608.like an iron-clad wall moving forward.
Fifteen warships armed with artillery advanced in a single line,
like an iron-clad wall moving forward.
Bronze gunports bound at the bows held their breath low.
Each time gunners moved with slow matches in hand,
the smell of powder spread first into the wind.
Behind them, warships mounting crossbows and ships packed with archers
advanced in three, then four layered ranks, pressing forward at a measured pace.
It was a formation moving as one body atop the waves.
To the enemy's eyes, it must have looked as though the sea itself were advancing.
As the artillery fleet drew near, the Japanese ships surged forward.
Masts twisted, oars tangled, yet they forced speed.
Their logic was simple.
Grapple.
Climb.
Cut with steel.
Before weapons that hurled explosions from afar, that logic failed.
The Goryeo warships did not break spacing.
They held the grain of the formation and drove straight in.
"Maintain distance."
"Fire forward guns."
Kwaaang—!
Kwa-gwa-gwa-gwaang—!
Shells tore through the water and ripped apart the bows and hulls of charging enemy ships
as if they were wet paper.
One round burst like a ball of flame, swallowing the raiders on the prow.
Another punched beneath the side, tearing the ship's belly open whole.
Enemy ships that had rushed in at full force lurched—
and stopped.
As hulls tilted, water poured through the gaps.
The ships folded in on themselves and sank.
The Goryeo fleet moved by governing speed.
Shells kept their place.
Arrows kept theirs.
Oarsmen kept theirs.
With brief commands, gunners held accuracy fast.
"Maintain firing intervals."
"Bow left thirty—minor adjustment."
Archers rained flaming arrows onto enemy decks and masts.
Each streak of fire cut the sky,
and wood aboard the Japanese ships caught first.
Oarsmen pressed the formation forward,
subduing wind and current together.
The sound of oars cutting water kept a steady rhythm.
The enemy charged, yet found no space to swing blades.
Artillery broke the ships first.
Arrows dropped the men first.
What remained was pulled down by the water itself.
Even those who seized the gunwales to board
were sent under with two shots—ship and all.
Leaning on the rail, Yun Dam checked the flags flying on each enemy ship.
Even amid the thunder, his eyes did not waver.
"Tsushima Sŏ clan."
"Tsushima lord's fleet."
"Matsuura."
"Hizen."
"A collateral branch of the court faction."
He paused, then spoke more softly.
"Southern domains are mixed in as well."
Without turning his head, Park Seong-jin said,
"Record every house and their port of departure."
Yun Dam set paper on a small rail and carefully copied each name.
When the battle ended, the line of responsibility would surface with it.
Both Yun Dam and Park Seong-jin were already tracing that line.
"Point of origin" did not mean Tsushima alone.
Iki Island.
The shadows of certain lords in Kyushu and Shikoku.
Those shadows were already trembling above the sea.
(Not spoken officially.)
(But recorded.)
On the warships, the next shells were being loaded in silence.
Inside Izuhara Harbor, the first thing to collapse was not ships.
It was command.
The chain of orders failed to function.
Below a hillside at the far end of the port,
inside a makeshift command shelter,
minor Japanese leaders shouted at one another.
Their voices were loud, but their words never met.
"Launch the ships!"
"Half of them are already sinking!"
"Abandon the port and take to the mountains!"
"If we go to the mountains, who guards the ships!"
Each clutched only the disaster before his eyes.
No one saw the harbor as a whole.
At the first cannon blast, they thought it a raid.
At the second, still only a surprise attack.
Only when the third explosion split the harbor mouth
did they realize this was not an intrusion—
it was a seal.
The retreat was cut off.
A man who had sprinted down to the quay collapsed to his knees, shouting,
"We can't get out! Every ship that tries is blown apart!"
As the words fell, the command shelter went quiet.
It was not deliberation—
it was the gap where fear enters.
Someone gripped a sword hilt.
Someone called to a god.
Someone was already staring toward the mountains.
"Who commands here!"
The shout rang out, but no answer came.
Izuhara had never possessed a single command.
Each house provided ships.
Each chief led his own band.
It was enough for plunder.
Not enough for war.
Inside the port, a ship tilted sideways and sank.
Men spilled off it into the water.
Someone cried,
"Fire!"
That word changed everything.
Blades lost direction.
Spears failed to align.
Orders shattered before they could be passed.
The instinct to survive split into fragments.
Those who tried to launch ships.
Those who abandoned them for the mountains.
Those who scattered into the alleys of the port.
And through it all, cannon thundered again.
Kwaaang—!
A ship set beside the command shelter flipped over whole.
The men inside dropped low at once.
In that moment, someone said,
"This is… the Goryeo army."
There was no surprise in the voice.
Everyone already knew.
There was only one thing they had not known.
That it would come this fast.
As smoke cleared from the sea side, black silhouettes emerged.
Ordered warships.
Movement that never lost spacing.
Someone swallowed hard.
"They… don't stop."
It was true.
The Goryeo fleet adjusted speed, but never hesitated.
Inside Izuhara Harbor,
the enemy's battle was already over.
They simply had not landed yet.
And those who grasped that truth first
were the first to turn their backs.
Command had collapsed.
The fight had not even begun.