournament, Baron finally scrunched his face as he realized that to break out of this was going to be extremely difficult. He only had 600 sloops of war with him while the enemy had at least 4 times that number and every ship was already better equipped than his. The chances that he wasn't going to be completely wiped out were slim.
First things first though, he thought. He ordered everyone that was on the small ships that were supposed to infiltrate the enemy ships to come back and board onto friendly ships. Baron had to talk quickly with Guan Yu and Yue Fei before they decided on any actions.
(GY) "Baron, Yue Fei. I'm glad to see none of you are hurt. I propose we send the rest of the ships from our camp on the shore as well as where we have them planted nearby and have them come to rescue us." Guan Yu blurted out.
(YF) "I agree, we should send the word out immediately." Yue Fei said.
(BM) "Not to worry, I have already spoken to the captains of the ships if an event such as this was going to go down. I haven't done it for the ships on the shore but the strategist that I had put in charge there should be able to pick up on our danger and send all the ships to us. It should only be a matter of time. We should still send a word through. You! Go!" Baron pointed to a messenger and commanded.
That messenger immediately went to get a carrier pigeon wrote a message and sent it towards the island.
(GY) "Good, now that we got that out of the way, we should also discuss what we should do while we wait for them to come and rescue us.
(YF) "Given that they haven't attacked us yet, I think that we should prepare as many explosives as we can and torch our way through the new Ironclad group and we should be able to regroup with our other ships."
(BM) "Yes, that sounds good. I wonder though, who could these new guys be. I'm not sure if these are just a group that Gou Shi had hidden away so that they could surprise us at a moment exactly like this."
(GY) "We should worry about getting out of here first. There is an abundant amount of moonlight out tonight, which means that escaping in the cover of darkness is going to be difficult. We can only fight our way out."
(BM) "Indeed."
A horn sounded in the distance and then every single one of the enemy ships came in swooping like these vultures that had been starving for days.
(YF) "I believe they will be upon us within half an hour. Let's get to work."
The three of them separated themselves amongst the few ships they had and began their preparations. It did not matter that they were severely outgunned and outmanned, all that mattered now was to get out of here in one piece. When the two sides were within the range of one another, thousands of thunderous booms filled the night and fierce fighting ensued.
The situation was so dire that even the three of them had to fight at the front lines. In the distance were ships that were under Baron's control tried to breach the blockade, but with no one tactically skilled enough to lead, there was little to no chance of them managing such a feat. The battle raged on for an hour before Baron and the other two realized that if they went on like this they would be gunned down eventually. So, instead of trying to brute strength their way out of the new group, they changed the course so that the majority of the ships would try to make a path through Gou Shi and Ho Yang's fleet.
A portion would stay and engage with the enemy that they had previously been dealing with and trying to stall for as long as possible. The situation devolved into more and more chaos as time went on. It was clear to anyone that saw this battle that Baron was in a very precarious position, and every minute that passes marked Baron's imminent defeat. However, Baron knew that it would be downright shameful to go down without so much as gaining anything in return.
By now, the ships that were on the shore of the island were still not being deployed, that must mean that something must have gone wrong on that end. Still, though, Baron hadn't counted on them right from the beginning. After all, an enemy who could entrap them in such a short amount of time when Baron launched a sneak attack was bound to have a few brilliant minds on their side.
Baron recalled Guan Yu and Yue Fei all the while looking around the enemy ships in front and behind of him. He needed to act now, so he picked a ship that was a fair distance away from all the other enemy ships and pointed out at it and beckoned Guan Yu, and Yue Fei to sneak onto that ship as fast they could.