Under Li Jingxuan's orders, the two fleets approached each other. The battleships on Li Jingxuan's side lined up in a thin horizontal formation, and in front of the enemy array, they crossed the body of the battleship, exposing their belly in front of them. Before the pirates on the other side could laugh at the miscalculation of the sailors here, the sound of the crossbow in the bed kept sounding, and then there was the roar of gunpowder explosion. In the midst of such a thunderous roar, Li Jingxuan's fleet was like a sharp bone-scraping steel knife, quickly passing over the pirates' bloated bodies, leaving a deep trace on their bodies very ruthlessly. This mark was very painful, at least it made those people in front of the pirate formation cry and cry out for their mother.

In one round of shooting, Li Jingxuan killed seven or eight warships on the pirates' side from two hundred meters away. Although these battleships are not big ships, and they are not comparable to such professional ballista battleships as Li Jingxuan's hands, the unfavorable start of the division still annoyed the pirates behind.

"Attack, attack!" was just annoyed, this kind of damage couldn't damage their roots, and it hadn't been able to penetrate their bottom line, so they still gave the order loudly and fearlessly and launched an attack.

Hundreds of warships were neatly pressed towards Li Jingxuan's side, with a mighty momentum like Mount Tai pressing on the top, exerting endless pressure on Li Jingxuan.

"It's a textbook offense, but it's a bit rigid. Looking at the other party's desperate appearance, Li Jingxuan pursed his lips lightly, and secretly shook his head in his heart.

The enemy's actions are dignified and not a little fancy, if their strength is really so strong that it is invincible, then Li Jingxuan has only one choice but to turn around and run away. However, this is not the case at the moment.

Li Jingxuan's ship is larger than the opponent's, its speed is faster than the opponent's, its attack power is stronger than the opponent's, and its attack range is larger than the opponent's. In addition to the fact that the number is not as good as the other party, it can be said that Li Jingxuan's strength is comprehensive. The difference between him and the enemies on the other side is like the difference between an adult and a child, to be exact, a dozen adults against hundreds of children. Although both the adult and the child were armed with weapons, the child was armed with a sword and a spear, while the adult was armed with a bow and crossbow.

With great strength and powerful equipment, in Li Jingxuan's opinion, as long as his side is not stupid, does not directly rush into the enemy's ship formation, and is stupidly surrounded by them, then he will not lose.

"Come on, guys, let's go around them in circles. Don't rush into battle, just keep shooting around them. Li Jingxuan calmly gave the order. Going around in circles outside the enemy's range, using his high speed to make the opponent unable to keep up with him, and using his long range to hit the opponent, this is the tactic arranged by Li Jingxuan.

This tactic was practiced by Li Jingxuan's subordinates. At this time, they were displayed under Li Jingxuan's order, but they were not unfamiliar at all.

At that time, the north wind was whistling, and Li Jingxuan's fleet turned sideways and cut from southeast to northwest. They sailed against the waves, and when they were still a kilometre from the western coast, they turned their rudder sharply to the east, and swept a white arc over the sea.

One, two, three...... Li Jingxuan was able to endure his temperament and persistently bleed the pirates opposite. He knew those people were stupid, and he knew they couldn't keep up with their own changes. So, he went around in circles, making the people on the other side dizzy and uncertain, and shooting their morale plummeted. At this moment, Li Jingxuan was like peeling an onion, destroying the ships in the pirate ship array layer by layer.

The pirate's military formation is made up of several entanglements, and because of the entanglement of interests, the point of collapse is extremely low. Hundreds of warships gathered together, and Li Jingxuan only destroyed one hundred and ten of their warships and sank one-fifth of their strength, so they couldn't stand it. At that moment, some people muttered that they wanted to escape from this purgatory and would live their own small life in their own stronghold.

Although this idea was finally suppressed by the big bosses inside, the entire fleet inevitably became chaotic. Some people want to escape, some people want to turn around, and some people want to move forward...... The originally neat ship formation showed the flaws in it. And this flaw was grasped by Li Jingxuan.

Now that we have the upper hand, and the enemy is in disarray, it is time for us to settle the battle. Assault, take down that pirate leader directly for me!" Li Jingxuan ordered in a loud voice.

With his order, the dozens of warships under his command were once again lined up in an almost end-to-end line, like a sharp kitchen knife, like a no-man's land, submerged in the boiling hot butter, and rushed to the front of the pirate leader at once.

The rest is much simpler. After all, the pirate leader is only a guy in the early stage of qi induction, although he wants to resist to the end, and his body wants to kill Li Jingxuan, but how can Li Jingxuan do what he wants.

On the slippery deck, the two of them fought against each other like this, and they started to move against each other. Silver sword light flashed in the air, and the gray sword light was also wrapped around like a python. After the two clanged and fought for more than dozens of rounds, Li Jingxuan used a move to "Meteor Chasing the Moon", sending the long sword in his hand into the chest of the pirate leader, completely killing him.

People can't be without heads, even the Pirate League. With the fall of the Grand Pirate Leader, the pirate's ship formation suddenly collapsed. They scattered and fled like frightened sheep, but none of them wanted to turn around and continue to fight Li Jingxuan. At this moment, they were already frightened.

At that moment, Li Jingxuan waved his boat division to pursue, followed behind these pirates, and directly copied their hometown. After half a month of slaughter and annihilation, Li Jingxuan eliminated 17 pirate nests, exterminated 22 pirates, sank 309 pirate ships, captured 472 ships, controlled the coastline of 1,500 miles north and south of Pingzhou, and seized a large amount of money, grain and materials. Here are the things that the pirates stole from Pingzhou City last time, and some of the things they looted from the merchants.

In short, this time Li Jingxuan achieved a bumper harvest in material and personnel. Although these captured thousands of pirates still need to go through some vetting and training before they can become their own people, with so many excellent sailors, Li Jingxuan believes that his new round of naval expansion will begin soon.

You must know that even when Li Jingxuan was on an expedition, the shipyard in Pingzhou City did not stop building ships. During the more than a month that Li Jingxuan went out to suppress bandits, the shipyard launched six ballista warships and four quick-ripening cruisers, which were the main forces in Li Jingxuan's fleet and the key to Li Jingxuan's new round of military expansion.

Returning to Pingzhou City, Li Jingxuan began to put aside the matter of the naval army's conquest, and let the officers who had grown up be responsible for the reorganization and training of the naval division. The people in the phantom array are all virtual, and they are not too smart, but they have a good ability, that is, they are good at imitation. If you give them an example, they will follow your guidelines. What you make, they make. All kinds of feedback are exactly the same as what you did, but this result made Li Jingxuan feel very relieved to place the order.

Throwing the captives to the officials in charge of the conversion work, Li Jingxuan was once again anxious about the people in the palace. New orders were issued one after another, and the large-scale construction, which had been stagnant for a month and a half, began again. This time, Li Jingxuan expanded the shipyard, cement factory, brick factory, built an armor factory, an ordnance factory and a steel factory, and transformed Pingzhou City from a foreign trade city to an industrial city - although he was able to run these factories, in the eyes of the society in his previous life, they were only slightly more advanced than the handicraft factory, and even less than the small rural factories in his previous life, but such factories produced much better benefits in the production of related products than the ordinary workshops of this generation. At least, in Li Jingxuan's factory, he has begun to use his not very rich knowledge of mathematics, physics and chemistry to prepare tools for the factory and improve production efficiency.

Because so many factories had to be started at once and a series of process improvements were carried out, Li Jingxuan became busy. Although to outsiders, he was silent.

It's just that no matter whether it's busy or silent, in short, Li Jingxuan is staying in Pingzhou City as an otaku at this moment. And just when he was becoming an otaku, Tang He, who stayed at home to train troops when Li Jingxuan went out to fight pirates, was dispatched again.

Competing for world dominance is actually similar to playing Go. After building his own hinterland foundation, seizing more territory and sitting on more resources has become the inevitable choice of Li Jingxuan's side. This choice has nothing to do with good or evil, only exists and is in one's own interests.

In fact, after having more money and more troops, Li Jingxuan and Tang He's side did have the necessity of expanding their territory and population and creating sub-bases.

As a result, the expedition became inevitable. The goal of the expedition, after Li Jingxuan and Tang He carefully discussed, was finally determined, that is, a city located in the upper reaches of the Great River - Xiongzhou.

Xiongzhou is not a resource-rich city, it is just a very ordinary agricultural city. It is located in the upper reaches of the great river, in the basin, surrounded by plains, with a longitudinal irrigation network and fertile land that has been cultivated for many years. At this time, he was one of the most important grain importers in Pingzhou City.

Food is very important to any force, but Pingzhou City is not short of food at the moment. After some suppression of bandits and trade, the grain in Li Jingxuan's hands was enough to support the expenses of Pingzhou City for three years. That's a lot of storage. It stands to reason that Li Jingxuan should put aside Xiongzhou City, which produces grain, and take Binzhou City, which is good at smelting steel, first. But Li Jingxuan didn't do it in the end.

In the discussion with Tang He, the two finally reached the same opinion: that is, the city won for the first time must be the city that helped them the most. After the two sides continued to discuss and dispute, the importance of Xiongzhou City was unanimously recognized by the two. Because they all understood that although Xiongzhou City was of little use in terms of resources, it surpassed the other cities in the Phantom Array in terms of geographical importance.

In the phantom array, the great river ran through the east and west, dividing Li Jingxuan and his opponent into two parts, north and south. The great river has become the north-south boundary of this world, and the four cities are separated by the river on the north and south sides. To the north are Hanzhou and Leizhou, and to the south are Pingzhou and Xiongzhou.

Hanzhou and Leizhou in the north will not talk about it for the time being, only Pingzhou and Xiongzhou in the south. Now Pingzhou is the old nest of Li Jingxuan and Tang River, and the city of Xiongzhou has become the only remaining riverside city south of the river. The city is near the river, and there must be a ferry. Unless the demon barbarians in the north have another way to cross the river, then if they want to invade the south, they will inevitably start from Pingzhou and Xiongzhou.

In other words, if Li Jingxuan's side can control Pingzhou City and take Xiongzhou City at the same time, then the road for the demon to cross the river to the south will be considered to be gambled. At that time, as long as Li Jingxuan and Tang He can hold the defense line of Dahe, then they will have the spare strength to take the remaining Binzhou and Muzhou in the south.

After taking all the four cities in Henan, Li Jingxuan's side could completely build a defense line along the river while establishing rear bases in Pinzhou and Muzhou, and deal with the enemy coming from the north by defensive counterattack. This seemed to be the best option for the two who were in the south. In fact, Li Jingxuan and Tang He also think the same way, and they also do it according to this strategy.

In order to achieve his strategic goal as quickly as possible, Li Jingxuan also sent a fleet equipped with light ballistae to go up the river while leading troops west from the Tang River, and cooperated with the Tang River to attack Xiongzhou City. This is not only to ensure the smooth operation of the Tang River, but also to temper the degree of cooperation between the two divisions under his command and to make a rehearsal for the battle that may inevitably break out in the future.

The result of the rehearsal was successful, under the pressure of Tang He's astonishing force, and under the roar of the terrifying ballista, Tang He's army only took half a month's effort to directly take Xiongzhou City, and achieved amazing results.

When Tang He sent the good news back to Li Jingxuan, Li Jingxuan was immediately so happy that he couldn't help jumping up.

"Taking Xiongzhou City is equivalent to taking the entire land of Henan. Next, it's time for me to start building my own Great River defense. Li Jingxuan thought. At the moment, he became more and more active. He sent out one by one the engineers, and he built the towers and the arrowtowers of the barracks not far behind the watchtowers, and kept a close watch over the entire river. Now, if there were really anyone in the river and on the riverbank who didn't come to test it, I was afraid that everything they imagined would be punctured by the soldiers who were behind the watchtower.

Watchtowers, barracks, arrow towers, and cities are the defense systems that Li Jingxuan has connected in series, and they are the forces he uses to guard his homeland. (To be continued.) )