It has been more than 20 days since the combined fleet of the Nanyang Naval Division and the Beiyang Naval Division set out on the expedition, and Zhu Cijiong's heart is becoming more and more nervous, although it is reasonable that the super fleet composed of 100 super battleships and 1,000 armed Daifuku ships will not be defeated by the Dutch Eastern Second Fleet with only 50 super battleships, but many times the war does not depend on strength alone, and luck is also quite important.

This luck is not illusory, there have been many incredible things in the history of naval warfare during the colonial period, such as the Spanish Armada expedition to Britain in 1588, almost everyone thought that this was a battle without suspense, the British poor navy composed of pirate ships and privateers could not defeat the Spanish Armada with more than 100 super battleships, but the Spaniards were defeated, the defeat was unreasonable, the defeat was inexplicable, the British did not rely on luck but on what?

Which side will the god of luck be on this time? Zhu Cijiong didn't have any bottom in his heart, he could only climb the main fort of Geranza City again and again, look at the south, and wait anxiously.

Early this morning, Zhu Cijiong boarded the main fort of Geranza City again, looked at the sea in the south, looking forward to the triumphant return of the Daming Sailor, I don't know if it was dazzling, he actually saw a row of black spots on the sea, he hurriedly stretched his hand back, and shouted anxiously: "Telescope." ”

Wang Chengen, who was not far behind him, heard this, and quickly took out the binoculars from his arms and respectfully handed them to him.

Zhu Cijiong raised his binoculars and looked at the sea in the distance, it was really the battleship of the Daming Naval Division! There are ten super battleships in front, and rows of Dafu ships in the back, one, two, and three rows ......, Zhu Cijiong counted it silently, and counted to ten rows, but there was no one behind!

What's going on, looking at the neatness of these more than 100 battleships, it doesn't look like a big defeat.

The fleet was getting closer and closer, and Zhu Cijiong was getting more and more anxious, he really couldn't bear this kind of torment, so he simply led Cao Huachun and the others to the prefect's office on the second floor of Relansha City.

Now the third floor of the entire castle has become his temporary residence, and ordinary people can't go up, and if any officials ask to see him, they usually wait at the governor's office in the middle of the second floor. At this time, he just wanted to know what was going on quickly, and naturally he wouldn't let the family wait for him, anyway, he had to go over when he met him, so it was better to go over early and wait for others to know the result earlier.

Zhu Cijiong's place to meet officials now is the large conference room of the chief's office, but this conference room has undergone a simple transformation, the conference table and chairs have been moved out, and a wooden platform about one meter high has been set up in the middle of the inside, on which are placed the small dragon chairs and tables he brought, he can sit on it to form a condescending momentum, highlighting the dignity of the emperor, and the ground is covered with a thick carpet, which is mainly convenient for people to kneel and kowtow, after all, they can come to see him are officials of not low grade, and the original ground is too dirty, It's not good to be disgraced.

Not long after he sat on the dragon chair, the voice of the eunuch came from outside: "Chen Zhang, the general of the Left Army of the Nanyang Naval Division, asks to see him." ”

It turned out that he was still an old acquaintance, and Zhu Cijiong hurriedly announced his audience.

After a while, Chen Zhang walked in with a happy face, knelt on the ground and said loudly: "Your Majesty, the combined fleet of our Ming Navy Division has won a complete victory, completely annihilating the Second Eastern Fleet of the Dutch Navy, and the enemy's fifty warships, none of them escaped, all of them were captured by our army!" Since some of the warships were badly damaged and could not travel at full speed, the two admirals asked the last general to come first to report the good news. ”

When Zhu Cijiong heard this, he jumped up from the dragon chair excitedly and shouted excitedly: "Okay, great, when will they arrive?" ”

Chen Zhang estimated it and replied: "If you go back to the emperor, according to the speed of the fleet, you will probably arrive around this afternoon." ”

............

At about the end of the afternoon, a huge fleet appeared on the sea south of the city of Geranza, and the combined fleet of the Daming Naval Division returned victorious, starting with 90 Daming super super battleships, in the middle were 50 Dutch super battleships, and the other 900 Dafu ships were lined up in three phalanxes to the left and right rear. That lineup is dozens of miles in total, and the momentum is majestic enough to make people daunted.

At this time, a wooden platform of more than ten meters high has been erected in the open space in the south of the city of Geranza, the flag is displayed on the stage, the elite of the 50,000 Praetorian Guards under the stage are lined up in a neat formation on both sides, a road paved with red cloth is directly pounced from the stage to the beach in the south, Zhu Cijiong, the emperor of Chongzheng of the Ming Dynasty, stands on the high platform to personally welcome the triumphant return of the sailors.

With the rumbling salute sounded, the solemn triumphal ceremony began.

Zheng Zhihu and Huang Long only selected more than 200 officers of the Dutch Navy's Second Eastern Fleet to be escorted to the stage for Zhu Cijiong's review.

After the ceremony of sacrificing prisoners, it was time for the military parade, and it was naturally impossible for the officers and men of the naval division to run to the shore one by one to accept Zhu Cijiong's review, and the naval division had the inspection method of the naval division, which simply means that all the warships were lined up in a neat formation and passed through the sea in front of the review stand, and then slowly sailed into the inland sea of the Taijiang River.

The last item is that Zhu Cijiong rewarded the sailors and soldiers, the Nanyang Naval Division and the Beiyang Naval Division were directly promoted to the first-class army of the Ming Dynasty because of their outstanding military achievements, and Zheng Zhihu and Huang Long were also promoted from the Admiral Tongzhi to the Admiral of the Naval Division. In addition, after conquering the city of Gelanza this time, he also searched out a vault of the East India Company from the city, which contained more than two million taels of silver alone, and hundreds of thousands of taels of gold, Zhu Cijiong took them all out without hesitation, and all the sailors and soldiers were rewarded with ten taels of silver, and the generals at all levels were directly rewarded with gold, at least ten taels, Zheng Zhihu and Huang Long were directly ten taels each! The remaining 50,000 elites of the First Legion of the Praetorian Guard, the 50,000 elites of the Second Legion of the Praetorian Guard, and even the civilians of the East who came to visit the ceremony, were all rewarded!

After the vigorous triumphal ceremony, it is time to consider the post-war matters, the war between countries does not mean that the war is over a battle, unless the country is destroyed at one time, otherwise, the subsequent fight is unavoidable.

Although Daming has achieved a stunning victory this time, but the Netherlands has not suffered a fatal blow, their strength is still strong, if you want to think that a big victory will be over, then it is estimated that you are not far from the end.

Is it a fight or a rip-off? Zhu Cijiong is inclined to rip off, because the Ming Dynasty is now in a period of rapid rise, getting stronger and stronger year by year, and now the maritime strength may be far worse than that of the Netherlands, but in a few years, it is not impossible to catch up with or even surpass the Netherlands. Therefore, if he wants to have a relationship with the Dutch, it is best to be able to do it for a few years, and when the time comes, even if he starts working directly, Daming will not be afraid.

In addition, Daming also holds nearly 20,000 Dutch prisoners, which can be said to be a great advantage, you must know that the Netherlands has a total of more than 1 million people, and the army is only 200,000 dead, and almost one-tenth of their army is captured at once, this deterrent is very great.

Are you still going to fight? If you beat me up, I'll kill all 20,000 captives!"

Do you lose money? If you don't lose money, don't want 20,000 people!

......

In short, the article that these 20,000 captives can do is big, and no matter how much they ramp up, the Ming Dynasty has the advantage. Of course, if you want to rip the skin, you have to have the capital to rip the skin, if the Dutch are desperate to come over and fight with Daming, then Daming is still a little unbearable.

In order to dispel the idea of the Dutch continuing to fight, Zhu Cijiong decided to build a sea defense line, using fortresses and batteries to connect Dongfan, Penghu and the southeast coast into a line, so that the Dutch were daunted, and honestly sat down at the negotiating table to fight with the Ming Dynasty!

Such a huge project is naturally not something that Zhu Cijiong can think about alone, he summoned Zheng Zhihu, Huang Long, Qin Liangyu, Shi Kefa and other generals together, discussed for a few days, and finally settled on a preliminary plan.

First of all, there is the problem of fortresses, according to the tradition of the Ming Dynasty, the construction of square cities, this kind of city in the appearance of thermal weapons after the defense is not as good as before, compared with the fortress is more than ten times worse, so, Zhu Cijiong decided to imitate the fortress, anyway, there are 20,000 Dutch prisoners, no need to use in vain, first build a few fortresses for the Ming Dynasty.

Then there is the problem of artillery, to make the fortress and the battery have a deterrent effect, it is natural that the more artillery the better, at least 500 artillery pieces in each place to make people have some scruples, if you want to make people daunting, then at least a thousand artillery pieces must be placed at each important pass.

Now the preliminarily determined passes are Xiamen, Quanzhou, Penghu, Chichi, Jiulong five, that is to say, now at least five or six thousand cannons are needed, according to the current production speed of the Ming Dynasty, it will take at least a year to build all these cannons, the Dutch will definitely not wait a year, what to do?

In fact, it was very simple, that is, to remove all the naval guns from the Dutch battleships and install them in various batteries and forts. Through several major battles, the generals of the naval division have found a problem, naval battles actually mainly rely on attack speed, range or anything is secondary, the sea is so bumpy, the warships on both sides are moving, and it is simply a joke to hit the target a few miles away, only to get closer, at a distance of two or three miles, at this time the Dutch's cannon is not suitable, they bomb one round, Daming's breech howitzer can bombard at least five rounds, the gap is ridiculously large!

Therefore, everyone agreed that it was best to convert all the captured fifty Dutch battleships with the breech howitzers of the Ming Dynasty.

Finally, there is a problem of personnel, there are batteries and fortresses, and cannons are also matched, there must be someone to defend it, and according to the development speed of the Daming Naval Division, a fleet can be built in two years, and there must be someone to drive the battleship, and the demand for officers and soldiers of the Naval Division behind will definitely increase. Considering these circumstances, Zhu Cijiong simply issued an order, and Nanzhili, Fujian, Zhejiang, and Guangdong all commanded Sima Shang to recruit new soldiers from various garrisons, first recruit 300,000 soldiers, and send all of them to Dongfan for training, first to practice artillery operation, and then to practice sailboat operation, and strive to train qualified sailors in the fastest time.

Time waits for no one, and the Dutch will definitely not be able to bear such heavy losses this time, so the defensive line must be established as soon as possible.

After some discussion, the defense line was immediately built, in fact, as long as there are people, the fortress and the fort are repaired very quickly, and now there are a lot of free laborers in the east, there are nearly 20,000 Dutch prisoners alone, and more than 30,000 pirate prisoners and more than 1,000 Spanish prisoners, 50,000 or 60,000 people work together, and the fortresses and batteries everywhere rise from the ground at a speed visible to the naked eye, and the famous southeast defense line of the Ming Dynasty was born!