A crescent moon hung high in the sky like an eyebrow, slowly turning westward, and gradually disappearing into the night sky. The stars twinkled in the dark sky, the entire canal was black, and even most of the wind lanterns hanging on the bow of the ship had been extinguished.

At dawn, everything was silent, even the sound of frogs that had been screaming all night gradually stopped, the stars hid into the clouds, and the earth became darker.

A soldier walked to the stern of the boat in a daze, unbuckled his trouser belt and discharged the water into the river heartily, and was about to put on his belt to continue sleeping after urinating, when he saw the north of the canal, several miles away, countless fires flickering, and they were rapidly approaching the fleet.

What's going on? How could a fleet come over in the middle of the night, the soldier rubbed his eyes, wondering what was going on?

The crisp sound of the gong suddenly sounded, breaking the silence of the fleet.

"Enemy attack! Enemy attack! "It was a soldier who had been scheduled to be on duty for the night calling out loudly.

The entire fleet suddenly woke up from its sleep, and the soldiers hurried up and grabbed the weapons around them. Before going to bed last night, Chen Yue had already passed down the general's order, and the soldiers of the whole army slept without untying their clothes and armor.

If it is on land, no matter how strong the army is when the enemy suddenly attacks the camp, it will panic, not to mention the 5,000 soldiers of the fleet, of which only more than 1,500 are the Pingnan Army and the sailors, and the rest are all trained by the Huai'an Regiment.

However, this is a canal boat, with dozens of soldiers on each boat, and the only area where soldiers can move is this boat, and there will be no random running around. So after a brief panic, most of the soldiers calmed down under the reprimand of the officers on board.

Straighten out the armor on his body, put the bow and crossbow in a convenient position, and nervously look to the north of the canal, waiting for the general's order.

A string of red lanterns gradually rose on the mast of the ship in charge.

"Master Hou has an order, all ships are on guard against enemy attacks!"

Seeing the red lanterns, the commanding officers on each ship shouted loudly, ordering the soldiers under their command. So, the sacks of mud and sand on the deck were untied, wooden shields were erected, and the soldiers on board were nervously busy, waiting for the surprise attack of the enemy.

On the Cao ship in charge of commanding, Chen Yue, the Marquis of Pingnan, who was in charge of commanding, had disappeared, and at this moment it was Jin Shenghuan who was in charge of commanding the operation, but he was commanding in the name of Chen Yue.

Although Jin Shenghuan is only a deputy general, and he is not a descendant of the original Xishan Army, but considering his great reputation in another time and space, as well as his record against the Southern Ming Army after surrendering to the Manchu Dynasty. In the history of another time and space, Jin Shenghuan led the army to defeat almost the entire Jiangxi, so Chen Yue was still relatively relieved about the command ability of this guy.

Standing at the bow of the ship, coldly observing the rapidly approaching enemy ships in the north, a series of orders came out of Jin Shenghuan's mouth, and then the orders were issued by his own soldiers in the form of lanterns hanging on the mast.

The commanding officers on all the ships were watching the lantern orders on the command ships and making further movements along with the orders.

The anchor was pulled up from the water, and the ship had the ability to maneuver. Forty or fifty small boats were dispatched from the flotilla, and each small boat had a dozen or so regimental soldiers who were proficient in water to train them, forming a defensive line on the perimeter of the flotilla.

......

"What's wrong?" Awakened by the sound of gongs and shouts that burst in, Chongzhen Huo Ran got up from the bed and yelled outside.

"Back to Your Majesty, there is an enemy fleet attacking!" Outside the cabin, Wu Mengming's voice was full of tremors.

Chongzhen was suddenly shocked, this was in the territory of the Ming Dynasty, and an army came to attack him at night.

Chongzhen hurriedly put on his clothes and came to the outer cabin, where Wu Mengming, Lu Zhenfei and Chen Jianghe were already waiting.

"Is it a thief?" Chongzhen's voice was full of tremors, hoping that he was a thief and hoping that he was not.

If it is a thief, it means that the army is ready to go south, and the army has already driven to the south. But he has not yet arrived in Nanjing to control the situation, how can he deal with the attack of the thieves?

But if it is not a thief, it must be the army under King Fu who attacks him, which means that Nanjing has been controlled by King Fu, so a civil war will start, and it is impossible for him to ascend the throne safely.

"Your Majesty, don't be surprised, it shouldn't be a thief." Lu Zhenfei comforted that most of Huai'an's regimental training troops were still in Huai'an, and it was impossible for the thieves to quietly cross Huai'an and come here.

Either the thieves or the army supporting King Fu, Chongzhen's face became even more gray.

"What about Chen Yue? Why didn't you see him? At this moment, the only one who can count on is Chen Yue, hoping that he can create another miracle and save me from fire and water.

"Pingnanhou is commanding the battle." Lu Zhenfei pointed to a few strings of lanterns on the mast of the boat not far away and whispered.

Chongzhen settled down, grabbed the railing of the ship and looked around, a lantern was lit on the boats, under the lights, the soldiers were busy nervously, and all the ships did not panic.

"Your Majesty, let's go back to the cabin and rest." Wu Mengming persuaded in a low voice, at this moment, the enemy ship was getting closer and closer, gradually approaching his own warship, a battle was about to begin, and it was very dangerous for Chongzhen to stay on the deck again.

"Please, Aiqing!" Chongzhen regained his composure and turned back to the cabin.

......

However, just as all the officers and men were nervously looking to the north, waiting for the enemy ships to attack, suddenly, countless fire points rose into the sky from the west bank of the canal and quickly covered the fleet.

"Raise your shield!" Looking at the fire points falling rapidly in mid-air, the commanding officer on the ship roared sharply, and before the words fell, the sound of "fluttering and fluttering" sounded, and thousands of fire points fell in the fleet.

At some point, the enemy infantry had moved to the west bank of the canal and launched an attack on the flotilla with rockets.

Screams rang out one after another, and I don't know how many soldiers were hit by rockets. A rocket landed on the ship, hitting the reed mat on the top of the cabin, and the flames quickly ignited.

"Extinguish the fire!" The officer in charge shouted again, and some soldiers scooped up bags of sand and covered the flames, or lifted buckets with hoses on the roof of the burning shed.

Round after round of rockets fell, and although they made the soldiers on the ship scramble, they did not cause much damage. There was a lot of sediment on the deck, and there was an inexhaustible supply of water in the river, which was easy to extinguish by burning the little fire next to the rocket.

A string of green lanterns was hung on the command ship, an order to return fire freely. So the commanding officer on each ship gave a resolute order, and the crossbowmen on the ship took up their crossbows and fired them in the direction from which the rockets came from on the opposite shore in the darkness. At the same time, the artillery crews of the large ship were nervously reloading, trying to give color to the enemy in the dark.