Zheng Zhilong convened a group of cronies to discuss the meeting, because he was surprised to find that although the Zheng family sailors were powerful enough to monopolize the shipping along the southeast coast, they still underestimated the sea power of the Three Guards. actually defeated his henchman Yang Qi in an encounter, and Yang Qi himself was also beheaded in a naval battle.

This time, even Zheng Hongkui, who was ordered to recuperate at home, was called in to study how to deal with the challenges faced by the Zheng family's sailors.

"Big brother, don't worry too much, what we lost is only a dozen boats of spices, didn't we intercept a boatload of hundreds of thousands of taels of silk trading silver from the Yin Ge Blue people before? Hatchback, this counts, we still make money. ”

Zheng Hongkui's comfort and persuasion failed to calm Zheng Zhilong's frowning brows in the slightest.

That's not how the accounts are calculated. On the surface, it seems that the Zheng family did only lose more than a dozen ships of spices, but the bad impact caused by this is far more than the spices of a few ships at that time. If the Zheng family does not launch a tenfold retaliation against the Three Guards, it will greatly reduce the reputation of the Zheng family on the southeast coast, and the pirates who have previously declared their allegiance to the Zheng family will also rebel en masse. Once the situation really deteriorates in this direction, then the Zheng family's big ship has already shown signs of imminent silence.

Therefore, Zheng Zhilong will never allow this to happen. He wants to strike a blow and completely defeat the sharp spirit of the Three Guards. With such a forceful means, it was declared to everyone that those who dared to challenge the authority of the Zheng family on the sea would never end well.

The imperial court was among them, and the three guards of the towns and towns were also among them.

However, Zheng Zhilong did not intend to explain these to everyone present one by one, and he did not express his position lightly, but just quietly listened to the disputes between his subordinates and his nephews. To Zheng Zhilong's surprise, Zheng Sen, the radical eldest son Zheng Sen, who has always been accustomed to shouting and killing, was surprisingly silent, only listening quietly and not arguing a word.

So, he named Zheng Sen.

"Zheng Sen, tell me, how to deal with the Three Guards' actions of attacking our sailors and plundering merchant ships?"

"Back to the big marshal, the last general thinks that my Fujian side can make a surprise attack and attack it unprepared."

Zheng Sen's answer was unexpected by Zheng Zhilong, he didn't start with whether he should send troops or not, but directly criticized how to send troops, it seems that this son has already made a plan, and this is exactly in line with Zheng Zhilong's fundamental intentions.

"Oh? How to attack it unprepared? Tell me about it! ”

Zheng Zhilong was noncommittal, but from the tone in which he continued to ask, all the generals present could hear that the marshal agreed with Zheng Sen's proposal to send troops.

For a while, the generals who advocated negotiating with him and calming things down lowered their heads one by one, for fear that the marshal would start a fire and harm the pond fish.

"It's very simple, the Three Guards dare to attack the strong with the weak, and we can also choose to attack the strong with the weak. And this is something that the Three Guards dare not imagine in any way. ”

Zheng Sen's seemingly seemingly appealing way of answering did not make Zheng Zhilong impatient, but aroused his strong interest.

"Oh? Beat the strong with the weak? Good saying, detailed arrival! ”

Zheng Zhilong showed patience that was very different from before, and quietly listened to Zheng Sen's explanation.

"I am good at being a sailor in Fujian, but I am weak in foot combat. Today, the Three Guards retaliated with a sneak attack by a naval division weaker than our Fujian navy, and they will inevitably defend it to the death at sea to prevent our naval division from retaliating. From this, we can make the naval division prepare for the battle to create the illusion that the Three Guards will attack and retaliate from the sea. However, this time we will use infantry to sneak up on the barracks of the Three Guards in Jianwu and other places. Seeing them defeated on land will have a shocking effect on the Three Guards and even the entire Jiangnan. Let those young people at both ends of the first rat see that my Fujian is not only stronger than the naval division, but the infantry is also not bad. ”

"Good! What do you think of Zheng Sen's plan? ”

Zheng Hongkui was the first to stand up and make a statement.

"What the eldest prince said is really a miracle in the world, and he thinks it is feasible!"

With the leader, after the generals here have realized the true intentions of the marshal, who will stand up and talk against the eldest prince for being bored? As a result, all the generals present agreed with Zheng Sen's strategy in unison. However, when the details of the troop were discussed next, there were still big differences. Because nine out of nine of the generals in the full house are generals from the sailors, basically no one is qualified to work with the generals who master the foot soldiers.

There was only one lieutenant general in the room, and he had the experience of commanding foot soldiers, so when there was a dispute, everyone turned their attention to this lieutenant general.

"I think that my Fujian infantry may not be able to fight. The Fujian infantry has always been dominated by mountain people, while the Three Guards are mostly northerners, and they are good at fighting in the plains. However, after fighting in a mountainous and watery place in the south of the Yangtze River, the results were not very good. first lost Jiangbei, and then fought a narrow victory with the Huaiwang rebels in Wuhu and other places. Therefore, these are enough to prove that the myth of the so-called invincibility of the Three Guards is completely boasted. ”

This deputy general's surname is a single name, in the early years he was a water bandit at the junction of Zhejiang and Fujian, and was later recruited by Fujian governor Xiong Wencan, and then Zheng Zhilong rose in Fujian, and then he took refuge in Zheng Zhilong, plus this person's subordinates changed from mountain bandits and water bandits to the official army, and its combat effectiveness is indeed much better than the original official army, so it has made great gains in all previous bandit operations, so Yu Liqi people have also won Zheng Zhilong's appreciation, so he can be here as a member of the Zheng family.

Yu Li's statement greatly boosted the morale of the Zheng family, so he was applauded by the audience, which was undoubtedly paving the way for the eldest prince's plan. His analysis doesn't end there, though.

"Moreover, since the Three Guards entered the mountains of Fujian, they were led by the remnants of the Huaiwang rebels in Jianwu and other places, but they could not immediately gain anything, which is enough to prove that they are not adapted to the mountainous and watery terrain in the south." Soon, Yu Li became a technical analysis of the Three Guards.

"I heard that the Three Guards used muskets as their main weapons, and when they were about to fight, they often lined up in a battle line several miles wide and fired at the enemy with muskets. And the terrain and weather of my Fujian are the two invincible enemies of theirs. First of all, Fujian is mountainous, and the terrain is undulating, and it is basically impossible for them to drain out a front of several miles. Secondly, it was rainy in Fujian, and the muskets of the Three Guards Army were fired with gunpowder, which would inevitably be rainy and ineffective due to moisture. On the other hand, our army is all local mountain people, good at trekking across the mountains, and it is not difficult to judge whether the winner or loser is afraid of the other. ”

Although Yu Li did not say the sentence that his side would win, everyone in the audience could clearly understand that the Three Guards had so many disadvantages, and they were afraid that they would definitely be defeated. At the same time, there seems to be no need to argue over the choice of generals to send troops.

It must be the boastful Vice General Yu Li in front of him.

So everyone dressed up for cheers, shouting that the Three Guards would be defeated and our army would be victorious. At this time, Zheng Sen stood up and motioned for everyone to be quiet.

"Everyone, everyone! Listen to me again. Although our army takes the sound of the east and the west as its basic strategy, on the battlefield, the soldiers are impermanent, and the water is impermanent. As long as the Three Guards are defeated in a battle on land, our fleet, which is used as a bluff at sea, can completely turn fiction into reality and launch a sneak attack on the strongholds of the Three Guards on the coast, leading its main naval division to encircle and annihilate it on the sea. At that time, looking at Jiangnan, who else is my Zheng family's opponent? ”

"The eldest son's clever plan!"

Everyone praised it again.

At this point in the meeting, even if the basic coping strategy has been decided. Zheng Zhilong cleared his throat and began to make a closing summary.

He spoke passionately for about a quarter of an hour, and then he was a little unsatisfied.

"Okay, that's all for today, you guys hurry back and prepare, this battle is about survival in the future, and you must not take it lightly."

Zheng Zhilong's instructions have a bitter taste, but in the eyes of the generals, they are just clichés, because every time the marshal will give an instruction, you must not take it lightly.

So the generals agreed and withdrew.

When Zheng Sen was about to go out, he was left behind by Zheng Zhilong, and he had something to talk with him privately. And Zheng Hongkui walked out of the main hall without changing his face, but after avoiding everyone's eyes, the smile on his face had disappeared, and he was replaced by a gloomy and sympathetic face.

"You tell the truth, what are the chances of winning against the Three Guards against my Fujian infantry soldiers?"

Although Yu Li's analysis is very reasonable, Zheng Zhilong is not a person who listens and believes after all, so he will not make a decision that can affect the life and death of the Zheng family because of a few words. However, he trusted the son in front of him very much.

Zheng Sen pondered and stretched out two fingers, one tail finger and one thumb.

"Only a sixty percent chance of winning?"

Zheng Zhilong's expression was a little surprised, obviously he didn't expect Zheng Sen's judgment of the situation to be not as optimistic as he and Yu Li showed when they sang and harmonized. So, Zheng Zhilong hesitated a little again, after all, it is better to be still than to be still, if the chance of victory is only eighty percent, then the later this battle on land happens, the better. Otherwise, if they lose the first war, the bad impact on them will be very serious.

Zheng Sen seemed to see Zheng Zhilong's doubts, so he said, "Father is worried that our army will not be able to win a battle?" ”

"It's not that my father is not optimistic about the combat power of my Zheng family's foot soldiers, but this move is related to the success or failure of my Zheng family, and I have to be cautious." Zheng Zhilong sighed nonchalantly.

"Father, you can't hesitate any longer, Li Xin sent the Three Guards to Fujian, where are the bandits? It's just a tiger and a wolf. Now there is still a sixty percent chance of winning, and once they complete the layout, our chances of winning will not even be fifty percent. ”

Zheng Zhilong has also been worried about this, now the imperial court decree is not the Huai River, and the provinces in the south of the Yangtze River are actually doing their own thing, without the constraints of the imperial court, it is only a matter of time before the Three Guards completely tear their faces.

"Our army first took the initiative to attack the northwest of Fujian after it was difficult and easy, so it was passive to take the initiative, and then locked in the victory with the naval division, so that Li Xin's ambition to invade the south could be contained, and the success or defeat of my Zheng family was also in this move."