Mythical Three Kingdoms

Chen Xi had warned Gan Ning a long time ago: within our own borders, if you hit me and I hit you, it doesn’t matter; but once we’re outside the country, if someone lays a hand on our own brothers, don’t ask why. Even if it’s our fault, we kill the other side first and then ask questions. In this era with no such thing as human rights, only your fists are real.

If it had been before, Gan Ning would have scoffed at the first half of that line, but after going abroad once, getting his entire army wiped out by Kasani, and then secretly studying in Kushan for over a year, Gan Ning truly understood just how correct Chen Xi’s words were.

The world is not the same as the Central Plains; there are countries out there that, when the Han Dynasty was split apart, we absolutely couldn’t stand against. So this time when Zhou Yu showed goodwill, Gan Ning indicated he’d received it. Though he was very displeased, since Zhou Yu had chosen to unite against the outside, then he, Gan Ning, would absolutely not resort to any little tricks.

”Brothers, kill! Reinforcements are here!” Gan Ning roared, slicing a Kushan Guard Officer in front of him clean in half at the waist with one stroke, then bellowed the message through Voice Transmission.

With this roar from Gan Ning, the morale that had already exploded among his men, combined with the surging battle lust in their chests, made the momentum of the pirates under his lead climb yet another step.

The ships led by Zhou Yu and Jiangh Qin were themselves extremely fast. Although they couldn’t match the Cloud Qi–boosted acceleration of the Kushan Warships, with Zhou Yu changing the heavens, the speed of their oar-and-sail vessels was still greatly guaranteed.

Lochte’s icy eyes swept the direction from which Zhou Yu was charging in. The shift in the morale of Gan Ning’s army had already let him confirm Zhou Yu’s identity, and he immediately issued the order to seal off Zhou Yu’s line of advance—almost exactly as Zhou Yu had anticipated.

”Mm, this is getting a bit tricky.” Cloud Qi manifested around Zhou Yu’s flagship as well. Looking at the Kushan Navy charging toward him, he frowned slightly.

The performance of the first half of the Kushan Warships’ engagement was just as Zhou Yu had expected after suppressing the opponent’s intellect, but the latter half deviated somewhat from his projections.

Zhou Yu’s Spiritual Talent had been cracked before, but aside from Chen Xi, he’d never met an opponent who could resolve this problem so quickly.

Even Guo Jia, who had once crossed blades with Zhou Yu, had needed over a month just to realize this issue existed; as for resolving it, Zhou Yu had only ever seen Chen Xi manage it.

[Rather than saying it’s been cracked, it’s more accurate to say that their Command System is split into a Central Government Command System, a fleet-level Command System, and I’d wager they even have a ship-level Command System. And there’s no Inner Qi Manifestation among this crowd, so I can only estimate the general direction and use my Spiritual Talent.]

Zhou Yu frowned slightly and decisively lobbed another blast of Spiritual Talent toward the direction of the flagship of the Marines advancing toward him. Sure enough, their command response overlapped even more with his estimates. In an instant, Zhou Yu confirmed his earlier judgment: the Kushan Navy’s hierarchical Command System.

But this sort of thing was completely unimportant to Zhou Yu. Seeing the opponent’s command begin to align closely with his projections, Zhou Yu directly led his warships in a close-in rush.

”Loose!” At Zhou Yu’s order, all the Longbowmen of the Eastern Wu Navy raised their bows and lobbed arrows high, blanketing the Kushan ships opposite them. The heavy Siege Crossbow Machines mounted at the bows, turned by three or four men working together, also launched their attack toward the Kushan Warships.

Spears as thick as a man’s arm were mounted onto the Crossbow Mechanisms; the tremendous launching force sent them shooting out, each carefully Nurturing-tempered spear turning into a black streak as it flew toward the Kushan ships.

However, after Penetration through that seemingly very thin group Defense, those spears that had originally possessed immense Great Power couldn’t even nail into the enemy’s ship’s side.

Zhou Yu wasn’t particularly surprised by this situation. In his view, whether it was Kushan’s style of Defense or the Han Dynasty’s Reinforcement Material–based Defense, both were valid approaches—at most, just different expressions of the same idea.

As the distance between the two sides closed again, neither side engaged in probing Legion Attacks, instead allowing the Cloud Qi spontaneously forming in the sky to begin entangling.

When the range closed by another thirty percent, Zhou Yu’s side loosed another volley of arrows, instantly suppressing the Kushan flagship facing him. Then, just as Zhou Yu had predicted, the Cloud Qi extending from the enemy Warship directly formed into solid chains that lashed onto Zhou Yu’s ships.

”What solid chains.” Zhou Yu’s expression tightened as he personally felt out the binding of those chains, his face growing far more solemn. But soon he couldn’t suppress his urge to set fires—when ships are bound together, arson really is the best option.

Zhou Yu led five hundred Marines in a probing boarding assault. The instant he leapt onto the Kushan Warship, his expression darkened.

The double-layered suppression caused a massive drop in Zhou Yu’s strength. His own decline didn’t matter; what mattered was that this environment greatly hampered the performance of his own Soldiers.

The moment Zhou Yu boarded, the Kushan Navy unleashed a suppressing arrow storm in his direction. Zhou Yu’s trusted aides either dodged or blocked with Round Shields, taking no losses; as for Zhou Yu himself, the rain of arrows didn’t harm him at all.

But just from feeling the buffs the Kushan Navy still possessed even after they had neutralized the Han Army’s Cloud Qi blessings, Zhou Yu’s face darkened several shades.

In this situation, if the Navy of Great Han and the enemy had comparable base quality, there was simply no way to fight. After all, no matter how impressive the Eastern Wu Navy was, there was absolutely no way every single man’s quality surpassed the enemy’s by an entire level.