All the sentinels deployed outside disappeared quietly, such a situation was too weird, and Zheng Zhihu, who was already uneasy, lost his sleep. Even if he had never systematically studied the art of war, he could still think that this phenomenon could well indicate that the enemy would launch a large-scale night attack next, so he did not dare to slack off at all, not only strengthening the defense force of the first line, but also personally sitting in charge, watching out for the opponent's next move.

From time to time, the sea breeze drifted into the ears of the pirates with strange sounds, some like the roar of wild beasts, others like the groans of a man after being wounded, which made people nervous, but they could not see through the night what was really going on in the wilderness outside the camp. Everyone's hearts were extremely uneasy, fearing that the next moment hundreds of enemies would rush out of the night. Over time, some people even began to claim that they smelled a faint smell of blood in the wind - perhaps from a partner who had been killed outside.

By the time of the fifth watch, there was already a small leader who couldn't hold back and asked Zheng Zhihu to fight, and he wanted to take someone out to have a look. Zheng Zhihu thought that it was not a way to sit and wait like this, at least he had to find out whether the opponent really planned to launch a field battle or just harass him, so he let the little leader take more than ten people and quietly go out from the gate. In order to conceal his tracks, he did not even use lighting tools such as torches and lanterns, so he disappeared into the night one foot at a time.

However, the luck of this group did not seem to be much better than that of the friends who had disappeared earlier, and after they got out, it was like a stone in the sea. The people in the camp waited for a long time to make incense sticks before they heard the shouting of someone in the wilderness to the east, but it was immediately interrupted abruptly, as if someone had cut their throats.

When the group set out, they brought two gongs with them, and agreed to sound the gongs to warn them if they ran into a large army of the enemy and had no time to retreat. But it was not until an hour had passed that the men in the camp did not hear the sound of the gong, and the group did not withdraw at the appointed time, and disappeared into the night.

Zheng Zhihu didn't dare to continue to send people out, sending his subordinates out to die so worthlessly was not the situation he wanted to see. Zheng Zhihu decided that no matter what the situation was outside, he would wait until after dawn.

After another hour, the sky was already slightly bright, but at the same time, the morning fog also filled the island, and the vision was still greatly limited, and the visibility range was only ten meters at most.

It wasn't until the sun rose above sea level that the fog began to dissipate. As the sunlight pierced through the morning mist and hit the ground, the pirates, who were standing above the lookout, finally saw what was going on outside.

About thirty or forty zhang away from the gate of the Eighteen Zhi camp, there was a row of corpses neatly placed on the ground, each corpse was spaced one foot apart, and even the direction of the head and feet was the same. Next to the corpses were the weapons of these men, spears, waist knives, harpoons, axes, etc., the same people who disappeared outside the camp last night. Aside from these corpses, the wilderness was empty, and there were no Ming or Haihan armies moving nearby.

After confirming that the outside environment was safe, Zheng Zhihu ordered people to go out to collect the bodies of these people. There is no doubt that the enemy in Nanri Village must have come out to carry out a sneak attack last night, and this sneak attack should have lasted for most of the night, so as to have enough time to deal with the two groups of men and horses sent by Shibazhi successively, and there is still leisure to place their corpses outside to demonstrate.

More than 20 corpses were quickly carried back to the camp, and Yi Lao Er had already arrived without notice, trembling and began to claim the corpses. The results of the statistics soon came out, and the first group of people sent out to guard before dark was missing, two were not among them, and the second group was completely wiped out, and none of them were spared.

"The person who didn't die should have been caught alive!" Zheng Zhihu quickly guessed the truth of the matter, but this could not alleviate his anger at the moment: "Yi Lao Er, what are you doing to eat? This is the scout you spent a lot of money to train?

Yi Lao Er stammered and defended: "Boss, this ...... It's not that the brothers are incompetent, it's really ...... It's the enemy who is too powerful!"

"You're still quibbling!" Zheng Zhihu glared and scolded, "Do you think you can shirk your own mistakes in this way?"

"The villain doesn't dare!" Yi Lao Er knelt on the ground and continued: "Master, please take a closer look at the injuries on these brothers, and you will know that what the villain said is true." ”

Zheng Zhihu was only angry just now, but before he had time to carefully examine the injuries on these people's bodies, when he heard this, his heart moved, and he immediately walked quickly to the side of these corpses. Yi Lao Er hurriedly got up and followed, pulled out the clothes of the injured person, and explained to Zheng Zhihu.

"Please look at the master, this person's name is Cao Shanbiao, he used to be a snitch in Fuzhou City, he was quite agile, and he ran fast, and his fatal wound was behind him. Yi Lao Er flipped the corpse over as he spoke, lifted his shirt, and saw a blood hole the size of a copper coin at the lower end of his shoulder blade on his left back.

"This wound penetrated Cao Shanbiao's body, and it looked like it should have been injured by a weapon like a bow and crossbow. The wound was pierced from behind and forward, and it is very likely that Cao Shanbiao was shot down when he was about to run back after discovering his opponent's tracks. Yi Lao Er's feelings calmed down at this time, and the note finally smoothed out: "The villain came to two conclusions from this, first, the injury he suffered was directly pierced, which shows that the bow and crossbow used by the person who killed him were very strong. Second, last night's night was so dark that even the moon didn't appear much, and there was only one possibility that the other party could kill people with a weapon such as a bow and crossbow in such a dark night, that is, they were very close to Cao Shanbiao, so close that they could shoot him without aiming. ”

"There is some truth to it...... Go on!" Zheng Zhihu listened to what he said, and his anger slowly dissipated. A successful spy leader will do more than just train spies and scouts, intelligence analysis is also one of the important tools that must be mastered. Although these people died silently, those who care can still find some useful information from their corpses.

"Look at this corpse, it was cut in the throat with a knife, and almost the neck was cut off. Yi Lao Er let go of Cao Shanbiao's corpse, moved to another corpse next to him and continued to explain: "Judging from the wound, this is not a scar caused by a slash in the fight, it is more like someone covering his mouth and nose from behind, and then cutting his throat with a sharp blade. ”

Yi Lao Er slowly stood up and said: "The villain has seen more than 20 corpses just now, and almost all of them are fatal injuries from one blow, and the knife wounds are mostly concentrated in the throat and ****, and the techniques are quite consistent. The external injuries caused by the bow and crossbow are almost all through the ****, and two people are even hit by arrows in the head, but the arrows have been removed, and it is impossible to confirm what the opponent's weapon looks like. ”

"Then what is your final conclusion?" Zheng Zhihu patiently waited for him to finish before asking.

Yi Lao Er frowned and said: "The other party's methods are already very clear, basically all of them are close combat, and our people should not have time to resist." The villain can't figure out one thing, how can the opponent accurately find the exact location of Cao Shanbiao and the others in the dark night when he can't see his fingers last night? According to common sense, who would use a weapon like a bow and crossbow when attacking the sentry at night? The range seen is only within a radius of one or two feet, and if this blow misses, it will alarm the target, but they used this method to kill more than ten of us, this is really unreasonable!"

Zheng Zhihu also realized the irrationality of this at this time, and he could even make up such a picture in his brain - the opponent approached his men in the dark of night without hurrying, and then used a sharp blade or a bow and crossbow to assassinate the unsuspecting target at a very close distance. And after these killings, the opponents even had the time to gather their bodies together and place them outside the camp of the Eighteen Zhi to demonstrate. There is no doubt that it is very difficult to complete the whole process without going wrong, as long as you miss a hit, someone may send a warning signal, but the scary thing is that the opponent actually did it in the dark, how did they do it?

Yi Lao Er lowered his voice at this time and said, "The villain heard about ...... The Haihan people have many witchcraft, and they have many methods to confuse the opponent's mind on the battlefield......"

"Ridiculous!" Zheng Zhihu didn't wait for Yi Lao Er to finish speaking, and then reprimanded: "Such remarks that shake the morale of the army, Hugh has to mention it again!"

Yi Lao Er didn't dare to defend himself after being scolded, so he could only bow his head and respond. Zheng Zhihu said again: "You first pick up the bones of these brothers, and after breaking the Nanri Village, you will take the heads of the Haihan people to pay tribute to them!"

Although Zheng Zhihu reprimanded Yi Lao Er in public, the other party's statement lingered in his mind. The legend of the Haihan people will do it, in fact, it is not news for a long time, when Liu Xiang came back from a great defeat at the mouth of the Pearl River, he once mentioned all kinds of miracles of the Haihan people. Of course, leaders like Zheng Zhihu, who had not faced off with the Haihan militia at that time, didn't believe it at all, they thought that this was just Liu Xiang making excuses for his failure. If someone really wants to be able to win on the battlefield by doing so, then why do they need so many young men to serve as soldiers? Wouldn't it be good to directly train a group of wizards to go into battle to kill the enemy?

However, two months ago, the Haihan militia hit Nanri Island, and Zheng Zhihu did feel the strength of his opponent. However, although he suffered defeat at the time, he didn't seem to have realized what spells his opponent would use in the engagement, as the legend has said - it would be terrible if the fierce artillery bombardment was also the spell of the Haihan people.

But this strange situation that appeared last night really can't be explained clearly by common sense, there are also many archers in the eighteen Zhi's array, and there are also many leaders who wear Yang in a hundred steps, but Zheng Zhihu will definitely not be stupid enough to let the archers attack in the middle of the night to play the role of spearheads, after all, in the middle of the night, archers with limited vision will not be more useful than ordinary infantry.

However, the arrangement of the Haihan militia was obviously unusual, and they even sent crossbowmen to fight in the dark night, and it seemed that only Yi Laoer's statement could explain the reason why they were so fearless - perhaps the Haihan people had some kind of spell that could make their soldiers see in the dark as if they were day.

Although this speculation is infinitely close to the truth, Zheng Zhilong and his pirates have gone astray. With these more than 20 lives, Zheng Zhihu has at least learned a lesson, that is, don't fight with the Haihan people at night, the difference in combat effectiveness between the two sides at night is too far away, so far that his side doesn't even have a chance to fight back.

Before the bodies of these unfortunate people were all cleaned up, someone came to report that they had picked up something that looked like bows and arrows outside. Soon the thing was presented to Zheng Zhihu's hand, this is an arrow made of metal, glowing with silver light, more than a foot long, it looks like it should be a crossbow arrow, but the weight is extremely light, the material is not iron or copper, and it is similar to wood. The balanced wings on the tail are not feathers, they are very light and thin, and it is not known what material they are made of. Zheng Zhihu tried to bend the arrow with a little force in his hand, but found that it was far harder than wood. There were still faint traces of blood on the arrows and shafts, and it seemed that this was one of the murder weapons that shot his men to death last night.

In last night's sweeping operation, there were indeed seven or eight arrows that could not be recovered in time after being fired, and they were left in the wilderness, and it was one of them that was found by the people who cleaned the battlefield by Eighteen Zhi. However, this kind of arrow is not inextricably replaced, and there are several kinds of tough wood in Southeast Asia that can be used to make special crossbow arrows such as zuò, so Qian Tiandun will boldly use this kind of weapon that has a good killing effect but is not convenient to recover in the night raid.

Although the division was unfavorable, and after landing on the island, it suffered a loss before the official war began, and its morale suffered a certain setback, but the plan to attack Nanri Village could not be stopped because of this. Zheng Zhihu brought more than 2,000 horses and horses on this trip, plus the Dutch who were covering on the periphery, the daily consumption of supplies was a large number, and the supplies they carried were only enough to last about ten days of operations.

After cleaning up, Zheng Zhihu still ordered to leave the camp and march in the direction of Nanri Village, preparing to attack the village. However, if he knew how many troops and horses his opponent had stationed on the island, perhaps he would immediately dispel this unrealistic idea and evacuate Nanri Island as quickly as possible.

"Eighteen Zhi is moving......" Standing on the lookout, Qian Tiandun saw the movement in the distance from the telescope, and a smile appeared on the corner of his mouth: "Okay, you haven't been scared away, you have the guts!"