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Thinking of some of Xiao Xuan's admonitions and exhortations at the beginning, Wang Yuan finally made a relatively more conservative choice and decision. After seeing some operational reports on the attack on Manila, Wang Yuan was convinced that the 2,000 officers and men who landed were capable of temporarily defending the place, so after replenishing some artillery, ammunition, bows and arrows, and fresh water supplies to Manila, he led the fleet to set sail back, first meeting the port of Quanzhou and reporting the battle situation to Nanjing, and at the same time replenishing a lot of mortars and related ammunition for melee combat in Quanzhou, and even other artillery.

Although the series of battles in the Philippines did not win in the most perfect way, it did not bring too much pressure to Xiao Xuan after all, and Wang Yuan's behavior of not estimating his face too much in order to avoid too much risk also made Xiao Xuan agree.

Obviously, it is still not enough for the sea forces with less than 40 standard capital ships and thousands of backbone water forces as the core to completely solve the maritime enemy in the South China Sea. There are also many problems exposed in combat operations on land or at sea, the most critical problem is that the supplies carried by the ships are obviously a bit too much for the operations in the South China Seas, and the average manpower of each ship is too small, and it is impossible to give full play to the advantages of longitudinal manpower propellers in mobility, but in the case of repeated trade-offs, Xiao Xuan is not willing to let the wartime delay until autumn, winter, or even next year, because by that time, no one knows if there will be any changes. In the South Seas, far from East Asia, the southward fleet is most likely to encounter more than just known powers.

"The construction of the existing maritime forces has begun to get on the right track, and now it seems that dozens of capital ships may be an indispensable force for the entire official naval division of the Ming Dynasty, but after five or ten years, it will be very different. Even if we encounter a setback in our journey south, we still have a chance to turn things around in a few years... In the end, Xiao Xuan ordered in the newly established naval department.

Under such circumstances, Xiao Xuan did not hesitate to order the twenty main armor ships that could be used to join the sequence of the Nanyang Expeditionary Fleet, and almost at the same time, five thousand marines who were more physically strong and had more training and experience in manpower propeller operation were transferred to the elite of the volunteer troops, and they were organized into two marine regiments, in addition to requisitioning a lot of specialized gunners, lighting equipment, and a lot of rockets and lighting equipment that had just been trial-produced by the Central Manor Academy. The personnel of the 55 armored ships of the core team has been increased to 12,000 people, and in addition to light artillery, 2300 mortars have also been armed on the ships, so that these ships have more means of destroying the enemy when they are close to the opponent, and the strength of the entire fleet has increased several times the original regardless of the possible increase in speed.

Drawing on the experience of previous naval battles, in order to more effectively command and coordinate operations in naval battles, this time there was no longer the Zheng family group in the fleet preparing to go south. Facts have proved that the superiority of the main ships of the Western Ocean in terms of firepower, protection and even maneuverability is still obvious, and if some ships with obviously weak combat effectiveness are allowed to follow, to a large extent, it will be a burden on the fleet

What gave Xiao Xuan confidence that the Nanyang Fleet would continue to expand southward was, of course, Batavia, which is largely located in the tropical windless zone, which is more conducive to giving full play to the advantages of longitudinal propellers.

In this way, after the fleet led by Wang Yuan rested and replenished for about a month and was fully armed, it once again launched a combat operation to the South Seas.

Of course, this expedition is not without risks, with the approach of summer, although most of the time the sea is not too big wind and waves are more conducive to the firepower advantage of the fleet, but if there is a typhoon, then all the seafarers who are not experienced in this era have to face a huge test, and the whole fleet is not without the possibility of encountering risks, but if you start to act in early summer and act as quickly as possible, it is still possible to avoid this risk to the greatest extent.

"This time is different from the previous strategy, occupying the local area is not the first task, the first task is to completely annihilate the remnants of the enemy in the South Seas, but if it is no longer possible, it is better not to venture into unfamiliar waters." When the fleet was about to leave, Xiao Xuan couldn't help but admonish.

In this way, the fleet sailed as far against the wind as possible in the assembly that did not seem to be suitable for the south, and once again embarked on the expedition, and sometimes, especially when the wind and waves were relatively calm and conducive to making the people on board feel the speed, Wang Yuan ordered the whole fleet to use longitudinal manpower propellers to assist the raised sails to move forward, and the ships seemed to be speeding on the sea when the wind was not so favorable, as if they were sailing downwind. As the entire fleet began sailing, almost all the officers and men on board felt this.

Later, at the temporary military meeting, Wang Yuan also said to the people who came to the meeting temporarily: "The reason why the previous battle seemed to be a little passive and difficult was because our army's mobility was limited at that time, and we could only let the opponent concentrate its forces and ships to attack us. Second, although our army has relatively strong protection and decent firepower, its ability to destroy enemy ships is insufficient, and our army today is completely different... Hearing this, many officers who had lingering fears at the naval battle center in the Philippine Islands also felt that this time was different from the past.

Although the wind direction was not very favorable, about a month after the departure of the fleet, it still sailed into the depths of Nanyang, approaching a position about dozens of miles outside the port in the northwest of Java.

When the lookouts in the sky took advantage of the reconnaissance of the hot air balloon to first discover the group of ships that had stopped broadcasting in the harbor, many officers and men on board also began to get excited.

"Is it going to be a surprise attack at night, or is it going to take action before it gets dark?" The captain of the flag ship also asked excitedly at this time

Wang Yuan ordered without hesitation: "In order to avoid long nights and dreams, let's let the team advance!" If the enemy ships do not flee while advancing, our troops will not have to sail too fast for the time being, and will still sail according to our previous skills. In this way, even if we see that there are more armored ships of our army than before, it is estimated that the enemy in the harbor will not flee from the wind, and should have the determination to fight our army... ”