Yang Feng's robbery at sea almost made Ito Hirofumi's nose crooked, Nima, don't play like this, do you still let us live?

But the fire is on the fire, and he has no good way to do this, condemning this shameless bandit in the international community, this is meaningless, in Europe Yang Feng has the right to speak, as for using this to win over the British and French fleets to interfere, this is not to mention dreaming, the two families and Yang Feng are so good that they are about to wear a pair of pants, and it is absolutely impossible to offend this villain for His Majesty the Emperor.

Dispatch the combined fleet to escort the ship, this is also no possibility, now the Beiyang Naval Division is eyeing Liugong Island, if the biggest enemy is not solved, the combined fleet will not dare to go anywhere, otherwise they will take the opportunity to bombard Nagasaki will be in trouble, as for dispatching those small warships, it is no different from sending them to death, let alone dealing with Yang Feng's high-speed destroyers, even those troop carriers can kill them in seconds, to be honest, these troop carriers are small except for the caliber of artillery, Otherwise it seems that it is no worse than any of the capital ships of the combined fleet.

In this case, Prime Minister Ito, the only thing he can do is to equip Japan's merchant ships with some weapons, of course, it is impossible to equip them with artillery, at most they will bring them some rifles, which is better than nothing, and spend more money to go around the sea in a big circle to bypass Taiwan, but this is definitely not possible for most merchant ships, even warships do not have such a long endurance range.

Prime Minister Ito is not in the mood to care about anything else now, the land war situation in Korea is still unfavorable, and the remnants of Oshima Yoshimasa's defeated army will be even less courageous to launch an attack after Zhang Gaoyuan led the four battalions of Songwu Army to arrive, in fact, if it weren't for the lack of attack power of the Qing army, he should have run away at this time, but even so, he retreated again and again.

After gradually becoming familiar with the combat method of mortars, Nie Shicheng has learned to use this thing to harass the Japanese army, every night the Qing artillery will sneak to the bank of the river, set up mortars to the Japanese defense line on the opposite bank to shoot a few shots, before the Japanese army reacted, carrying the cannon and running away, Oshima Yoshima Yoshimasa was about to be tortured and crazy, and there was no possibility to expect him to take Chenghuanyi.

Now the only hope is pinned on reinforcements, just when Yang Feng is making a windfall in Taiwan, the Fifth Division led by Nozu Michikan and the Lijian Shangwen Tourism Regiment have begun to take a boat along the Nakdong River to the north, and then land on the Jinquan and Daejeon lines to attack Tianan, but this will take time.

At the same time, under the escort of the main force of the Combined Fleet, the Oshima Kunao Brigade of the Japanese Third Division also began to land at Incheon, but their main task was to take over the defense of Seoul, although the Qing army on the northern front was not advancing fast, but in the final analysis, North Korea is that big place, plus the road is unimpeded, it will not take more than 10,000 people to kill Seoul in a few days, if the combat effectiveness of these 13,000 people can also reach the level of Nie Shicheng's department, then Seoul is really dangerous.

Incheon Harbor is full of warships, on the Matsushima, the flagship of the Combined Fleet, Ito Hensuke looks at the south with a gloomy face, the Yoshino has suffered more severe wounds than expected, and it has not been able to open the dock until now, and one of the four shells that hit it even pierced the internal dome armor, causing a lot of damage to the power system, but without Yoshino and Akitsu Prefecture, with the strength of the Combined Fleet, if it is attacked by the Beiyang Naval Division, there is almost no chance of victory, and now I can only pray that this kind of thing will not happen.

Of course, he was still a little confident in this, it was impossible for the Beiyang Naval Division to know the time of his departure, it was at least ten hours to sail from Liugong Island to here, and the combined fleet arrived at Inchon at dawn, because the port and telegraph office were controlled, and it was impossible for anyone to report to Ding Ruchang.

Even if a spy finds out and then runs to Asan to notify by wireless telegraph, then it will take at least half a day, that is to say, even if the Beiyang Naval Division attacks, it will not be able to reach before dark, and no one will be stupid enough to play night battles at this time, but the landing force can be completed at night, and then the combined fleet can retreat before dawn, and he must have an absolute advantage over speed.

But unfortunately it backfired, and just as he was sitting on the deck worriedly and watching the Japanese troops landing on the shore, he suddenly saw the cruiser Chiyoda, which was in charge of reconnaissance in the distance, running back at high speed like crazy, waving flags to this side as he ran.

The Beiyang Naval Division is here.

"What?" Ito Hyungwoo was so shocked that he stood up directly.

"It can't be!" He roared angrily.

On a merchant ship in the port of Incheon in the distance, the captain of the ship looks at the Japanese fleet that has set sail in a hurry with a smile over coffee.

The news of the Japanese landing in Inchon was that this British-flagged merchant ship had been notified by wireless telegraph to Liugong Island, a merchant ship belonging to the Yang Shipping Company, which had been stopped at Incheon Port for half a month on the grounds that the captain was ill, and that it had been acting as a secret agent since the cable telegraph office here was charged by the Japanese army.

After receiving the telegram from Incheon, Ding Ruchang immediately ordered the fleet to set sail, and the voyage of one hundred nautical miles set sail at dawn, even the speed of the Beiyang Naval Division arrived near evening, looking at the Japanese fleet in the distance and taking advantage of the setting sun, this naval admiral, who was full of controversy in history, immediately issued an order to meet the enemy with a horizontal formation.

The eight warships of the entire fleet were lined up with Dingzhen and Liangyuan as the core, and gradually formed a goose wing formation similar to a cavalry charge during the voyage, rushing towards the Japanese fleet like a huge chisel, in fact, this is the best formation that the Beiyang Naval Division can take, because they were originally designed for such a battle, and the eight powerful 305 mm main guns on the Dingzhen 2nd Distance were replaced with picric acid shells, not to mention the Japanese warships of three or four thousand tons, even at this time, the first-class ironclad ships in Europe could not stand it.

With Dingzhen Eryuan as the blade, to the left are Jingyuan, Zhiyuan, Guangbing, Jiyuan, to the right are Laiyuan, Jingyuan, Chaoyong, Yangwei, and the remaining Pingyuan and Guangjia because the speed is too slow, at this time still behind did not catch up.

However, now these eight battleships are not what they used to be, the 150 Krupp guns in front and behind Dingzhen Eryuan have all been replaced with 152 mm Armstrong rapid-fire guns, the three main guns in front and behind Zhijing Eryuan have also been replaced with rapid-fire guns, Jingyuan has replaced the four main guns in the front and rear, Laiji Eryuan has replaced the double-linked rear main guns, and the remaining two have been replaced by Guangjia and Pingyuan, as for Guang Bing and Guang Yi, they use domestic 120 mm rapid-fire guns.

As for the shells, needless to say, the 152 shells were well stocked, and the 8,000 shells were outrageous, and although the 305 shells were only 600 rounds, they were picric acid shells from Bofors, and the quality level was more than a little stronger than that of the Japanese.

However, to Ding Ruchang's regret, Li Hongzhang was frightened back by the terrifying offer of the steam gas torpedo, which is understandable, even he didn't expect that thing to be so expensive, the price of 10,000 pounds is more expensive than the Fulong torpedo boat, although he did not buy a torpedo, but as a thank you to Bofors for helping the sailors sink the Qiujinzhou, Li Hongzhang not only asked O'Connor and the two for a reward of 5,000 taels of silver, but also bought 20 Makqin and 1 million rounds of matching ammunition that had just been shipped to Shanghai.

As the fleet completed the change of formation, smoke traces of the Japanese warships as they sailed also appeared in the distance.

"Send a flag to inform all ships, fight to the death!" Ding Ruchang ordered with a cold face.

The herald immediately passed the order on the flag language.

At the same time, on the Matsushima in the distance, Ito Hensuke also issued almost the same order, and the combined fleet, which was marching in two columns, immediately began to turn into combat formation, losing Yoshino and Akitsu Prefecture, but replenishing Chiyoda's first guerrilla fleet, three high-speed cruisers quickly moved forward, forming a column with the main team behind them, showing their side fire and rushing towards the right flank of the Beiyang Naval Division.

The two sides soon entered the visual distance, and Ding Ruchang, who discovered the Japanese attempt, immediately ordered the whole team to turn right, and the wild goose wing formation, which had changed slightly due to the speed problem, drew an arc on the sea surface, and still maintained the state of each ship's bow facing the enemy, and rushed towards the Japanese army.

At this time, the Japanese First Guerrilla Fleet also began to distance itself from this team, and its course turned slightly to the left, aiming directly at Chaoyong, the weakest combat effectiveness on the right flank of the Beiyang Naval Division, and the second ship, which had actually copied the original history of the Battle of Dadonggou.

It's a pity that the combined fleet at this time is no longer the original combined fleet, and the Beiyang Naval Division is not the original Beiyang Naval Division, at a distance of five thousand meters, with Ding Ruchang's order, the four front main guns of the Dingyuan were aimed at the Songdao directly in front of the first round of salvo, although it did not hit the target, but it caused a close miss.

The 305 mm shell filled with picric acid exploded less than five meters away from the Matsushima, and with a loud sound like the sky cracking, the powerful water pressure impact made the Matsushima hull creak, and Ito Hyungyu in the command cabin almost hit his head on the bulkhead, and when he tried to stabilize his body, his whole face turned white with fright when he saw the thick yellow smoke on the sea.

"Bastards, how do they have Shimose gunpowder!" The frightened roar of the fleet commander immediately echoed from the Matsushima.

The enormous power of the 305-mm picric shells stunned the entire United Fleet.

Although they have a large number of spies in China, and they also clearly know that the Beiyang Naval Division has replaced 20 152 rapid-fire guns, but they only know that the shells are nitrocellulose, but no one knows that the second batch of shells has been replaced with picric acid, and the nitrocellulose shells in Jiyuan in the Battle of Toshima have also misled them, so today the Beiyang Naval Division actually has picric acid shells, which is tantamount to a bolt from the blue for them.

This is their secret weapon, the thing on which they can defeat the enemy, and no one knows better than them the power of this thing, and no one knows better than them how terrifying it can become when the shells of the Dingyuan main gun are filled with this thing.