Yang Feng stood on the north bank of the Yao River, looking at Ningbo City opposite.

Behind him, the three battalions of infantry of the First Brigade of the Ming Army lined up in three phalanxes, red robes, silver armor, black pants with double yellow side lines, leggings, and black canvas shoes with high-waisted cowhide soles on their feet.

Well, he's showing off.

His field army has now been reorganized into the First Army, and the commander of the army is still himself, with three infantry brigades under him, the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd. The commander of the 1st Infantry Brigade was still himself, but all of them were recruits, consisting of three battalions of recruits who had been assaulted and armed during the Battle of Jinhae. The core of the second brigade is the original first battalion, plus four or five infantry battalions, and the brigade commander is Feng Zhen. The core of the 3rd Brigade is the 2nd Infantry Battalion, plus the 6th and 7th Battalions, and the brigade commander is Du You, the commander of the 3rd Battalion, who was transferred back from Taiwan.

Each brigade also has a field artillery battalion.

According to the planned establishment, each brigade should also have an infantry battalion and a cavalry post responsible for reconnaissance, and the military dependents should also have an infantry brigade, a cavalry brigade and a heavy artillery brigade.

The latter one will be equipped with a fifteen-pound front-loading rifled gun and a twenty-four-pound howitzer, that is, a large-caliber mortar gun, but now it is under development, and secondly, there are not so many people, so it can only be planned first. Besides, Yang Feng didn't think that the current Qing army was worth using these things, in fact, unless those top cities such as Nanjing did, they didn't need artillery larger than the nine-jin cannon. What's more, even if the effect of the twenty-four-pound howitzer bombarding the city wall is not as good as his spray cannon, it is filled with a full eighty pounds of gunpowder, and the twenty-four-pound howitzer is a fart in front of this thing.

"Dashuai, these villagers are willing to support the boat to help us break through Ningbo."

Gao Huai, the new chief of staff of the First Army, led a group of local people to Yang Feng and said, just as he spoke, those ordinary people had already knelt down and kowtowed, all of them looked sincerely frightened, just like worshipping gods in the temple.

In fact, Yang Dashuai is indeed about to be regarded as an immortal in this vicinity, and from this point of view, his pretending effect is still very significant.

"Old gentleman, please hurry up, I have received the wishes of the villagers, but this forced crossing of the Yao River will inevitably suffer certain casualties, this war is a matter of being a soldier, and we can't let the villagers take this risk for us."

Yang Feng piled up a smile on his face, and hurriedly stepped forward to help up a white-bearded old man in front and said.

"Dashuai, the old man has an idea to avoid this Yao Jiang."

The old man said very directly.

"Sir, please."

Yang Feng said unexpectedly.

"We are all small boats, as long as there is water to go, the river here is longitudinal and horizontal, almost anywhere, and many people have boats, as long as the commander gives an order, you can quickly gather hundreds of boats, a boat carrying four or five soldiers, cross the Yongjiang River to the south bank, take advantage of the night to insert into the upper reaches of the Fenghua River, down the river can be directly inserted into the Changchun Gate, and even can be inserted into the moat in front of the Changchun Gate, after going ashore, blow open the city gate, in addition, as long as there are hundreds of boats connected across the Yao River, you can make a pontoon bridge, That's when the army can pass in a steady stream. ”

The old man said.

"This trick is very good, old gentleman!"

Yang Feng's eyes lit up and said, but then he looked at him a little puzzled, it was obvious that an ordinary old farmer had this kind of abnormal mind.

"The old man followed King Lu back then, King Lu was defeated, and my whole family died and I was left alone, and now I am also half of the age of being cut into the ground, I don't ask for anything else, just follow the handsome and kill a few more Tartars, and avenge my dozen relatives."

The old man said and fell to his knees again.

"Old gentleman, please get up, the supreme general of the Tartar held this time will be executed by your old man!"

Yang Feng immediately helped him up and said.

Since this is the case, then the rest is simple, the boat is very easy to do, who does not have a small flat-bottomed boat in the water town in the south of the Yangtze River, the commander quickly summoned nearly a thousand boats under the order, there are all kinds of mess, in the lower reaches of the Yongjiang River, the dense almost obscured the river, and finally the three battalions of the Third Infantry Brigade were all loaded on the boat, and there were even some ammunition supplies left. And the only problem is the lack of artillery support, this is not a big deal, the coastal defense fleet is being transferred, once the infantry begins to raid, those shallow water warships will provide artillery support, the Fenghua River channel is about three meters deep, and those battleships can easily drive in.

After all the preparations were completed, the mile-long queue, which was completely composed of various small wooden boats, quietly burrowed into a small estuary on the south bank of the Yongjiang River under the cover of night, and inserted itself into the upper reaches of the Fenghua River in a labyrinthine water network.

These water networks are a maze for outsiders, but for these locals it is the main road, just a few hours, before the dawn of the next day, the first small wooden boat drilled out of a small estuary on the east bank of the Fenghua River, and then all the other small wooden boats continued to sail out one after another, and some of them diverged the way, but still drilled out from the other small estuary, and soon thousands of small boats were like koi gathered in the pool, densely arranged on the bank of the river.

Looking at Ningbo City under the moonlight two miles away, Du You waved his hand and said, "Rush!" ”

Immediately after that, the herald beside him waved the lantern in his hand, and soon the same lantern on the river continued to light up and then extinguished, and the small canopy boat carrying five people under his seat immediately followed the action of the boatman's penny propping downward, slowly inserting diagonally towards the west bank.

At the same time, Du You opened a small rattan box beside him, took out the Kong Ming lantern inside, and after lighting the candle inside, the Kong Ming lantern soon rose.

"Dashuai, I see the signal!"

In the headquarters of the Ming army on the north bank of the Yao River, Gao Huai rushed into Yang Feng's tent and said.

Because Yang Feng forbade disturbing the people, all the Ming troops, including himself, lived in tents, at this time this guy was holding a book and reading it with relish, and when he heard Gao Huai's report, he immediately put down the book in his hand and said: "Then let's start!" ”

Immediately after that, all the river warships on the Yongjiang River, which were full of soldiers of the First Brigade, raised their sails and slowly sailed towards the Sanjiang Estuary under the impetus of the northwest wind blowing from the side, and on the Yongjiang River channel at the Sanjiang Estuary, the port side gun doors of the 11 cruisers were all opened, and all the cannons were aimed at Ningbo City.

"Lord Wang, you just listen to the lowly duty!"

Zhao Hongcan was still there and persuaded hard, they didn't sleep all night, and no one could sleep in this case, including Chang Ning, who was also staring at the two swollen eyes, drinking strong tea and sighing there, and there were more than a dozen Eight Banners and Green Camp generals standing or sitting on both sides.

In fact, at this time, there were about 30,000 eight banners and green battalions in the city, and the original attack on Zhenhai was less than 100,000, and the four generals of Hangzhou, Fuzhou, Jiangning, and Jingkou had 12,000 eight banners. Jingkou General Ma Zide, they don't know whether the old horse is alive or dead, Fuzhou General Jin Shirong, Lao Jin's head was just brought to the Ming Army for exhibition yesterday, the Hangzhou Eight Banners were almost completely killed, and after the general Dandai was beheaded, Chang Ning was temporarily in charge of it, and General Jiang Ning did not come. In addition, there are 82,000 green battalions, the main commander is Guo Shilong, the governor of Fujian and Zhejiang, but Lao Guo is in Hangzhou, and the front line is commanded by Zhao Hongcan and Wang Wanxiang, the governor of Fujian, but Lao Wang let his soldiers trample to death, and Zhao Hongcan is left.

As for the total number of soldiers, there were originally twelve, and now there are five left.

It's also very miserable!

Chang Ning sighed and looked at the room full of generals, none of them lowered their heads and didn't let go of a fart, except for Zhao Hongcan, who could still give some opinions, everyone else was shut up, and even the usually arrogant Eight Banner generals became wood carvings. Even from their gray faces, Chang Ning could directly see their fear, and he even doubted that these people were really on the battlefield, would they run away as soon as they heard the sound of the Ming army's artillery, the generals were like this, and the soldiers could be imagined.

"It seems that this is the only way to go!"

He looked up at the roof and said gloomily.

"Lord Wang, a fire was found on the Fenghua River."

An officer suddenly ran in and fell to his knees to report it.

"Fenghuajiang?"

Chang Ning was stunned for a moment.

Almost as soon as he finished speaking, a loud "boom" came as if the sky was cracking, and even the ground under his feet seemed to jump hard, and one of the deputies was so frightened that he screamed, turned his head and ran out, and then hit a pillar hard, and then fainted to the ground.

"Rubbish! Let's see what's going on! ”

Chang Ning looked at this scene and said sadly.

What else can it be, the Ming army has arrived!

Outside the Changchun Gate of the South Gate of Ningbo, several dripping Ming soldiers clinged to the city wall, looking at the top of their heads with a frightened face, the city bricks that were blown up were smashed on the opposite bank like cannonballs, and on the other side of the city gate hole, a small wooden boat was docking, a large number of heavily armed Ming soldiers got off the boat, and then quickly stood close to the city wall, in the moat, a small wooden boat was sailing towards the city gate.

"One more shot, the gates didn't blow up!"

A lieutenant shouted.

The small wooden boat then sailed to the hole facing the city gate, and two soldiers quickly jumped from the boat, one holding the bow and stern of the ship, tilting the hull at a large angle, and aiming the rocket launch tubes on the hull at the city gate, which was only ten paces away. Another soldier who had already jumped into the water took a match and then leaned on the fuse, lit it and dived into the water as fast as he could and swam into the distance, while the two soldiers who grabbed the bow and stern of the boat still stared at the burning fuse and gritted their teeth.

Soon the fuse disappeared into the launch tube, and the blazing flames suddenly erupted, followed by a heavy rocket flying out of the front end, and the two soldiers hurriedly threw themselves into the bottom of the river, and at the same time swam into the distance like crazy. Almost at the moment when they swam away, the rocket hit the city gate inside, and the terrifying fire mass of eighty catties of gunpowder exploded with countless fragments of the city wall like a scattered bomb, and the top of the city gate jumped up fiercely, and then the city tower collapsed together.

"Into town!"

Du You waved his saber and shouted.