There is a saying in this world, if you want people to know, you can't do anything unless you don't know! In order to retaliate against Chu Cailao for robbing the Seawolf merchant ships and killing the members of the Seawolf merchant fleet, Yu Xiaotian sent a smuggling fleet consisting of three sloops, which are now called Feizi clippers within the Seawolf, to the south to attack Chu Cailao's ships.

Although this matter was kept very secret at first, when Luo Xianbin and his party returned to Nanri Island, this matter was no longer a secret.

The reason why Yu Xiaotian did this was to let the sea wolf know that if anyone provoked their sea wolf, he Yu Xiaotian was not a person who was afraid of things, and he would definitely repay the favor.

At the beginning, Chu Cailao's interception and killing of the sea wolf merchant ship caused a lot of discussion among the sea wolves, and many people proposed to retaliate, but Yu Xiaotian did not react for a long time afterwards, so this incident caused some negative effects within the sea wolf.

Some people secretly thought that Yu Xiaotian must have felt that he couldn't afford to provoke Chu Cailao, so he calmed things down and swallowed this breath, since he, the big boss, has admitted it, what else do they have to quarrel about?

Some people even feel that if this continues, the sea wolf may not be a place to stay for a long time, it is better to go to Chu Cailao to have more face, but the generous treatment among the sea wolves makes some people with this kind of thought reluctant, and the internal management of the sea wolf is also very formal.

But when the Chinese New Year was approaching, it wasn't until Luo Xianbin led the two boats back to Nanri Island that the news immediately spread within the sea wolf, and then the sea wolf tribe knew that in fact, their big boss didn't swallow this breath at all, but had already secretly planned revenge against Chu Cailao.

Yu Xiaotian knows very well that this kind of thing is actually something that can't contain fire in paper, as more and more Feizi clippers are launched on his side, more and more people will know that this kind of ship is their sea wolf's exclusive ship, and then Chu Cailao will naturally learn about it.

Moreover, his ship is located on Nanri Island, although it is not open to people to visit, but it can't stop people from looking at it from afar, let alone people from seeing the ship launch for sea trials.

There is a shopping area on Nanri Island, and naturally there are many outsiders who enter and leave Nanri Island, and it is basically impossible to block such news.

Therefore, he knew that he couldn't block such news, so it was better to publicly admit that he did it after the matter was completed, so that everyone could know that he was not afraid of Chu Cailao in the sea wolf, and at the same time, he could boost the morale of the sea wolf people.

Therefore, he did not give any gag orders to Luo Xianbin and his party, nor did he restrict the dissemination of the exploits of the smuggling fleet everywhere, and even semi-publicly commended the crew members who participated in this trip.

As soon as the news came out, there was an uproar within the sea wolf, and many people knew that Yu Xiaotian selected sailors from various ships some time ago, but it was not clear what these selected personnel were doing at that time.

Now they know that these people were originally selected by lottery and went south to find trouble with Chu Cailao.

Especially when I heard that their big boss only sent a small fleet, and after two months' work, they turned the people that Chu Cailao cleaned up on their backs, and suddenly all the people in the sea wolf tribe felt a little arrogant, and no one regarded Yu Xiaotian as a timid person anymore.

What happened to Chu Cailao? Isn't it just that there are more people and more boats? Now as long as you provoke them sea wolves, you can still turn the people he packed up, right?

So this matter soon spread on a large scale, at least in the Fuzhou area, it became a topic of conversation in people's leisure time.

If Chu Cailao can't find out who did this secretly under such circumstances, then he really doesn't deserve to be called a tyrant on the sea anymore.

It can be said that to a certain extent, Yu Xiaotian deliberately released this news, just to let Chu Cai know about this matter, and then come to him for trouble.

The reason why Yu Xiaotian dared to do this was because by the end of the fourth year of the Apocalypse, he already had the strength to give Chu Cailao a go.

Since Yu Xiaotian's first imitation six-pounder cannon was cast by the iron fan cannon method, Nanri Island cannon work has begun to produce non-stop, and the scale of cannon work has also continued to expand, from the original one iron melting furnace to the current scale of five iron melting furnaces.

In July, the first 12-pounder cannon was trial-produced, and by the end of August, the first 12-pounder cannon was successfully trial-produced, and the output of the cannon was also from the initial month to cast a maximum of four six-pounder guns, to now the monthly output has reached the scale of 12 six-pounder guns, six 12-pounder howitzers, and four 12-pounder guns.

And in the middle of November, the first set of 24-pound short guns had been cast, and before the end of the month, the first 24-pound guns were trial-produced, passed the test firing, and were transported to Jilongwan, where they were loaded into the Jilongzhai Fort.

The twenty-four-pounder cannon is not the largest artillery among the Western maritime powers so far, but it is already a large-caliber artillery of the main warship, at least half of the warships and armed merchant ships will not be equipped with such heavy artillery.

When this 24-pound cannon was cast, it consumed a total of more than 5,000 catties of refined iron produced in Guangdong, and after casting, the weight of the cannon body alone was as high as more than 4,000 catties, far exceeding the kind of Hongyi cannon that Yuan Chonghuan used in the great victory of Ningyuan, which the Portuguese sold to the Ming Dynasty.

The caliber of this gun is about 150 millimeters, the length of the barrel has reached a length of nearly three meters, each time it can be charged five to six catties, and the weight of the solid projectile is up to twenty catties. It can even reach a distance of about six miles at most, such a range is quite far in this era, but this kind of unconventional long range has little practical combat significance, and the effective range under normal conditions is still controlled within 200 meters to 1,200 meters, and if it is farther, the accuracy will become a joke.

If you talk about the power, Yu Xiaotian made a special thick wooden target, and bombarded it with this twenty-four-pounder cannon, this guy was two hundred meters away, easily destroyed a wooden target with a thickness of nearly two feet, and collapsed a low wall of earth and stone structure about three feet thick with one shot, it can be said that the power is quite large, just looking at the Ming Dynasty, now there is almost no equal!

If you pull this thing to attack the city, you don't need a few cannons, as long as you concentrate on bombarding a little bit of the city wall, you can quickly collapse a section of the city wall, so this thing is definitely a big killer, anyone who has seen the power of this cannon, all smack their tongues at its power, and are overjoyed.

But such a heavy cannon is also a disaster for the Seawolf, in order to trial produce this cannon, the production of other cannons was almost stopped in November, all the personnel and the molten iron furnace were put into the trial production of this cannon, and the first cannon that was really trial-produced also became a waste product because of operation errors, and had to be smashed and rebuilt.

Moreover, the huge amount of iron consumed by this cannon made the sea wolf unable to parry, and the iron material transported back from Guangdong in October, the iron fan and the cannon body of this cannon alone were almost all consumed, and the iron work was almost cut off.

Therefore, after casting the first 24-pound cannon, Yu Xiaotian, a wealthy and wealthy man, couldn't even stand it, so he had to order the iron fan of this set of 24-pounder cannons to be temporarily sealed, and after reserving more iron, the casting would be resumed.

Then, in early December, the artillery resumed normal production.

However, even so, in the production that lasted for more than half a year, the artillery still provided nearly 100 six-pounder guns to the Seawolf, almost all of which were replaced by the guns on the Seawolf warship, and the artillery also produced nearly 30 12-pounder short cannons and 12-pounder long cannons for the Seawolf.

These twelve-pounder cannons, in addition to being equipped on a small number of reinforced Fu ships, were also equipped on the forts on Nanri Island, Jilong Bay, and Tamsui Zhaideng, and the twelve-pounder cannons were all equipped with forts everywhere because they did not have suitable ships to equip so far, providing considerable garrison firepower for these important places. If you want to go to Jilong Bay or Tamsui Village to find trouble with the sea wolves, if you don't gather a considerable number of gunboats and enough artillery, I am afraid that you will not be able to bargain much easily.

This is where Yu Xiaotian's confidence lies, and at present, the three sub-fleets under his command do not include the Jilongwan detachment and the Tamsui Zhai detachment, and there are already more than 50 warships of various types and more than two masbreasts, and there are also four cutting-edge sloops for him to use as an assault force.

In addition to these vessels, which have been explicitly used as warships, his merchant fleet also has an almost equal number of ships of various types, which are mainly used as transport and merchant ships here at Seawolf in normal times, but can also be used as auxiliary warships when necessary.

Therefore, if there is something under his command at present, he can assemble nearly seventy to eighty ships of various types in a short period of time, and the number of troops is as many as nearly 1,500 to 2,000 people, not including the garrison strength of Jilong Bay and Tamsui Village and the ships and troops left behind in Funing.

If the situation forces him to do so, he can also mobilize nearly 1,000 villagers on Nanri Island to use as a reserve, so he is really not afraid that Chu Cai will come to Xingshi to ask for guilt at this time.

Even he wished that Chu Cailao would come to Nanri Island at this time to ask him about his mentorship, and he happened to come again to wait for work, teach Chu Cailao a good lesson, and let this guy understand that on the Fuzhou side, there is a figure he can't afford to provoke, and this guy in the province will not be polite to his sea wolf's ship in the future.

Therefore, while Yu Xiaotian deliberately released the wind to the outside, he also adopted a loose approach inside the sea wolf and began to secretly prepare for war.

(Happy Eleven!) Have a long and happy vacation! In addition, special thanks to Lao Luo, you old Khan, Winter Solstice 1979, and a drunken three brothers for their rewards yesterday! Today is the No. 1, ask for a monthly pass, ask for a reward, ask for a red ticket, ask for a subscription, ask for a collection! Hehe! ）