Zhu Mingxia is gone.

Standing on the slipway of the Port Arthur and looking at the sails that gradually disappeared into the sky, I thought.

His Majesty came to Lushun this time to take time out of his busy schedule to meet Huang Sitong, who had just come down from the battlefield. After a morning of cordial and friendly conversation with Huang Stone, the patriarch encouraged Huang Stone to continue to fight hard and contribute to the early elimination of the Tartars, the recovery of Liaodong, and the liberation of the people of Liaodong who were oppressed and brutalized by slave owners. Comrade Huang Stone felt the deep concern and expectation of the veterans and the Chinese government and people, and burst into tears on the spot, vowing not to return to Liaodong and never stop fighting.

After briefly inspecting the Lushun garrison area and consoling the officers and men of the garrison area, the veteran boarded the ship and left without a moment's rest. He will first inspect the construction of the town of Dengju in the west, and then travel all the way east across the Yellow Sea to Korea, inspect the headquarters of Donggang Town, and pay a state visit to the Kingdom of Korea. Finally, if all goes well, His Majesty will go to Japan to discuss the end of the crusade with the Japanese shogunate. Ah, Zhu Mingxia is really a good veteran and leader who is hardworking and tireless, selfless and dedicated to the interests of the motherland!

Well, yes. At noon today, the news of Qian Ran's landing in Edo had already arrived. He had already made contact with the envoys sent by the Tokugawa shogunate, and peace would soon be brought to the Japanese people by our invincible defense forces.

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Rewind the clock to three days ago, the day Huang Stone was rescued back to Eternal Life Island.

Thousands of kilometers to the east, in the middle of the island of Honshu, Edo. Edo Bay, which used to be bustling with sails, is now home to less than one-tenth of the usual boats. And these big ships anchored in the harbor, but the naval flag of the Australian Song Dynasty fluttered on the mast.

Lieutenant Colonel Qian Ranqian, who was in charge of the first section of the Liaohai Fleet, was standing at the bow of the flagship Zhenyuan at the moment. The sea breeze blew his clothes, Qian Ran took off his hat and handed it to the adjutant, and spread his hands as if hugging the city: "Look, this is our trophy, the heart of Japan, the burning Edo!" ”

As the camera progresses, several destroyers are slowly moving closer to the shore, aiming their guns at the shore. The artillerymen were gearing up in the cabin, ready for the cannon to roar. Hundreds of dinghys are sailing on the sea, and the people on board are struggling to paddle their oars. Snow-white waves rolled beside the dinghy, and countless white lines flowed on the clear blue sea.

The first soldiers who landed had taken control of the port. The port area of Edo Port, like almost all urban ports in Japan, is full of chaotic and illegal buildings. The chaotic wooden houses are stacked on top of each other, like the building blocks of children piled up haphazardly. Dirty cloth of all colors hangs on the house for all sorts of reasons and ways that we can't think of. Some of them may be curtains, some of them may be signs... Well, anyway, their original role will not be played now. In the eyes of the Ao, Song and Ming people, who came all the way across the sea, these dirty cloths and wooden houses together can only make those who see them feel very irritable.

The reactionary forces of the shogunate were ambushed in the houses of the port area – and it was difficult to tell which ones were used for business or office – in an attempt to defeat our landing force. These stubborn and ignorant samurai not only did not surrender, but also showed extreme aggression. In the face of the combined forces of the southwestern feudal clans that had landed on the shore to establish a landing ground, the shogunate's samurai and modern troops opened fire on the harbor from the residential area, supplemented by swift spear charges and arquebus fire, and almost succeeded in driving the landing troops into the sea.

However, Qian Ran's navy is not an ornament.

The destroyers approaching the harbor immediately launched a counterattack, dozens of guns spraying grapeshot at the same time, and the shogunate army was subjected to terrible fire that they would not have seen in their nightmares. The samurai who rushed to the front were dressed in expensive iron armor - it turned out that it was the old armor that our country had exported to them before, and it was subjected to the heaviest firepower. One by one, instead of a row of samurai, the samurai were carried backwards by lead bullets, and the people began to disintegrate in the air, and their bodies of more than a hundred catties were shattered by the high-speed passing shotguns, and they fell into a pile of indescribable flesh and blood when they landed.

The destroyer, which opened fire at the same time, made a deafening loud noise. Under the cover of naval artillery, the more than 300 vassal armies of the southwestern feudal domains that landed on the shore finally stabilized their positions and established a rough defensive line near the port.

Half an hour later, the second group of vassals landed on land. This is a special group of troops (if they are also considered an army), and their special performance lies in the fact that their equipment is particularly cheap, cheap enough to be comparable to the peasants who were captured as cannon fodder during the Warring States period of Japan. Precious iron armor is naturally not available, and it is not a first-hand product that looks like a professional knife; As for the flintlock pistol, don't even think about it. In fact, the Cheechitan army, which carried the Red Cross flag and was led by Bishop Born Island, the Catholic Catholic President of the Loyal Monarch, Lord Duncan of Scotland, was dressed in poorly made leather armor or blood-stained armor, carrying bamboo guns with iron spear heads or notched knives, and wearing strips of cloth with the words "God above" tied to their heads. Except because of religious superstition... Or the desire to rob and the excitement of the red skin, they are not much different from the robbers in the mountains of Japan.

Having received reinforcements of more than a thousand men, the vassals began to attack the residential areas. The fierce Japanese vassals did not show any preferential treatment to their compatriots, torches and incendiary bombs were thrown into the wooden houses, the flames gradually spread in the sea breeze, and the heat and poisonous smoke quickly cleared the way for the landing force.

More than a dozen three-pounder guns were transported to the shore, and the artillerymen of the Dongjiang Army pushed the cannons to a place more than ten meters away from the wooden house area. The shogunate troops, who were entrenched in residential areas, rushed out, presumably trying to destroy our artillery, but they were fired in the face by the musketeers who protected the artillery, and were killed at a close distance.

The three-pounder guns opened fire, and the thin wooden houses were knocked down in rows, and the shogunate troops hidden in them could no longer withstand such ferocious fire. They fled like rats in the sun, dropping weapons and armor everywhere.

It was a very boring battle, the enemy's counterattack was as weak as cotton, and our army suffered less than thirty casualties, all of whom were of Han Chinese descent, unscathed. After the third group landed, the army commanders regretted to find that what prevented them from expanding their gains was actually a fire in a residential area that had been ignited by the vassals.

"Tell the Japanese who come ashore to plunder the port." Qian Ran said to the adjutant with a frown. It is only two or three kilometers away from the Honmaru Goden, where the Tokugawa family lived, and even if you don't stand on a high place, you can easily see the rising gunpowder smoke and hear the rumbling of cannons from this distance. This time, the fleet sailed into Edo Bay and shelled Edo Port with great fanfare, not to conquer the city, but not to let the Japanese who had lost their minds after robbery run out completely.

The chief of staff of the fleet on the side brought a map. This is a standard map issued by the Senate, and the content can be accurate to the administrative division of the city, and the entire map includes all of Japan... Qian Ran firmly believed that the Japanese themselves did not have such an accurate map.

The chief of staff looked at Qian Ran, and he knew that he needed to choose a city to occupy.

"That's it." Qian Ran pointed to Kanagawa on the west side of Edo Bay — that's the name on the map, but it's not actually called Kanagawa — and said to the chief of staff. These four simple words determine the fate of a city.

The chief of staff went down to set up the task, and Qian Ran continued to look at the burning port. This was the first and a half months of the war against the shogunate, and the shogunate, which was violently heading for the Hizen Domain, must not have imagined that less than fifty days later, the Ao-Song people put the cannon of the giant ship in front of their heads.

The war between the newly industrialized countries and the old feudal agrarian states was always simple enough to reduce the level of the commander.