"Captain, they said that there are no Dutch in Longyamen, and our workers and soldiers on the construction site in Zhennanfu have been evacuated in advance, as for the battle situation in Malacca, they don't know, should we go south to find the second squadron or go directly into the Strait of Malacca?"

On the Zhenwu steam test ship, the first mate who was in charge of talking to several Malay fishermen said to Captain Xu Shou. Pen | fun | pavilion www. ｂｉｑｕｇｅ。 ｉｎｆｏ

It's just that he didn't notice the sinister gaze of the fishermen.

"Straight into the strait!"

Xu Shou said without hesitation.

Although he only had two ships, the speed of these two steam schooners was enough to easily escape even if he ran into the main fleet of the Dutch.

The first mate did not speak again.

Immediately after the order was issued on the Zhenwu as the flagship, and the Baiyue behind went straight to Longyamen, and soon the coastline of the Malay Peninsula in the distance appeared in the field of vision of Xu Shou and others, although Zhennanfu was the future Nanyang political and military core appointed by Emperor Yang, but at this time it was only a construction site that had just started. From the telescope, you can see that there are no workers on the empty construction site, there are indeed no workers here, there were only 3,000 workers and a battalion garrison, the design of the fortress has just laid the foundation, there is no defensive barrier in the face of the Dutch attack, and it is normal to retreat.

"No wonder the emperor takes a fancy to this place, this is the real throat, the dragon's tooth gate, this name is very vivid."

Xu Shou said.

At the entrance to the Strait of Malacca in front of him, large and small islands are crowded together, separating the originally very wide sea surface, especially Bintan Island and Batam Island in the middle, plus Kundur Island to the west and these small islands between these large islands, together form the stretching Riau Islands, which are blocking the Strait of Malacca, and the most suitable passage for navigation is only the northernmost Longyamen, which is the future capital of Daming Zhennan Province.

However, at this time, this was the busiest waterway in the world in the history of later generations, and at this time, not a single ship could be seen, let alone merchant ships, even small fishing boats, and only the waves were washing the shore.

"Command to be ready for battle."

Xu Shou suddenly said lightly.

"Captain, are you worried that the natives are lying?"

The first mate said.

"Do you think they're worth trusting? Do you think that such a choke point will make the Dutch not even a single battleship come over? With so many islands, not to mention a few warships, even the entire fleet of the Dutch can be hidden without any problem! No general in his right mind would let go of such a good ambush pole. ”

Xu Shou said.

Well, he guessed right!

Almost at the same time, the observer on the overhead mast let out a sudden exclamation.

"Enemy ships!"

With this exclamation, countless white sails suddenly appeared from between Bintan Island and Batam, and then one after another towering giant ships appeared in their field of vision, and countless gun muzzles were densely arranged on the side of these warships, venting their domineering spirit unscrupulously.

Admiral Bank's main fleet.

He is not a junior brother at sea, this guy is a veteran who followed Ruit to raid London, of course he will not be stupid enough to wait at sea near the city of Malacca, the reinforcements of the Ming fleet must go here, and this is the most suitable place for ambushes, then he is here to wait for the ambush, the Ming fleet is coming from many different places, there must be a lack of effective communication between each other, as long as there is a greedy one who enters his open net, and those Malay fishermen are also arranged by him.

Obviously, he succeeded, but he didn't expect that what he caught was actually a two-headed monster.

"Damn it, a hundred-pounder cannon!"

Admiral Banks on the William III looked at the two battleships opposite, at the four frighteningly long and frighteningly thick barrels on their fore and rear decks, and then a cold sweat came down from his head, and he exclaimed almost subconsciously.

Luckily, however, the two oddly shaped schooners were now facing his side, which meant that they had to turn their guns to this side, and it took some time for the ships to turn at sea.

Admiral Banks did not hesitate to order the fleet to adjust its course at once, cut diagonally from the port side with the battle line, and try to make the distance closest before the opponent completed the turn, and then by virtue of the huge numerical superiority, fire a salvo as fast as possible, and pile them to death with a large number of shells, if they could be closed to within five hundred yards, it would be more perfect with those forty-two-pound cast steel flowering shells, so more than twenty battleships, including four second-class battleships, fought out in columns and cut straight to the port side of the two ships of Zhenwu

But the Zhenwu did not turn, because at the same time, the four terrifying cannons pointed at the front and rear suddenly turned slowly.

They turn very slowly.

Because they are turned artificially.

The huge runners rotated by ten strong men with big shoulders and round waists next to each cannon, and through the combination of gears, the heavy cannon and gun carriage of 20,000 catties relied on several steel wheels at fixed angles to slowly rotate on the annular track at the bottom. This is not the 305 mm main gun of the Dingyuan ironclad ship, it is just a small cannon with a caliber of less than 180 mm.

But even if it was human-driven, it made Admiral Bank, who was approaching at full speed in the distance, dumbfounded.

They held up their binoculars and watched as the four cannons pointed at them little by little, while they were like soldiers lining up on land to attack, one after another, posing their huge bodies to the fullest, waiting for the arrival of one cannonball after another, and this was a hundred-pound cannon, they already knew the power of this cannon, they had already sunk four battleships by this thing.

"Open the cannon, concentrate your fire on the paddle wheel, attack the battery!"

Admiral Bank yelled in a cold sweat.

The starboard side of the William III, which was nearly 3,000 yards away from the Zhenwu ship, first erupted like a volcanic eruption, and forty-two-pound shells roared across the sea, but unfortunately none of them hit, which was completely beyond the aiming ability of this kind of cannon, after all, they were actually designed for naval battles from hundreds of yards, not against opponents thousands of yards away. The cannons on the battleships behind them also roared at great speed, and the dense cannonballs flew towards the Zhenwu and Baiyue.

Fortunately, the number was useful after all, and the two shells fired from the battleship I don't know which one hit the Zhenwu one after another, but unfortunately the shells ran out after flying over 3,000 yards, and only killed one sailor, but one of the shells hit the paddle wheel, but it was bounced off by the steel plate and teak that protected the paddle wheel.

"Fire!"

And at this moment, the four eighty-pound cannons finally completed their turn, and with Xu Shou's roar, the bow gun of the Zhenwu immediately spewed out flames more than five zhang long.

The huge cannonball suddenly flew towards the target, and at the same time the cannon body retreated fiercely, but it gradually slowed down and stopped on the upward slope, and then reset it manually by the soldiers, and the artillerymen behind smashed the door wheel with a sledgehammer, rotating it counterclockwise at the fastest speed, and then the two soldiers lifted a piece of more than 100 pounds of heavy gun lock blocking the front from above. After the gun door was opened, two soldiers carried 80 pounds of heavy flower shells and put them on the ammunition supply slot, and the back bombardier pushed the shell into the gun chamber, and then put it into the firing yao bag to close the gun door, just when the runner was rotated in the back, the two soldiers carrying the gun lock inserted the gun lock, tightened the runner in the back, and smashed it a few times with a sledgehammer to determine the lock, and the main gunner completed the final aim and immediately pulled the gun rope, and the firing tube ignited dozens of catties of gunpowder, pushing the huge shell to rotate and fly out.

The same process was repeated on the other three cannons.

The first round of shells did not hit the target, but after the second round of shells fired, the middle of the battleship Ruyter, which had just been repaired on the opposite side, suddenly turned into a terrifying flame.

"Close the distance and keep firing!"

Admiral Bandke roared hoarsely.

He had to sink both battleships.

He is glad now that the commander of the Ming army is too arrogant, if it is not for these two warships to rush into the strait alone, but wait for follow-up reinforcements and then cooperate with their main fleet, then it will have a terrifying impact on the battle situation between the two sides, in this case, then desperately bear a certain loss and sink them here, anyway, it is just two battleships and four cannons, and he has enough warships.

But he had forgotten what terrain it was.

"To the north, into the Straits of Johor!"

Xu Shou looked at the Dutch second-class battleship that ignited the fire, and said indifferently to the first mate.

"Captain, we're fast, shouldn't we keep our distance from them and keep playing long-range shelling?"

The first mate said suspiciously.

This was a good idea, the Dutch sail ships could not catch up with them anyway, and the range of the Dutch guns was also no match for them, just pull away and keep a sufficient distance and then keep bombarding the opponent.

"This, the first time in actual combat, can you guarantee that it will not fail?"

Xu Shou pointed to the cannon and said.

Well, the first mate immediately understood, that is still in actual combat, it is very common for failures in training, the cannons of this new gun carriage can even be said to be full of failures, they can only rely on these four cannons, and it is good to say that the cannon is out of order, if the steam engine fails, it will be a dead end.

Immediately after the two battleships turned at the same time, while continuing to fire at the Dutch fleet, they sailed at full speed to the Johor Strait, which was less than twenty miles away, and their speeds could reach more than fifty miles per hour at the fastest, and soon reached the entrance to the Johor Strait, and the huge fleet of the Dutch was still in hot pursuit, and soon another Dutch battleship was hit by eighty pounds of shells, and then a huge internal explosion occurred, and the entire battleship was directly blown into pieces, but the Ruyt, which was shot before, extinguished the fire again, but also lost its combat capability, It can only drift far behind.

"Into the Strait!"

Xu Shou looked at this scene with satisfaction and said.

His plan succeeded, and the rest was up to the Dutch to cooperate. (To be continued.) )