The battle continued well into the afternoon, but Luo He had no intention of remaining until its very end. The first reports were enough.
The Wu Kingdom's fleet had been caught completely by surprise. Nearly a third of their forces had already been destroyed, most of their supply ships captured.
And the surviving vessels were fleeing in disorder. From that alone, Luo He could already predict the remainder of the campaign without much effort.
"They'll abandon the Pirate Island." He said calmly. "The surviving troops will most likely land somewhere along the coast and march toward the Jin family Mansion."
"They have no other meaningful objective left." He turned to Jin Sang.
"Take your fastest ships and keep harassing the retreating fleet."
"Sink every vessel you can catch. As for the rest of the fleet, return to the Pirate Island and maintain its defenses. Don't chase them recklessly nor board their ships keep your distance."
Jin Sang nodded solemnly. "We've already gained a decisive advantage," Luo He continued. "We haven't lost a single battle since this war began."
"Even if the Wu Kingdom commits every remaining soldier it has, our chances of victory are still greater than theirs." His expression softened as he looked toward Ning Jia.
"My only concern is my family. As long as all of you remain safe, nothing else matters." Ning Jia stepped forward and quietly embraced him.
Unlike Jin Mulan, whose affection was fierce and possessive, Ning Jia simply held him tightly in silence, as though trying to memorize his warmth before letting him go.
After a long moment, she gently kissed his cheek. "Come back safely, Husband." Ning Jia said. Luo He chuckle before reassuring with a smile.
"Don't worry, Princess. I always come back alive." Ning Jia smiled faintly, though concern still lingered in her eyes.
"I'll wait for you."
Luo He nodded before boarding the Black Cloud Shuttle. The shuttle rose silently into the evening sky, slowly disappearing toward the mainland.
Jin Sang continued pursuing the retreating enemy fleet. By around six hours after the initial engagement reports confirmed that the first engagement had officially ended in complete victory.
Although the Wu Kingdom's fleet had not been entirely annihilated, it had been crippled beyond recovery. Thousands of enemy soldiers had perished.
Countless supply ships had fallen into Jin hands, and the remaining vessels were scattering in every direction, desperately trying to escape Jin Sang's relentless pursuit.
Satisfied that the naval campaign was now in capable hands, Luo He did not remain to witness the final cleanup. His responsibilities lay elsewhere.
Without wasting another moment, he directed the Black Cloud Shuttle inland, flying through the fading light toward the military encampment of Gin Wenyuan.
Another battlefield awaited him, and the next phase of the war was already beginning to be set under the already predetermined route Luo He had chosen.
Day Two: The First Assault
Although Jin Sang had shattered the Wu Kingdom's transport fleet, complete annihilation had proven impossible.
The surviving enemy ships had abandoned their original objective and were now escaping without a purpose. But Luo He expected them to land along the Yue coastline.
From there, the remaining soldiers would march overland and reinforce the siege of the Jin Mansion within three to four days according to Luo He's estimates.
Jin Mulan had little time.
While Luo He commanded the events at sea, Jin Mulan faced a battle of her own.
The Duke Lu's army, reinforced by ten thousand Shia family troops loyal to the Crown Prince, had arrived before the Jin Mansion on the early morning of the second day.
Altogether, roughly thirty-four thousand soldiers completely surrounded the fortress, establishing camps and sealing every road leading in or out.
The first assault did not begin the moment the troops reached the mansion. The enemy spent the entire day constructing siege positions.
Organizing supply lines, and studying the mansion's defenses. Only as evening approached did the first attack finally begin. Nearly ten thousand soldiers advanced toward the walls.
Jin Mulan remained perfectly calm.
Although Luo He's crossbows could accurately reach well over two hundred meters, she deliberately forbade her soldiers from firing.
The defenders simply watched from the walls while the attackers advanced in orderly formations. The enemy naturally reached the wrong conclusion.
"They're conserving arrows. They don't have enough archers. They're relying entirely on the moat." Confident in their assumptions, the Wu soldiers continued forward until they were barely seventy meters from the walls.
Only then did Jin Mulan lower her hand.
"Fire." The silence shattered instantly.
Thousands of steel bolts erupted from the walls like a black storm.
The first volley struck before these unsupecting soilders could even comprehend what had happened. Men collapsed by the hundreds, iron bolts punching through shields, armor, and skulls alike.
Entire ranks disappeared beneath the hail of steel. Panic spread immediately.
Before the officers could restore order, a second volley descended upon them.
Then a third.
The attackers abandoned the assault almost as quickly as it had begun, retreating in complete disorder before many had even reached the moat.
When the dust settled, between fifteen and sixteen hundred Wu soldiers lay dead across the open ground. The defenders had not suffered a single casualty.
As the enemy fled beyond one hundred meters, Jin Mulan calmly raised her hand again. "Cease fire." There was no reason to waste valuable ammunition on targets beyond effective range.
From nearly six hundred meters away, the enemy commanders watched the battlefield in stunned silence. Then came something even stranger.
The gates of the Jin Mansion slowly opened. A heavy wooden bridge was lowered across the moat, and about fifty Jin soldiers calmly walked onto the battlefield carrying large wicker baskets.
Protected by crossbowmen on the walls, they ignored the corpses entirely, pulling iron bolts from bodies, shields, and the ground alike before carefully placing every recovered bolt into their baskets.
Not a single Wu commander ordered an attack. The distance was too great, and sacrificing hundreds of men merely to kill fifty soldiers seemed pointless.
The Jin soldiers finished their work without interruption before returning safely behind the walls. From the enemy camp, the conclusion seemed obvious.
"They're running out of ammunition."
"Those bolts must be incredibly difficult to produce. They were forced to recover every single one." The illusion spread rapidly through the Wu officers. None of them realized they had been deceived.
Hidden beneath the Jin Mansion were nearly fifty thousand forged iron crossbow bolts. Far more than the defenders could expend in a few volleies.
It was not a large number compaired to normal arrows but enough to keep up the resistance long enough. Recovering the ammunition had never been necessary.
It was simply another trap.
If the enemy believed the defenders possessed only limited ammunition, they would become increasingly confident with every assault, convinced the crossbows would eventually fall silent.
That false confidence would cost them dearly. No further attacks came that day.
The failed assault had shaken the besieging army, forcing its commanders to reconsider their approach.
As night settled over the battlefield, a messenger crow descended onto the mansion walls. Jin Mulan read the report in silence. Jin Sang had won a decisive naval victory.
There was neither surprise nor disbelief in her voice, only quiet pride. Her idiot husband had once again proven himself right. The report, however, carried a warning as well.
Enough of the enemy fleet had escaped to reach the Yue coastline. Once ashore, the survivors would most likely reinforce the army surrounding the Jin Mansion within three or four days.
She folded the message and looked toward the direction of the sea beyond the distant horizon.
Time was no longer on her side. If she intended to break the siege, she would have to do so before those Wu kingdom reinforcements arrived.
As night settled over the battlefield, messenger crows departed from the Pirate Island, carrying news of the day's victory across the kingdom.
The first report reached Su Kim. She silently unfolded the message, read every line from beginning to end, then folded it again without the slightest change in expression.
She simply placed it on the table before returning to the military map spread before her. It was exactly the outcome she had expected from her man.
Inside the emperos camp, another messenger crow descended onto the emperor's desk.
The emperor barely finished reading before bursting into laughter. His palm slammed heavily onto the desk. "That's my boy!" The tent fell silent.
"I knew this war would be a victory the moment he stood on our side." The emperor laughed again before looking toward his two most trusted attendants.
"Giving him my daughter was one of the best investments I have ever made." Neither eunuch Long nor Shu Kang spoke. Both simply bowed, accustomed to their emperor's rare moments of open excitement.
Far away in the imperial capital, Princess Ning Luo received the final report. She read it once before quietly rolling it closed.
"Good." Her expression relaxed only slightly. "At least one battlefield is going our way." She lifted her eyes toward the towering walls surrounding the capital.
Beyond them, the enemy armies would soon gathere, between two hundred thousand and two hundred fifty thousand soldiers would surround the capital itself.
Yet she still had only ten thousand defenders. The victory at sea had bought the kingdom time. Whether that time would be enough remained to be seen.