Although Zhou Lang agreed to Colin's military action, Harald and Xie Qinggao's ship still set sail.

But their direction is different, Xie Qinggao will go to Manila, the capital of the Philippines under Spanish rule. Harald will travel to Macau and then to Guangzhou.

This is a very bold move, obviously this side has already started a war with the local government in Taiwan, and that side still dares to go to Guangzhou to throw themselves into the net. The reason was that Zhou Lang looked down on the administrative efficiency of the Manchu Qing Dynasty, and he felt that eighty percent of Guangzhou at this time did not even know what was happening in Taiwan.

According to the process of the Manchu government, there was no delay in joining Fengshan County, and after learning that the left camp was occupied, they immediately reported to their superiors, and their superiors also reported to their superiors at the same time. Then the news spread from Fengshan County to the Taiwan Prefecture, and then from the Taiwan Prefecture to Fujian Province, to the Governor of Fujian and Zhejiang, and finally to the six departments of Qianlong. If a Manchu magistrate died in office, it generally took six months to a year for his successor to take office, because the process took so long. This is still a good thing that everyone is staring at such a lack of officials, and now it is bad news that the city is occupied, and I am afraid that the speed of transmission will be slower. If that link is unwilling to affect the political performance, but presses down and orders the lower levels to solve the problem first, and then report the good news to the above, I am afraid that the news will not be transmitted for an unknown amount of time.

When the Manchu court knew about the situation, and then reported it to the Guangdong Palace, it would take at least half a year to a year, and Zhou Lang and his occupation of Zuoying until now, it was only more than a month that passed, and it was difficult to say whether the news came out of Taiwan, and the probability that Guangzhou knew it was very small.

Even if Guangzhou knew, how could they know that it was the people on the Harald ship who occupied the left camp, unless the Guangzhou government attacked it in an all-round way, and would rather kill the mistake than let it go, and arrest all the foreigners who went to Guangzhou to trade.

But there is still a risk, the administrative efficiency of the Manchu government is very slow, but the administrative efficiency of the Westerners is not slow, Zhou Lang has already sent a ship from Taiwan to Macao, he does not dare to guarantee whether the news has been kept secret, if the Dutch, the Portuguese and other British merchants' competitors know, they report to the Guangzhou government, the Guangzhou local officials are very meritorious, and it is not impossible to detain Harald and the crew and then hand them over.

That's why Zhou Langcai sent Harald instead of letting Xie Qinggao go, the reason was that Harald died when he died, and he was not a pity.

Xie Qinggao but Manila is also risky, where the ruler is the Spaniards. However, Xie Qinggao brought a complete set of documents issued by the government of the British East India Company in Calcutta, plus most of the sailors and crew on the ship were white, and Spain did not go to war with Britain, so the chances of the Spaniards taking action against Xie Qinggao were very small. Even without these documents, the Spaniards were generally welcome to trade with Manila as merchants. You must know that in this era, the main force of Manila's trade is still Chinese businessmen.

Harald and Xie Qinggao take different risks, and their purposes are different. Harald went to Macau and Canton in order to purchase Chinese goods, the main one being tea, and then ship them back to India to sell, completing the first trade of the Chinese (East India) Company. After the completion of this trade, it will be possible to prove to shareholders that trade between China and India is viable, increasing shareholders' confidence, and Zhou Lang intends to get them to invest more.

Zhou Lang never thought of relying on profits to expand slowly, otherwise he would not need to form this company according to the Western business model, just build a shop. The reason for the establishment of a joint-stock commercial company is to take advantage of the capital market and business culture that have been formed in the West. He wants to use the capital power of the capital market, which can be inflated hundreds of times, to rapidly expand the company's strength.

Zhou Lang thinks the plan is very feasible, because he also made Zuoying an important hot topic, telling shareholders in India that the company now has a commercial base in southeast China, close to the tea producing area, which will bring great imagination to shareholders.

The reraised funds will be used to continue to buy ships, hire sailors, and strengthen the company's maritime power. The conservative plan is to build three new armed merchant ships in India, doubling the company's fleet. If the situation is ideal and investors are enthusiastic, Zhou Lang will directly expand the size of the fleet to eight, that is, build six new ships.

In contrast, Xie Qinggao's task of going to Manila was much easier. He is there to procure materials, to spend money, and it is always easier to spend money than to raise money. He would buy a large amount of grain from Manila and, if possible, buy as much gunpowder and lead as he could from the Spaniards.

In other words, Harald was tasked with returning to India to prove the company's business model to the shareholders, while Xie Qinggao remained in the East to continue to support the company's military occupation in the left camp.

So the departure of the two ships did not affect Colin's military operations.

At the same time as they set off, Colin's military operation also began.

The military force he had was mainly the sixty mercenaries under his control and the three hundred local Chinese soldiers he had recruited, as well as the sixty-three soldiers recruited from Nanyang under Zhou Lang.

Zhou Lang also went with him, and after the battle began, Zhou Lang would stay with his Nanyang company. Before, Zhou Lang stood with Colin.

Colin was very excited, his plan of action was not hidden from Zhou Lang, but kept showing off.

Now he had an armed force of 400 men, none of whom were equipped with regular flintlock pistols, and he had unloaded twenty cannons from the ship, which he believed was enough to sweep the surrounding Qing army, and his intention was to defeat all the Qing troops around him.

As for the strength of the Qing army as the enemy, Colin has already figured out these days, and his scouts even drew a more precise military map than the official map of the Manchu Qing Dynasty, marking the location of each Qing military camp and the deployment of troops.

The strength of the Qing army was about the same as previously estimated, within 1,000 people, 120 to 150 people were deployed in the Banping Mountain in the north, 45 to 600 people were deployed on the east bank of Lianchi Lake in the east, and 150 to 180 people were deployed in the direction of Dagu Mountain in the south, and the total strength was never more than 1,000 people.

Colin was very excited to tell Zhou Lang that it was an idiot to say that the Qing army was so deployed, and that it was an idiot to disperse the troops on his periphery, so that he could calmly use the advantage of the inner line and quickly mobilize the army to break through, and he proudly introduced to Zhou Lang how Frederick the Great of Prussia took advantage of the advantage of the inner line in the Seven Years' War and took a forced march to break the powerful French, Austrian, and Russian armies one by one.

Zhou Lang remembered the tactic adopted by the Manchu ancestor Nurhachi back then, "I will only go all the way if I come by a few roads", and obviously used the inner line to concentrate troops to break them one by one. But to say what a serious mistake the Qing army made, it can't be said, because they have no choice, and in the case of not daring to attack the left battalion, do they have any other way than to encircle?

However, Zhou Lang is not as optimistic as Colin, and even he thinks that the probability of Colin's failure is as high as eighty percent, the reason is very simple, most of the four hundred people led by Colin are unreliable local soldiers who have not yet completed their training, how can such soldiers be able to fight, and I am afraid that the chance of being held back on the battlefield is greater. All Colin can use is his sixty mercenaries, which means that he is using sixty against six hundred, and he is still actively attacking.

It was precisely because he expected that Colin would have a greater chance of defeat, so Zhou Lang agreed to support Colin, the real purpose was extremely sinister, and he planned to borrow the knife of the Qing army to get rid of Colin as a threat.

Since he thinks that Colin will be defeated, then why does Zhou Lang still follow, firstly, not to let the other party be suspicious, and secondly, Zhou Lang is also just in case, if Colin's attack goes well, Zhou Lang does not mind causing him some trouble, at this time, on the battlefield, this Nanyang company, which is currently only subordinate to Zhou Lang, will play a great role, such as taking the lead in escaping, such as walking the rumors of failure, shaking the heart of the entire army.

But what if after Colin's defeat, what will Zhou Lang do?

Of course, he ran away, and the back road was all figured out, and more than 60 Nanyang mercenaries under his command would protect him from escaping to the port. Xie Qinggao and Harald's boat both ran away, but the smuggling boat forcibly rented from the fishing village was still there, and Zhou Lang asked Xie Qinggao to leave ten sailors, enough to drive the boat to take Zhou Lang and them away safely.

It can be said that Zhou Lang planned everything, but he never expected that the Qing army would be so corrupt that it would not be able to kill Colin!

He borrowed the wrong knife!