Herald of Steel

Chapter 499

Contrary to the much more visibly impressed two nobles, Alexander was much calmer as he had already expected the results.

So he addressed the two, “Thank you for your praises, my lord, my lady. But to make sure it was not a fluke, let’s try that again a few times.”

“I’m interested to see just how powerful this ship really is.”

It seemed Alexander wanted to find the limit of his ships and hence asked the men to continue until the trireme failed.

“That….” Which on the other hand made Pasha Farzah feel it was a great waste to destroy such a ship.

‘If you don’t want it, sell it to me,’ He wanted to ask Alexander.

But it was ultimately Alexander’s ship and he could do what he wanted to it.

It was not really Pasha Farzah’s place to object now was it?

And so the attacking trireme took position again and rammed the new ship again, which again creaked and groaned in pain.

But still refused to budge.

So it was rammed again and again several more times, with each hit causing the dent on the ship to become that bit bigger.

Until finally, after nine whole rounds of ramming attacks to the flanks at full speed, even the steel pegs could no longer hold their ground and at last gave away, snapping like hard candy and letting the huge, heavy bronze ram punch a sizable hole around the waterline side of the prototype ship.

And soon afterward, the water began to flood the compartments and the ship began to list noticeably.

Which made the crowd both impressed at the ship’s performance but also a bit sad at seeing it go down.

Now, to be specific, the ship did not literally go down, meaning it did not really sink, but was simply turned inoperational.

Wooden ships generally did not sink like steel ships unless it was laden with heavy cargo but would list to one side and become immobile.

Which would work just as well as sinking them as they would be unable to participate anymore in the ongoing battle.

Or it might even be argued that not sinking was actually better, as those sailors could be captured and traded for ransom.

Anyway, after the new, steel-jointed trireme was destroyed, it was towed back to the shore so that the group could get a better look.

And as Alexander and the two approached the punched hole situated around the waterline, they found traces of the repeated attacks along the outer perimeter of the holes, where a significant amount of the paint and even wood had been chipped away to reveal the inner structure of the hull.

The group could even see some of the steel pegs in the hull.

“It seems my lord will soon be able to rule both the land and sea of Souther Adhania, haha,” Seeing the amount of damage it took to bring the trireme down, Lady Inayah had a big smile on her face, as she was quite confident in Alexander’s chance of achieving exactly what she had said.

While Pasha Farzah additionally joked, “Yes, perhaps the next time we visit he will show us a way to fight in the skies, hahaha.”

Which got a chuckle even from Alexander along with Lady Inayah.

But for very different reasons.

While Lady Inayah laughed at the impossibility of it, for Alexander, it was not because the joke was funny or anything but because he knew Pasha Farzah had framed the joke as an impossible endeavor, while he very well knew otherwise.

But he also knew that building an airplane even in his lifetime might be too tall an order, no matter how much he wished otherwise.

And so only smiled and nodded at the man’s joke, unable to give the perfect reply of, ‘Perhaps there will be a flying machine by the next time you come by.’

Though Alexander was confident about making something workable as a hot air balloon sometime in the future.

As Alexander planned his inventions way, way into the future, Lady Inayah, who was staring at the exposed nail-like steel pegs that were sticking out suddenly asked, or rather shrilled in concern, “But Lord Alexander, won’t these iron pegs rust?”

The lady had quite a bit of panic in her voice as she believed she had detected a grave hidden threat.

But Alexander only gave a light smile and a reassuring look.

Being a metallurgist specialized in steel, he in general knew almost everything there was to corrosion.

And so afterward in a cool voice said, “These steel pegs will not rust for around a decade. We have made them as such.”

Which made Lady Inayah speechless.

‘How can steel not rust? Is he a magician?’ She thought incredulously.

But given everything Alexander had shown them in this short period of time, she felt she should no longer be surprised by anything Alexander could claim, and so decided to take Alexander’s word for it, and simply weakly nodded her and smiled, “It seems that I was so hasty. Of course, I should have expected my lord to have already thought about that already.”

To which Alexander gave a thin smile and humbly said, “No, my lady’s concern is most appreciated. This lord is most grateful”

Now Alexander had not certainly sued magic to make the steel rust-proof.

So how did he do it?

Well, the reason he could make this claim was because he had dipped all the steel pegs in molten tin, giving them a coating that would ‘rust’ instead of the steel.

This was quite easy to do as tin was widely available due to it being used to make bronze, which was an alloy of copper and tin,

While the reason why he did not use zinc was because it had not been discovered yet.

Though Alexander knew how to get it.

In fact, it would be quite easy to get, given copper ores were widely available and they usually had zinc metal mixed in with them as a chemical compound.

Which could be then separated by simply heating the ore to sufficient a temperature that the zinc would melt and drip out, while the copper with a much greater melting temperature would remain solid.

And at a later period, Alexander would use both zinc and tin to galvanize his steel and protect it from corrosion.

And if all these sounded too complicated, well one could just paint the steel such that water and air simply could not come into contact with them.

So all this went on to show that steel rusting at sea was not really a problem.

While Pasha Farzah had a much simpler idea, “Even if the pegs rust it is no problem. They can be taken to a dock and simply replaced.”

Which actually impressed Alexander as he had not thought of that.

Guess simpler times produced simpler solutions.

“Yes, yes, that is also certainly possible,” Alexander nodded affirmatively at the proposal, as right then he noticed the soldiers had already finished bringing out the next concept ship.

It was another trireme.

Noticing Alexander’s gaze, the two nobles also turned their heads to observe, eager to see how it was so different but after looking at it for a while, Lady Inayah made the comment, “It looks pretty ordinary to me. So what is it that makes it special my lord?”

Just from the outside, they could find no discernible outstanding features, and it simply looked just like any other ship out there.

Alexander did not answer the query right away.

Instead, to better show the specialty, or more specifically specialties of this ship, first Alexander invited the two back to the raised platform saying, “It will be much easier to show you, my lady.”

And what he meant by that was made instantly apparent when they got back, as in the raised wooden platform now was a small table, with a replica trireme placed on it.

But it was unlike any other trireme they had ever seen before.

Namely because its hull was too big and long, extending quite a bit downward, presumably much below the waterline of any ordinary trireme.!

This replica ship, unlike a normal trireme whose hull would be just a smooth curved surface that would sink into some depth under the water, had an additional hull attached to its regular hull, one which descended much further down and was tapered in its shape.

The exact shape of the ship was kind of like if a boat also had another much larger hull attached to it at the bottom, one which had that distinct shape of a modern ship’s hull, tapered and sharp, meaning it could cut through the water like a knife.

The shape of this ‘double hulled’ replica trireme was so bizarre that Lady Inayah and Pasha Farzah could not help but approach the table with morbid curiosity and then start to carefully scrutinize it.

They did not need to be told that the special ship was based on this very design.

And so, in the meantime that they waited patiently for Alexander’s explanation, they could not help but marvel at his new type of ship, and comment on the exquisite artwork.

Which was superb to say the least.

They would easily be able to showcase it in their homes as the centerpiece of their decoration to their guests.

But that was not what this ship was here for.

And so as soon as Alexander got close enough to the small wooden ship, the ingenious explanation behind the shape came forward.