The smoke of gunpowder filled the sea, and the guns on the sides of the forty-eight warships of the Second Cruise Fleet roared on the sea, and they formed a neat battle line, directly cut into the rear of Shi Lang's three-stacked heavy wave formation, cut directly into the tail of the second stack of three-stacked bird ships, and then rushed towards the first and third stacks by the wind.

This completely disrupted Shi Lang's plans, and in the face of as many as forty-eight sloops and brigs, the bird ships under his command had no numerical superiority, not even firepower superiority, and the powerful bow guns could not be used, so they could only watch them cut into formation.

The deafening sound of artillery roared on the sea, and the "Xuzhou", which directly broke into the enemy formation, was full of holes in the foremast sails because of its leading position, which was a hole made by a cannonball, and a sail rope hung loosely. When the whole formation completed the turn, the bow guns of the third stack of bird ships of the Qing army opened fire, compared with the shells that were bounced off before, the shells weighing more than a dozen catties directly penetrated the gunwales of the "Xuzhou", but for the wooden-hulled warships, this was not fatal.

By this time the entire fleet was now in full swing - about every half a minute, nine port guns of the "Xuzhou" would open fire, and another nine starboard guns, which would also fire, should also be fired at the third stack of bird ships. At this time, the sixteen cruisers of the 1st Cruiser Group, also lined up in neat columns, fired shells at an extremely stable rate of fire - three broadside salvos in five minutes. This is an excellent speed. However, after several rounds of shelling, it has now become less regular, and the roar of artillery is not stopped.

The smoke from the artillery fire drifted across the sea in the middle, and the smoke from the fire of the enemy and us was mixed together, and the cruising fleet at the downwind was completely shrouded in the smoke cloud at this time, through the thick smoke cloud, you could see a strong orange fire, which was one of the disadvantages of being in the wind below.

"Indulge the fireboat!"

Without any hesitation, when he found that the big ship of the Loyal Army was in smoke, Shi Lang immediately ordered the arson ship to be released, only two or three times, Shi Lang could determine the results of the naval battle, once when a gust of wind blew and tore open the smoke screen on one side, and it could be clearly seen that many of the ships in the Loyal Army had been pierced by cannons, and their sails were no longer as neat as before. Now that the other party is in smoke, it's time to cast the Burning Boat.

In fact, when the cruiser of the Loyal Army fell into smoke, Shi Lang himself was no better, he was in the middle of the attack, compared to the Second Patrol Fleet, he was also at a disadvantage, and he was also shrouded in smoke, and even compared to the warships of the Loyal Army, his situation was much worse - because the board of the Chinese ship was weak, it was easy to be pierced through the board, and even caused fatal damage.

When the combat distance was compressed from 200 zhang to 100 zhang, or even only tens of zhang, the gunners on both sides could easily hit each other with little need to aim, although the planks of these sloops or brigs were designed to withstand the shelling of eight-pound guns, but compared with these small schooners, the shells fired by the relatively large Qing army bird ships when they were condescending still brought unprecedented casualties to the sailors on the ship.

The moment a whistling sound swept overhead, the entire deck was suddenly a bloody storm, hundreds of egg-sized iron bullets swept above the deck like a storm, and smashed on the deck, some unlucky sailors became bloody and blurred at the moment they were hit by iron bullets, and before they could even scream, they were torn to pieces.

Although there was not much time for Yan Fu to be afraid, he ran between the cannons, helping from time to time, pushing the cannons out, scrubbing the chambers and reloading, occasionally he would even slip to the ground by the blood stains on the deck, and he would shout loudly after every fall.

"Sand, pour the sand......"

The sand can absorb the blood on the deck and prevent the deck from slippery, in fact, he doesn't need to shout at all, those young young soldiers, this will have already poured bags of sand on the deck.

Although the deck was full of bloody rain at this time, but in fact, in addition to the damage to the personnel, the damage on the ship was not large, it was obvious that most of the bird ships of the Qing army were using six-pound cannons, and it was almost impossible for them to tear the board of the loyal army, but their shells could bring damage to the sails, rigging and masts, although they could not destroy its fleet, and they continued to sweep the deck with grape bombs, killing and injuring people, sweeping the rigging.

In contrast, every warship of the Loyal and Righteous Army is a difficult guy to deal with, they all have powerful artillery fire without exception, unlike the rigging that the Qing army constantly attacks them, as soon as they fire, they are aimed at their gunwales, and the cannonballs easily tear apart the three or four inches thick planks, and then tear open a table-sized hole at the waterline, and the turbulent sea water instantly poured into the hull, and the bird boats of the Qing army were swallowed by the sea.

"That's how it was fought, brothers, work harder!"

And when they desperately attacked the Qing army's bird boats, the starboard side of the boat rushed to the battlefield along the wind, and there were dozens of arsonist boats, those arson boats, the Qing army with oars continued to row the oars, the starboard side against the wind The view of the sailors was blocked by smoke, and the Qing army's arson boats were approaching the fleet under the cover of smoke.

Suddenly, a huge explosion sounded not far ahead on the sea, and the violent shock wave even washed Yan Fu down, it was the "Luzhou", its hull was detonated by the arsonist ship, burning and slowly sinking into the sea.

"Arsonist ship!"

As Yan Fu fumbled to his feet, he heard someone shouting loudly, and he struggled to get out of the gun position. He was not seriously injured, but only the shock wave of the explosion of the arson ship.

And the bow of the ship was also distorted - an arson ship exploded in front of its bow, and although it did not cause fatal damage, the explosion still caused damage, and the first gun was blown away, killing several members of its crew, shattering the head of its gun commander, and the broken pieces flew everywhere, even injuring those far away from the mainmast, Yan Fu was also injured, and a piece of wood was pierced in his arm, and blood was constantly flowing.

"Arsonist ship! Arson boats! ”

The sailors stared blankly at the arsonist ship at sea—in fact, only the shadow of the ship could be faintly seen, and the smoke obscured them, and the sailors kept repeating it, so that everyone became a little frightened, because the arsonist ship was fast, and small, and although it was vulnerable, it was not easy to hit.

"Grenades, grenades, ......"

Looking at the small shadow of the boat in the smoke, Yan Fu completely woke up, and he shouted loudly.

"Quick, blow them up with grenades, with firearms, with firearms......"

Yan Fu's voice didn't seem to come out of his throat.

In his exclamation, the firecrackers immediately came back to their senses, and they lined up to stand on the side of the gunwales and fired at the shadows of the ship in the smoke, compared to the artillery, the firepower of the firecrackers was denser, and the aim was more flexible, with the sound of guns, the screams of the arsonist ship in the smoke came from time to time, and the speed slowed down.

When an arson ship rushed out of the smoke, dozens of firecrackers on the deck opened fire on the ship, and after the oarsmen were constantly killed, its speed slowed down, and when there were still dozens of feet away, Yan Fu shouted loudly.

"Grenades, grenades ready, listen to my commands......"

Standing on the side of the board, Yan Fu's eyes were fixed on the arsonist, his right hand held a grenade, the porcelain beads under the grenade swayed there, and dozens of gunners were like him, holding the grenade like a bow.

Slowly, his eyes narrowed into a slit, the boat got closer and closer, and finally when the distance was only a dozen zhang away, when those oarsmen of the Qing army thought they had succeeded, they were ready to jump into the sea, Yan Fu shouted.

"Pull the fire ......"

When pulling down the fire rope, Yan Fu did not throw the grenade, but shouted loudly.

“1、2、3…… Bombing! ”

Dozens of grenades crossed a parabola in the air and flew towards the arson ship more than a dozen feet away, although most of the grenades missed, but still half of the grenades were thrown onto the ship, and the moment they fell on the ship, an explosion immediately occurred, and the explosion of the grenades immediately detonated the powder keg on the ship.

In an instant, with a violent explosion, the arson boat that was originally directly towards the ship was immediately swallowed up by the smoke cloud of the explosion, and even sank to the bottom of the sea in an instant and disappeared, and the Qing army who had just jumped into the water was killed in the water.

After sinking an arsonist ship, Yan Fu immediately breathed a sigh of relief, and he shouted loudly at the same time.

"That's what I did! Gunner, don't be stunned, aim, aim, aim at those arsonist ships......"

After the initial confusion, the gunners on the starboard side immediately operated their guns to aim at the shadow of the ship in the smoke, although the accuracy of the shelling was not high because the arsonist ship was too small, but because most of the arsonist ships were thin sampans, they were not vulnerable to attack at all, and once they hit the hull, they would be smashed to pieces, and then quickly sink into the sea.

But in spite of this, there were still a successes of arsonists, and those rushing ships released hundreds of arsonists, although they were not large, but they still brought an unprecedented threat to the fleet, and on the surface of the sea, the hundreds of arsonists rowed by a dozen or twenty people, like a nimble shark, threatened every warship in the fleet at all times.

Despite the devastating blows of musketeers and artillery whenever they approached, they still tried to seize the opportunity to crash into the warship in front of them, detonating the powder keg and sinking it to the bottom of the sea......