Shobe stood at the bow of the warship with his hands behind his back and his large, imposing form standing straight.
Two Navy officers stood behind him. These two were completely different from Harry, they had straight postures and sharp eyes, with heights of more than 1.8m. They gave a sense of composure and seriousness at first glance.
If not for the fact Shobe was standing in front of them, these two should also have been able to take charge of a fleet or army.
"Ensign Beika, did Hades say which sea monster is the one responsible for this mess?" Shobe held the cigar at the corner of his mouth and asked.
"Lieutenant, according to Lieutenant Hades' description, we can already confirm that it is the Deep Sea Octopus Emperor." Beika replied dryly.
Shobe couldn't help but let his face turn grim after hearing the report, "That monster came out again? No wonder Hades was begging me for help." He slightly groaned as he thought about the sea monster in question. "Remind me again, how high is the bounty on the monster right now?"
"Lieutenant, the latest bounty reward update came out last month, the bounty for the Deep Sea Octopus Emperor is now at 1,800 pearls."
"1,800? It's higher than even Medusa's bounty!" Shobe scoffed coldly, "That means if we can kill that beast, we can get 1,800 navy merit points."
"But Lieutenant, that monster is notoriously difficult to deal with and has a cunning nature, it has escaped from the Navy 4 times according to our Navy records."
After he finished speaking, the other ensign beside Beika spoke, "There were 9 pursuit attempts, 5 of which ended in complete failure and 4 times he directly escaped. The 9 pursuits resulted in a total of 744 missing and 89 wounded. 5 G-class main ships were scrapped, 1 was severely damaged, 2 needed major repairs, and the remaining 49 smaller ships were all pulled into the sea by it!"
It was easy to see that this man is a data analyst(Nerd), he reported a series of precise numbers in one breath.
He went on to continue to inform them, "The sea monster is extremely good at destroying ships, as long as it can entangle the ship with its tentacles, the ship will either be strangled and immobilized or directly pulled into the sea and sink. There is no record of anyone surviving when crew members fall into the sea unless they're a mutant."
The previous report from ensign Beika said they were only missing, but this person said 'no survivors'. No one questioned it, because they knew the Navy too well.
They were reported missing because they were eaten by the monster and no bodies were found.
Shobe took a deep puff of his cigar, turned his head, and glared at the data king, "Rachel, can you shut it?"
Rachel choked back a cough, and waved his hand in front of him in surrender, "Lieutenant, I'm just afraid that you'll be reckless."
"Hahaha, I would never." Shobe laughed out loud a few times, then put away his smile again and his face turned serious, "I have two hundred and forty-three people on this ship, how could I be careless with their lives?"
"Beika, relay the order to speed up!"
"Yes, Lieutenant!"
...
Arsan was pushing the ship from behind, but even as they desperately fought to catch up, the fleet ahead began to speed up again.
Raine started fading away from the view of the fleet...
That wasn't the worst part, after pushing for a few hours, Arsan was finally completely exhausted and was pulled on board by the rest of the crew, which made Raine's speed slow back down to 4 knots.
"Damn, some people are walking and falling apart!" Raine said with a pained voice. (E/N: I have no idea what this means.)
It seems that Raine is far from qualified to join this battle.
"Arsan, don't rush. I believe the battle will continue for some time, maybe we can catch up to them while it's still ongoing." Avril comforted her, "Besides, Lieutenant Shobe said they were going there support another fleet, which means there is still another navy fleet over there, the danger factor should be much more tame than normal."
Arsan sighed as she looked down at her hands, "I'm so useless!"
Suddenly the captain's voice rang out.
"Arsan, don't blame yourself, you did your best, the whole time you were near the limit, it's a miracle you could keep it up for 4 hours."
"Captain..." Arsan looked down at the deck of the ship.
"Don't worry, I think that Shobe guy is not a simple man. He is a backstabber, so he shouldn't be that stupid."
This time, Raine's words did not resonate with the crew. He seemed to be the only one who felt Shobe was a cunning snake.
However, his point did get across that Shobe was still a man with a brain.
Besides, there didn't seem to be any other way out now. They could only move slowly in the direction of the Mississippi market.
300 nautical miles, according to theoretical calculations, even if Arsan could push the boat four or five hours a day, the other crew members taking day and night shifts cranking the thrusters, it will still take four or five days to reach.
But in the early morning of the third day, the sea was flooded with a mist of water, while wave after wave of gentle waves rocked the bottom of the ship gently.
Raine's senses were the sharpest so he noticed that, strangely enough, the wind and the direction of the waves were going opposite directions.
Raine immediately became alert.
Under normal circumstances, the direction of the waves would be consistent with the direction of the wind, so the current anomaly can only mean one thing.
Something was happening in the sea ahead and was setting off waves!
As Raine was wondering what the cause was, a series of booming sounds came. It woke up everyone on the boat.
Boom, boom, boom, boom!
Arsan snapped her eyes open, her whole body sitting up like a wound spring, "Sister Armin, Avril, there is the sound of cannon fire ahead!"
The three hurried out of the cabin.
Terry and White were already standing at the bow of the ship and looking ahead.
There were sounds from time to time in the distance. Besides the sound of cannons, there seemed to be the shouting of people. Only, the sea was too foggy for them to see very far ahead.
"Captain?" Avril asked bewildered, "What's going on, are we there yet?"
"It can't be, it's only been two days, didn't the Navy say it was 300 nautical miles from here?" Armin said in confusion.
Raine had not said anything, he was now keeping an eye on the system radar at all times.
Even if the navy said it was 300 nautical miles away, the sound coming to his ears now could not be an illusion. There was such a thing as mirages at sea, but it could not replicate sound.
Either way, he had to stay alert now.
The radar was still not responding, and the 1000-meter warning distance had not yet been reached.
"It's possible we're already there." While this was happening, Raine responded to their inquiries, "At the time the navy said that there were already other warships that were at war with the sea monster and were asking for support. So that means that the current navy forces couldn't beat the sea monster, and I guess they might have retreated towards Morgan's Trading Post to wait for Shobe and their support."
"That means that since we were going opposite directions towards each other, the travel time was cut shorter than usual."
When Raine said that, after a moment of thinking the crew realized that his reasoning had a high chance of being true.
"It's too foggy now, so let's approach carefully." Raine calmly stated, "Everyone, return to your positions."
Terry and the others, although worried about Arsan, they didn't stay still standing around and they quickly led the way, "Aye, Captain!"
Avril was standing at the stern of the ship, since she was the decoy captain she must stand in this position for appearances. The sound of cannon fire was slowly getting closer and closer.
[999 meters directly ahead, a G-class sea monster has been detected]
[994 meters directly ahead, a naval battle is taking place. Participating forces: 2 G-class three-masted warships, 8 two-masted warships, 11 triple-decked Somali warships(E/N: Beden I think), 31 double-deck transport ships, 1 G-Class Sea Monster 'Deep Sea Cctopus Emperor']
[981 meters directly ahead a large number of timber resources have been detected]
A series of warning sounds came from his brain, but right now Raine wanted to kick the system.
What the hell is a large amount of wood found? Do you want me to take advantage of the war between the two sides that is now in full swing to pick up wood? Although he also kind of wanted to scavenge some resources for his next evolution, he doesn't want to become wood now!(E/N: Tried to make that last phrase as understandable as I could but don't really understand it myself.)
"Stop moving forward, we're here." Raine lowered his voice and continued, "The battlefield is around 1,000 meters ahead."
This is the first time Raine has encountered such a large-scale naval battle!