Rise of the Legendary Emperor

Chapter 287: Ship Building III

The moment, the white boat made of Celenium was put in the sea, Lia's body jerked as everyone stared at the boat to see whether it's going to float or sink.

Fortunately, everything went well, and Lia could see the boat sank nearly half a meter into the water as the rest of the boat perfectly floated in the river. The workers were extremely surprised to see that this massive ship made of a new substance that felt like marble stone after cooling off would not directly sink into the riverbed with a loud noise, but instead, it floated on the surface like a leaf.

The subsequent hardening of the Celenium took a lot of time, and by the time it began to snow heavily, the work had to be stopped. Only when the snowfall was minimum, were they able to continue their work. The most time-consuming task was the construction of the cast, which was built out of many wooden planks and metal pillars, and supported by many small stakes that were placed between the bottom and the deck. 

Looking at the white ship floating in the river, Lia heaved a sigh of relief and felt proud at her work. However, she knew there's still work to be done in the ship such as they had to finish the interior of the captain's room, place the Accelerator in the lower deck, place the cannons in the upper deck and complete the masts.

"Alright, people, let's do the corrosion proofing!"

Lia shouted the order with newfound confidence as the dwarves quickly started their work. The dwarves knew very well how to do corrosion proofing. Initially, she thought Celenium couldn't be corroded but after consoling with Ken, she was instructed to do the corrosion proofing just in case by Ken and Reghys.

As a first step, they brushed a layer of oil with a pungent smell onto the deck. When the oil had dried with the help of battle energy, they repeated this procedure with red oil several times until it was finally coated with red paint. Once the corrosion proofing was completed, the installation phase of the lower and the upper deck of the ship began.

As for the so-called upper deck, it was a fancy room made of Celenium which was placed between the two masts. Other than the captain's room, there was also another shed. In case of a rainy day, this shed could also be utilized by the crew as a shelter and temporary storage to keep all the fishes they catch fresh.

The stern rudder was also made of Celenium and iron, and its installation was a bit troublesome. The tiller had to go through a reserved hole under the water, and then appear again on the deck, where an iron ring would be put on it. 

The troublesome part had to be done by Benedict and Nicolas considering they had to connect the rudder to the Accelerator through runes and energy conducting metals. When Ken finishes building the device, the ship could get energy created from the Accelerator using Life stones and use that energy to sail the ship rather than depending on the traditional wind-based sails.

However, until they could figure out the kinks of Accelerator and how to pass energy from it to the ship, Lia could sail the ship using the masts she built as an alternative.

At the Turtle River, the dwarves flew from the shed to the ship carrying all the materials they needed to finish building the masts and the decks. Considering the hard part, the casting was done, they took only a couple of hours to finish the remaining works.

"Lady Lia, we are finished"

She didn't answer the girl but looked at the majestic ship floating in the river before her. It had no similarities with the traditional boats she had seen and built except for the masts and rudder. She wondered whether to call this a ship or a boat because it was not as small as a normal fishing boat but also not as big as a warship. With its 40m long size, two decks, and masts, people would have a hard time believing this as a fishing boat.

What surprised Lia more was how much wealth she spent on the ship. Generally, for a typical fishing boat, the cost would be 200-300 gold coins but to build this boat, it cost only 30 gold coins, considering almost the entire ship was made of Celenium rather than wood.

"Lady Lia, shall we?"

The girl standing with Lia flicked her wrist as a long wooden plank connected the ship and the ground.

"Yes"

Lia came out of her shock and walked on the wooden plank to test sail the ship.

When Lia stepped on the ship for the first time, she immediately felt the outstanding stability of the boat. As the river was flowing beneath it, the ship remained motionless; it felt just like standing on solid ground. Only when the dwarves and the workers came on the deck did she feel a little swing.

At the moment there were three spots on the deck that seemed unfinished, they were the designated places for the cannons, one at the front and one at each side of the ship.

"Who has experience in sailing a ship?!"

Lia walked on the steps to the stage where the rudder is and stood overlooked the workers given to her.

Hearing her question, a couple of the workers raised their hands as Lia nodded and prepared to put the ship into the test.

"Alright, release the sails!"

She shouted at the workers and flicked her wrist as a bottle of ale appeared in her hands. In accordance with the tradition, she then smashed a bottle of ale on the bow and ordered to raise the sail for the ship's maiden voyage. 

The sail of the ship was made of animal skin. It was mostly calf leather and sheepskin with a mix of some magical beast's skin, such as white wolf skin and Monster bearskin. It had different colors and shading, with brown, white, and gray colors. The sail was separated by four sticks of beams in which the cable passed through the iron ring on the top and fell onto the deck. The entire sail could be raised by simply pulling the cable.

Lia commanded the men on the shore to untie the safety rope once the sail had completely risen up. The weather was still fine at the time with occasionally falling snow. The ship was slowly leaving the shore, driven by the breeze and water flow.

The design of the ship was indeed so unique that it had smoothly left the shore with less than a 30 man crew.

She held onto the steering wheel and rotated it towards the left to sail the ship in the wind direction. The huge steering wheel was very heavy for a person with a low cultivation level, so she had to use all of her strength to rotate the rudder. It was hard overcoming the water resistance in order to direct the iron rudder at the bottom of the boat in the absence of the Accelerator's assistance. 

Although the wind was not very strong the sail was still bulging up and the continuous thrust had caused the mast to make a squeaking noise. The bow started to swing rightwards.

"We're really moving!" one of the workers exclaimed.

"Lady Lia, you made a ship from a strange white goo," the girl behind Lia smiled and said. 

The Littletown was going further and further away from the shore and gradually moving into the center of the river as the dwarves started to chant and sing in the joy of sailing.

"Far over tha misty mountains cold

ta dungeons deep an' caverns old

we must away, ere break o' day,

ta claim our long-forgotten gold.

goblets they carved there for themselves

an' harps o' gold; where nae man delves

there lay they long, an' many a song

was sung unheard by men or elves.."

After an hour of singing and sailing, Lia was the first to be worn out.

It was because her body had hit the limit. Although her body was wrapped up like a dumpling, she still could not resist the cold for long. 

There was a thin layer of snow gathered on top of her thick fur coat, and even with gloves and shoes, her hands and feet were almost numb due to the cold, her body was shaking unsteadily on the upper deck. 

"Lady Lia, it's beginning to snow heavily, we should dock the ship back at the shed"

The girl came to remind Lia after looking at the upper deck getting covered in snow. The black armor everyone wore kept them from getting cold to the point of shivering but Lia didn't have the black armor. 

"Lady Lia, I can take the rudder if you want"

Looking at the shivering body of Lia, the girl asked to help Lia but she shook her head as she rotated the rudder to dock the ship somewhere on the shore. The shed where they began their journey was too long from their current location and she couldnt resist the cold until they reach there.

So she decided to dock the ship nearby and make it to the castle by teleporting.

The reason she didn't let the girl take the rudder was that pulling the ship into the shore required fine controlling, Lia did not dare to entrust it to be operated by someone who had no experience of sailing.

"Hang on!"

Thud!

The ship finally landed after tossing around for a while. Everyone's heart was raised when it collided with the river bank. The hull made a dull noise when hitting the land, but fortunately, it looked just fine. The workers quickly gathered the sail and put the springboard up to the shore.

"We...successfully...built...our...first ship"

When her feet touched the solid ground, she looked at the ship in the river and stuttered.

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