Three days later, Sambawood led the Lightning Strike Fleet to escort a convoy of more than 800 merchant ships and cargo ships to Cape Romani, and asked to see Lorist immediately.
"Your Highness, this is the list of materials and personnel carried by the transport fleet. There are a total of 843 large and medium-sized merchant ships and cargo ships. Among them, 103 large ocean-going merchant ships are transported by the commercial alliance in the southern part of the mainland. The more than 100,000 recruits recruited by the provinces are all young and strong. There are more than 500 ships carrying food, and most of the rest are various military supplies. By the way, there are 38 large cargo merchant ships. They carried nearly 100,000 barrels of ivy gum juice..." Semba Wood reported in detail.
Lorist was taken aback, why did the business alliance transport so much ivy gum juice? These 100,000 barrels are almost the total annual output of the Roman Empire. Picking up the list of materials handed over by Semba Wood, it is recorded that the Double-headed Dragon Chamber of Commerce has contracted the production of Ivy Gum Juice for the Romon Empire for a year at a price 30% higher than the market price, and also sold the inventory for one year. sweep away.
Strange, what does the Double-headed Dragon Chamber of Commerce need so much ivy gum juice for? Lorist thought for a while before he understood. Three years of continuous bloody battles had left the Mana Hill Plain in ruins. The Double-Headed Dragon Chamber of Commerce purchased so much ivy gum from the Romon Empire. It is likely to be prepared for the reconstruction of the Mana Hill Plain. Perhaps the ivy gum can also be used to build those fortresses that have been recovered by the business alliance. The city's defenses and ruined walls.
A barrel of ivy gum juice weighs one hundred catties, and one hundred thousand barrels is ten million catties. With these ivy gum juices as a binder, one of Lorist's ideas in the past two days can be perfectly obtained. accomplish. This was really a pillow sent when he was dozing off, which made Lorist very happy.
"Very well, I'm short of manpower and manpower." Lorist said to Samba Wood very satisfied: "Let those 100,000 conscripted recruits disembark and go ashore to work for me. Now they have become members of our Norton family." Prisoners, there is no need to go to the plains of Faliqiu to die. Tell them that as long as they serve five years of hard labor, they will be free and send them home. By the way, unload the 100,000 barrels of ivy gum juice and pile them on the shore."
"Huh? Your Highness, don't we want to transport the 100,000 barrels of ivy gum juice back to the family territory?" Compared with the 100,000 young and strong captives, Sambawood valued those materials more, which may be related to his early experience as a pirate Related, value property rather than human life.
"Come with me." Lorist did not answer, but led Sambawood out of the captain's cabin and onto the deck.
"See, I'm going to build a city here and build a checkpoint. This will be the starting point for our Norton family to control the golden coastline of the Sunshine Sea." Lorist said.
Semba Wood looked at it for a long time with a pair of bull's eyes, it was a sea of waves. Well, looking in the direction of Lorist's finger, it is Cape Romani standing on a cliff. Could it be that Lorist wants to build a castle on the cliff? Sambawood is puzzled...
There was no response, but Lorist turned his head and looked at Semba Wood's appearance, knowing that he didn't know where he was going. Really dumbfounding: "Where are the eyes looking? I want to build the city not on the cliff, but in this reef area."
It was only then that Sambawood realized that Lorist was really pointing at the sea. But even if it is a submerged reef area, it is impossible to build a city. This submerged reef area is about ten meters deep and only two or three meters shallow. Even when the tide ebbs, there are only some reefs exposed to the sea. area, otherwise it would be impossible to build a city on it.
"This reef area is close to the Golden Sea Road. If we build a city here, our family can control the throat of the southern sea to the Golden Bay with only a few lightning strike warships and bronze cannons installed on the city wall. Then the Business Alliance The lifeline of maritime transportation is in our hands. Our family does not need to venture to the southern waters, and build a city here, which echoes with Shilovas Island from south to north, and also allows our family fleet to have a supply base and a foothold in the southern seas ..." Lorist came up with the idea of building the fort after receiving Schwader's report two days ago, and has sent people to survey the reef area for the past two days.
"But Your Highness, this is a big project." Semba Wood swallowed and said, "Now our family is still at war with the Business Alliance, even if we have enough supplies and 100,000 captive labor, we want to fill the gap This submerged reef area is not something that can be achieved in a short period of time, it will take at least three or four years, isn't it worthwhile to spend such a large amount of manpower and material resources?"
Lorist laughed: "If it takes three to four years to fill up this reef area, it's not worth it as you said. But I think it takes two months to fill up the reef area and start building the city, half a year After that, this place can become the base of our Norton family fleet."
"What? That's impossible!" Semba Wood exclaimed, "Your Highness, how could it be possible to fill up this hidden reef area within two months? It's impossible to live..."
"Of course it's possible, because we don't need to fill up the entire reef area at all." Lorist laughed: "Sembawood, did you know that the results of the naval battle came out three days ago. Armada 470 Of the two warships, only 147 remained intact. Except for the seventy-four large armed warships that were destroyed by us, the remaining more than 250 large, medium and small warships were more or less All have been scarred by our shelling.
If these damaged warships are temporarily repaired, they can sail to the Golden Bay, but then they can only be docked on the shore and slowly rot in the wind and rain. It would be risky and dangerous to repair these warships before sailing. Irresponsibility for the lives of crew sailors. Perhaps they can persist for a while longer in the calm southern waters, but they cannot withstand the ravages of wind and waves in the windy and rough northern seas.
But our Norton family is in the north, and the northern seas are the foundation of our North Sea Fleet. Therefore, these battleships that have undergone shelling have become tasteless to us, and it is a pity to keep them useless. That being the case, I am going to use these warships. You think, if these warships are filled with rocks and soil and sink around this reef area, they will soon be connected to form a dam.
There is an oval lagoon in the center of this reef area, with a depth of more than ten to twenty meters. As long as a few obtrusive reefs are removed, this lagoon can become a harbor for our family fleet to anchor. So the 100,000 barrels of ivy gum juice you mentioned in the transport fleet is really useful to us, we don’t need to stir it, we just need to dilute the ivy gum juice and pour it into the cabins full of rocks and mud Here, when solidified, these shipwrecks became the cornerstones of the impregnable castle fortresses we built on them. "
It turned out that Lorist had this idea, use the waste, use those broken ships to sink in the submerged reef area to form a circle of dams, and then build a circle of city wall fortresses on it, and install bronze cannons to control the southern sea area The golden sea route to Zangjin Bay also gave the family's North Sea Fleet a supply base and a foothold in the sunny sea.
Semba Wood suddenly realized, and he was overwhelmed with admiration. This is simply out of thin air, building a castle fortress in the reef area, and the coast is full of cliffs, which cannot be conquered by land. And at sea, what kind of warship can be used to attack a castle fortress with bronze cannons? As Lorist said, this is equivalent to controlling the throat of the commercial alliance's sea transportation line, and this knife is hard enough and painful enough.
"Your Highness is wise..." Semba Wood patted his forehead: "I never thought that there is such an unimaginable method. After the castle fortress and checkpoints are built here, the sea tolls that our family receives every year will become a huge amount. No smuggling ship can escape the taxes and fees collected by our family. Your Highness, may I ask to use this income to expand the family fleet?"
Lorist was stunned: "Sembawood, I have ordered the Oxhorn Bay Shipyard to build another ten Thunderbolt warships, and plan to expand the North Sea Fleet's Thunderbolt warships to twenty-four. At the same time, reduce those large armed warships, redesign and manufacture A new type of large ocean-going armed transport warship equipped with a small amount of bronze artillery, as a supply transport ship for the lightning strike warship. But what do you mean by the toll at sea?"
When he heard that Lorist had ordered the construction of ten new lightning strike warships, and that he wanted to develop a new type of ocean-going armed transport ship, Sambawood was overjoyed, and quickly explained: "Your Highness, the toll at sea is actually a tax in disguise. The Armada before It is the maritime overlord of the southern seas. All family ships and private ships sailing in the southern seas have to pay a fee to the Armada to obtain permission to do business in the coastal countries of the Sunshine Sea and the Golden Coast, otherwise they will be used by the Armada as pirates. It was sunk or confiscated in the name of a smuggling ship. As far as I know, a large ocean-going merchant ship charges twenty-five Goldfords a year."
"Huh? Didn't you say that the Chicod Chamber of Commerce is the maritime overlord of the southern sea area? How did it become the Armada?" Lorist asked. The information submitted by Tagle clearly stated that the overlord of the southern sea area is the Chicod Chamber of Commerce. , Why Sambawood said differently.
"Your Highness, it is not wrong to say that the Chicod Chamber of Commerce is the maritime overlord in the southern sea area, because the Armada is a joint-stock company, and the Chicod Chamber of Commerce accounts for 40% of its revenue, and the remaining 60% belongs to the other six major companies in the business alliance. Chamber of Commerce. However, after the Vicia Chamber of Commerce was destroyed by our family, his shares in the Armada were swallowed up by the Two-Headed Dragon Chamber of Commerce.
On the bright side, the Armada is the overlord of the southern waters on the bright side. It can do whatever it wants in the southern waters in the name of the commercial alliance. The countries along the golden coastline can only swallow their anger for fear of the power of the commercial alliance. The Chicod Chamber of Commerce secretly controlled the Armada, and at the same time monopolized several relatively profitable productions in the southern countries of the mainland. Their maritime merchant fleet and armed fleet were also the largest besides the Armada.
Even the ports and wharves of some coastal countries have fallen into the hands of the Chickard Chamber of Commerce. It can be said that the Chickard Chamber of Commerce has woven a large maritime trading network in the coastal countries in the southern part of the mainland. Only those businesses that they look down on will become the income that the noble fleets and private ship owners of the coastal countries are vying for. Therefore, it is not wrong to say that the Chicod Chamber of Commerce is the overlord of the southern sea area. "Sumbawood explained that the Armada and the Chickard Chamber of Commerce have always been his focus.
"Oh, that's how it is." Lorist understood that the Armada was called the Overlord of the Seas because of the force of the fleet, while the Chicod Chamber of Commerce was called the Overlord of the Seas because of its overall strength: "That, Sambawood, You said just now that you can collect a huge amount of sea tolls after building a castle and fortress here? What if those merchant ships don’t come... "
"Hehe, Your Highness, don't worry." Semba Wood was happy: "If those merchant ships are circling in the southern waters of the mainland, then they will not earn any income at all. The only way to transport the products from the southern part of the mainland to Tibetan Gold Bay is to sell them to others. The merchants in Morente City can afford the price, because the merchants in Morente City will sell these things to the central and northern parts. Then buy special products from the central and northern parts and sell them to the southern part of the mainland through these merchant ships, deducting the cost one by one After the fee, a merchant ship can earn at least a hundred Goldfords, and one trip a year is enough."
"That's right, but how do you know so well? Could it be that you are also doing this kind of business in private?" Lorist looked at Semba Wood suspiciously.
Semba Wood Khan came down: "Your Highness, I didn't do any business in private. These are what the private ship owners told me when I went to receive the transport fleet. They helped me a lot and stopped those Armadas The person sent to escort them wanted to sink the ship and destroy the transportation supplies, so they handed over the entire transportation fleet to me. I asked them what reward they wanted, and they said they wanted to come and see His Highness."
Lorist became interested: "Why do they want to see me?"
Sambawood scratched his head, and said a little embarrassedly: "Your Highness, it is reasonable to say that the merchant ships of these private ship owners were requisitioned by the Armada and the Chickard Chamber of Commerce, and joined the transport fleet of the Commercial Alliance. Now they are our captives. It belongs to our family's capture and spoils. But those private ship owners want to see you because of their merchant ships, begging you to return those merchant ships to them. Although they helped our family a lot and stopped the sinking of the ship, this little credit It is enough to reward them with a dozen gold blessings, there is no need to return those merchant ships to them... "
"I'm gone now," Lorist touched his chin and said, "Accept their request and let them return the ship to them after they finish delivering the supplies."
"But Your Highness, these are more than 300 large and medium-sized merchant ships and cargo ships, worth a lot of money..." Semba Wood was still a little bit reluctant.
"Give it back to them. There are more than 800 ships in the transport fleet. Even if we return these more than 300 ships to them, we still have nearly 500 ships left. What we lack now is not ships, but to drive these ships. The sailors and crew of the ship, we will not be able to recruit enough trustworthy sailors in the short term. What's more, this is also an opportunity for our family."
Lorist pondered and said: "Isn't our family unable to open the trade routes of the coastal countries with the golden coastline in the Sunshine Sea? Maybe this will be a good opportunity.
In the past, the trade routes leading to the southern sea were monopolized by the Chicod Chamber of Commerce and the Peterson Chamber of Commerce of the Business Alliance. The products produced in our family territory became the production and procurement points of these two chambers of commerce, and now the business has been cut off. contacts.
This time, let these private ship owners transport supplies to Hilovas Island, let them visit the display of our family products, and let them purchase freely. Maybe the products produced in our family territory will be sold to countries in the southern part of the mainland through these private ship owners... "
"Yes, Your Highness, I will definitely follow your orders." Sambawood understood what Lorist meant.
"Well, if Hilovas Island can also become a fulcrum of the Golden Sea Road, then the castle fortress checkpoint set up here may really bring a lot of benefits to our family. I will check it at the end of the year. If the amount is huge, I can consider expanding the North Skeleton Fleet into three squadrons, twelve lightning strike warships plus twelve new large-scale ocean-going armed transport ships, and twenty-four new medium-sized rapid armed ships equipped with artillery. A squadron of warships is enough for you to traverse the northern and southern seas." Lorist promised.
"Thank you, Your Highness..." Semba Wood was so happy that his mouth cracked to the side of his ears.
But then Lorist said seriously: "Sembawood, your next task is very heavy. First of all, you hand over all the stormtroopers to Shi Huade's jurisdiction. He needs manpower to take care of the 100,000 young and strong captives working on the shore. .Secondly, you take ten Thunderbolt battleships to escort the Firebird Legion of the Kingdom of Chigda and the captive crew and sailors of the Armada, and the more than 300 private merchant ships to transport supplies to Hilovas Island. I have already sent the order with the letter eagle Baron Camorra went to Hilovas Island to receive these prisoners and supplies.
I will take the rest of the transport fleet and the warships of the Armada to the port of Ametrine to join the Stone Legion and the Guards Legion. And you will come back here after you send the captives and supplies to Hilovas Island. One is to supervise the project of filling the reef here and control the ocean. The second is to gradually transport the 100,000 young and strong captives to West Degrad Province, the family territory of the Duke of Kenmes, and go ashore from Platinum Beach to Yungesandra Province. The family needs 100,000 labor to develop this province... "
"But, Your Highness, don't you want to attack the Golden Bay and capture Morente City?" Semba Wood was in a hurry. It sounded like Lorist had excluded the North Sea Fleet.
Sure enough, Lorist shook his head: "We don't need the North Sea Fleet to attack Hidden Gold Bay. Look at the battleships and transport fleet of the Armada that we captured this time, we can definitely use them to enter Hidden Gold Bay and capture Morent city."
Well, it is safer to pretend to be the Armada to enter the Golden Bay, and the enemy is not easy to guard against. If there is a lightning strike on the warship, it will startle the snake and make the enemy more vigilant and take precautions. Sambawood figured this out quickly.
"Well, Your Highness, I will definitely complete the task." Semba Wood said dejectedly.
…