Hou Sihai climbed to the lookout platform on the top of the mast and carefully tied the safety rope around his waist. Pen? Interesting? Pavilion wWw. ｂiquge。 infoAlthough there is not much wind and waves on the sea, it is essential to have proper safety measures. No one can say for sure what the weather is at sea, and if the wind suddenly blows and falls off this mast, it will be really sour, you must know that the mast of this cruiser they are using now can be dozens of meters high.

Hou Sihai stood on the lookout, then took out his binoculars and began to look around. At this time, the cruiser was slowly sailing on the sea at a low speed of four knots. Most of its sails, especially those on the mainmast, were retracted, and it sailed only by a few jibs hanging from the bowsprit, for the purpose of concealment, of course.

Because of the curvature of the earth, when a ship slowly approaches from a distance on the boundless sea, the first thing that shows the horizon is its towering mast. So lowering the snow-white sails on the high mainmast can make you much less inconspicuous.

Visibility was now very good, but there were no boats on the whole surface, except for the small boats that were used as bait at twelve o'clock.

It was one of the trophies of the capture of Jeju Island, and these boats were so seaworthy that they were still lost to the fishermen of Jeju Island. Speaking of which, because the people of the Zheng family don't look down on the taxes of the poor people on Jeju Island, compared to the original Korean court, the degree of looting is much more relaxed, and now there are not many people on the island who really want the Korean government to come back. And the Kingdom of Korea did not dare to fight the idea of recovering Jeju Island at all, and even there was such a strange rumor in their court, saying that it was the Japanese Tokugawa Shogunate who captured Jeju Island, and the reason why the Japanese Tokugawa Shogunate seized Jeju Island was because Korea was ungrateful and betrayed the Ming Dynasty, so even the Japanese Tokugawa Shogunate was contemptuous and hateful after knowing it, although the Ming was magnanimous and did not condemn the crime, but the Tokugawa Shogunate couldn't stand it, so he sent troops to capture Jeju Island as a punishment.

As a result, North Korea, which consciously took care of its losses and had no decent military strength at all, naturally had no intention of recovering Jeju Island.

"It's been four days since I came out, and I haven't taken the bait yet. It's boring! Hou Sihai took out the small wine jug hidden in the pocket close to his chest and took a small sip. This is the prerogative of the lookout, the wind is strong above the mast, and it is already September, and the sea in the Yellow Sea is also a little cold. Lookouts often rely on hard liquor to keep them warm.

Hou Sihai swallowed the wine, and felt that there was a hot current flowing through the esophagus to the stomach, warm and very comfortable. He made a gap between the wines, corked the flask tightly, and put it back in his pocket, then tightened his leather coat, raised his head again, and raised his binoculars to look in the direction of the two boats. Then his movements stopped, and then he reached out and jerked the rope hanging next to him, and a string of alarm bells rang out.

"Target found!" Hou Sihai shouted.

……

"Discover the target! Discover the target! There was a shout outside. Shang Kexi came out of the cabin and came to the deck, where a guard immediately knelt down and said to him: "Lord Qiqi, I have found a few smuggling boats!" ”

Shang Kexi didn't speak, just stretched out a hand, and the guard was also Shang Kexi's old man, so he naturally understood what he meant, so he handed a telescope to Shang Kexi's hand. Shang Kexi opened the binoculars and put them in front of his eyes.

"Look, lord, over there......" The guard held out his hand and pointed over there.

Through the binoculars, Shang Kexi saw several small North Korean-style boats raising their sails in a panic, turning around and fleeing, and sailors constantly throwing things into the sea to reduce their weight.

"Humph!" Shang Kexi sneered, just a few small boats, still want to run?

"Catch up! Arrest them all! Those who dare to resist will be killed! Shang Kexi said coldly.

……

"Lower the mainsail! All sailors are ready for battle! Everyone is in place! Captain Jack shouted excitedly, "Raise my flag!" Rise to the top! ”

A blood-red banner was raised, with a black skeleton painted on it, holding a blood-dripping steel knife in one hand and a blood-dripping heart in the other. At this time, the "Happy Jack" banner with a skull and two crossed scimitars had not yet become a uniform style of pirate flags, and the pirate flags at this time were still varied.

However, in this era, there is already a common color language. Generally speaking, when a pirate ship raises the white pirate flag against its prey, it means two things, one is to identify itself, and the other means that if the other party gives up resistance, it will only rob and never harm the people on the opposite ship.

And if the prey insists on resisting, the pirate ship may raise a red flag, which means: once you win, the chicken and dog will not be left! Generally speaking, though, pirates rarely actually raise the flag. Because everyone comes out to mix, all they want to make money is, of course it's fun to kill others, but when people resist, they will also die, and the ship will also be damaged, so it's still rare to do things like chickens and dogs don't stay. However, if the opponent is so ignorant that the peace-loving pirates have to raise the red flag, then the situation will definitely be different. You must know that if you come out to mix, you must be trustworthy, and if you say that you will kill your whole family, you must kill your whole family.

And now, Captain Jack didn't say a word, and directly raised the red skull flag, which is not common. However, it was absolutely justified for him to do so, because one of the orders he received was to destroy and destroy the Manchu sea power as much as possible. Even if you can't completely eliminate them, you have to make them afraid of going to sea to fight.

The snow-white sails were unfurled one by one, and these sails were swollen with the sea breeze. Two cruisers, seven modified whaling ships lined up in a straight line. Start accelerating.

……

At this time, Shang Kexi's fleet was already about to catch up with those small boats, and Shang Kexi was sure that in half an hour at most, he would be able to catch them all. But at this moment, someone suddenly shouted: "Enemy ship found!" ”

Generally speaking, at sea, when two ships meet, they will never approach each other out of friendship, as long as one ship takes the initiative to approach the other, it is a sign of hostility. And the rapid approach of one fleet to another, not to mention.

"Enemy from there!" Shang Kexi was taken aback, and he hurriedly raised his binoculars and looked over there. Because his opponent was lined up in a column, he couldn't see how many ships were on the opposite side, but he could clearly see two flags flying high on the mast of the ship rushing to the front, one of which was a slightly larger one with a red, white and blue flag with something painted in the middle (in the middle was a pattern composed of the letters A.VOC, which was the logo of the Dutch East India Company). On the other, slightly smaller red banner has a black skeleton painted on it.

"The whole team! Get ready for battle! Shang Kexi ordered. So his fleet gave up the pursuit of those small boats and began to discharge the classic five-point plum blossom formation to meet them. Shang Kexi had already seen that the other party's ship was much larger than his, and he also guessed that it must be the Dutch who occupied Jeju Island. When they were trading with Yuri, they also had a certain understanding of the military power of the Dutch on Jeju Island, and knew that although these Hongyi ships were strong and powerful, the number of ships was actually very limited. Shang Kexi came out with more than fifty warships this time, and although he couldn't see how many ships the opponent had, he estimated that he still had the upper hand in the number of ships. The five-point plum blossom array is actually to take advantage of the many ships, and form a pentagonal phalanx of ships like plum blossoms, in order to divide the enemy forces that rush into the formation, and use the advantage of many ships to win.

"It's a pity that I didn't expect to meet these guys, and I couldn't get ready to get off the ship." Shang Kexi thought so.

……

"Inform the battleships behind them to fight according to Plan A, and be ready to follow our ship to the right, the port guns ready to fire, and the other sailors to prepare to move to starboard." Captain Jack looked at the Manchu fleet in front of him, in order to mentally estimate the speed of both sides, and gave instructions to his first mate.

So a signalman appeared at the stern of the cruiser, waving two flags, one red and one white, towards the rear. This is another technology that appeared at sea in advance with Zheng Sen - flag language. Its appearance made it possible for the fleet to carry out complex combat maneuvers at sea.

After giving this order, Captain Jack continued to stand in the bow of the ship, holding a telescope to observe the Manchu fleet.

"Prepare the sailors to put away the mainsail." Captain Jack said.

Now that his ship was in the upwind position, if he were to make a sharp turn, if he continued to open the mainsail, and when he made a sharp turn, the ship would be tilted so badly that the elevation angle of the cannon on the port side would be greatly affected, and it would not be able to shoot effectively, and if the wind was a little stronger, it would even cause the ship to capsize. So the mainsail had to be put up as fast as possible before making a sharp turn, and any idle sailor should run to starboard, while the sailor on deck even had to climb some support poles that protruded to the right, taking advantage of the change in the ship's center of gravity caused by his own weight to reduce the degree of tilt of the ship to starboard.

A group of sailors climbed the mast like monkeys.

The distance between the two sides was getting closer and closer, and Captain Jack no longer needed to rely on the telescope to observe the enemy, he once again estimated the distance between the two sides and ordered: "Put away the mainsail, the right full rudder!" ”