Zhai Dazhong sat on a rough wooden chair, his hands on his knees, leaning forward slightly, listening intently to Sha Zhengming's assignment.

Zhai Dazhong is a native of Fujian, and is currently a guerrilla in the Fuzhou Water Label Battalion. This position is theoretically the same as that of an impostor who has just been publicly appointed as a guerrilla general.

However, the official rank is the same, but the real power is very different: for military attachés, the number of soldiers and horses is to some extent directly proportional to status. Qu Dazhong, a guerrilla battalion of water marks, naturally did not have enough soldiers and horses under his command compared with "Cao Chuan".

Mo said that the tens of thousands of soldiers and horses that the pirate leader showed under Fuzhou City a few days ago were those strange ships and the red-haired people who came to help, and Qu Dazhong, who was proficient in water warfare, also knew very well that he was not an opponent.

You must know that some time ago, the officers and soldiers fought a series of battles with Zheng Zhilong, but in the end they ended in a big defeat for the officers and soldiers. This defeat not only sent Yu Zhigao, the chief military officer of Fujian, to the prison, but also from Yu Zhigao down, many generals of the imperial court were killed in battle, a large number of warships were damaged, and the soldiers suffered heavy losses.

The defeat not only led to a great loss of the overall hard power of the Fujian Navy Division, but also the soft power is not optimistic: at present, there is only one deputy commander-in-chief, Zhao Tingyuan, who was originally stationed in the Central Left Institute and has now lost his old nest, is mixed up in Fuzhou City to listen to the guilt, so the officers and soldiers below this person are panicked and have no fighting spirit.

Therefore, when the guerrilla general of Xinke convened a battle meeting with people from all walks of life in Mawei Water Village today, Qu Dazhong came honestly - he had nothing to put on in front of these strong pirate leaders.

......

Like all first-time dealers with the Crossing Crowd, the first thing Qu saw when he arrived at the Maweishui camp was all sorts of shock: the clean and tidy barracks, the smoky boilers, and the glass windows that had only recently become popular in the city of Fuzhou.

Qu Guerrilla knew that the glass was made by these people. But he really couldn't understand the way to install such an expensive thing in the windows of the barracks.

But once it's time for the formal meeting, people feel the benefits of glass windows: bright rooms with plenty of light, and any markings on the map can be seen clearly.

There are quite a few people here today.

There was Cao Chuan, a guerrilla general of the new branch who was dressed in official robes, Sha Zhengming, Sha Qianzong, the actual presiding officer of the meeting, Qu Dazhong, a guerrilla general, five or six foreign generals, including Du Dewei and Cao Hu, and three eye-catching Dutchmen and interpreters were also present.

The various participants quickly focused their attention on the detailed topographical map of Xiamen's surroundings on the wall. The natives, who had never seen the style of satellite maps in later generations, all opened their eyes at this moment.

Not to mention the strange ideas such as "his ambition is not small" and "premeditated" that came out of the minds of Ming people such as Qu Dazhong and Du Dewei, when the curtain on the wall was opened, the majestic Sha Zhengming picked up a whip at this time and began to explain to the map by himself.

The innovative format of the strategy session was a delight for the participants.

Sha Zhengming first introduced the historical background of the entire battle to the map. This includes the current strategic posture of both sides, as well as the resumes and troop numbers of the enemy's major leaders from Li Kuiqi onwards.

After introducing these backgrounds, Sha Zhengming began to explain the draft campaign in detail.

The battle plan drawn up by the Traversal is called "Peeling the Onion", and it is an extremely simple plan to suppress the bandits - these miscellaneous reinforcements here cannot complete the complex task.

The core of this plan is that the fast fleet will strike at the enemy first, and when the enemy's strength is weakened to a critical point, a large force will be dispatched to wipe out the opponent.

So at the end of the meeting, Sha Zhengming concluded: "After our main fleet crushes the bandits, everyone can rush to it." ”

Although the current situation of the Water Mark Battalion is not good, Qu Dazhong is after all an elite military attache of the imperial court who has just crossed the pirates, so he can't understand this reason: how can 8 ships destroy the pirate gang with a total of thousands of ships? ...... Despite the speed of the eight strange ships, and despite the fact that many of the pirates' ships were broken fishing boats.

So Qu Dazhong smiled, the kind of slightly mocking smile with the corners of his mouth slightly upturned.

Then his smile was seen by "Cao Chuan" who was sitting on the side: "General Qu, but the other party has a little opinion?" Let's talk about it. ”

"Don't dare, don't dare, General Sha's strategy is magnificent, Qu admires it!"

Qu Dazhong naturally wouldn't pretend to be a master tactician at this juncture...... At the moment, this gang of pirates is scorching, and the horsetail is people's territory, and the ghost knows who these people are trying to harm when they throw a big head, and he General Qu will naturally not take this stubble.

Hearing someone's seemingly admiring words, Sha Zhengming, who had already put down the whip and walked back, sneered: "General Qu is probably jealous and hateful, and he can't be boasted by others. It's good to say, let's go to sea tomorrow and have a, and we will definitely be able to teach the general to be satisfied. ”

......

The so-called drill is naturally not a fleet that crosses the crowd to pull out the officers and soldiers and hang the boats, but a real live fire.

Early the next morning, off the coast of Fuzhou.

A large number of ships are gathering here. The largest number of them were the pirates who came out of the Mawei barracks. These recruits, who had learned what military discipline was under the education of sticks, were now crowded into 10 brand-new lucky boats, waiting to observe the exercise.

And Qu Dazhong's fleet is not far away. The general only brought five boats out of the water mark this time, and on them were all the officers under his command and some of the officers and soldiers - those who were really in bad spirits he did not bring with him.

In the end, there were three lonely Dutch ships.

Mr. Putmans has been a long-cherished wish since he visited Fuzhou City. And today he actually came to say goodbye: the Dutch had a rather painful perception of the force of the crossers, and they usually saw too much of the power of these destroyers in the Taijiang River, so they were not interested in the so-called exercises...... As soon as the exercise is over, they will have to return to the army to rearm and fight, and they will not have time to waste money here.

All the observation fleets faintly formed a large circle on the sea, and in the middle of the circle were five or six dilapidated Chinese sailing boats.

The next moment, the exercises began.

I saw a white dragon rushing over from a distance. After showing the audience more than 12 knots of high speed, the white dragon began to approach the target ship, followed by a standard shelling at a distance of 1,000 meters.

The combination of 2 destroyers + 6 frigates, a total of 44 Napoleonic guns firing at high speed in turn, suddenly made the onlookers open their mouths.

When the entire fleet fired two rounds of artillery at a distance of 1,000 meters, there were already two target ships slowly sinking. Then came the finale: the fleet lowered its sails at the next moment, then rotated 360 degrees around the target ship twice at high speed, and fired three more volleys at extremely short intervals over a distance of 500 meters.

"There is such a divine thing in the world?!" Comrade Qu Dazhong, who took the telescope presented by the traverser and saw everything clearly, his hands trembled at the moment and he couldn't stop. He now thoroughly understands the meaning of the "onion peeling" plan, and agrees with it from the bottom of his heart.

Just as shocked as Qu Dazhong were those pirate recruits. In addition, the shock of these recruits also contained fear. As long as the brains among them are not stupid, they will have figured out a certain logical relationship: if they didn't follow the shopkeepers to surrender to Chengcheng, then they would soon be sent into the bottom of the sea box by these strange ships without sails and oars......

The exercises went quickly.

If we count from the moment the distant fleet appeared, it took less than 20 minutes for the platoon to send all the target ships to the bottom of the sea.

In fact, the shorter the time, the more shocking it is. Looking at the distant figures of those melon-eating people who were worried about it, Zhang Dongdong standing on the flagship, they could finally breathe a sigh of relief.

In fact, this exercise has been planned for a long time. Because if the traversal crowd does not show strength, then these recruits and the old oilmen of the water mark will retreat in the future battle and will be tied.

And when they find out that they are actually holding a golden thigh, presumably these undisciplined guys will think more about it before doing something. Especially these officers and soldiers who want to transfer at any time: if General Cao returns victoriously, then those who escaped from the battle before can still have a good life?

......

With the end of the exercise, the southward offensive with the crossing fleet as the main force, the officers and men, and the Dutch assisted by the Dutch also began to enter a state of countdown.

In fact, the traversers couldn't drag it on, because Li Kuiqi had to do it.

You must know that more than a month has passed since the first infighting between the pirates of the Central and Left Institute broke up today.

And this situation is actually a kind of competition: the crossing crowd and the pirate gang led by Li Kuiqi and Zhong Bin are desperately fighting for time to integrate. Whoever succeeds in integration first can strike first.

And because of the existence of Xu Xinsu in Yuegang, the traversers have always had an intelligence advantage, which is why they can squeeze out more than a month to train pirate recruits: Li Kuiqi's side is also integrating.

However, the day before the military meeting, a telegram came from Yuegang saying that Li Kuiqi was already in the "conference ministers" and was ready to make a big deal in the near future.

Therefore, Zhang Dongdong and the others hurriedly held a military meeting, and then hurriedly held an exercise - Li Kuiqi must not be allowed to go ashore on a large scale to plunder, otherwise Xiong Wencan and "Cao Chuan" will not have good fruits to eat.

Fortunately, after more than a month of integration, both the soldiers and logistics on the side of the crossing, including the Dutch and the officers and soldiers who came to help, have been coordinated, so the day after the sea exercise, Zhang Dongdong secretly resigned to Xiong Wencan: There are too many eyeliners in Fuzhou City, and there is no need to make a big show for the expedition ceremony.

...... The first to set off was naturally the main fleet composed of 8 sail gunboats, the commander of this fleet was Sha Zhengming, and the deputy commander was Mu Longcheng.

In fact, because all the families of the navy are here, except for Comrade Liu Zhe, who is still staying in Dayuan's town, most of the navy has already come to Fuzhou with the last large force and are stationed in the Mawei barracks.