For a long time, the ocean sailors of the Lena people have been the henchmen of the Qianyuan Empire at sea.

This fleet, which started by stealing imperial shipbuilding drawings and technology, was built up over the decades, and at its peak there were no less than 400 warships alone. Every time you set out from the natural ice-free port of Hayshiliang in the east, the mighty fleet is enough to terrify any enemy.

Before Chen Wu entered the East China Sea, the East China Sea Master of the Empire was forced by their pressure to maintain their existing existence. Otherwise, with the indifference of the emperors of the Qianyuan Empire to sea power, it would be impossible for them to allocate so much money and silver to build so many warships.

Although over the years, with the successive battles with the Imperial Naval Division, the Great Ocean Naval Division has also suffered a lot of losses, but it is still the same level of existence as the East China Sea Division. When they fight each other, they even have a little upper hand.

This time, after learning that the East China Sea Division had split its troops to go south, the Ocean Naval Division decisively seized this opportunity and sent a main fleet with a total size of nearly 200 ships to sail. After heading south to the waters of the Eastern Ocean, in search of opportunities, the fleet was divided into two detachments to search for Imperial ships in several major shipping lanes of the Eastern Ocean. Unfortunately, the fleet that was loaded with iron ore from the Asahikawa Domain and bound for the port of Quanzhou collided with the detachment of the Ocean Naval Division.

Since the opening of this overseas source of iron ore, the Matsue Army has been keeping this shipping route connecting the Asahikawa Domain of the Cook Islands a strict secret. When passing, it was also intended to go around to the southeast, avoiding the fleet of the Lena people as much as possible. However, the Lena people still seized an opportunity after all.

This fleet was escorted by about sixty warships, which were much weaker than the detachment of the Lena men in terms of number and average combat strength.

Realizing that naval battles were inevitable, the escort fleet of the Matsue Army could only choose to take the initiative to meet the battle. The ships transporting the iron ore took the opportunity to clear their warehouses, threw all the iron ore they were carrying into the sea, and left at full speed with full sails.

At the end of the first battle, although the sea ships were basically unhindered, no less than 30 ships were sunk in the escort, more than 1,200 sailors were killed or missing, countless were wounded, and many of the remaining warships were damaged. If you are not lucky enough to escape with the help of night, I am afraid that the loss will be even greater.

The news was transmitted back to Quanzhou Port and then to Dengzhou, bringing a haze to the good situation.

Everyone knows what the Asahikawa Iron Mine means to Songjiang, whether it is the supply of weapons and equipment for more than 200,000 troops, or the hundreds of kilograms of artillery, it needs to consume a huge amount of high-quality iron ore. Once this transportation line is cut off, the Matsue army will fall back into a situation of iron ore shortage in a short time. In contrast, the iron ore that has been mined by a fleet or some casualties is not the most important.

However, even more infuriating is yet to come.

After defeating Matsue's fleet, the detachment of the Lena people calmly picked up the sailors who fell into the sea of the Matsue army, and together with the merchant ships captured on other waterways, they were used as prisoners to ask for ransom from the Matsue army!

This is a very immoral thing, and the Lena people have done it more than once. The world knows their temper, and there is nothing the Nalena dynasty can do.

It will definitely not work if you don't save it, and the soldiers of the Songjiang Army Naval Division who were captured all fell into the sea in the process of fighting for the Songjiang Army. If they are left alone, it will definitely chill the morale of the army. But if you agree to the other party's extortion, it will not only boost the morale of the enemy, but also pay a large sum of money in vain to extort the price that the people have set for these sailor prisoners, which is as high as two hundred gold per person!

If it was put in the early days of the Songjiang Army, this amount of money was enough for the Songjiang Army to recruit twenty or thirty recruits! Even if the settling-in fee has risen a lot now, it is far more than the value of a sailor.

Despite his anger, Chen Wu swallowed his breath and chose to ransom the people, just as the Omanis had done for their 6,000 Waranga Divisions.

There is no doubt that in this contact, it was the unexpected Lena who won a small victory. Not only did he win the naval battle, but he also extorted a sum of money from the Songjiang army with his captives. However, Chen Wu naturally would not let this kind of thing happen a second time. After returning the prisoners, he immediately allocated another sum of money to increase the maintenance and maintenance of the warships of the East China Sea Division, and demanded that all fleets bound for the Asahikawa Domain in the future be equipped with double the number of escort ships.

For the two major sailors of Donghai and Ninghai, this is undoubtedly a very difficult task.

After all, they have to keep the two ocean-going routes safe, patrol the coastal waters, and clean up the seas and keep the ports safe. If we take into account the rotational rest of the sailors and the regular maintenance of the warships, with the strength of the existing two major sailors, it is still too difficult.

In this regard, Chen Wu did not have a good way, so he could only let the soldiers of the Navy Division grit their teeth and hold on for a while. The shipyards in Quanzhou Port and Changding Port are constantly building new warships at full power, and the naval base in Jinghu County is also constantly cultivating sailors. In the near future, when the artillery is formed, the artillery can also be loaded onto the warship, which will greatly improve the combat power of the sailors.

When these measures are effective, the Lena Oceanic Sailors will no longer be a threat.

………

As mentioned earlier, with the exception of the middle line of the Imperial Civil War, the Matsue Army encountered challenges in both the north and south directions. The restlessness of the Lena people on the sea is only part of the challenge. In the south, the military intelligence of the Songjiang Army also received new movements from the Omanis again.

The Omanis sent a huge team of envoys to Qingyue with a swaggering posture that others would not know!

At first, Matsue's MI didn't pay much attention to it. After all, there are too many things that the military intelligence department needs to take into account recently, as long as it is determined that the strategic center of gravity of the Omanis has left the Nanfeng fortress, and the action is not aimed at Songjiang, there is no special investigation of the basis. But soon, the only two spies planted by the Songjiang Army in Yuejing, the capital of Qingyue State, found out a shocking piece of news.

Saladin, the emperor of the Kingdom of Oman, is said to be a princess who admires Qingyue Kingdom, and treats her as a queen and wants to marry Qingyue Kingdom!

It is worth mentioning that this is not a public statement by the envoy of the Kingdom of Oman, but a rumor that has come from nowhere. It's just that unlike ordinary rumors, the timing of this rumor is too coincidental, the mission of the Kingdom of Oman arrived in Yuejing on the front foot, and before it was received by the lord of the country, the next day there was a rumor spread among the market, and the momentum of the spread was far beyond imagination, and it was obvious that someone was fueling the trouble.

The secret agent of the military intelligence department in Yuejing made almost no effort to make a judgment, and this was the news deliberately released by the Omani mission itself.

As for its intentions......

The news spread all the way back to Tiannan at the speed of an urgent report, and then from Tiannan to Dengzhou, only three days later than the bad news of the attack on the merchant ships of the Songjiang Army by the Oceanic Naval Division of the Lena people. After receiving this information from Gan Xing, Chen Wu quickly figured out Saladin's intentions after only one glance.

With thirteen years of experience and vision in the game, he knows very well the way the Kingdom of Oman wants to break the game. After he was born out of thin air and used two Tiannan wars to block their possibility of opening the Nanfeng fortress, Saladin still wanted to continue to go north to plot against the Central Plains, and there was only one way left: adjust the strategic focus, first annex the Qingyue Kingdom, and then march from Daze County in the south-central part of the empire.

If you can realize this, it is not difficult to understand the intention of the envoy team's ostentatious behavior and deliberate rumors.

Obviously, Saladin had the idea of attacking Qingyue, and did not want to use the method of forcible attack, but through the marriage of large and small countries, he annexed Qingyue with the least blood. With the strength of the seven counties of the Oman Kingdom, compared to the territory of the two counties of the Qingyue Kingdom, as long as he can marry a princess and have a righteous name, and then try to remove the current reigning lord of the Qingyue Kingdom, with Saladin's hand, Chen Wu has no doubt that he has that ability!

Of course, the Qingyue Kingdom can survive under the remnants of the empire and the eyes of the Omanis until now, instead of falling like small countries such as the Hue Dynasty and the Nam Thai Kingdom, so it naturally has some ability. In addition to the fact that the national strength itself is stronger, the current Qingyue State lord is quite discerning, which is also an important reason.

Saladin undoubtedly knew that if he directly asked for his wife, Li Shaoyuan, the lord of Qingyue Kingdom, would definitely not agree, but tried to find a reason to refuse. It is precisely for this reason that he ordered the envoy to deliberately swagger and take the initiative to release rumors, creating an impression of a fait accompli to the people of Yuejing and even the civil and military officials. Later, supplemented by the threat of military force, it was possible for the lord of the country to be forced to give in and agree to the marriage.

This was just Chen Wu's speculation, but the information that came next quickly proved him right.

Only one day later, through the secret investigation of Nguyen Shiming and the Fuguo forces, Chen Wu received information that the Omanis were mobilizing and gathering troops, and the direction was the Yuan Wu Dao of the Qingyue Kingdom. Perhaps because the Omanis did not deliberately keep it secret and intended to deter the Qingyue Kingdom, Nguyen Shiminh's strength even found out the specific strength of the army and the entire 150,000 army of the generals of the unified army!

After the two Tiannan Wars and the great loss of the strength of the Kingdom of Oman, this is already half of the military strength of the Kingdom of Oman.

Even, if the troops guarding the royal capital of Waranga and other key points are excluded, plus some of the troops placed in Koi Citadel and the Red River Valley to defend the Songjiang army, the 150,000 troops already account for eighty percent of the free movement of the army of the Kingdom of Oman, and this proportion is absolutely not exaggerated in the slightest!

After a day, two pieces of information, one before and one after, allowed Chen Wu to determine the calculation of the Omanis and Saladin.

There is no doubt that Matsue must do something about this, rather than let the Omanis do it. Otherwise, once Saladin succeeds, the probability is very high, and after the annexation of Qingyue, the territory of the Kingdom of Oman will increase to as many as nine counties. No matter where it is placed, it is a real big country. At that time, they who attacked the empire from Daze County as a pedal would once again pose a huge threat to Chen Wu.