"Alfred! Alfred? A group of officers in the captain's room looked at their stormtrooper with concern.

"Huh? I'm fine! Xu Mo smiled reluctantly.

Soon, Manuel also returned to the battleship, and this time, Hedram called Dinah into the captain's room, after all, Dinah was the priest and ship doctor on the battleship, and it was okay to exclude her from the usual battle. This time the plan is related to the possibility that she will not be able to return to Stockholm for two or three years, and she must be made aware of it.

To Hedlam's satisfaction, Dinah did not choose to get off the ship, and volunteered to stay on the ship to spend time with everyone.

"Well, if that's all right, I'll relay the information about Clifford to you. The day before yesterday, London had received news of the death of an English whaling ship in the waters off Norway. Because the only warships currently in Hong Kong are Clifford's privateer fleet, they have already set sail yesterday!

There were two ships on this trip, one was Clifford's flagship 'Hell God' and the frigate 'Miracle', both ships were regular warships, and the two armed sailing ships that accompanied them did not follow. The Miracle belongs to the North Sea galleys, and it is a ship of the same style as our Vestelos, about the same size and firepower, and there is nothing to say. The point is to let you understand that Clifford's flagship 'Hell God', this is the 'Hell God' that I took the time to draw, you all take a look! Hedram said solemnly.

The officers on the Vestelos all gathered in front of the table, and even Dinah leaned on Xu Mo curiously and poked her pretty little head in. As soon as Xu Mo saw the blueprint of the "Hell God", he frowned tightly and looked up at Hedlam, and all the officers next to him also had a solemn face, they all knew this kind of ship very well.

The reason is very simple, they have all seen the detailed construction drawings of this kind of battleship with their own eyes, and this is the kind of battleship drawings that Xu Mo led the action team to get from the Earl of Essex.

"It's a little smaller than that, but the structure is the same, about 150 feet (46 meters) long, and it's 14 knots downwind with full sail, two knots faster than us. Two gun decks, the first with 24 12-pounder guns and the second with 22 16-pounder cannons, nearly twice as many firepower as ours, and 300 armed sailors on the battleship, 50 more than we have when we are fully loaded! The English called this type of battleship the capital ship. Gerhardt's eyes swept across the faces of the crowd.

(Capital ships are actually battleships, but the name battleships appeared in the 19th century because of the lines of battle in which each column was arranged in a single column in naval battles.) In this era, there were already 3rd and 4th class sail battleships, but because of the scarcity of numbers, a country's battleships could not be lined up in a single column. ）

"You can't win a head-on gun battle with it, you can't get the upper hand if it's slower than it, the 16-pounder cannon has about the same range as ours, but the 12-pounder gun has a longer range than ours, so you can't take it for a ride. However, even so, it still has weaknesses in artillery battles. Hedram said slowly.

"The hull of this type of ship is large and spindle-shaped, with symmetrical thickness at the front and rear, and the sloping hull makes the boat heavier and wider. This construction allows the hull to be up to two feet thick, so strong that our 12-pounder shells may not even be able to penetrate the hull at long range. However, the Admiral was right, it still had a weak point, and no matter how large and heavy a ship was, its rudder was as fragile as any other ship. ”

Gerhardt said with a smile, remembering a previous naval battle with Hedram, when he had taken out Hedlam's rudder in a surprise attack and won the victory.

Seeing the smile on Gerhardt's face, Hedram secretly rolled his eyes, the two of them had a naval battle deduction, he played Clifford, and Gerhardt was the Vestelos. He was able to win almost eight of the ten naval battles, and the two times he lost were caused by Gerhardt's sneak attack. Of course, this is not to say that there is a big gap in the level of naval warfare between the two, but that the strength of the two warships is there.

"There aren't many tactics we can use to win against Clifford, one is to strike from the rear and knock out its rudder, or break its mainmast in a raid, or one is to get close to it and engage it in a broadside battle. Okay, guys, any questions? Hedram slapped the table.

"This ...... I have a question, Your Excellency! How do we get close to it? Xu Mo asked with a bitter face, although he knew that he would be ridiculed, but in order to play a greater role in the naval battle, he couldn't help but ask, but the strange thing was that no one laughed at him this time.

"Let's get out first, Alfred stays!" Hudram waved his hand, motioning for everyone to go out first, then turned his head to Xu Mo and smiled, "Do you know why everyone didn't make fun of you this time?" ”

"I don't know!" Xu Mo said honestly.

"Because your question is also what we're thinking about." Hudram sighed, "We could have approached it disguised as a merchant ship!" But Clifford's purpose was not to privateer merchant ships, but to pursue pirates. Pirates are the best at disguised as merchant ships, so Clifford will be very careful, and it will be almost impossible to sneak up on him. ”

"There aren't many ways we can do it, the best way is to take advantage of the Vestelos, you've already seen the drawings of the 'Hell God', so do you see under what circumstances the 'Hell God' will be slower than ours. If we can hang it when it's slower than us, we have a chance to overcome it. Now it will be up to our sharpshooter, Mr. Charlie, to destroy its rudder with the bow cannon in the shortest possible time. Hedram shrugged his shoulders.

"Is there a situation where we can be faster than the Hell God?" Xu Mo frowned, looked at the drawings on the table again, and soon he suddenly realized, "I understand, Admiral!" ”

"Boss, they came to recruit me again, but this time it's very interesting, Selena didn't come, it was actually Ahan who opened his mouth to recruit me to his team, and from his mouth, I know one thing, they are not the relationship between the main and deputy heads, but two small teams are discussing the merger!" Xu Mo's soul imprint suddenly came with news of Dinah.

"Oh? I see, a little more news comes out, it seems that Ahan's self-confidence has swelled up a little! Xu Mo said with a smile.

"Boss, we better be careful, I feel that Selena has always been very wrong, it stands to reason that this strong woman should not have fought back for so long!" Dinah said solemnly.

Xu Mo was a little negligent, and now that Dina reminded him, he also felt that Selena's situation was a little wrong, and it seemed necessary to go and see this strong woman.

Half an hour later, all the sailors on the Vistelos had returned to the ship, and Hedram stood at the top of the rear deck of the battleship, his admiral's coat hunting in the wind and waving his hand.

"Anchor and set sail!"