It was the battleship "Fuyuan" that opened fire. The cannons on the Spaniard's battleship had now been replaced by home-made 18-pounder guns that had been retired from the Enterprise. The Enterprise had begun to gradually replace the original 18-pounder gun with a better front-loading rifled crucible steel gun and a larger caliber 24-pounder gun, which was transferred to the Fuyuan.

If it was on land, at such a distance, an 18-pounder gun could already quite accurately attack a target as large as a fortress, but on a shaking battleship, firing from such a distance, even with a huge fortress as a target, it was difficult to guarantee a hit. In addition, although the east is already a little white at this time, the sun has not fully risen. If it weren't for the moonlight, the Niuzhuang fortress would have been almost completely hidden in darkness at this time. This also seriously interfered with the range of the warship to Niuzhuang Fort. In this way, it is more difficult to hit the target. Of course, the officers and men of the Navy on the "Fuyuan" did not have the good habit of indiscriminately firing their guns at the longest range like those gunners of our Ming Dynasty. They opened fire, more to lure their opponents into firing. Sometimes, those opponents who are overly nervous, as long as you give them a little bit of stimulation, they will shoot indiscriminately.

However, the effect of this round of shooting was beyond Shi Lang's surprise, at such a distance, the first round of shots of his battleship actually hit, and a solid cannonball happened to hit a section of the female wall. The 18-pounder shells are not something that a weak female wall can hold, and even the female walls used to block arrows and shotguns in a sense enhance the lethality of solid shells. It was smashed to pieces by solid shells, and the flying debris knocked over more than a dozen people standing around.

I had no experience of using batteries to fight warships before, so I didn't design the batteries with semi-enclosed fronts like those in the south, which had concrete (or triad earth and wall brick) walls up to two meters thick and a fighting compartment with a top that could also block shotguns. Of course, even the Europeans did not make the batteries of their time as strong as those of the Model Army. Compared with Niuzhuang Fort in the Qing Dynasty, the main difference is that their walls are lower and sloping, which is less likely to collapse under shelling, and the anti-artillery wall in front of the gun emplacement is thicker.

This cannon made those Wuzhen Chaoha suddenly chaotic. Even their commander was a little flustered. Zhang Jing Cai Shiyin was just not far from the landing point of the cannonball, and half of the city brick flew past her nose, and then smashed the head of a gunner next to her. It was a real flower, and the gunner's head was smashed apart like a watermelon, spraying the red and white things on Cai Shiyin's face.

In a panic, Cai Shiyin couldn't help shouting: "Open the gun!" Shoot back! ”

However, Uzhen Chaoha's counterattack was not so fast, as many of the soldiers were thrown into disarray. It wasn't until the masters of the Eight Banners pulled out their knives and cut down a few that order was restored.

During this time, the "Fuyuan" fired another salvo, but this round of shelling did not accurately hit the target.

However, this round of salvo once again stimulated those Wuzhen Chaoha, and after getting the order from above, the Wuzhen Chaoha also fired back one after another.

"Hehe, if you tease it, they won't be able to stand it immediately." Shi Lang looked at the other side and laughed. Of course, the shells fired by the Qing army did not know where they flew.

If they are attacking the model army's own batteries, then even at night, even if the distance is long, they can ensure a good shooting hit rate, because the batteries of the model army have played grids in the nearby sea areas, conducted test firing, and recorded data, so they can completely count the grids and fire according to the data, as long as the grids are not mistaken, the accuracy of the shelling will not be bad. But this trick was unknown to the Qing army, and even with them they lacked the ability to make calculations using trigonometric functions, and their shelling was almost entirely dependent on experience. This, naturally, made their long-range artillery hits low.

Shi Lang looked at the opposite side again, and then looked at the sky in the east. The sky was getting brighter, and the eastern sky was already turning red, and in less than a quarter of an hour, the sun was about to come out. And the artillery fire of the Qing army on the opposite side gradually thinned out.

"Alas, it's not the same as the Ming army in the end. They still reacted, and they didn't scrap their own guns. The captain of the Fuyuan, Ma Lide, said.

"It is estimated that there is a Jianxuan behind him. Well, we can't always try to fight easy battles. Well, now that the enemy's artillery fire has weakened and the sky is almost dawning, we will speed up and teach them how to play with artillery with real guys! ”

"Hmm!" Maled nodded, then turned his head and shouted, "Full sail!" Turn to 35, accelerate! ”

More sails were opened, and the entire fleet began to accelerate towards Niuzhuang Fort.

An hour earlier, the small boat, laden with marines, had landed on a further beachhead, under the cover of several armed whaling ships. Marines jumped from their boats, holding flintlock pistols wrapped in tarpaulin, into knee-deep water and walked ashore. The two companies that came ashore first quickly followed the plan and occupied a small mound nearby. Then more troops began to come ashore under their cover, and began to form a formation.

Now the soldiers of the two Marine battalions have successfully completed the landing and are ready for battle. Begin to line up towards Niuzhuang Fort.

The sun had finally risen, and the model army fleet consisting of two cruisers and one battleship had approached the sea about 600 meters from Niuzhuang Fort, where they made a turn to the right, facing the rising sun, heading east, and aiming their port side at Niuzhuang Fort.

The distance is closer, and the accuracy of shelling on both sides has increased. In the process of moving laterally, the "Fuyuan" fired two salvos, knocking down at least fifteen shells on the walls of Niuzhuang Fort. However, most of these shells hit the middle of the city wall, and only two cannons were of appropriate height, and they hit the female wall at the top of the city wall, causing more than a dozen casualties. In addition, there is also a Hongyi cannon that seems to have been hit, but whether it was hit or not, because of the influence of the fog of the battlefield, the lookout on the mast is not sure. However, the "Fuyuan" was honestly hit three times. The first shot landed on the deck of the ship, then bounced, knocked over two sailors, and plunged headlong into the sea.

The other two guns were hit on the port side of the "Fuyuan", but fortunately, the "Fuyuan", which was a battleship, was quite strong on the side, so the damage caused by the shells was limited. However, one shell pierced the side of the ship near the gun gate and entered the interior of the battleship, causing more than 20 casualties. The other two cruisers also received several shots. But the fleet of these three warships was evidently unfazed, and continued to sail eastward for a moment until they were out of range of the enemy's main artillery fire, and then turned again in order to approach four hundred meters later, and then cut off the opponent with intensive artillery fire.