Chapter 830: Ashley

"Look at the citizens' anger; this failure has truly brought shame upon our Britain. In recent years, the Navy has become truly disgraceful."

A black, ornate carriage happened to pass by the London citizens reading the newspapers.

The citizens' shouts caught the attention of the two people inside the carriage.

One of them was covered in fat with a wine-red complexion; he was the British Diplomatic Minister Nuohan. There was another person, younger than Nuohan, named William George.

He was the current British Prime Minister and private secretary to Queen Ashley.

Hearing Nuohan's complaint, William looked out the window, "The Navy is indeed somewhat disgraceful. Perhaps they haven't had an enemy capable of threatening them for too long; this incident is a good wake-up call for them."

Taking off his glasses and wiping them, he looked toward Waterham Palace, which seemed shrouded in mist.

Because London had the most prosperous Steam Industry among the cities in Britain.

The smoke produced by the burning of massive amounts of coal clung to this city like a ghost.

While the citizens hated the smoke, they also felt proud of it.

Because it was the existence of numerous factories that provided them with countless jobs.

"But the point is clearly not this; that a barbaric and ignorant Dongtu country could build a Steamship in such a short time—that is what is critical," William said.

After the intelligence from Tianzhu reached his hands, he simply could not believe his eyes, even thinking that Governor Bolt had gone mad.

After all, it was like someone telling him that a man had given birth to a child.

Not until he repeatedly confirmed and verified that the intelligence was accurate did he sit on the black leather chair in his office and smoke three whole cigarettes before calming down.

Without a doubt, this was the worst intelligence he had encountered since taking office as Prime Minister.

It was even worse than Sam Country becoming independent from Britain.

Because an independent Sam Country was merely like a rebellious son, but they were still of Anglo-Saxon blood.

Yet this Dayan Wang who had risen in Dongtu was a foreign race completely incompatible with them.

Moreover, he possessed the power to destroy their vested interests in Dongtu.

It was simply like a demon crawling out of hell.

Furthermore, just a year ago, under the joint resolution of the Queen and Parliament, Britain had formulated a plan to turn Dayan into a British colony.

The fleet sent to Tianzhu was also for the sake of this plan; never did they expect such a thing to happen.

The two chatted for a while, and the carriage crossed a small bridge, with a white castle appearing in front.

This was Waterham Palace, the place where the British Queen slept and worked.

Stopping in front of the castle, the guards stationed at Waterham Palace stepped forward to open the carriage door and led the two to the conference hall.

After waiting for three minutes, Queen Ashley, in a long golden dress, walked in accompanied by her maids.

Nodding to Nuohan and William, she sat down in a chair, her brows tightly furrowed.

As the Queen of the United Kingdom of Britain and Ireland and Tianzhu, in the twenty years since her coronation, no event had ever shocked her so much.

So much so that she had not slept all night and had summoned Prime Minister William and Diplomatic Minister Nuohan to Waterham Palace early.

Regarding the crisis in Dongtu, Britain must react immediately.

"What do the members of Parliament say?" Supporting her head with her hand, Ashley said slowly.

"They demand that a fleet be dispatched to Tianzhu, that troops be reinforced, and that war be declared on the Yan Wang in the North Territory of Dayan," William said.

Last night, he had urgently summoned the members of Parliament; both the Whig Party he belonged to and their rivals, the Tory Party, advocated for war.

Tianzhu, the jewel in the British crown, was related to the interests of too many members of Parliament.

Moreover, Britain's colonies in Dongtu were not just Tianzhu, but also Piao Country to the east of Tianzhu, as well as Malacca and the nearby islands.

If they could not suppress this Dayan Wang and allowed him to rampage in Dongtu, their interests in Dongtu would suffer major losses.

The intelligence sent by Bolt mentioned that they had conducted an assessment of this Yan Wang.

This Yan Wang's style of conduct was very tough; he would not allow Dayan's interests to be damaged and advocated for Westerners to withdraw from the colonies in Dongtu.

His actions of controlling Gaoli and attacking Dongying also proved his extremely strong desire for expansion.

All these things led to the fact that a conflict between Britain and this Yan Wang was inevitable.

Only if Britain abandoned its colonies in Dongtu could the two sides sit down and talk.

It was for this reason that the attitude of the members of Parliament was unprecedentedly unanimous.

Ashley nodded; she had thought about it all night and held the same attitude.

According to Bolt's account, the Yan Wang was currently waging a war to unify Dayan.

This was the best time to contain or even eliminate the Yan Wang.

If they missed this opportunity, once the Yan Wang unified Dayan, they would inevitably have a direct conflict with the Yan Wang's army next.

Since they could not possibly abandon Tianzhu and other colonies in Dongtu, the conflict with the Yan Wang was unavoidable.

It would be better to intervene in the Dayan civil war comprehensively sooner.

Furthermore, they, Britain, were the empire on which the sun never sets, the leader of the Western Lands world.

If their fleet was wiped out by natives in Dongtu and they did not take retaliatory action, the empire's honor would be damaged.

"But the British mainland is too far from Dongtu; fighting in the distant Dongtu is very disadvantageous. Moreover, this Yan Wang's firearms are on par with Britain's, and because he used a clever method, he has even surpassed our muskets. This war will not be easy," Ashley said slowly.

This was also one of the things that shocked her.

However, what was fortunate was that this type of musket was not a subversive technology; relying on their Steam Industry, they could imitate this type of musket.

"There is more than just us, Britain, that has relevant interests in Dongtu. Your Majesty, you summoned me—is it to prepare to launch a diplomatic action?" Nuohan said.

When the Queen summoned him, he had already thought of this point.

"That is correct. Bolt did what he should have done in Tianzhu, but we still need a real consultation with other countries, especially Ross and Frank. Using the minimum cost to obtain the maximum benefit has always been our British tradition; a lone wolf hunting is never as good as a pack of wolves," a sharp glint flashed in Ashley's eyes.

Cooperating with other Western Lands countries, they might have to concede some interests.

But this was at most a division of spheres of influence, a question of who eats more and who eats less.

But if they lost in the contest with the Yan Wang, they would not only be unable to consume the interests in Dongtu, but they would also have to spit out what they had already eaten.

Therefore, in order to strangle this Yan Wang, she naturally had to unite more Xitu Guo.

After all, they in Britain could not even send ordinary fleets and military forces to Dongtu.

They had too many colonies in the world that needed to be maintained.

At the same time, she was also worried that the Xitu Guo would take the opportunity to backstab Britain; cooperation was one thing, but there was no guarantee that Frank and Ross would not engage in underhanded tricks.

It was also necessary to leave behind a portion of military forces to defend the homeland.