Flares in the Gathering Dark
Weren't those ships taking their sweet time?
A mere thirty vessels of the first wave had left dozens of Xia warships shattered and burning across the sea. The second wave pressed the advantage, raining arrows down to finish off the stragglers.
And far away, the Xia commander watched it all through gritted teeth.
"Damn it all! What in the world is happening out there?"
"We had no idea their ships would be so sturdy!"
"What do we do now?"
The commander wracked his brains, and slowly, one by one, the scattered Xia fleet regrouped beneath its signal flags.
There were still well over four hundred of them.
Flutter, flutter. A signal banner whipped on the wind from a ship drawing up alongside. The Xia fleet communicated its orders through the colors and sequence of their flags.
"General! A message from the ship to port!"
Ram — to the side.
Drive the ram into their flanks. A galley was hardly a poor vessel for ramming tactics — it was only that the Black Whale was too damn solid.
"Yes — the side won't be as reinforced!"
"A head-on strike would fail, sir. Better to come at them on the diagonal."
"Right! Send the signal at once!"
"Yes, sir!"
Flags flew and snapped in every direction as the order spread. And the Xia, it seemed, had no intention of sitting idle either.
"It's our turn now! The wind is on our side, is it not? Let's settle this once and for all!"
The Xia hadn't gathered nothing but fools.
Behind them, the battlefield receded into the distance — a graveyard of ships, drowned in flame.
"Wahaha! Serves those bastards right!"
Not a single Daehan vessel had gone down. By any measure, the first engagement had been a resounding victory, and the soldiers were giddy with it.
"No ships lost, perhaps — but we have dead comrades. Don't laugh too loud."
"Yes, sir..."
He'd caught the Deck Boss's scolding after all. The dead weren't many, but there they were, along with the wounded — the comrades tending to injuries in the Deck Boss's sight.
"My apologies."
"Then get moving and make your preparations. The battle isn't over yet."
They would have to sail out into open water, turn about, and come back again.
"That's what worries me. The wind's against us on the return."
Coming in the way they had, plenty of ships were bound to stall. The Black Whale's high decks gave them an edge, but sheer numbers could not be ignored.
Casualties were certain to grow.
"Captain."
"Ah. Admiral. Good to see you."
"It may not be my place to meddle, but wouldn't we be faster than they are?"
"Wouldn't they be the faster ones?"
The enemy, after all, could turn and run with the wind filling their sails. Wasn't that a far better position?
"Heh heh. My friend — is there any rule that says we must meet them face to face?"
"Ah! Thank you, Admiral!"
"Just a thought, that's all. Ho ho ho."
This fleet commander — lean and sharp-featured, with a nose like a cucumber and a bristling mustache — had a nickname of his own. They called him the Fox, earned through sheer cunning. A filthy, devious human being.
"All hands! Bring out the slingshots!"
"Gah — no, sir!"
"Not that..."
What in the world was a "slingshot"? The soldiers went green around the gills. Whatever the thing was, the very thought of it clearly made them sick.
"What's this now? You lot want to swim home from here?"
"Urk..."
"Please, no..."
There was no helping it. Everyone aboard these ships came from the same neck of the woods, one way or another. And this devious man never lifted a finger himself. He simply sent word home. So unless you had no intention of ever returning there, mutiny was not an option.
You'd be wearing bruises for weeks.
In Daehan, showing up with a black eye meant one thing only — you'd done something wrong at home and caught a beating for it. Strangers passing by would click their tongues at you in the street.
Clack, clack. Still, the soldiers bustled about the ship, busily assembling something.
The contraption resembled a crossbow in its general shape, but a metal cylinder hung off it, and the aperture was far too large for any arrow.
"Have all the ships been informed?"
"Yes, sir. Everyone should be readying themselves now. Though the men do have complaints..."
"Isn't the point to win without losses? What exactly would you say to their families?"
"Forgive me, sir..."
The news of the fallen, along with their remains, was delivered by their direct commanding officer — one of the few iron military laws of Daehan. Because Haneul himself had set it down, breaking it was a matter in a class entirely apart from mere insubordination.
You didn't just lose your home. You lost the country.
"Position of the enemy fleet?"
"They've been teasing the horizon for some time now, sir."
Xia scouting vessels had latched onto them, tracking the fleet's movements — and by now those scouts had fallen so far behind they were out of sight.
"Begin the turn. Nice and slow."
"Yes, sir!"
Gracefully coming about, the ships of Joseon began clawing upwind along a diagonal course.
Against the wind, a ship could only travel on a diagonal — short of rowing against it outright.
"Get the oars out!"
"Time to put some muscle into it!"
"About time I got loosened up!"
They'd be rowing hard for a while yet, and apparently their bodies had been itching for it — they hauled the oars out with actual relish.
"Keep the rhythm! Anyone who slips up can hang off an oar all the way home!"
"We've been at this a day or two, sir!"
"Wahaha! Keep that up and you'll be hanging off one for sure!"
Rowing a warship was not work for just anyone. The effort was one thing — but if even one oar fell out of tempo, the blades collided and tangled, or the whole ship yawed left and right. It was a job for seasoned men who had spent years breathing in unison.
"We've lost sight of their ships!"
Daehan's fleet had sped off at such pace that they'd vanished entirely from Xia eyes.
"Turn the fleet around and come down. Set a course southeast."
"Yes, sir!"
The Xia would be running before the wind, so the Daehan ships had to be headed either back toward Xia territory or toward Joseon.
It was a gamble, but Joseon was the likelier bet. That was the direction they'd been sailing. Their supplies and their troops were bound for Joseon — that much was certain.
Unless they meant to avoid battle altogether, they would turn up somewhere.
Neither side knew the other's position, so the Xia fleet sailed on nothing but the blind hope that their enemy would be waiting where the logic pointed.
"Still nothing in sight?"
"No, sir!"
"Did they flee, or did we simply pass each other..."
The Xia commander agonized.
"Scatter the ships! We have to find them!"
"Yes, sir!"
The scouting vessels they'd first attached to the enemy fleet had long since vanished too.
The Xia commander decided to release additional scouts. With a fleet this size, sending out dozens of small craft was no burden at all.
"Tch. What a shame."
The Xia officer chewed his lip as he watched the scouts grow distant.
"That was our chance at revenge, sir."
"Cowardly dogs. They've clearly run away. No spine in them at all!"
What did these men imagine a human life was worth? What crime had the soldiers committed — the ones who would bleed and die at the front lines?
Fighting when you held the advantage — wasn't that simply the first rule of war?
But there was one thing the Xia command had overlooked.
The loftiest point on a Daehan mast reached seventy feet. A Xia mast, barely thirty.
At sea level, the maximum line of sight was over three-quarters of a mile against just half a mile — a gap that was anything but small.
"It's the scouts that followed the Daehan ships! Turn the fleet around, now!"
Before long, they'd spotted their fellow ships chasing after the Daehan fleet. The scouts had pursued the enemy — so yes, the enemy was indeed headed toward Joseon.
They had simply miscalculated the speed. The Xia scouts hurried back toward the main fleet.
Daehan was sweeping north in a great arc, rowing hard all the while — and that was why, against the wind, the ships were moving faster than anyone had expected.
"What! They've already pulled ahead?"
"Yes, sir! It seems even the rearmost ships of their fleet have spotted us."
"God damn it all! Row, you dogs! We have to catch them!"
He'd rather fight while running the same direction. If he let them keep sailing north like this, the enemy would simply come back downwind and beat him all over again.
How many hours had passed since the two fleets first clashed? The sun was already sinking low and lazy toward the horizon.
"Hey! Ease up on the oars a little, will you? We can't keep up!"
"What do you mean? We're just dipping them in the water."
"Huh? Is that so?"
The ships were moving so fast under sail alone that rowing had been abandoned long ago. They were simply riding the wind north. The oars hung in the water only to slow the vessels down.
And the Xia, seeing this, took it for exhaustion — and drove themselves half to death to keep pace.
"What's with those sails? Why are they so small?"
"Beats me?"
A sail's size was decided by any number of factors — though in this case, the real answer was simply that the cloth the Xia wove for their sails was garbage.
"So anyway, when are they expecting us?"
"Who knows? Think we'll make it before sunset?"
The gulf between Daehan's seafaring technology — refined over ages of ocean crossings — and the Xia's ship-handling was simply too vast.
"They told us to eat early. Did you eat?"
"Eat what? It's jerky and potatoes, same as always."
"This is that thing, huh?"
"Looks like we're pounding them all night."
"And here I thought we'd get some rest once the sun went down."
"Wipe them out quick so we can all sleep easy, that's the plan."
"True enough."
Was a night fleet engagement even possible in this age? What were they planning to pull...
"All hands, bring in the oars and begin final preparations!"
"Yes, sir!"
Far in the distance, the Xia ships were still rowing after them. The problem was... depending on each ship's rowing skill, the crew's stamina, and a dozen other variables, the fleet had stretched out into a long, ragged line.
The Xia fleet strung out longer and longer, its slowest ships falling ever further behind. Countermeasures were clearly needed.
"General, our formation has fallen apart! We need to regroup!"
"You want me to just let them go?!"
He knew as well as anyone — but hadn't they only just barely caught up? A little further and they'd have been within reach.
"But sir, isn't it far too dangerous?"
"Then the vanguard keeps them busy while the rear keeps funneling in. What's wrong with that?"
Still, the commander listened to his aide's counsel.
"Even if we take them, sir, the losses will be catastrophic."
"Damn it all..."
"Please. Survey the situation with a cool head."
"Hoo... Restore the formation. Set a course for Joseon."
"Yes, sir!"
There was hardly any daylight left anyway. A night battle was pure madness.
You couldn't see the ships. You couldn't tell friend from foe. How exactly were you supposed to fight? Such was the nature of night combat in this age.
The Xia set their lines to rights — and, in truth, allowed themselves a measure of relief. If the enemy struck now, every ship would simply tangle together in a midnight free-for-all. And with superior numbers on their side, wasn't chaos entirely to their advantage?
"Ah! Enemy ships closing!"
The shout rang out from a sailor in the crow's nest, watching the Daehan fleet bear down on them!
"What! Why? Why now?"
The Deck Boss, the aide, the general — every one of them was thrown into confusion. Why on earth would they attack now?
"These lunatics have lost their minds!"
"Draw blades and shields!"
The general was dumbfounded, and the Deck Boss readied the men for close-quarters combat. At sea, in the dark, there was nothing to do but fight it out hand to hand.
"Hm... something's strange here..."
Only the aide harbored any suspicion that something was off.
The two fleets drew nearer and nearer. The sunset itself was burning down to its last embers. Once the sun slipped below the horizon, darkness would swallow everything whole.
Then it happened. At a distance of some sixty feet, give or take —
Lights began to bloom across the Daehan ships.
"Now what is that? Lighting fires in the dead of night?"
Kindling lights at midnight was tantamount to standing on the deck and advertising: Here I am, come and get me.
"A-arrows! Get your bows out!"
The Deck Boss barked the order in a panic. If it came to this, surely someone would land a hit if they just loosed at the glow.
Thwip — sploosh.
Thwip — crash.
Something came whistling out of the dark. Some of it splashed into the sea, but the rest struck the ships and began shattering.
Thwip — thud.
"GYAAH!"
And of course, some of it found flesh.
"Sniff, sniff. The hell is this stuff?! The stench is vicious!"
No one knew what it was, but getting hit by it hurt like hell — though, strangely enough, it didn't feel like it would kill you.
"Loose arrows! Come on, you dogs!"
"Yes, sir!"
The Xia soldiers answered with a volley of their own. All they had to do was shoot toward the fires burning on the horizon.