"The old man is the first big fan head of the Nagasaki Domain, Yamamoto Kamiemon Shigesumi! Today I will march to the side of the first queue and live and die with you! I hope that all the armies will obey the order, advance without retreating, bravely kill the enemy, and make a name for themselves as Nagasaki samurai! ”

Shigesumi Yamamoto, a seventy-year-old man, struggled to hide his inner panic while loudly agitating in front of the battle.

Don't look at the fact that he has lived a long time, and he was once a high-ranking feudal lord of the Saga Domain, with a family of up to a thousand koku, but before today, he had never really set foot on the battlefield.

The battle, which later became known as the Battle of Nishisaka no Hills, was actually the first battle of Shigesumi Yamamoto Shinemon, and it was also the battle of his fame with the Nagasaki Red Iron Artillery Army.

The reason why this new infantry regiment of 2,000 flintlock musketeers was called the "Hematite Artillery Army" was not because the iron cannons they held, that is, the flintlock rifles produced by the Ming Dynasty, were painted red, but because they all wore red feather weaves, red cuirasses, and red helmets.

After more than two months of training day and night (no longer 996 or 997), they have been able to arrange a relatively strict formation, and the 2,000 people have divided into five large formations, which are placed outside the city of Nishisaka, waiting to go into battle to kill the enemy or be killed.

Today is October of the twelfth year of Hongxing in the Ming Dynasty, and the year on the Japanese side is October of the second year of Wanzhi.

The Battle of Nagasaki has been dragged on for more than two months - the reason why it has been fought for so long is because the defenders have also dug trenches outside Nishisaka Castle, and they have also deployed 12 and 24 catties of mortars in the trenches. The artillery from the Ming army was able to use these mortars placed in the pit to bombard the soldiers of the Toyotomi Army who were digging trenches five or six hundred paces away. The Nagasaki Domain, on the other hand, continued to organize death squads to launch wave after wave of counterattacks under the cover of these mortar cannons and 12-pound cannons deployed on Nishisaka Castle. Therefore, the siege trench of the Toyotomi army was blocked two miles north of Nishisaka Castle, and there was no way to advance forward.

However, the Toyotomi army has not made any gains in the past two months, although they have not made any breakthroughs in the middle road, they have made a lot of gains in the hilly areas of the left and right roads, and have successfully captured many hills. By the beginning of October, the front of the Toyotomi army had formed a three-sided encirclement of Nishisaka Castle.

In the face of the continuous breakthrough of the Toyotomi army in the mountains on both sides of Nishisaka Castle, the generals of Nagasaki Castle, such as Hoshina Masashige, Nabeshima Mitsushige, Kuroda Mitsuyuki, Hosokawa Tsunori, Tachibana Tadashige, and Tian Yiqing, who came from the Ming Dynasty to serve as the chief of staff, decided to launch a large-scale counterattack against the Toyotomi army on October 11 by attacking the position north of Nishisaka Castle on the middle road!

Since it was a large-scale counterattack, of course, it would not have been just 2,000 hematite artillery troops, in fact, Yamamoto Shigemumi's hematite artillery army was not on the front line when the Nagasaki army was deployed - they were regarded as a decisive killer weapon, not a belligerent vanguard.

While Yamamoto Shigesumi and the other big men were mobilizing with their voices at their heads, the 20 infantry troops composed of iron artillery and Nagasaki soldiers had already set up two large horizontal formations on the slightly undulating open ground north of the trench dug by the Nagasaki army.

Each large horizontal formation consisted of 10 infantry units (equivalent to battalions), and each infantry army had two artillery groups (hundreds) in front and three pikes in the rear in a firing formation - the Nagasaki Army's infantry formation was slightly different from the Ming Army's battalion, and their arquebuses were equipped with a lower ratio, about two to three with spears. Therefore, a large fan is enough to be composed of five hundreds.

Among them, there are two 100-man iron cannon groups, all of which are equipped with Hongxing six-year arquebuses. There are three of them in the 100-man spear group, all of which are equipped with the simplest and most practical long-pole plain guns.

Because this kind of infantry army has not been organized for a long time, there are no complicated tactics, only two ways of playing: "shooting array" and "stabbing formation".

When the firing array was formed, the two artillery hundred-man groups were placed in front of the three spear hundred-man groups, forming a round-fire formation of five to ten rows - because the Toyotomi army basically had no cavalry available, so the Nagasaki army musketeers did not need to form a dense formation, and the Nagasaki army chief Tian Yiqing did not expect to rely on their firepower to defeat the enemy, so he chose the rotation firing tactics of the Nagasaki army's iron cannon hundred-man group to ensure continuous firepower output to attract the enemy's firepower and cover the cavalry and hematite artillery army assault.

After the two iron cannon hundreds, there are three spear hundreds, each of which has five horizontal formations, and after being put together, a large phalanx of fifteen columns is formed, which is the same as the iron cannon group. Therefore, after completing the shooting task, the iron cannon group placed in front of the formation can directly retreat to the rear of the spear group through the sparse formation of the spear group.

In this way, the firing array of the infantry army will become a thrust formation!

At the same time as the 20 infantry troops lined up, the Nagasaki army also had artillery and baregarached cavalry covering the artillery—these troops, although they were dressed in similar clothes to the samurai army of Japan, they were all Ming troops who were disguised as before.

10 3-kilogram guns and 8 12-kilogram guns quickly entered the position under the towing of strong horses and mules, and aimed the muzzles of the black hole hole diagonally at the front line of the Toyotomi army.

The Toyotomi army on the opposite side also made a big move, flying flags, trumpets and drums, and the horses and Hui people who gave orders were constantly coming and going, raising bursts of dust. However, the formation of the Toyotomi side was still not complete, and in the face of the thousands of naked cavalry on the Nagasaki side, they had to carefully arrange the formation, and they also needed to constantly change the formation to cover their extended flanks. As a result, the speed of the Toyotomi army's formation was greatly slowed down, and it also affected the position of their artillery.

Tian Yiqing smiled proudly, and said to Tokugawa Takaka's formation Daibo Ke seriously: "General General, please give the order to attack!" ”

Bao Ke nodded solemnly, raised a "small mop", pointed forward, and said loudly: "Let's start!" ”

A group of neatly draped Japanese generals on both sides shouted in unison: "Hey, hey! Hey, hey, hey......"

Their shouts are the signal to start the attack!

Then the big drums placed on both sides of the Nagasaki army were beaten, and several trumpets that didn't look like words were also sounded!

In the midst of a tight sound of drums and trumpets, the front line of the Nagasaki Army's large horizontal formation began to move forward!

At the same time, a muffled thunderous cannon roar rang out! Tian Yiqing immediately raised the telescope and aimed at the artillery position on the right flank, and saw that the muzzles of several cannons there were emitting a puff of white smoke, and the cannon body retreated sharply.

The Nagasaki Army's 12-pound guns and 3-pound guns fired cross-fire at the Toyotomi army array from both flanks, because the width of the battlefield was not large, so the depth of the Toyotomi army's array was very large, and it was almost impossible to hit the diagonal shot!

The cannonballs flew across the ranks of the Toyotomi army, landed in the crowd, and then bounced up violently and continued to fly, and where they passed, the samurai of the Toyotomi army were knocked down by rows and rows!

Several of the Toyotomi guns had already been deployed, and they began to fire back, and the shells and artillery air also fell in the ranks of the Nagasaki Army that was advancing......

The artillery men of the Nagasaki Army soon began firing, one volley after another, as if there was no end.

The counterattack by the Toyotomi musketeers began...... The guns on both sides came and went, and soon the front of the two armies turned into a cloud and a mountain of fog, and the visibility dropped sharply.

"General, the hematite artillery army can attack!" Tian Yiqing took a breath, raised his right hand and pointed at the right flank of the Toyotomi army, "That's it!" The smoke there was particularly heavy, just enough to cover the advance of the hematite artillery army! ”

"Good!" Bao Ke nodded solemnly, "It's exactly what I want, go and give the order!" ”

"Hay!"

The two horses responded to the crowd, flew out of the fort, rode the "Mongolian horses" imported from the Ming Dynasty, and galloped towards the hematite cannons who had been eager to try for a long time!

Hematite artillery army, attack!