"Crackling ......"

On Chinese New Year's Eve, the day before the New Year, when the flames in the bonfire exploded from time to time, the Ming army on the Mannar Pier was in full array.

Due to the shallowness of the Mannar harbor, the Ming army could not dock more than 3,000 ships, so they had to build fortifications to prepare for defense.

After four days of repair, this place has been commanded by Chen Zuo, and a four-foot-high semicircular fortification has been built with sand and soil.

At sea, the Ming warship lookouts kept an eye on the Ming troops on the shore at twelve o'clock, and the bonfire was a means for both sides to transmit messages at night.

In the darkness of night, Nayan also led a large army to the outskirts of Mannar.

Mannar is just a small town, and there are less than 3,000 people living in the town, so it cannot hide the figure of 50,000.

It was only by the darkness of night that Mannar was able to approach the Ming army with his large army and launch a night attack when they were tired.

At this moment, the time has come, and Nayan also resisted his excitement and ordered to the left and right: "Let the whole army rush in the direction of the bonfire and deal with all these guys!" ”

"Yes!"

The generals responded and began to deliver the message, and the military backwardness of the state of Ceylon was also manifested here.

Nayan did not give a definite time, so the 50,000 Ceylonese troops rushed towards the town of Mannar one by one with a shout, thinking that the Ming army on the harbor was rushing.

"Beep-"

The strange howl woke all the Ming troops in an instant, and the whistle continued.

Thanks to Chen Zuo's military order to sleep in armor, all the Ming troops were in position immediately after waking up, which was a skill trained in long-term camp training.

"Fireworks!"

After Chen Zuo woke up from his sleep, he ordered the army to set off fireworks.

He knew very well that the Ming army relied on firearms, and it was impossible for you to extinguish bonfires and torches, so they were targets.

But if you don't want to be a target, you can use fireworks.

Not only can it be used for simple lighting, to see the general situation of the enemy, but also to remind the naval fleet to send reinforcements.

"Fireworks!"

The shouts rang out, and dozens of soldiers immediately took out a white cylinder that was arm-thick but only a foot long from a large box.

They grabbed the end of the cylinder with one hand and lit the lead above and held it up to the sky.

"Bang bang bang-"

For a while, they only felt a numbness in their hands, a shock in their ears, and when they looked up again, they saw bright fireworks lighting up the night sky.

The blooming of more than 20 fireworks instantly illuminated the situation around the pier.

In an instant, the Ming army stationed on the front line saw a large number of Ceylonese troops rushing towards the Ming army along the streets of the town.

They were dark-skinned, small in stature, extremely fast, with shields and spears in their hands, and their hair scattered like evil spirits.

"Beep-"

"Crackle!"

Almost as soon as they were seen, the military attachés blew the wooden whistles, and the musketeers' muscles reacted by igniting the fuse and pulling the trigger.

Hundreds of buckshot bullets were fired at the Ceylonese soldiers seventy paces away, but the military attache who blew the wooden whistle felt a tightness in his heart, knowing that he had blown it early.

He had no hope for this round of guns, but in his eyes there were many fallen Ceylon soldiers, although there were only a few dozen, but this made his eyes widen.

"They have no armor, keep shooting!"

The military attache shouted excitedly, because as long as the enemy was unarmoured, then his whistle just now was not considered a mistake in operation.

"Crackle-"

"Uh-huh!!"

Strange shouts came from all directions, and the Ming army stood in three rows behind sandbags, armed with ordinary arquebuses to shoot.

The two thousand musketeers constantly took turns lining up their guns, with fireworks exploding from time to time overhead, giving them a faint light that allowed them to see where the enemy was coming from.

Nayan was right to choose the night attack, because most of the Ceylonese soldiers could only see the light of the Ming army's fire, and even if there were fireworks overhead, they could barely see how many people were lying under their feet because they were running.

It wasn't until more and more people fell and began to affect the running that they reacted with hindsight and there were routers.

"The whole family of the fleeing is made a slave!"

Nayan led 5,000 royal troops to kill the fleeers on the periphery, and this dilemma drove the Ceylonese soldiers, who were not even militiamen, to continue to charge the Ming army.

Seeing that they seized the gap between the Ming army's loading and ammunition, they were about to rush into the Ming army's position, but at this moment, a flash of fire suddenly appeared in front of them.

"Boom, boom—"

Fifty field guns rang out in an instant, and in an instant, they loaded their shotguns and knocked over a wave of charging Ceylonese soldiers.

The muffled thunder seemed to the soldiers of Ceylon as if the gods were angry, and some of them even knelt down directly.

"What sound?"

"China's Ming army has something in its hands that can kill many of us in an instant!"

The sound of the cannon frightened Nayan on the periphery, and the generals who had fled from the front were also explaining to him.

"What?!" Nayan thought he had misheard, but there was a shout of killing coming from the direction of the port.

"Kill!!"

"Kill!!"

"What sound?!" Nayan became flustered, he had never encountered such an army.

"General! China's Ming army has launched a charge! ”

"What did you say?!"

The news from the front made Nayan's brain blank, he didn't expect that he would besiege 50,000 people with 5,000 people and didn't dare to charge directly with the Wangcheng army, and the Ming army actually dared to charge back against his 50,000 people.

For a while, Nayan suddenly became angry, and he pulled out the knife on his waist: "Everyone give it to me, kill this group of Chinese Ming troops, whoever captures what is who's whoever!" ”

"Kill!!"

Nayan's words inspired the royal army of Ceylon, which had not yet fought the Ming army, and they rushed forward with great momentum, charging with a large number of ordinary Ceylonese soldiers.

However, when they collided with the Ming army, they instantly understood the gap between themselves and the Ming army.

When the troops of the royal city of Ceylon, accustomed to the straggler style of fighting, rushed to the front of the battle, they saw iron men who were half a head taller than them, and formed a long spear formation, pressing forward step by step.

The armor of the Ming army was higher, the body was taller, the armor was heavier and thicker, and the spear in his hand was six feet longer than the spear in the hand of the royal army of Ceylon.

In other words, their spears were stabbed to death by the Ming army before they even touched the Ming army.

They tried to harass the Ming army with arrows, but the arrows hit the armor but only made a sound, except for a few unlucky Ming troops who were killed in the cheek because they did not bow their heads in time, the rest of the Ming army still advanced steadily.

"Beep-"

The whistle sounded, and the Ming spearmen instantly squatted down.

For a time, gunsmoke and fire appeared, and at a distance of less than ten paces, Wang Chengjun's army was like wheat after autumn, and they fell in batches.

"Beep-"

The whistle sounded again, and the pikemen got up and continued their steady advance.

This seemingly simple way of fighting allowed the Ming army to crush the royal city army of Ceylon out of the market town of Mannar, and drove them to the plain and began to shoot.

"Retreat!!"

In the dark night, as the Ming army stopped lighting fireworks, Nayan immediately began to flee with the people around him.

As soon as he left, 5,000 royal city troops and more than 40,000 Ceylonese soldiers immediately began to flee.

At this moment, Chen Zuo sounded the horn without thinking: "The whole army is pursuing!" ”

"Woo-woo-"

As if there was a terrifying sound from the bottomless cave, the Ming army was no longer obsessed with forming a formation, but drew a short knife, held a spear and began a unilateral pursuit and slaughter.

The chase lasted two quarters of an hour, several miles out of the town of Mannar.

If it weren't for Chen Zuo's worry that there would still be ambushes in Ceylon, he might be able to chase and kill all the way until his physical strength is exhausted.

All the Ming troops withdrew to their positions under the command of Chen Zuo, resting while waiting for reinforcements from the sea.

Two quarters of an hour later, dozens of sand boats arrived in the harbor, and thousands of people disembarked on the shore.

Because Chen Xuan needed to sit in the fleet and did not go ashore, this army was controlled by Chen Zuo.

Chen Zuo did not rush to attack, but ordered the army to collect the corpses and count the results.

From Zishi to Yinshi, as the sky gradually brightened, the results of the Ming army were also counted.

More than 4,600 enemies were killed, more than 3,200 wounded soldiers were captured, and no casualties were killed in the headquarters, but 17 were lightly wounded.

Looking at this report, Chen Xuan, who was on the boat, didn't know what to say, and only held back one sentence for a long time: "How did they have the courage to attack us at night?" ”

"Master Hou, what should I do next, it's almost dawn." A commander asked Chen Xuan, and when Chen Xuan heard this, he put his hand on the hilt of his knife:

"Let Chen Zuo's kid come to the fleet, and I will personally lead the 14,000 people who went ashore to attack the mountain city of Ceylon and rush to the aid of Zheng Zheng's envoy!"

"At the same time, send Tang Qi to expedite the search, and be sure to find the traces of Zheng Zheng and them!"

"Yes!" Hearing the military order, the commander hurriedly asked people to transport the horses to the shore.

Soon, more than 100 Tang horsemen set off in a group and began to search for Zheng He's traces.

After Chen Xuan and Chen Zuo switched formations and went ashore, they immediately led an army of 14,000 and rushed towards the mountain city of Ceylon under the guidance of the captives of Ceylon.

During this period, the Ming sentinels also searched for the Ceylon routs who had withdrawn to the mountain city of Ceylon together, and in the face of them, the Ming sentinels often had more than ten horsemen who could easily defeat hundreds of prisoners.

Gradually, more and more Ceylonese troops captured by Chen Xuan were surrendered, and most of them were not in good physical condition and could not keep up with the marching speed of the Ming army at all.

In order to be able to take the mountain city of Ceylon by surprise, Chen Xuan left 500 people to guard the more than 7,000 prisoners of Ceylon who were captured on the road, and led the rest of the soldiers and horses to continue to advance towards the mountain city of Ceylon.

At the same time, Zheng He was also woken up by Li Shi in the early morning.

"Envoy, Adahar, they just took advantage of the build-up of our army to leave first."

Li Shi made a bow, and Zheng He also rubbed his eyes that were not rested: "Did you send someone to follow?" ”

"Sent, they didn't notice." Li Shi bowed his head, and Zheng He also nodded when he heard this:

"It seems that they are really hiding something from us, maybe Pingjianghou's side has already been attacked."

"Since Ceylon is unkind, then we must also reciprocate."

"The army will follow Adahar and their troops, and follow me to raid the mountain city of Ceylon!"

"Yes!" Li Shilong responded, and soon the 3,000 Ming army was fully equipped and launched a pursuit.

The speed of the minister Adahar was not very fast, he thought that it would take three hours for the Ming army to catch up, but in less than an hour, the Ming army had already appeared behind him, and the cavalry even intercepted Adahar's carriage.

"Zheng, what are you going to do?!"

Ah Daha was taken aback, he only had five hundred guards here, and he was not Zheng He's opponent at all.

At his exclamation, the Ming army surrounded him, and Zheng He also walked out of it and interrogated him on this plain.

"Adaha, I am very polite to you, but you are plotting against us, what is your intention?!"

Zheng He clenched the reins of the horse, looking very angry.

He wants to trick this Adha and see if he can come up with any useful information.

Just before he thought that he had just put his hand on the hilt of the knife at his waist, Ah Daha in the carriage climbed out of the carriage with a rolling belt, and his greasy fat face was full of panic.

"This is the arrangement of Alekhinal, and I just got the news this morning, so I chose to flee."

"Alekhnael?" Zheng He frowned, he didn't expect this guy to dare to make a move on himself after accepting his gift.

"How many soldiers and horses are there in the mountain city of Ceylon?"

He questioned Adaha, and when Adahar saw this, he hurriedly spoke: "Eight thousand." ”

"Just 8,000?" Zheng He couldn't believe it, after all, Ceylon also had a population of nearly one million.

"There were 13,000 men, but 5,000 men were sent out to attack Mannar, and now there are only 8,000 men."

In order to survive, Ah Daha confessed all the information, and even took the initiative to suggest that Zheng He go to support Chen Xuan, otherwise Chen Xuan would be torn apart by the army of more than 50,000 led by Nayan.

"Haha!"

Facing Adaha's words, Zheng He laughed and said, "I'm afraid your 50,000 army has been defeated, and what I have to do now is to bring the culprit to justice!" ”

"What are you going to do?!" Ah Daha was taken aback by Zheng He, but Zheng He explained to Li Shi, the commander beside him: "Leave a hundred people to guard them, and dare to take other actions to correct the law on the spot." ”

"The rest, follow me to raid the mountain city of Ceylon!"

"Yes!" Hearing that he was going to raid the royal capital of Ceylon, Li Shi instantly became excited.

Conquering the royal capital and capturing the king is a rare achievement!

Like Zheng He, he did not take the so-called 8,000 royal city army of Ceylon in his eyes, and the 2,900 Ming army was enough to break through the mountain city of Ceylon.

"Let's go!"

Shaking the reins of the horse, Zheng He rushed towards the mountain city of Ceylon, and Li Shi saw this, and left a hundred people to supervise the more than 500 people of Adaha, and then led the army to follow Zheng He's footsteps.

Seeing that the main force of the Ming army was gradually moving away, the fear on his face began to slowly disappear, and finally calmed down.

He took the lead in pulling out his dagger and stabbing at the nearest Ming soldier, but the dagger could not enter an inch after stabbing into the armor.

"Beep!"

The Ming army reacted, pulling out the golden gourd hammer and smashing it at Adahar and blowing the wooden whistle at the same time.

In an instant, one hundred Ming troops moved against five hundred guards, although this group of guards wearing leather armor had a numerical advantage, but when they really fought, they were divided and killed by the Ming army in an instant, and most of them surrendered.

As for Adaha, who took the lead, he was killed with a hammer by the soldier he tried to assassinate at the first time.

When the news reached Zheng He's ears, Zheng He only felt extremely disgusted with Ceylon.

He has never been so disgusted by people all the way to the West, and if he doesn't break through the mountain city of Ceylon today, he will be disgusted for the rest of his life!

The sound of uniform footsteps sounded on the plains of Ceylon, and since he had been on the road for three days, Zheng He was now only more than twenty miles away from the mountain city of Ceylon.

Although the Ming army had already been attacked, the Ceylon State did not distribute Tang cavalry around the Ceylon mountain city, so when the defenders at the head of the city discovered the Ming army, Zheng He had already led the Ming army to three miles outside the Ceylon mountain city.

"Go two miles and shell the city gate and the city gate tower for me!"

After a morning's journey, the Ming soldiers accumulated a lot of grievances one by one, so when Zheng He ordered the artillery bombardment, the Ming army quickly walked to a position one mile outside the Ceylon Mountain City to build an artillery position.

Twenty field guns were erected, and urgent bells and hurried whistles rang in the hill city of Ceylon.

"Bell... Clang... Bell ......"

"Boom, boom—"

The bell tower did not ring for long before it was overshadowed by the sound of Ming artillery, and twenty five-pound stone bullets smashed through the city gate in an instant.

Seeing this, the Ceylon army defending the city hurriedly filled the city gate with debris, and their movements were roughly looked at by Zheng He with a telescope, and he immediately changed direction: "Shell the northeast corner of the city wall, and prepare the gunpowder pack!" ”

"Yes!" The Ming gunners changed direction and began shelling the northeastern corner of the city of Ceylon.

Unlike the Ming Dynasty's city walls, which were often several zhang wide, Ceylon's city walls, like most of the Deccan Plateau walls, were low and thin, and they had not experienced any siege warfare at all.

In the war on the island of Ceylon, ladders, trebuchets and chariots were often very clever siege equipment.

Before the Great Voyage, their walls were not very strong for cannons.

"Boom, boom—"

The sound of artillery was heard again, this time a test firing, but the test fire was successful.

After a slight adjustment, the Ming artillery began to bombard the northeast corner of the mountain city of Ceylon, until the wall bricks fell off under Zheng He's gaze, Zheng He looked behind him and ordered: "Prepare for the gunpowder bag to blow up the gap, and the artillery will interrupt the female wall for me!" ”

"Yes!"

The artillery continued to fire, and from noon to midday, a full hour of one-way shelling soon exposed the rammed earth behind the wall tiles.

At this time, Arekhunar gathered the rest of the defenders in the city to climb the city wall in a panic, but in the face of the shelling, everyone did not dare to go up to the city wall, and the city gate was blocked.

"Idiot, why are you blocking the city walls? There were only three thousand of them! ”

Ya Lie Kun Er scolded loudly, and hurriedly drove the army and the surrounding residents to clean up the blocked city gates, and opened the city gates under Zheng He's incredulous gaze.

Eight thousand royal city troops went out of the city, and they were all wearing chain mail and helmets.

Although it is not as good as the armor of the Ming army in terms of protection, it is already very good to have such an army in this part of South Asia.

What's more, Zheng He also saw elephant soldiers among the troops who walked out of Yongdao.

Twenty war elephants walked out of the corridor and rushed towards the Ming army under the command of the Ceylonese army.

"This group of people fights in a disorderly manner, and they dare to attack us."

Zheng He put down the binoculars, snorted lightly, and then motioned for the artillery to prepare.

The Ming army did not move, but waited for the Ceylonese army to approach.

When Yalie Kunar saw this scene, he thought that Zheng He was stupid by the war elephant, so he was still sitting on the back of the war elephant and commanding the army to pounce on Zheng He.

As the distance between the two sides became closer and closer, the war elephants also made elephant moans to intimidate the Ming army.

It's just that they don't know that there are not 1,000 war elephants that died at the hands of the Ming army, but 800.

"Artillery preparation."

Zheng He sat on horseback, holding back the horses frightened by the war elephants, as steady as Mount Tai's order.

Twenty artillery pieces were lit in his order, and at this moment they were less than a hundred paces away from the Ceylonese army.

"Boom, boom—"

When the cannon sounded, twenty iron cannonballs smashed into the herd of war elephants like lead balls thrown by someone.

For a while, the wailing of war elephants continued, and I don't know how many war elephants were shot, in short, many war elephants fell down one after another, and less than ten could stand.

"Charge!"

Seeing this terrifying scene, Yalie Kunaer suddenly panicked, but after seeing that they were only seventy or eighty steps away from the Ming army, he immediately boldly ordered the whole army to charge.

This time he rode a war elephant and rushed towards the Ming army, and the Ming army seemed to be frightened by them, and actually abandoned the artillery and hugged it together.

If they had taken out a spear, Arekunar would have had a headache, but they had brought out strange weapons that were about the same height as them.

"Beep-"

A whistle sounded, and the pikemen in the front row were half-kneeling on the ground, their spears lying flat.

A thousand arquebusiers in the back row raised their arquebuses and pulled the trigger when the Ceylonese approached less than twenty paces.

"Crackle-"

For a time, the number of fallen troops of the royal city of Ceylon was very large, but the war elephants did not suffer too many blows.

They were wailing, but they weren't going to die for a while.

Seeing this, Zheng He hurriedly shouted behind him: "Throw the gunpowder bag!" ”

"Yes!"

At his shout, two soldiers lit the gunpowder bag, and one soldier grabbed the ten-pound gunpowder bag and threw it out as he circled in place.

"Beep-"

The Ceylonese army was already close at hand, and when the three rounds of guns were over, the whistle sounded again, the arquebusiers retreated, and the pikemen rose up with their guns against the elephants.

The gunpowder packets were thrown into the ranks of the royal city army of Ceylon at this moment, while the Ming army fought and retreated.

In a few breaths, the Ming army had already taken seven or eight steps back.

Just when Alekhnell felt that the Ming army was vulnerable, he caught a glimpse of the smoking powder bag.

At this moment, it was beside the war elephant that Alekhnar was riding.

Under his gaze, the powder bag exploded......

"Boom!!"

A wave of air knocked the Ceylonese soldiers around them away, and even the war elephants fell to the ground, and the Ming army seized this opportunity to start charging.

Two thousand pikemen charged in formation, while arquebusiers stayed where they were to reload.

Zheng He put on his armor and led more than a dozen cavalry beside him to rush into the Ceylon army.

For a time, the 8,000 Wangcheng army was disrupted by Zheng He's less than 2,000 short soldiers, and the musketeers also followed the team after loading their ammunition.

The Ming army cooperated closely, and the war elephants who tried to stand were also greeted by the Ming army's hammers, muskets, and spears, and they completely swallowed their last breath after a short time.

In a daze, Arekuna only felt that his collar was being pulled up, and when he opened his eyes in a daze, there was a middle-aged bearded man with dark skin and a three-mountain hat in front of him.

"Yalie Kuner, right, grandpa, I'm the Zheng He you want to kill!"

(End of chapter)

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