Doi only got the news on the night of the 2nd.

The Misaki fleet, which remained at Kokura Castle, was annihilated by the Song navy, and several ships of the Choshu Domain's entourage fled before the battle and are now missing; Ogura Castle was then bombarded and landed by the Song army's navy, and the fanatics with the Kishitan cross flag ransacked the entire city, and it was not until the evening that it was driven back by the ronin death squad organized by Hosokawa Tadashi, and even calmly boarded the ship in the harbor and ran away!

As for Kokura Castle, it was burned red by a fire, and looking at the description on the letter, Doi estimated that it should still be burning at this time, and I don't know if Hosokawa's castle tower is still there... It seems that the Hosokawa family is going to move out of the city for the time being.

With a stiff face and handed the letter to Hirotaka Terasawa, Doi barely squeezed out a smile and said to Hosokawa Mitsusang, who came to ask for help: "I have read it, I know your difficulties, please go down first, I will deal with it." ”

Finally told Hosokawa Mitsushang, who staged the crying Qin Ting, Doi sighed and looked at Terazawa, who also had a calm face: "Terazawa-kun, what do you think?" ”

Terasawa glanced at him, and after a while said, "I think there's a problem." ”

Doi didn't speak. He also knows that there is a problem, and it is not a small problem, not a medium problem, but a big problem.

The southern front (i.e., the central line) faced a lot of problems, the army led by Terasawa Taketaka himself seized the No. 1 defense line of the Song people when the sun was about to set, and the legions that had been tired of fighting for a long time were broken under the fortress-shaped defense line built of cement and concrete, and the corpses filled the trench nearly three meters deep, and the continuous gunfire and cannon fire of the Song soldiers rang out all afternoon. He had only recently visited the wounded barracks, and the wounded with missing arms and legs had even been placed outside the camp, and from time to time there were guys who were moaning and dying out of breath and were carried out and burned... The whole thing looks like hell on earth, and it will take at least two or three days to repair before continuing to attack the Song army's hard soil fortress.

Now Kokura Castle to the north has been raided again... The Hosokawa family is a close confidant of the lord, and they can write directly to the lord, and they can't be ignored as cannon fodder. Doi felt the pain of losing sea supremacy for the first time after the Zhiyuan ship visited Edo a few years ago, and the enemy could land wherever they wanted, and the thousands of miles of coastline were all possible battlefields, and it was impossible to defend them.

Doi looked up at Terasawa who was sitting opposite, his gloomy face looking a little terrifying in the flickering candle flames. He didn't wait for the other party to speak, because he knew very well that in such a dilemma, Terasawa would never want to say a word.

That night, Ozaki, who had been transferred to the rear to take charge of logistics, learned of Doi's decision: to transfer the three corps stationed in Kitakyushu to Kokura Castle to protect the Hosokawa family, and then transfer two corps from Shimonoseki to Kitakyushu.

At about 4 o'clock in the morning of the 3rd, I received information from Ozaki in the hard earth fortress. Based on past experience, Doi's order will probably be sent to Kitakyushu tomorrow evening. In other words, between tomorrow night and the morning after tomorrow, it will be the window of time for the change of troops stationed in Kitakyushu.

Pushing forward this time, the time for the implementation of the Trojan plan can also be determined.

"Capture the Void Fortress at noon tomorrow and start a counterattack in the afternoon." I said to Wang Shunjie, who was observing the military meeting, "Some of the fly in the ointment is that the shogunate army has not reached the maximum level of exhaustion, and perhaps more will run away." ”

Wang Shunjie nodded, did not express his opinion, and lowered his head to write it in his notebook.

I continued to look at the huge map hanging on the wall of the conference room, and Chen Jisheng was holding a whip to introduce the strategy of the counteroffensive phase to the army and navy officers attending the meeting.

"Tomorrow will be the beginning of a full-scale counteroffensive, and the end of the retreat on the central line will be the hard earth fortresses. First of all, after capturing the Void Fortress, we will condescendingly storm the Karatsu Legion in an effort to cut off the Karatsu Army's supply line near the Second Line, and then surround nearly 4,000 men, including Doi Toshimori and Terasawa Hirotaka and his sons, between the Booming Falls and the Hard Soil Fortress. ”

"The navy will send a fleet, starting from Nagasaki, into Saga Bay, and finally landing at Saga, and recovering Saga within tomorrow; At the same time, the land forces that attacked Ogura Castle yesterday will land again tomorrow night and complete the occupation. ”

"In addition, the Choshu Domain in western Honshu will officially declare war on the shogunate and will take Kitakyushu in the early morning of the day after tomorrow."

Chen Jisheng smiled and put away his whip and said to everyone: "That is to say, everyone, when the sun rises the day after tomorrow, the shogunate crusading army in the western part of Kyushu Island will be divided into three battlefields hundreds of kilometers apart like a carrot that has been cut into pieces. According to the quality of the Tokugawa army, at that time they would be on the verge of collapse or even directly lose their combat effectiveness. ”

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Although military operations on the frontal battlefield would begin more than a day later, the fighters of the underground front had already begun to get busy.

Before the first rays of the morning sun shined, a dilapidated fishing boat had drifted quietly to the edge of a fishing village in the south of Saga.

"Hey, come out and check it out." A ashigaru standing on the edge of the fishing village shouted. He was dressed in old clothes, without armor, with a knife stuck in a scabbard tied to his waist, and shouted at the fishing boat.

The rags on the fishing boat were lifted, and a dirty-faced fisherman came out of it, bent over his waist, with a somewhat flattering expression: "The villain is a villager from this village, who went out to sea to fish at night, and has only come back now." ”

Ashigaru's eyes widened, and he shouted: "What's the matter, don't you know that there is a war now, and you are not allowed to go out to sea to fish?" ”

The fisherman's eyes showed a trace of sorrow, and with some hesitation, his right hand took out a straw-wrapped thing from the straw basket around his waist, and stuffed it with his hands: "The villain has been hungry for too long, and he really can't help it, so he went out at night..."

Ashigaru didn't wait for him to finish, grabbed what he was holding and put it under his nose, and then took a deep and obscene inhale.

A faint fishy smell came, with a hint of saltiness.

Ashigaru nodded with satisfaction, stuffed the salted fish into the pocket of his waist, and did not forget to threaten a few words in his mouth: "Today is your luck to meet the master and me." You won't be allowed to go out fishing in the future! ”

The fisherman nodded sadly, not daring to say a word, and allowed Ashigaru to extort one of his precious salted fish.

With a soft sigh, the fisherman turned around and signaled softly when he was far away.

The dirty curtain was lifted again, and several wives in rough clothes came out, dismantling the short crossbow they were holding, and quickly jumped out of the boat and walked towards the village.

The fisherman looked at the spies who were fading away in the pre-dawn darkness, and his face still habitually maintained the expression of a sad working man.

"Martial arts are long-lasting." The fisherman bent down again, lifted the basket of fish out of the cabin, and walked slowly towards the village where it was still sleeping.

At the same time, along a dozen kilometers of coastline, on various roads leading to Saga Castle, hundreds of well-trained Japanese spies entered the city in various capacities. Some of them have been killed, but many more have lurked in the city, waiting in the dark for the moment of outbreak.

The ghost blows the lamp