With the arrival of the main force of the Right Route Army, the total strength of the Zhou army and the Wu and Yue armies under Jinling City has reached nearly 140,000. It is said that the display of force in the artillery bombardment of Jurong has completely broken the morale and fighting spirit of the Jiangnan monarchs and gentry and the common people in Jinling City, even if there is no shelling of Jurong, Li Yu and his civil generals, military generals, soldiers and ordinary people have no confidence to be able to compete with the fierce Zhou and Wu coalition forces outside the city. At this time, the greatest hope of Li Yu and his courtiers was pinned on the 150,000 soldiers and horses of the southern capital led by Zhu Lingyun, the envoy of the Hongzhou Festival and the Divine Guard.

In fact, as early as after learning the news of the Zhou army's southward expedition, Li Yu had already ordered Zhu Lingyun, who was then the envoy of Hongzhou Jiedu and the capital of the Divine Guard, to lead the soldiers and horses of the southern capital to aid Jinling. Although Zhu Lingyun, who received the order, was eager to obey the order, he had already closely watched Nanchang's every move in Hunan Province to pacify Qian Yuanshan, and he was unwilling to let him go north calmly. So, Zhu Lingyun gathered troops and horses on his side, and Qian Yuanshan also began to move. On the one hand, he transferred the main force of the Hunan Provincial garrison from Langzhou to Changsha Prefecture, which was closer to Nanchang, and on the other hand, he sent many small units to operate in the border area with Jiangnan, and from time to time crossed the border to carry out sneak attacks on the small strongholds of the Jiangnan Army and harassed the border prefectures and counties, so that Zhu Lingyun did not dare to let go of his hands and feet, and he did not care about concentrating all the main forces in Nanchang to make preparations before going north. It was not until more than a month after receiving Li Yu's order and nearly two months after the start of the Zhou army's southern expedition that Zhu Lingyun basically completed the assembly and mobilization of troops and met the conditions for departure.

On the second day of the fifth lunar month of the second year of Jianlong, Zhu Lingyun led an army of 150,000 to leave Nanchang, went down the Ganjiang River, crossed Poyang Lake to Hukou and stationed troops. Subsequently, Zhu Lingyun inquired about the situation ahead, hoarded grain and grass, and urged Chai Kezhen, who was still in Nanchang, to stay in the southern capital to go north as soon as possible, and guard Hukou after the people of his headquarters entered the east, so as to relieve his worries. I never thought that at this critical juncture, Chai Kezhen suddenly became seriously ill, and said that he went north to guard Hukou, and it was difficult to complete the daily handling of government affairs in the left-behind mansion.

If it weren't for the messenger sent to deliver the letter who saw Chai Kezhen with his own eyes, he reported that the southern capital was indeed very ill, and he had worked with him for many years, understood the other party's temperament, and knew that he would not secretly collude with the Zhou army, Zhu Lingyun would even suspect that Chai Kezhen was deliberately pretending to be sick in order to prevent him from going north to reinforce Jinling. But because of this, although the news that the Zhou army had passed all the way and quickly approached Jinling made Zhu Lingyun anxious, he had no choice but to pray to Lu Shangcang, hoping that Chai Kezhen would get better as soon as possible. At the same time, in the face of the request put forward by his generals to take advantage of the rising river to quickly move eastward to relieve the danger of Jinling, Zhu Lingyun could only answer: "Now that many prefectures and counties along the river have been captured by the Zhou army, if our army advances eastward at this time, the enemy army will definitely send troops to attack and occupy Hukou." If we cannot arrange a reliable and competent official to guard the mouth of the lake, our army will fall into the hands of the enemy in a short time between the rear road and the grain route. At that time, if our army defeats the Zhou army and solves the crisis of Jinling, everyone will naturally be happy. However, if our army is defeated, or a confrontation with the Zhou army, and our army's grain route is cut off by the Zhou army, the hundreds of thousands of troops can only be defeated. Therefore, before the firewood is left behind, it is really not appropriate for our army to rush eastward. ”

What Zhu Lingyun said is the truth, although the generals are unwilling in their hearts, in the face of the current situation, they can only withdraw their requests and wait patiently for the Nandu who is very ill at the wrong time to stay in Chai Kezhen.

On the 27th day of the fifth lunar calendar of the second year of Jianlong, after stationing in Hukou for nearly a month, Zhu Lingyun finally saw Chai Kezhen, who had just recovered from a serious illness. Although his body was still weak and his spirit was still poor, Chai Kezhen did not hesitate to take over the important task of guarding the mouth of the lake, ensuring the safety of Zhu Lingyun's back road and the smooth flow of the grain road. After Zhu Lingyun left 30,000 horses for Chai Kezhen to garrison Hukou, he led an army of 120,000 troops to the east along the river on the 28th day of the fifth lunar month of the second year of Jianlong, and slaughtered to Jinling to rescue Li Yu, the lord of the country who had been besieged by the Zhou army for more than ten days.

In fact, as the largest force in the south of the Yangtze River except for the Jinling Prefecture garrison, and as the most important force to aid Jinling City, the movements of the 150,000 Nandu troops under the jurisdiction of the Hongzhou Jiedu Envoy have been closely watched by the Southern Expeditionary Army. Thanks to the effective work of the "Dark Feather" branch in the relevant prefectures and counties, as well as the all-out investigation of the reconnaissance personnel of the First Fleet of Jiangfang, from the time he received Li Yu's order to start assembling and making preparations, to the time when he led the army to leave Hukou and gallop to the aid of Jinling, Zhu Lingyun's every move was under the control of the Southern Expeditionary Army. Therefore, Zhu Lingyun led the army to leave Hukou, and the relevant news had already been sent out and quickly passed to Wang Kunjun under Jinling City.

Because Zhu Lingyun's eastward advance was along the river, and its purpose was to aid Jinling on the one hand, and on the other hand, it was also to burn down the quarry rock pontoon bridge, cut off the back road of the Zhou army and the grain road. Therefore, the task of blocking and destroying the most vital force in the south of the Yangtze River fell to the First Fleet of Jiangfang and the Southern Expeditionary Fleet of the "Flying Dragon Army" Navy.

On May 30 of the lunar calendar of the second year of Jianlong, the main force of the First Fleet of Jiangfang and the main force of the Southern Expeditionary Fleet of the "Flying Dragon Army" Navy completed the assembly on the river near Jinling and began to carry out mixed formations;

On the first day of the sixth month of the lunar calendar in the second year of Jianlong, the special task force of the Southern Expeditionary Army was organized, and under the leadership of Xin Feiyu, the commander of the Southern Expeditionary Army and the Navy, Shuojiang went up;

On the sixth day of the sixth month of the lunar calendar in the second year of Jianlong, the special task force of the Southern Expeditionary Army crossed the quarry rock pontoon bridge through the temporarily opened gap;

On the eighth day of the sixth month of the lunar calendar in the second year of Jianlong, the task force of the Southern Expeditionary Army arrived at the river near Wuhu and met with Zhu Lingyun's department, which was advancing eastward;

In the early morning of the ninth day of the sixth month of the lunar calendar in the second year of Jianlong, in the face of more than 2,000 large and small warships under Zhu Lingyun's command, which came surging and had the advantage of the upper hand, the special task force of the Southern Expeditionary Army, which had only 120 warships, was not afraid, and under the leadership of Xin Feiyu, the commander of the Southern Expeditionary Navy, pounced on it and launched a fierce battle with the other party.

Although Zhu Lingyun lost the best opportunity to rescue Jinling in order to wait for Chai Kezhen, it was also this relatively peaceful period that gave Zhu Lingyun time to understand and study his opponent, and he thought that he had recognized the shortcomings of his opponent and his own strengths, and found a magic weapon to defeat the enemy.

Therefore, when he met the Zhou fleet on the Wuhu River, Zhu Lingyun did not adopt the usual method of arranging formations and advancing and retreating in the past, as other generals of the Jiangnan Navy used in previous battles, but on the one hand, he divided the large and medium-sized warships into multiple clusters and approached the Zhou warships from different directions, so as to disperse the firepower of the Zhou army and reduce the damage of the Zhou army's artillery to his own side. On the other hand, they sent a large number of the original equipment of the fleet under their command and the small and miniature arsonist ships that were temporarily collected from the people in advance, and took advantage of the opportunity when the firepower of the Zhou army was attracted by their own large and medium-sized warships, quickly approached the Zhou warships, set fire to the ships, and destroyed the Zhou warships and killed and injured the Zhou generals in this almost suicidal way.

In terms of tactics alone, Zhu Lingyun's arrangement is still very correct. Although the Zhou army has strong firepower, it is limited in number after all. When their attention was attracted by the large and medium-sized warships of the Jiangnan Army, it was difficult for them to immediately adjust their firepower and attack these small ships, which were small, fast, and agile, in the face of thousands of small and even miniature arson ships swarming in. In addition, the wind direction was favorable to the Jiangnan Army at this time, although the ships of the Zhou Army urgently turned their guns to attack the Jiangnan Army's arsonist ships, and all the sailors who could be mobilized were transferred to the deck to intercept and shoot at the Jiangnan Army's arsonist ships with machine guns and even rifles, there were still several battleships at the forefront of their own formations that were too close to sink all the Jiangnan Army's arsonists approaching them, and they were ignited by the arsonists that had turned into a ball of fire. What's more serious is that due to the direction of the wind, whether it is the arson ship of the Jiangnan Army or the Zhou warships that ignited, it will eventually lead the fire to the main fleet of the Zhou Army's special task force in the direction of downwind and launch, thus causing catastrophic consequences.

Seeing that his tactics had achieved results, and that more and more arson boats broke through the fire interception of the Zhou army, and rushed towards the Zhou warships at an increasing speed with the wind, Zhu Lingyun couldn't help but be secretly happy in his heart. After all, under the condition that the Jiangnan Army has been defeated repeatedly and the water battle has not even sunk a single Zhou warship, it is definitely a great achievement that he can burn several or even more Zhou warships. What's more, once the Zhou fleet is defeated, its supply lifeline, the Quarry Rock Pontoon Bridge, will become meat on its own chopping board, and it can be cut off at any time. Having lost the most important logistical supply lines and grain routes, the Zhou army besieging Jinling would not be long before it would be in chaos without a fight, and withdrawing from the siege and collecting troops would be its only option. When the time comes, he will become the first hero to save Jiangnan Sheji from fire and water, and he will be the prime minister of the Marquis.

Thinking of his bright future, Zhu Lingyun was naturally highly motivated, and immediately ordered the drummers on the marshal ship to beat the war drums, urging all the units under his command to move forward bravely and fight to the death with the Zhou fleet.

Zhu Lingyun is determined to win this battle, hoping to become famous in one battle, and become a famous general in the world and a major minister in Jiangnan. But as the so-called "unpredictable weather and clouds", just when Zhu Lingyun urged the army to storm and the Zhou army's special fleet of the Southern Expeditionary Naval Army began to fall into an unfavorable situation, and Xin Feiyu, the commander of the Southern Expeditionary Army, was ready to order the sinking of the Zhou warships that had lost power due to fire and were drifting towards their main formation, the wind on the river suddenly changed. The west wind, which was originally favorable to the Jiangnan army, became an east wind favorable to the Zhou army. As a result, the Jiangnan Army arsonist ship, which was originally pulling full sails and quickly approaching the main formation of the Zhou army's battleships, slowed down significantly; The Zhou army's firefighting ships, which were originally pushed by the wind and water to their own formation, gradually slowed down; The various burning ashes that had been flying towards the main formation of the Zhou army and might ignite the battleship also turned around and floated towards the area where the Jiangnan army's warships were located.

Seeing the change in the direction of the wind, the speed of the approach between the enemy and us is getting slower and slower, and many of the Jiangnan Army arson boats that have already ignited the fire are also eaten by the flames on the bow of their own ships because of the change in wind direction, and they instantly turned into a big fireball. On the one hand, he ordered his ships to keep a distance to prevent a small number of ships from catching fire and turning them into "burning company camps." On the other hand, taking advantage of the fact that the fleets of the two sides were approaching a slowdown, they temporarily ignored the large and medium-sized warships of the Jiangnan Army, which did not pose much threat to them, and concentrated their firepower to eliminate the most threatening arsonist ships of the Jiangnan Army, so as to ensure the safety of their own warships.

As the Zhou army's special task force adjusted its tactics, the situation on the river gradually changed in its favor. Although the Jiangnan Army had a large number of arsonist ships, this kind of small wooden boat, which could be beaten to pieces by even machine guns, was under the continuous attack of the Zhou army's dense light and heavy firepower, and it was impossible to take advantage of it as it did at the beginning of the war. In particular, these arson boats are filled with all kinds of flammable materials, which can be said to be hit by artillery shells, even machine gun or even rifle bullets, which can cause fires. What's more, not all the sailors of the Jiangnan Army could continue to move forward bravely under the intensive fire of the Zhou army. And as soon as someone becomes cowardly and turns the bow of the ship and flees backwards, others will follow his example. Therefore, after holding out for less than half an hour, more than 300 arsonist ships were sunk and burned one after another, and the remaining nearly 700 arsonist ships finally could not resist the fear of death in their hearts and the instinctive avoidance of danger.

Although the large and medium-sized warships of the Jiangnan Army intercepted the escaping arsonists, and even used catapults and slapsticks to sink some of the arsonists running in front, in the face of nearly 700 small arsonists with flexible turns, the interception role of the stone-throwing machines with very poor accuracy and the clumsy clumsy clap rods with short operating distance was really limited. In addition, the commanders of the large and medium-sized warships of the Jiangnan Army were also afraid that these arson ships loaded with sulfur, flame and nitrate and other fire-causing things would be stopped and anxious, so they set fire to death with themselves. Therefore, each ship is also very measured when intercepting, in case the opponent's dog jumps over the wall. As a result, except for a few arsonboats that were too unlucky to hit the guns of their own warships and were sunk, the Jiangnan Army arsonist boats, which had almost covered the entire river, escaped completely.

The arsonist ships scattered and fled, and the main fleets of the Jiangnan Army and the Zhou Army, which were originally blocked by these small boats on both sides, turned from a confrontation in the air to a face-to-face fight. As a result, the main force of the Jiangnan Army fleet was completely exposed to the Zhou fleet.

As the battle returned to a state that was favorable to the Zhou army and very familiar to them, the situation on the battlefield quickly and completely reversed. In the round after round of artillery attacks by the warships of the Zhou army, the warships of the Jiangnan army were also blown up, ignited, and sunk one after another. At noon, after destroying more than 300 warships and capturing more than 500 warships, Zhu Lingyun escaped from the range of the Zhou army's artillery with less than 100 warships that were almost all hung with colors, and then ran all the way, and fled back to the lake mouth in an extremely embarrassed and panicked manner, hiding in the big camp water village, and never dared to come out again. The last force in the south of the Yangtze River was completely ineffective.