I Blasted the Crown Prince Away with Naval Guns (2)

The order Captain Arthur of the battleship Albion had received was, strictly speaking, to arrest the nobles only after seizing the vessel.

But... that did not mean he had no intention of using force at all. A considerable proportion of the nobles were mages.

Regardless of how much firepower the mages possessed, there was no more dangerous enemy than them in close-quarters combat aboard a ship.

The firepower infantry could carry was limited, whereas mages could produce cannon-level firepower from a human-sized body.

Therefore, suppressing them after boarding was only an option if the nobles had given up their resistance.

Boom—!

That mercy did not extend to them when a massive fireball slammed into the side of the ship, either.

"Report the damage!"

"No damage to the starboard armor belt!"

"No damage to the starboard secondary turret!"

"Two crewmen lightly wounded, one seriously wounded! No fatalities!"

"If they insist on rejecting mercy to the very end, then it can't be helped."

Of course, if they continued sending in troops, they could eventually drag the nobles out alive.

But... the Navy's losses would be far too great. They could not throw away the lives of innocent sailors for the sake of a few criminals.

The lives of naval soldiers were far more precious than those wretched criminals.

Ideally, I would have dragged them to the heart of the Empire and made them see the consequences of their own actions with their own eyes. But, well, it wouldn't matter if a few of them died.

"Blow them away with Turret No. 1."

"Yes, sir!"

The firepower of the battleship Albion's twelve 406mm naval guns was truly immense. If a ship were hit by those guns, capable of bringing down mountains and shattering cliffs, nothing would be left—not even a trace.

That was why only the first gun of Turret No. 1 had been loaded.

That was more than enough firepower for something as insignificant as a coal carrier.

"Fire as soon as it's ready!"

Immediately afterward, a flash erupted.

Piercing the thick sea fog blanketing every direction and smashing apart the gently rippling sea, the heavy shock wave rattled the loose equipment on the bridge.

And then...

KABOOOOOM—!

Half a beat later, a massive explosion erupted from the coal carrier.

The armor-piercing shell smoothly punched through the ship's bow and reached the engine room without difficulty.

The monstrous physical force of the one-ton armor-piercing shell tore various pieces of machinery to shreds and passed leisurely through the ship. Nothing could survive in its path.

Several unlucky nobles who were still inside were vaporized on the spot. Following the trajectory of the armor-piercing shell that had pierced the ship vertically, the deck split apart, accompanied by the sound of the keel twisting.

Naturally... there was no way the deck could have remained intact.

The enormous shock wave overturned everything on the deck. In the face of a one-ton mass of steel fired at supersonic speed, the human sense of balance was practically meaningless.

Everyone on deck, from the obscure baron to former Crown Prince Theodore, fell to the floor in a disgraceful heap.

And finally.

As the flames that had begun at every point shattered by the armor-piercing shell spread to the fuel and piles of coal, a roar loud enough to tear the ears rang out.

***

Eeeeeeeee—

A dense ringing filled his ears. His consciousness, which had been sinking peacefully, was ultimately unable to overcome the ringing and was forcibly dragged back toward reality.

The first thing he felt was a strange buoyancy.

It felt as though he were floating on the surface of the water. Then the chill of the sea enveloped his body.

"Uuugh..."

Theodore reflexively furrowed his brow and tossed and turned, without even realizing what state he was in.

However, if someone twisted around while bobbing on the surface of the sea, it was only natural for their head to plunge straight into the water.

Theodore went under without properly coming to his senses, and only regained consciousness after inhaling a great deal of seawater through his nose.

"Ghk, urgh, kuh-huuk...!"

His arms and legs flailed instinctively. Faced with the threat of death, the Crown Prince's dignity no longer mattered. Tears and mucus streamed down his face as he struggled desperately.

The lazy Crown Prince did not even know how to swim properly.

The Imperial family's golden bloodline magic, which was supposedly activated automatically whenever its user sensed a threat to their life?

It had already done its job by shielding him from the shock wave of the engine's explosion. The magic had fulfilled its purpose by allowing him to move unharmed even in a situation where an ordinary person would have had every bone in their body shattered.

And at last, the Crown Prince, who had lost everything that had protected him, could do nothing but struggle pathetically.

A man who had spent his entire life passing everything off onto others and running from responsibility would collapse all too easily when the moment finally came for him to stand on his own.

The strength was slowly draining from his limbs. His stomach was already full of seawater, and every breath through his nose was half air and half seawater.

Was he really going to die like this? That thought crossed his mind as his consciousness began to fade.

From above, someone's hand seized him by the neck.

At first, for the briefest moment, Theodore thought it was a hand of salvation. He felt relieved, thinking that a noble who had somehow survived had rescued him and intended to flee.

But that misunderstanding was quickly corrected.

"Kuh-huk, urgh, kuh-huk, thank... keh!?"

That was because Theodore's body was violently hurled onto the floor just as he was trying to thank his rescuer while vomiting out mouthfuls of water.

...Something was a little strange.

It was far too rough to be a hand of salvation.

Sensing something amiss, Theodore slowly opened his eyes—and

"...Huh?"

He found himself staring into five pairs of brilliant red eyes.

The figures surrounding him as he lay on the ground wore thick steel armor and carried heavy equipment on their backs. The only things that possessed any color on their pitch-black steel armor were their glowing red eyes.

Those glowing eyes merely stared fixedly at Theodore.

"Keh, cough, stop... khh..."

A steel military boot mercilessly stomped on Theodore's body. As he was forced to vomit up seawater, he tried to understand the situation.

Those are... those are the Southern bastards' special forces.

And if men like that were here...

Only then did Theodore recognize the identities of the people who had pulled him from the sea.

[ Former Crown Prince Theodore of the Empire secured. No visible external injuries, and he is expelling seawater without issue ]

"W-Wait!"

Theodore hurriedly tried to rise, but the special-forces soldiers, all of them seventh-tier mages or higher, were much faster.

Boom!

A steel boot slammed down with tremendous force and crushed Theodore's index finger.

For a brief moment, he felt nothing. Perhaps it was because the situation itself felt so unreal.

The Crown Prince of the Empire. A man loved and revered by everyone. The master of all its subjects and one of the most exalted beings in the Empire.

Was someone like him being captured by a group of unknown men and subjected to this?

He had never even imagined such a thing in his entire life, so Theodore could not properly comprehend what was being done to him.

However, as always, Theodore did not need to understand what was happening to him.

Pain was the most intuitive and certain answer of all.

"Aaaaaaaagh!?"

The agony of his index finger being horribly crushed made his vision flash white. The Imperial Guards seized Theodore by the hair as he rolled across the floor clutching his hand, which was streaming with blood.

[ Does it hurt? ]

"Khh, kuh..."

[ Hah, you can't endure even this? You were the Empire's Crown Prince? ]

[ Pathetic. Where is your dignity as a member of the Imperial family? ]

The Imperial Guards reacted differently. But they all shared one thought: the Crown Prince was pathetic.

They had assumed that the Crown Prince would be able to endure this much, but at this rate, he would pass out before they could do anything.

The Crown Prince had to be judged before the citizens of the Empire. That alone was the way to soothe the resentment of all those who had suffered unjustly at his hands.

For that to happen, the Crown Prince had to remain in his right mind.

To make him receive the condemnation directed at him while fully conscious, and to have him executed while fully conscious. That was the order Lord Kyle Leopold had given them.

[ Bring a healer. ]

In other words, they had to keep him alive and bring him back conscious, but...

Lord Kyle Leopold had issued no orders beyond that.

Which meant that all he needed was to remain conscious with his body intact.

"W-Wait! Excessive torture of a prisoner is a war crime..."

[ That's only if you get caught. ]

Whether former Crown Prince Theodore had any right to babble about war crimes was another matter, but a war crime was still only a war crime if someone found out about it.

And a healer could completely restore physical injuries.

[ What can you do? ]

Well, they had not actually intended to torture him so blatantly.

Excessive torture was one of the chief causes of military discipline collapsing. It was unacceptable for the discipline of those guarding Lord Kyle Leopold's immediate vicinity to break down.

The Imperial Guards understood that perfectly. They were people who valued their loyalty to Lord Kyle Leopold more highly than their personal desire for revenge.

All they wanted was for Theodore to experience, just once, the helplessness they had felt.

But from Theodore's perspective, since he did not properly understand that fact, there was no situation more terrifying than this.

With the Imperial Guards holding both his arms, Theodore wet his pants in a disgraceful fashion.