After Jack and Barraba left, the explorer did not stay put.
Roger commanded the fleet, sailing towards a nearby deserted island.
He had specifically chosen this island while studying sea charts.
It was hidden, surrounded by mountains on three sides, with only a narrow entrance, forming a natural harbor.
Most importantly, it was far from the main shipping lanes.
Neither the Royal Navy nor other pirates rarely ventured here.
This would become the secret base for the explorer fleet for the next few days.
"Captain, aren't we going straight to Tortuga to wait for news?" Gibbs asked, somewhat puzzled, as he watched the explorer slowly enter the unfamiliar bay.
"Why go to Tortuga? To wait for those British fellows to come knocking?" Roger glanced at him.
"Governor Swann isn't a fool; he'll prepare the ransom, but on the other hand, he'll definitely send a fleet to blockade all routes to Tortuga."
"If we go now, we'll be walking straight into a trap."
Gibbs understood, and a cold sweat broke out on his forehead.
"Captain, you're always so thoughtful!"
"So what are we doing here? Just waiting?"
Billy also came over; he was someone who couldn't sit still.
"Of course not just waiting."
Roger's gaze swept over the crew on the deck, who were full of energy but still somewhat lax in discipline.
"Starting today, the explorer will undergo three days of intensive training."
"Training?" Billy and Hanson were stunned.
"We're pirates, not the navy, what's the point of training?" a new pirate grumbled softly.
"Exactly, don't we just need to know how to fire cannons and fight?"
Roger heard their discussions, but he wasn't angry.
He walked in front of everyone and said loudly:
"I know that for many of you, being a pirate relies on courage and luck."
"But I want to tell you, from today onwards, on my ship, Roger's ship, courage and luck are only secondary!"
"We, on the explorer, rely on this!"
Roger pointed to his head.
"We rely on skill! On discipline! On teamwork!"
"I don't care how you were pirates before, whether you rushed into close combat with a burst of passion or bullied merchant ships with sheer numbers."
"That won't work here!"
"I want to forge you into the most professional, most efficient, and most fearsome team in the entire Caribbean Sea!"
"I want all the Royal Navy and pirates who hear of the 'Albatross' flag to be scared shitless and flee at the mere mention of it!"
Roger's words were filled with strong confidence and infectious energy.
The crew listened with boiling blood, as if they could already see their future selves dominating the Seven Seas.
"From now on, wake up at dawn every morning for an hour of physical training!"
"Run twenty laps around the deck! Move cannonballs a hundred times!"
"Anyone who can't complete it won't eat today!"
"Ah?!"
"Captain, isn't that too harsh?"
The pirates immediately cried out in lament.
They were used to being lazy; making them get up early to run was worse than killing them.
"Then, the morning will be for cannon training!"
"Billy!"
"Here, Captain!"
"You're responsible for taking the gunners and throwing those empty rum barrels we brought into the sea as targets."
"My requirement for you is: at a distance of five hundred meters, three cannonballs must hit one target!"
"If you can't do it, no one gets to drink rum today!"
"What?!" Billy and the other gunners' faces turned green.
Five hundred meters was quite a long distance for the smoothbore cannons of that era.
Wind speed, waves, and the swaying of the ship would all have a huge impact on accuracy.
One hit out of three shots?
This was an impossible task!
"In the afternoon, we'll have sail handling and tactical drills!"
"Gibbs, you're in charge!"
"I'll teach you a whole new set of turning and speed-changing techniques, as well as several different battle formations."
"Everyone must remember their position and responsibilities; I want your coordination to be as precise as one person!"
"As for the evening..."
Roger paused, a mysterious smile appearing on his face.
"Evening is for cultural lessons."
"Cultural lessons?" The pirates were even more bewildered.
"That's right." Roger nodded.
"From today onwards, everyone must learn to read and write, and learn basic arithmetic."
"I don't want my crew not even knowing how many gold coins they've plundered."
Roger's "devil training" plan left all the pirates dumbfounded.
This... was this still being a pirate?
This was even stricter and more abnormal than the Royal Navy's training!
They felt as if they had boarded a pirate ship.
A pirate ship with stricter management than the army!
...In the storeroom, Elizabeth heard Roger's conversation with the crew clearly.
Her small mouth was slightly agape in surprise.
What exactly did this pirate named Roger want to do?
He actually wanted to teach these illiterate, rude, and barbaric pirates to read, write, and do arithmetic?
And also conduct physical training and tactical drills?
Was he playing make-believe?
Elizabeth thought this man's ideas were utterly absurd.
However, in the next three days, she realized how wrong she had been.
Roger was serious.
Every day before dawn, she could hear Billy's pig-like squeals and the heavy breathing of the pirates from the deck.
In the morning, there was deafening cannon fire.
At first, the cannon fire was sparse, and nine out of ten shots missed.
But in just one day, under Roger's personal guidance, the gunners seemed to have had an epiphany.
They began to learn how to calculate lead, and how to observe the effects of wind direction and ocean currents on cannonballs.
The frequency of shelling became faster and faster, and the accuracy also became higher and higher.
By the third day, they could consistently achieve one hit out of three shots at a five-hundred-meter distance, and sometimes even one hit out of two shots!
This rate of progress was simply astounding!
The afternoon sail handling drills further broadened Elizabeth's horizons.
the explorer, under Roger's command, performed various incredible maneuvers.
It could make sharp turns within a very small area.
It could maintain a decent speed even when sailing against the wind, using a strange "Z"-shaped course.
The crew's coordination also evolved from initial fumbling to increasingly tacit understanding and proficiency.
What Elizabeth found most unbelievable was the "cultural lesson" in the evening.
Roger actually brought out a small blackboard and used a branch as chalk, teaching the pirates to read letter by letter.
These pirates, who usually only recognized cutlasses and rum bottles, now sat obediently on the deck like a group of elementary school students, awkwardly writing "A, B, C" with charcoal on wooden boards.
Although the process was full of various jokes and chaos.
For example, Billy, who could lift a two-hundred-pound cannonball, couldn't remember the difference between "G" and "Q" no matter how hard he tried, frantically scratching his head.
But no one dared to slack off.
Because Roger's rules were stricter than any pirate captain's.
Those who failed to complete their learning tasks also got no food and no rum.
Elizabeth peered through the crack in the storeroom door, watching the man standing in front of the blackboard, patiently explaining the pronunciation of letters.
He seemed to possess a peculiar magic.
He could make a group of unruly desperadoes obediently follow his seemingly absurd commands.
He could transform this motley crew in just three days.
Who exactly was this man?
Was he really just an ordinary pirate?
For the first time, Elizabeth felt a flicker of curiosity about the man who had kidnapped her.
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