On a small Venoan herring boat Matelleo Tovani plied the waters of Bluewine Bay with his son Paulo. It's lateen sail catching the modest morning wind in pursuit of the shoals. So far they'd brought in a small catch and if they were lucky they'd be home sometime this afternoon. Not that they did not enjoy their work, but getting more things done that day would be good for the family in general. Matello's expert eye was good at finding signs of the fish. Paolo was not as sharp about it and was more concerned with sail and wind, but he was good enough for a teenager. Even so, they took note of the other ships around them which if nothing else helped pass the time.









A slim majority of them were Venoan or hailed from other Anvosian states, but he made out a fair number of foreign ships as well. He'd made out several ships that were probably Dalisid, Torionese, Nyconian and Imperial and a fair number that were not clear. Those from the east usually had ports for oars and lateens and those from the east (save for the occasional craft from the Rajs) and north generally had a more extensive sail plan, but many shipbuilders copied the elements from each other. A few steam galleys paddled about as did couple of enginized freighters. They'd first showed up a decade ago and were still a small minority, but their numbers had risen considerably over the last few years.





Matello saw the steam virtues but still did not care for them. He'd seen a couple of the damn things burn to the water line and that was enough to turn him off the idea. Keeping a big fire in a wooden craft was asking for trouble. They were apparently getting better at preventing that and some of his fellow fishermen had been talking about the prospects of outfitting their boats with steam engines, but leaving that aside there was fuel. Getting enough for the stove back home took up enough of the family budget as is while the wind was free. The merchants who wanted to cross the sea in a few days could have their steamships, Matelleo would stick with his sailboat. There was a good chance that Paulo and a better chance that five year old son Lazzarno would spend a couple years on board a steam galley was their time to serve the Serene Republic, he'd just hoped that the worst of that era.







When he saw a few pillars of smoke coming in from the east he was not surprised or inclined to give it too much consideration. A while latter he noticed that there three ships in that fleet, none of them any masts able to carry meaningful amounts of canvas. That got his attention and Paulo's. Outside of a few tugs and floating experiments there was only one nation in the world which took to the sea without sail. Even before he saw the fluttering flags, Hexagons and cannons did he knew that these were Infrastructural Navy ships. They trumpeted a couple of times and flashed a few times to Galleys which flashed back with some of those new Semaphore Lamps and continued on towards shore. As they did so, they passed by their small craft and he got a good view of them.









The leading ship was enormous, about a hundred yards long as far as he could tell. Not as long or as high as a Prosperity Class ship but stouter. This was a brute with two massive turrets carrying four massive cannons like tree trunks topped with two smaller turrets. It's boxy central hull contained a broadside of six smaller guns and it had four tube shaped affairs in the front. Printed on her prow was "SH-1 AVATAR". The Hunter class ship which followed it was more modest, but was still obviously quite a powerhouse in it's own right. The Cargo ship which took the rear was comparatively mundane, but by in large it was overlooked. A couple of Steam Galleys escorted it in, but that was mainly for show.





"Well, guess the broadsheets were right." Paulo said.





"You're right my boy." Matelleo replied. The Infrastructural Embassy made various announcements which got out through it's own newspaper and gave official releases to the local print shops. The description of what their fleet had done at Daagsgrad were amazing and terrifying. Some of it was inflation, he knew that, but when you saw it motor by you definitely felt that at least some of it was true. If any ship could go up against ten times it's number of Dark Elven warships it was currently heading to his home city. As methodical and practical as they were supposed to be, the Infrastructurals were excellent at making a show.







Next: Infrastructure: Part Two Hundred and Eighty Eight