Early the next morning, Sun Ce transferred 50 archers including Xie Kuan and Deng Xin from the guard battalion, carrying six-stone crossbows and sufficient arrows, to board the building ship to provide long-range cover for Gan Ning's subordinates. These people are carefully selected archers, the original foundation is good, and later after Chen Wang's training, the archery skills are exquisite, the practice of archery is a compulsory subject every day, and other training is also around archery. There are no sharpshooters among these people, but the overall level can definitely be called elite, and it is difficult to find fifty people of the same level in the world.

Gan Ning arranged them on the building boat. With these archers, the two ships became movable archers.

Gan Ning asked people to prepare a hundred iron poles overnight, selected ninety-nine strong subordinates, plus himself, to make up the number of 100 people. He handed over the rest of his men and horses to the deputy general Yang Hong, and he took these warriors in heavy armor to board five fighting ships, and sailed towards Niu Zhu under the cover of two building ships.

Yang Hong commanded 500 soldiers to take more than 10 fighting ships, and followed closely.

Sun Ce also boarded a building ship and watched the battle from afar. Guo Jun stayed in the camp on the shore, waiting for the attack, and Xu Chu and Dian Wei took the righteous battalion with them to protect him. Ma Chao, Yan Xing and others did not get on the boat, yesterday they took a boat to reconnoitre, they were all dizzy, Ma Chao vomited after returning to the camp, this kind of thing is not suitable for them, it is safer to wait in the land camp with peace of mind.

Yang Xiu followed Sun Ce's side, and he was surprised to see Gan Ning and the others fighting like this, so he believed that what Yuan Yao said was true, Sun Ce didn't drink and brag with Gan Ning last night, but discussed the war.

Seeing that there were warships approaching on the river, the Danyang soldiers on Niuzhuji were the first to sound the alarm, and the war drums immediately sounded in the camp. Zhou Xin hurriedly walked out of the big tent, rushed to the riverside position, and looked into the distance. He didn't take Gan Ning and the others seriously, but set his eyes on the flagship in the distance, and when he thought that Sun Ce was on that ship, he gritted his teeth with hatred, and only hated that he couldn't have wings, so he flew over directly and took Sun Ce's life.

"Crossbowmen, get ready to shoot. Spearmen, swords and shields are in the forefront! ”

One after another, orders were issued, flags were flying, war drums were thundering, and one after another, countless soldiers rushed out of the camp, rushed to the position, and laid several lines of defense by the river. The crossbowmen untied bundles of arrows and inserted them into their quiver pouches. The sword and shield men were lined up in small formations, staggered and horizontal, and the spearmen stood behind them, in a triple formation, the nearest was only ten steps away from the river bank, and resolutely did not give Sun Ce a chance to land. Behind the large array were dozens of guards, and if anyone was in a battle, these guards would not hesitate to kill them in order to correct military justice.

Zhou Xin paced back and forth on the platform, standing in a row on the platform, the guard battalion, the long knife out of the sheath, murderous.

The two boats sailed to the shore first, and stopped about thirty paces from the shore. The boat is heavier than the average boat, and the draft is deeper, so it cannot sail directly to the shore. With the efforts of the scholars, the building boat turned around, almost parallel to the river bank, and the two building ships were only twenty paces wide, which could only be used by one fighting ship. Some soldiers shouted and threw down the stone and fixed the ship. Ordinary boats use one stone baron, and the building boat is huge, at least two, and sometimes even four, to protect the stability of the building boat and not be deflected by the current.

The archers take their positions and look for each other's strong crossbowmen. Most of these archers are capable of bows and crossbows, and today's task is to snipe the opponent's strong crossbowmen, so they all use six-stone crossbows, with a range of about 200 paces, etc. The most commonly used crossbow on the battlefield is the four-stone crossbow, with a range of 160 steps, for many shooters, this is already the limit, no matter how far the range is, it is not accurate, and you can only estimate and shoot. Even Xie Kuan and the others used the six-stone crossbow to hit less than forty percent, and whether they could hit the key point could only depend on luck.

But on the battlefield, deterrence is more important.

The archers are well-trained and know what tactics to use in what situations, and they work in groups of five and fire at the same time to improve the accuracy of hits. Before the battle, Wu Chang put his fingers into his mouth to wet them, held them in the air, skillfully measured the wind speed, and visually measured the distance and angle, reminded him to adjust the deviation, and prepared to shoot.

"Are you ready?" Xie Kuan walked over and shouted: "Cheer up, don't embarrass General Sun, don't embarrass King Chen, remember who you are, keep an eye on your target until you shoot him." ”

"Whoa!" The archers replied loudly.

Xie Kuan raised his head and looked at the big ribbon that was blown by the river wind, the big ribbon was heavy and the swing amplitude was small, but the ribbon used for decoration on it was blown up by the wind. Xie Kuan looked at it for a while, took out a striking arrow, put it on the string, aimed it slightly, and pulled the crossbow machine.

"Phew!" The bowstring vibrates.

"Whoosh!" With a sharp whistle, it flew into the sky, drawing a gentle arc, and swooped down, flying more than a hundred and fifty paces, right in the chest of a crossbowman. The crossbowman heard the whistling, but he didn't take it seriously, he always felt that the building ship was too far away, and it was already the range limit of the commonly used four-stone crossbow. In order to boost morale, the first arrow usually chooses a closer target to ensure a hit rate. By the time he heard the whistling sound getting sharper and sharper, it was too late to hide.

The arrow pierced through the chest and peeked out of the back, the feathers buzzing. The crossbowman was taken three steps back and fell on his back.

The nearby soldiers were taken aback, and the opponent not only shot far, but also accurately. If you dare to choose such a distant target with the first arrow, your archery skills will be outstanding. They subconsciously crouched down, looking for a place to hide.

But they were obviously still slow, and before the sound of the chirping fell, dozens of arrows flew out of the building boat and into the crowd, and almost at the same time, four or five crossbowmen were shot with arrows, some of them were hit by more than one arrow, some were killed on the spot, some were seriously injured, and they could not scream.

The bow and crossbow positions of the Danyang soldiers were chaotic, and screams rang out. The guards who oversaw the battle immediately rushed forward and killed the wounded who screamed the loudest. Although the chaos was suppressed in time, the morale was severely damaged, and the crossbowmen who had thought they were safe asked the shield bearers for protection.

At this moment, a fighting ship rushed between the two building ships, and quickly sailed towards the shore, Gan Ning was wearing heavy armor, holding an iron pole, rushing to the front, more than one person high iron pole was erected, and the body of three feet wide was like a big shield, protecting the face door and chest and abdomen, and twenty soldiers were behind him, two side by side, rushing forward, stepping on the water splash.

Zhou Xin was condescending, saw clearly, surprised and disdainful at the same time. You think you'll be able to break the formation? The bow and crossbow can't threaten you, I still have two thousand elite foot soldiers waiting for you, even if you can use one as ten, you will have no return today.

"Drumming, fighting-" Zhou Xin shouted.

The herald waved the battle flag and gave an order, the drummer beat the cowhide drum, the drum exploded, and the crossbowman, who was disrupted by a burst of fire, remembered his mission and hurriedly began to shoot, and in an instant, more than a thousand feathered arrows jumped into the air and flew towards Gan Ning and others.

"Raise the shield—" Gan Ning roared, clenching his grip on the iron pole, ready to meet the rain of arrows.