In the past few years, the mortality rate of officials who have come to Banten to take office is actually not low, and more than a dozen officials have died in office, and most of them died of illness!

This is still the biggest enemy of the Tang Dynasty in terms of expanding its territory in Nanyang, even if the Medical Department of the Imperial Royal Institute of Technology has already put forward many countermeasures in response to the situation of water and soil adaptation.

However, this kind of measure is still based on prevention, mainly to do a good job of hygiene, but the lack of modern medicine is still a big problem, and there is only one way to improve this situation, that is, to thoroughly improve the living environment, especially the sanitary environment.

This is also the case that in most cases, the Tang people who immigrated overseas did not have contact with the local aborigines, let alone live in the indigenous cities, and they all chose new places to open up and build cities and live bases.

The most obvious example of this is the city of Banten, which was not built on the site of the original indigenous settlement, but a new fortress on the side, and the original Banten Castle has long since been abandoned.

Cheng Zhiqi doesn't want to die in Banten like Zhu Jiaxiang, he desperately wants to return to China!

So the three of them went out of Zhu Jiaxiang's bedroom and came to the side hall, Cheng Zhiqi suddenly said: "No matter what, this official has to return to China!" ”

Cheng Zhiqi said this suddenly, Xia Zhiquan and Yang Hong on the side were slightly surprised, this person suddenly said that he wanted to return to China, but this is not easy, he is not an officer like Yang Hong and Xia Zhiquan, but a civilian official.

The three people present actually came to Banten for different reasons!

Cheng Zhiyan was demoted, and if he wants to return to China to take up his post, the difficulty is not ordinary.

Yang Hong was level-shifted, although he failed to compete for the commander of the main force in the country, and was forced to come to Banten to serve, but this was not a degradement, but a compensation for his inability to serve in the main force.

Because there are battles in Banten, and fighting means having merit, at least much better than serving in the garrison headquarters of the provinces in the country or in the reserve divisions, those are the complete losers of the competition.

And Xia Zhiquan is different, people didn't come to Wanten to serve because they were demoted, they came here because they were promoted, and they are also the fleet commanders that the navy focuses on cultivating!

At present, among the two major fleets of the Navy, the First Fleet is responsible for the waters north of Daeyuan Island, guarding Gyeonggi and controlling the domestic coasts such as the East China Sea, the Yellow Sea, and the Bohai Sea, as well as the waters around Japan.

But on the surface, it seems that the First Fleet controls a large sea area, and it also controls Gyeonggi, which is very important, but in fact, the above-mentioned sea areas are almost all the inland seas of the empire, not to mention the domestic coast, not even pirates, let alone the enemy navy, and on the Fuso side, they don't even have a sampan, and it is impossible to pose any threat to the imperial navy.

Therefore, the daily tasks of the First Fleet have nothing to do with operations, most of them are just symbolic cruises, which is why in recent years, the Imperial Navy has begun to reduce the fleet size of the First Fleet and increase the size of the Second Fleet.

The Second Fleet, the sea area in charge is south of Dayuan Island, at present, the entire South Sea Sea is their responsibility, and in this place, there are many pirates, and at the same time, they are facing a huge threat from the Portuguese, and there are also the sea forces of the indigenous countries of the South Seas and the ships that occasionally come to other Western countries, the situation is quite complicated, and the combat mission is very heavy.

As the main fleet, the Second Fleet has heavy tasks, but in the operational planning of the Datang Navy, the main fleet is used to conduct decisive battles at sea, and daily patrols and small-scale naval conflicts are not their tasks, and these tasks belong to overseas fleets.

At present, the Imperial Navy has a total of three overseas fleets, namely the Ryukyu Fleet, the Luzon Fleet, and the Banten Fleet, among which the Banten Fleet is of relatively high importance.

Xia Zhiquan was able to serve as the commander of the Banten squadron, which was only possible to sit in this position by squeezing out many competitors, and if nothing else, he would be able to obtain his rank of rear admiral in this position.

Therefore, strictly speaking, Xia Zhiquan is different from Cheng Zhiqi and Yang Hong.

But one thing is the same, they are all eager to make contributions, Cheng Zhiqi wants to make achievements, and then transfer back to China to work, whether it is to return to the economy or to work in the local area, he is willing, as long as it is not in an overseas territory like Banten.

Yang Hong wants to make achievements, so as to be transferred to the main force on the front line, so that he can have the opportunity to rise to another level in the fiercely competitive army, cross the threshold of generals, and become a general, even if it is just a brigadier general.

Xia Zhiquan wanted to make achievements and be successfully promoted to rear admiral in the Banten squadron, and then seek the position of commander of the main squadron.

Although their identities are different and their political futures are different, their goals are very similar, so Xia Zhiquan's plan to attack the natives of Banten Island and eliminate a number of rival lords was unanimously agreed upon by the other two.

In this kind of matter, they have a common interest!

Since it has been decided to fight, then the next thing is naturally to discuss how to fight, and this kind of thing Cheng Zhiqi consciously closed his mouth, he is a civilian official, and he can decide whether to fight or not, but how to fight, specific military operations, he has no authority to intervene.

So after determining the general direction, Cheng Zhiqi just shut up, and just listened to Xia Zhiquan and Yang Hong, the two army and navy leaders in the Banten region, discuss military affairs.

Xia Zhiquan's proposal was very simple, that is, to directly transfer about a thousand troops to carry out a sweeping operation against several hostile lords nearby, break through their cities, eliminate their armies, and destroy their lords.

The whole battle process will not last long, start the campaign quickly, and then end the battle!

Colonel Yang Hong, on the other hand, hopes to recruit some more indigenous lords who have returned to the Tang Dynasty and let them also send troops to fight, and the battle should be mainly based on the indigenous army, supplemented by his own troops.

This is to avoid casualties among the troops!

After all, in this campaign, the main force participating in the battle will be the Banten garrison regiment, and the navy will at most provide a little support, which is of little use, and the militia is okay in defending the city and acting as a logistics force, but it is still not good to go directly to the front line to fight.

After all, the militia is a militia, and its combat effectiveness is not very strong, and it is okay to fight and fight, but it is still unreliable to participate in the war as the main force.

However, whether it is the army, the Marine Corps, or the militia, if the casualties are too large, it is difficult for them to replenish the soldiers, but it is too difficult, they need to be transported from the country, the cycle is too long, and the cost is high.

Therefore, if there are too many casualties, it is not a good deal.

But there is no need to care much about the deaths and injuries of those indigenous troops, anyway, there are many indigenous people, and the problem of tens of thousands of deaths is not big, and this is a lot of deaths, which will also help the subsequent situation on Banten Island.

After all, the empire wants land rather than people, regardless of whether it is to the natives of the empire or the hostile natives, in the end it is not needed.

After a day of deliberation, Xia Zhiquan and Yang Hong reached an agreement, the battle is expected to be launched in five days, the expedition is led by Colonel Yang Hong himself, the Banten garrison regiment of 1,000 people are all on the march, and the marines and militia units of the navy are staying in Banten City.

The Banten Squadron also stayed in Banten Harbor during this time to prevent the enemy from taking the opportunity to attack Banten Castle from the sea, and the reason why those pirates were able to attack Banten Castle before was because the Banten Squadron was not there.

Otherwise, with the Banten Fleet, unless the Portuguese dispatched the main fleet, it would be impossible to pose any threat to Banten City with the pirate ships and indigenous ships, let alone a successful landing.

With the naval fleet, marines and militia, the safety of Banten City can be ensured, and Colonel Yang Hong can also lead the Banten garrison regiment to the expedition with confidence.

At the same time, the Banten authorities also asked the five surrounding submissive indigenous lords, large and small, to send troops to the war, and the largest one was Jakarta.

This place was originally a vassal country of Banten, and after the Banten royal family was destroyed by the Tang Western Company, they took the opportunity to break away from the control of Banten and began to stand on their own.

Because Jakarta was so close to Banten, they were also the first lord forces to be militarily attacked by the Banten authorities, and needless to say, they were undoubtedly defeated and chose to surrender.

At that time, Zhu Jiaxiang abolished the original lord of Jakarta and supported a new lord of Jakarta with a side royal family, so Jakarta also became the dog leg of the authorities of the Tang Banten Province.

Because the natives of Jakarta work hard, and many people did die when they fought for the Tang Dynasty, the Banten authorities were not bad to them, and various trade policies were relatively friendly to them, and they also sold them not good weapons and equipment, not to mention plate armor and cold weapons, and also shot a batch of arquebuses to them.

Therefore, the Jakarta Consulate is actually the first lord to have an organized musket unit on the entire Banten Island, which is only a small number, only more than 500 people.

This time, according to the order of the Banten authorities, Jakarta sent most of their main force with a total of more than 5,000 people, including 1,000 arquebusiers, four-signature spearmen, sword and shield soldiers, etc.

In addition to the indigenous troops sent by the other four indigenous families, this time the authorities of Banten Province have gathered a total of nearly 10,000 indigenous troops, and under the pressure of the Banten garrison, they have set off a sweeping operation against the entire western area of Banten Island!

This kind of sweeping operation is not aimed at occupation, but at destroying the enemy's living forces, destroying the enemy's production, and plundering their wealth!

Their first target was the nearest indigenous lord of the Bajang Kingdom called Puja, who had sent troops to besiege Banten City.

When attacking Puja City, the Banten garrison led by Yang Hong did not directly send infantry to participate in the battle, but only let the artillery unit provide long-range fire support in the rear, and the indigenous army led by Jakarta besieged the city for five days, successfully conquered the city, besieged and annihilated about 5,000 indigenous troops in the city, and then burned the entire city.

The city of Puja has been completely erased, leaving only a ruin to tell future generations of their final fate!

The destruction and even burning of Pujia City also announced the official start of Datang's revenge against the siege of Wandan City!

For a time, there was smoke on Banten Island!