Early the next morning, Cao Conglong boarded the ferry to Yiwu under the care of Wenwu in Dongyang County, and traced down the Dongyang River. However, among the attachés, there is no Lu Wenlong, the chief secretary of Jinhua County, who has almost never left before, and it is said that he is going to Yongkang to do some official business, but he has no way of knowing what he is going to do.

Half an hour later, the soldiers in the north and south camps of the Ming army, who were far away in Longyou County, Quzhou Prefecture, had also eaten breakfast and were resting for a while so that they could be in a better state when beating the drum and sending out the troops.

The officers and men of the Ming army who went to war came from the two battalions of Yiwu and Dongyang, as well as some of the garrison troops that were transferred, and almost all of them participated in the successive battles in Jinhua Mansion last year and had some battlefield experience, so they appeared relatively calm. And this atmosphere also infected a very small number of recruits, so that the somewhat apprehensive mood of these warriors who had been carefully selected to enter the war camp was also calmed to a certain extent.

In contrast, the recruited men were panicked, because in the wars of this era, they were often used as trenches. I just heard that the Ming army was preparing to forcibly cross Lingxi, so the Qing army on the other side of Lingxi would naturally not sit idly by, and it was likely that they would be the unlucky ones at that time.

Fortunately, Jinhua and Quzhou are separated by a strip of water, and they have also heard of the prestige of this Zhejiang Ming army, compared to the terrifying reputation of the Qing army that does not leave prisoners, they still believe in the strict military discipline brought back by the local merchants from Jinhua, and the people do not commit any crimes, after all, this is also what they have seen with their own eyes in the past few days, and they can't fake it.

The rest time passed quickly, and under the reminder of the staff officer, Chen Wen put on a set of armor, put on a helmet, hung up his sword, and announced the departure of the whole army. And with the coach's order. A large number of Ming troops came out of the camp.

At this moment, it was nearly May, and the weather was getting hotter and hotter, and it was really inconvenient for the Ming army to wear cotton armor to fight in such weather, so they had to wear ordinary military uniforms and march according to the establishment of the camp and the team. The folk men wore their own clothes and followed closely behind with bamboo rafts and boats that had been prepared. Walk towards Lingxi.

Lingxi "has a long history, can pass the raft, Nanxiang a source, bamboo, wood and rice, all come out of this, instill the benefit of the economy, than the land of the river", is one of the main waterways of the Ming and Qing dynasties "Longyou Merchant Gang" to trade with other places. Until the beginning of the republic, due to excessive felling of trees in the mountains. Soil erosion is serious, the river sediment is silted, the riverbed is raised, and the water volume is sharply reduced, and the function of navigation is gradually lost. And at that time, the afterglow of the "Longyou Merchant Gang" inherited from the Ming and Qing dynasties also disappeared.

At this moment, as the Ming army approached, the Qing army also ordered all rafts from the source to stop on the west bank. Otherwise, they will all be burned to avoid financing the enemy. Such military actions would inevitably affect the conduct of trade. But compared to those worthless filial piety. Defending Quzhou Mansion was a matter of life and death for Chen Jin, so the work of clearing the wilderness was still carried out.

The camp of the Ming army outside Longyou Town was not far from Lingxi, and the army soon arrived there. Carrying the built raft, the Ming army quickly completed the assembly, and then began to board the raft in the order set by the staff officer.

With the large-scale dispatch of the Ming army, the Qing army across the river also lit the beacon fire. Not only did the whole army begin to assemble and dispatch, but it also took this opportunity to inform the Qing army water battalion that was still at the wharf of Longyou County to come to assist in the defense.

At this moment, the Ming army began to board the ship in an orderly manner, and the Qing army on the other side did not rush down to the river beach, but arranged artillery and archers at the same time as the array. to prevent the Ming army from forcibly landing.

Chen Wen looked from afar, and the opposite side was mainly the banner of the Quzhou Green Battalion, which was mixed with some troops from the Jinhua Town Standard Battalion. It seems that the Inspector Battalion is very relieved to hand over this spiritual stream to them and the water camp to guard, and it is more focused on recuperating its energy. However, he didn't bother to think about anything more at this moment, and seeing that the estimated time was almost up, he ordered the army to start crossing the stream. And as his orders were issued one level at a time, the Ming army, which had already been prepared, propped up the poles of the ships and sailed towards the opposite shore.

The first batch of Ming troops came from the Yiwu battalion, and their task was to seize a beachhead at the first time in the order of crossing the river normally, so as to form a formation for the follow-up Ming army to occupy a larger space, so as to crush the Qing army. In order to cross the river this time, Chen Wen specially chose several infantry teams that knew how to use water, but the success or failure was not yet known.

This section of Lingxi is already in the downstream, which is not very far from Longyou County, and the river channel is relatively wide. Since the Ming army crossed the river, the Qing army did not rush to open fire, but after the Ming army crossed the center of the river in Lingxi, the Qing army immediately began shelling.

At a glance, after the smoke of the Qing artillery, there will always be columns of water near the rafts of the Ming army on Lingxi, and even some of them are very close, pouring the Ming army on the raft like a chicken in soup. It's just that the aiming technology of the Qing gunners is really not worthy of the artillery they use, and the Ming rafts are small, most of them are so small that they can only fit one army, so that there are no casualties among the Ming troops who crossed the stream.

Soon, the Ming fleet sailed a third of the way to the west bank of the river, and sailed a little further, until the stream was knee-high before disembarking and landing.

However, at this moment, a few miles north of the Ming army's crossing point on the east bank, there was a faint sound of warning horns, and at the same time, a thick black smoke also rose from the direction of the beacon tower built there.

"The Tartar Water Battalion is coming, retreat!"

At the same time as the leading officer shouted loudly, the main position of the Ming army on the east bank also issued an order for Mingjin to withdraw his troops. At this moment, the Ming army, which had received the order, turned around and rowed back, trying to quickly return to the east bank. However, the raft of the Ming army did not sail far under the escort of the water column stirred up by the Qing artillery, and the clipper boat of the Qing army's water camp appeared in sight and rushed to the crossing point at a very fast speed.

On the surface of the Lingxi River, the rafts of the Ming army were struggling to return to the east bank, while the Qing army was sailing downstream, intending to eliminate the Ming army's river-crossing troops.

Although the Lingxi waterway is not very wide, the slightly larger ships in the Qing army's water camp are not convenient to fight here, so they are all slightly smaller ships. However, the so-called "slightly smaller" ships of the Qing army's water camp were also incomparable behemoths compared to the small boats and bamboo rafts of the Ming army. And the most important thing is that this forcible crossing was a feint, and there was no need to confront the Qing army's water camp at all.

"Aim at the Tartar fleet and give Lao Tzu a hard beating!"

Receiving Chen Wen's order, the gunners, after roughly measuring the distance, lit the fuses of the already loaded guns under the orders of the officers.

Time. The position of the Ming army was full of gunsmoke like the Qing army on the other side of the river, and shells sprayed out from the muzzles of the guns, drawing a parabola. However, this level of aiming, let alone a moving target, may not be able to hit even a fixed target. After the Ming army's cannonballs crossed the sky, they also stirred up columns of water on Lingxi like the Qing army's cannonballs.

The only difference is. The gunners of the Ming army seem to be more accurate, and the sailors of the Qing army are more drenched in the soup, and that's it.

It's a pity that the shelling on the river bank did not hinder the speed of the Qing ships in the slightest, and when the rafts of the Ming army began to sail past the center of the river one after another, heading towards the east bank at a faster speed, the Qing ships also arrived in front of them, and the attack they chose was the most primitive collision!

The Qing army's ships were not large, but they were still much larger than the boats and bamboo rafts of the Ming army. In the absence of water weapons such as slapsticks. The most primitive impact of the Qing army was quickly taken effect.

Riding on a horse, Chen Wen looked from a distance, and the fastest Qing army ship aimed at a bamboo raft near the downstream of the Ming army, and directly collided with it. Seeing the Qing army's ships coming, the Ming troops on the bamboo raft jumped into the water one after another, and the bamboo raft was immediately crushed by the Qing army's ship, breaking free from the shackles of rattan under the triple action of impact, buoyancy and pressure, and instantly fell apart into individual bamboos. And at the moment. The Qing army on the ship used long soldiers such as bamboo guns to pierce those Ming troops who fell into the water......

At the moment when the first bamboo raft was destroyed by the Qing army, more Qing ships sailed to this section of the river. In the same way, an attack was launched on the rafts of the Ming army.

"Keep paddling, hurry, don't stop!"

In response to Chen Wen's anxiety, the frequency of the Ming army's golden drummer Ming Jin also increased sharply, but the frequency of the sound wave could not increase the speed of the Ming army's raft to the limit. Seeing that the rafts were crashed and destroyed by the Qing army, the soldiers of the Ming army continued to fall into the water. Some were even fished onto ships by the Qing army.

In addition to the soldiers holding the bamboo rafts, the soldiers of the firearms team used bows and arrows and bird guns to launch a counterattack, and the Ming troops on the rafts that were approached by the Qing army also used their weapons to fight with the condescending Qing army.

After a while, the Ming rafts returned to the east bank one after another, and the battle on the river gradually began to calm down. Most of the Ming rafts that were fortunate enough to return to the east coast were close to the upper reaches. And those rafts that took the lead in facing the Qing army were rarely able to come back, and even those soldiers who fell into the water were fished up by the Qing army one after another, and then the heads of the owls showed off their might.

In order to ensure the effectiveness of the feint, the arrangement of the Ming army in these river-crossing troops was known only to the officer who came back from being wounded, and the other non-commissioned officers were unaware. Most of these people followed Chen Wen before the Battle of Xiaoshun Town, and there were even veterans who were earlier than this. These infantry should have fought with the Qing army on land, and even if they died in battle, it was when the tactical conditions of the two sides tended to be equal, and they should never have been killed on this Lingxi by the superior water battalion of the Qing army. However, at present, when the water battalion of the Ming army was not enough to undertake the task of escorting, they could only use the forced crossing to cover up the troops of the dark Chen Cang, and they made the greatest sacrifice for this.

Although the Ming army, which was constantly able to swim to the riverbank, looked at the Qing army that was showing off their might, under the order of Chen Wen, who was angry and soaring into the sky, the artillery of the Ming army once again erupted the same anger.

It's just that the Qing army at this moment is no longer as lucky as before, due to the need to hit the Ming army's raft and attack the Ming army that fell into the water, the speed of the Qing army's ships has almost stagnated, but it is still guaranteed not to be drifted downstream by the current. In addition, it is much larger than the raft of the Ming army, and the artillery of the Ming army has been systematically trained in aiming for a month, and the hit rate has far exceeded before, but more live-fire training is needed to continue to improve the hit rate, and now it has become a live target for the Ming army's artillery.

The two sides were not far apart, and the moment the Ming artillery opened fire, it constantly stirred up columns of water around the Qing ships, splashing the stream water on those Qing troops. And almost when the Qing army found out that the Ming army had fired back again, the Ming army's Furlong machine gun was replaced with a second sub-gun and continued to fire at the Qing army. Only this time, the ships of the Qing army were no longer as lucky as before, and some of them were quickly concentrated by the Ming army.

Under the bombardment of solid shells, although the ships of the Qing army were larger than those of the Ming army, they were still not enough to withstand such a blow. The ships that were hit by the Ming artillery shells were either the masts and cabins on the ships, or they were smashed by the shells and leaked through the bottom compartment and began to sink after entering the water, and those Qing sailors had to jump into the water.

However, before other Qing ships could come to the rescue of these sailors, the third son of the Ming army's Franc machine gun continued to splash the anger of the Ming army on the river bank after being replaced......

After paying more for the loss of ships, the Qing army had no choice but to retreat to the west bank in embarrassment, because they had no idea how many such guns there were in the Ming army. As for the Qing sailors who were left behind, they had to swim to the west bank in desperate cries for help, and at this moment, groups of Ming troops operating bamboo rafts and boats sailed towards them one after another, replicating what they had done to the Ming army in the water!

From the morning, in addition to lunch, the Ming and Qing armies have always been under the rhythm of the Qing army's water camp showing off their strength and the Ming army's artillery counterattack. In the afternoon, the Nantang battalion, which had been ordered to form a warehouse in secret, also set out from the concealed assembly site and quickly arrived at the area of Turtle Mountain upstream, preparing to secretly cross Lingxi here, and then go north along Lingxi to cooperate with the main force of the Ming army to break through the Qing army's defensive line.

The number of rafts collected along the way and made at the concealment points was small, and the infantry troops that could only transport at most one outpost at a time could only be transported, and if the cavalry, artillery, and other battalion units were included, it would take a long time to get the entire Nantang operation to the other side, and during this period it could not be disturbed by the Qing army.

It's just that no one knows whether it is Chen Wen, who has great expectations for this, Li Ruixin, the commander of the Nantang battalion, or other Ming army soldiers, and at this moment, a Qing army with no bandits is rushing here. (To be continued.) )