Chapter 186: The Terrifying "Ice Hammer"
The ministers, hearing this, immediately showered the King and Queen with compliments once more, but this time, the Crown Prince was included as well.
They all remembered that it was the Crown Prince who had originally proposed this cost-free plan to combat pirates, and now it was indeed beginning to show results.
Joseph, intrigued, took the report from Marquis de Castries and began reading it. He soon discovered that an American named Charles had obtained intelligence on the pirates from Algiers, which allowed the ambush to be successfully carried out.
When he saw Charles mention that his intelligence might have come from a former Tunisian Pasha named Younis, he couldn't help but narrow his eyes.
A former Tunisian "Crown Prince" who still wielded significant influence in Tunisia – if this information was accurate, then his North Africa plan might need some adjustments.
Previously, he had intended to follow the historical trajectory, first attacking the pirate strongholds on Algeria's northern coast and then commencing a full-scale eradication of pirates throughout Algeria. The Barbary Pirates also served as the navies for various North African states, their power deeply intertwined with the local elite. Once the pirates were annihilated, it would essentially be equivalent to overturning the entire country.
However, it now seemed that Tunisia offered a better leverage point!
After the cabinet meeting concluded, Joseph immediately sought out Marquis de Castries, instructing him to send an order to the combined fleet to summon the American named Charles to Paris.
Though the Minister of the Navy was somewhat surprised, he nevertheless agreed at once.
...
In the central Pacific, two medium-sized sailing ships, emblazoned with the words "Gemini Trading Company," were sailing seemingly at random across the ocean.
The cargo had long since been unloaded in the Far East, and nothing had been purchased in return, leaving the ships very light and resulting in extremely high speeds.
After the two ships sailed straight west for a week, they turned south for more than ten nautical miles, before turning east again and sailing at full canvas.
If one were to examine their logbooks from the past month or so, it would become clear that they had been continuously circling in the nearby waters, seemingly searching for something.
Aboard the armed merchant ship "Short Temper," Captain Frault drew a few lines on the navigation chart and looked at his first mate: "If we don't find it after another 100 nautical miles south, we'll have no choice but to resupply in Batavia and then return to Europe."
Just then, the lookout's excited shout came through the speaking tube nearby: "Land! It's land! East-southeast, 25 nautical miles!"
Frault quickly scrutinized the chart, confirming that there were no known islands at the lookout's reported position. Immediately, he excitedly grabbed his telescope and ran a few steps onto the forecastle deck.
Sure enough, before long, a dark gray island with mottled green patches appeared in his telescope.
His heart swelled with excitement. The Crown Prince had been right, there really was an island here!
Over the next period, Frault led his crew to find a suitable sheltered harbor and established a forward base on the island, hoisting the fleur-de-lis flag of the French King.
Five days later, they located the first group of island natives. After some difficult communication through gestures, they hired nearly a hundred of them for the price of one glass bead per person per month, to begin excavating the brittle rocks that were abundant across the island.
The captain of the "Long Organ" watched as the crew and natives loaded the rocks into the holds and asked Frault: "Are you certain this is the kind of rock the Crown Prince wants?"
Frault nodded. "There's only this island in this sea area, so it can't be wrong."
"Alright then. But at least we've discovered new territory," the captain mused. "We should get a good bonus for this, shouldn't we?"
"I hope so." Frault looked out at the distant sea. "But the Crown Prince pointed out the island's location; we were just here to confirm it. Oh, he even knew the island's name. What was it again?"
"Nauru, I think."
"Right, Nauru. What a strange name."
As more Nauru natives heard the news and came to dig for rocks, it took only a little over ten days for hundreds of them to fill the holds of the two armed merchant ships, each displacing nearly 500 tons.
Frault left behind more than ten sailors to guard the base and ordered the two ships to hoist sails and return to Europe.
...
The scorching month of July arrived.
In France, in a small village about 15 kilometers north of Berry.
Gaizka leaned against the rooftop, taking a wooden plank from his wife, who stood below. He painstakingly maneuvered it over the last remaining hole, measured it, then pulled out nails and hammered them in with force.
The entire roof was covered in haphazard "patches." Just buying these planks alone had cost Gaizka a full 1 livre and 7 sou.
Gaizka looked towards the chicken coop not far away, which had largely collapsed. This made him recall the horrifying disaster that had occurred three days prior.
At the time, the sky had been clear and cloudless. He was with Blanche, a fellow villager, 'attending to' the parish's newly acquired water pump. Suddenly, he felt something strike his shoulder with great force, making him wince in pain. He turned his head to look and found a large bruise forming on his shoulder.
He thought it was the work of mischievous village children and immediately glared around. Before he could spot any children, Blanche let out a cry of "Agh!" and collapsed to the ground, clutching his head.
"What happened to you?" Gaizka rushed forward to help him up and was shocked to see a bleeding gash on his forehead. Nearby, in the dirt, lay a fist-sized "glass ball" stained with blood.
Gaizka picked up the "glass ball." A chill immediately permeated his palm. Only then did he realize that it was, in fact, an ice ball.
Immediately after, the sound of heavy objects thudding into the ground began to emanate from nearby.
Blanche, still half-reclining, suddenly pointed to the sky and cried out in alarm: "The sky! Hide quickly, these things are falling from the sky!"
Fortunately, a wooden shed had already been built over the water pump, and the two men scrambled inside.
Soon, the thud-thud sounds around them merged into a continuous barrage. The wooden shed above their heads, moreover, began to emit terrifying pounding noises, as if a demon outside was trying to smash them to death with an iron hammer.
The terrifying "iron hammer" continued its assault for nearly 40 minutes before gradually subsiding. Gaizka saw that even the thick wooden planks on the shed's roof had several cracks smashed into them.
He suddenly remembered something and shoved open the shed door. He froze on the spot.
The once lush wheat fields had now been flattened. The nearly ripe wheat had been utterly pulverized by countless fist-sized hailstones and mixed into a slurry of ice and mud.
Nearly half of the distant trees hung with broken branches and leaves, as if ravaged by a rampaging giant. On the ground, one could even see the flattened corpses of wild animals lying in pools of blood.
"No, no, God help us..." Gaizka murmured, his voice trembling. Ignoring the ice balls scattered everywhere, he stumbled and ran all the way back to his house.
"Annette! Are you alright?!"
The next moment, he saw his wife, her face covered in blood, holding their two children, emerge from the house with a look of terror.
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