Nova immediately sets sail back to Cannanore…

Nova immediately sets sail back to Cannanore to see if the agents he left there have had any more success, but they are facing much the same problem: Portuguese merchandise is going unsold, and the spice merchants are demanding payment in silver.

The Third Armada's mission is on the verge of failure, when the Kolathiri Raja of Cannanore intervenes, and places himself as security for the sale of spices to the Portuguese on credit.

This breaks the deadlock and allows the Portuguese to finally load up at the spice markets.

Having loaded up with the all spices they can obtain on credit in Cannanore (plus whatever cargoes they have managed to steal by piratical attacks on Malabari ships), Nova prepares the Third Armada to leave India.

However, as he is about to set out of Cannanore, João da Nova's Third Armada is cornered in the bay by a fleet dispatched by the Zamorin of Calicut, composed of nearly forty large ships, plus some one hundred and eighty small paraus and zambuks, carrying an estimated Malabari force of seven thousand armed men.