Chapter 10

On the helicopter, Shen Wanqing couldn't help but ask, "Captain, what are you going to do on the Japanese warship?"

Lin Yuan smiled and said, "I'm going to make them surrender."

Shen Wanqing's eyes widened as she said, "Are you crazy? How is that possible! Didn't you discuss this with anyone else? Would they agree?"

Faced with Shen Wanqing's barrage of questions, Lin Yuan smiled, turned his head, and gazed at the sea under the night sky, saying nothing. For some reason, Shen Wanqing felt an unprecedented urgency. She said anxiously, "We just sank their flagship. If we go to their ship now, they will kill us!"

Lin Yuan smiled calmly, as if looking at a child who knew nothing of the world. He said, "Don't worry, they won't dare to do anything to us."

Shen Wanqing asked again, "Then why did you ask me to come with you?"

Lin Yuan smiled again but said nothing. Shen Wanqing couldn't figure out what he was thinking and stopped talking. Lin Yuan then asked, "Did you bring any weapons?"

Shen Wanqing shook her head and said, "I didn't bring anything. It's useless. I don't believe they would let us board their ship with weapons."

Lin Yuan nodded and said, "We're on the same page."

Speaking of the warship "Hashirigaki," Ito Sukenori could not figure out which country had such advanced technological capabilities to develop weapons that could attack warships from the air. If they were not Qing warships, why did they have the Qing dragon flag on their mast? If they were Qing warships, why did they lower the dragon flag after being attacked and replace it with a strange flag that no one had ever seen before? The flag was mainly red with five five-pointed stars, one large one in the upper left corner and four smaller ones surrounding it.

The warship itself was even stranger. There were no cannons on the deck, and no smokestacks were visible. Instead, there were several bird-like objects on the deck.

While Ito Sukenori was racking his brain trying to figure out this strange warship, he received a message from the aircraft carrier. He was overjoyed and immediately agreed.

The warship was under a blackout at night, with no lighting or movement allowed. Although the Japanese officers and men on the ship heard the roar of the helicopter, no one dared to come out to look. Lin Yuan couldn't help but marvel, "Such strict military discipline! This fleet is a formidable enemy."

The helicopter lowered a rope, and Lin Yuan and Shen Wanqing descended to the deck one after the other. Ito Sukenori and the captain of the "Hashirigaki," Navy Captain Gao Zhuangzhi, along with the staff officers, were waiting on the deck to welcome them.

Lin Yuan looked at the group and thought that the oldest one in the middle must be Ito Sukenori. He walked up and said in standard and fluent Japanese, "Admiral, I am the captain of the transport ship opposite. Your warship fired shells at my ship at noon today, causing many casualties. We had to take some drastic measures for self-defense, which has caused unpleasantness for both sides. I have come here specifically to exchange opinions with the Admiral to prevent the situation from worsening."

Shen Wanqing also understood Japanese. When she heard Lin Yuan's words, she couldn't help but want to laugh. Clearly, their aircraft carrier had the upper hand, but in his words, it seemed as if they had suffered a great injustice.

When Ito Sukenori heard Lin Yuan's Japanese, he was puzzled. His pronunciation was very standard, but some of the words he used were unfamiliar. Ito Sukenori's thoughts were quite normal. Lin Yuan had learned 21st-century modern Japanese, which naturally differed from what Ito Sukenori knew.

Ito Sukenori had originally intended to determine Lin Yuan's nationality from his language, but he didn't expect him to speak Japanese so fluently. How could he possibly be Japanese? He didn't look like a Westerner. Could he be Chinese? How could the Chinese have such advanced technology? Ito Sukenori could only say, "I am Ito Sukenori. May I ask the name of the honorable captain? And who is this beautiful lady?"

Lin Yuan smiled and said, "My surname is Lin, and this beautiful lady is my assistant. Admiral, are we going to talk in the sea breeze?"

Ito Sukenori smiled and said, "Of course not. Please, guests, come to our conference room."

As they walked to the conference room, Ito Sukenori said at the door, "Do you have any weapons? If so, please let our people take care of them for you."

Lin Yuan raised his hands and smiled, "We don't have any weapons. Would you like to search us, Admiral?"

Ito Sukenori laughed and said, "No need, no need. Even if you did, it wouldn't matter."

Inside the conference room, they took their seats. Ito Sukenori said first, "I have been in the navy for several decades. I have seen almost all the major warships in the world, but I have never seen your ship. May I ask which country your ship belongs to?"

Lin Yuan smiled and said, "We belong to the People's Republic of China."

In Japanese, the terms for the Qing Empire, China, and the People's Republic of China are different. Ito Sukenori frowned, having never heard of this country, and said, "If the honorable captain is unwilling to say, I won't force you. But may I ask why you sank our warship? Declaring war before attacking is the least you could do!"

Hearing this, Shen Wanqing's temper flared. She said angrily, "You have the nerve to talk about declaring war! You ambushed the Russian fleet (on the night of February 8, 1904, Japan attacked the Russian Pacific Fleet in Port Arthur without declaring war, starting the Russo-Japanese War), and later the attack on Pearl Harbor (on December 7, 1941, Japan attacked the U.S. Pacific Fleet in Pearl Harbor without declaring war, starting the Pacific War). Did you ever declare war?"

These words left Ito Sukenori completely baffled. It was 1894, and those events hadn't happened yet.

Lin Yuan quickly laughed in Chinese, "Journalist Shen, think about the time we're in."

Shen Wanqing, flustered, blushed. At this moment, Ito Sukenori said in Chinese, "Are you both from the Qing Empire?"

Lin Yuan was taken aback. He hadn't expected Ito Sukenori to be so knowledgeable about China. He reluctantly said, "Sort of."

Ito Sukenori said, "What did you use to sink our warship?"

Lin Yuan looked puzzled and asked, "What do you mean? We sank your warship? That's impossible. We are a transport ship, unarmed. How could we sink your warship?"

Ito Sukenori hadn't expected Lin Yuan to deny it outright. However, he had no direct evidence to prove that the warship was sunk by Lin Yuan's ship, so he was momentarily speechless.

At this moment, Lin Yuan smiled and said, "Your fleet attacked our ship without cause, causing heavy casualties. I hope the Admiral can provide us with some compensation."

Ito Sukenori had never seen anything like this. He was the commander of the mighty Imperial Japanese Combined Fleet, and his ship was the top warship in the Japanese Navy. His subordinates were thousands of elite Imperial Navy soldiers. Yet now, a Qing person had come to his ship to demand compensation!

Ito Sukenori was both angry and amused. He said, "How much compensation do you want?"

Lin Yuan grandly held up two fingers and said, "Two hundred million taels of silver."

Shen Wanqing almost burst out laughing. She thought, "Captain Lin, are you trying to extort the Japanese fleet commander?"