Chapter 628: Battle of Lusong Island
The officers and soldiers led by Zhao Bing had been displaced throughout the battles, and some had died, some had been injured, and nearly half of their troops had been lost. The losses in their warships could not be replaced, and they had to rely entirely on the spoils of victory.
However, the small country in Southeast Asia brought in the navy of Zhenla to jointly resist his troops. The coalition had many ships, and as the saying goes, many ants can kill an elephant. The two sides fought fiercely for the third time in the Mayi Sea. After a group fight, the navy of the Song Dynasty suffered heavy losses and had to withdraw from the battlefield.
This is called Zhao Bing's pain in the balls.
The deputy admiral of the navy, Zheng Qilang, reported: Your Majesty, the situation is not good. If this continues, our warships will become fewer and fewer, and sooner or later we will be trapped on Lusong Island.
The false emperor asked him: What should we do? Should we make peace with the Southern Barbarians?
Now that we have lost the battle, we don’t know whether these vassal states will recognize him as the emperor of the Song Dynasty.
Zheng Qilang replied: We have to try, we have to stop the war. Our patrol ships have seen the New Song navy cruising on the sea. The ships are as big as a small island. Although there are only three or five ships, we dare not approach. If we threaten the safety of their fleet, the New Song warships will fire shells. If we are really targeted, the ship will definitely be destroyed and people will die. We might as well ask our brothers for help to repel the current enemy.
The fake emperor hesitated for a moment and asked him: Is it possible? Is the new Song willing? I caught Zhao Qi'er and beat him to death back then. Doesn't he bear a grudge?
Zheng Qillang thought that they had to give it a try. Right now they had no help in Southeast Asia, so who else could they ask for help except the New Song Navy?
However, the current focus of the navy of the New Song Dynasty's Shenwei Army is not on Southeast Asia, but on the Ryukyu Kingdom opposite Fujian.
The Ryukyu Kingdom was also called Ishu. At that time, the country was in disarray and in internal strife, and the island country of Japan was also sending troops and gangsters to take advantage of the situation.
Zhao Yulin asked the navy commander Zhou Ping to concentrate all forces to pacify the situation and then take it back for him.
What the Song Dynasty navy saw was just a fleet of ships escorting merchant ships in the South China Sea.
Although the escort fleet of the New Song Dynasty was small in number, the ships were new and large, and were equipped with new artillery. They fired at dangerous ships from a long distance and never encountered them head-on.
Inside the palace of Mayi, the chief officers of the navies of various countries were sitting together drinking and having fun. The chief officer of Zhenla was hugging the princess of Mayi, eating big chunks of meat and drinking big bowls of wine to celebrate the victory of the coalition forces.
King Ma Yi thought that they should not be careless. Although the Song Dynasty in the north was gone, they changed their country's name to the New Song Kingdom. This country withstood the grassland empire in the north and also produced many novel things. The crystal glass cups that everyone of them held in their hands were purchased from the New Song Kingdom.
The general of Zhenla hugged Princess Mayi tightly and said disdainfully: The new Song Kingdom has only a few broken ships, what's that? Not a big deal, I brought 300 warships and vowed to destroy the Song Emperor's navy on the island of Lisong. I will make the king no longer have the emperor above him, and directly become the emperor to rule the world.
King Ma Yi was delighted, but he warned his son-in-law not to be careless, saying that our target was just the savages who occupied Lusong Island and abused their force.
This guy still had a trick up his sleeve and didn't allow his invited son-in-law to provoke the navy of the New Song Dynasty.
However, as luck would have it, three days later a team of escorting New Song warships arrived in the Mayi waters. When the commander of the escort fleet saw the densely packed warships, he realized that these small South Sea countries were fighting for petty profits. After soliciting the opinions of the Mayi merchants, he stopped far away on the sea and waited for the merchant ships to return with supplies.
The commander of the Zhenla navy received a report that the New Song warships were cruising in the open sea for some unknown reason.
Upon closer inspection, it was found that the New Song Kingdom had only five ships of all sizes. Although one ship was as big as an island, how much could such a ship do?
He was not satisfied with King Ma Yi's praise of the New Song Kingdom for its power and its suppression of the Zhenla Kingdom, so he wanted to touch the tiger's butt to see how powerful the New Song Kingdom's ships were.
So, this guy ignored Princess Ma Yi's obstruction, ordered fifty warships to go out to sea, and went directly north in a fan-shaped battle formation to encircle the escort fleet of the New Song Dynasty.
This was a small fleet of the New Song Kingdom escorting merchant ships in the South China Sea. Five ships were waiting for the merchant ships of the Mayi Kingdom to deliver supplies. The observer in charge of the lookout saw that the warships in the Mayi port suddenly filed out and formed a fan-shaped battle formation to surround them. The commander of the fleet immediately blew the whistle and ordered the interception warning bombs to be fired.
However, the enemy ignored them, did not retreat at all, and continued to surround them quickly.
Mad, what does this mean?
That's very unfriendly. We are here to escort merchant ships and make money through harmony.
The deputy general suggested to the commander to return home immediately and go east to the small island of Wanlishitang to replenish fresh water. Because there are hundreds of ships stopped by Mayi country at this time, the situation is unclear, so we should not stay for long.
The commander knew that he could not act arrogantly with only five ships in his hands, so he reluctantly ordered the return. The deputy commander received the order and immediately dispatched the ships to set sail.
The southeast wind was rising, and the commander ordered observation balloons to be raised to keep on alert and prepare for battle.
Soon, the escort fleet of the New Song Kingdom set sail and left. A white balloon slowly rose on the large ship, observing the surrounding sea area from a 360-degree angle.
On the sea in the southeast direction, dozens of South China Sea warships formed a fan-shaped formation to encircle them and were approaching rapidly. It seemed that an encirclement was about to be formed.
The commander was angry.
Mag forced him to do this. He is bullying the fact that he has few ships. Are you going to surround and rob the ships?
The deputy commander of the fleet cautiously suggested to speed up the retreat. If there is a fight, we will definitely suffer. The few ships of our army are not enough to defeat the bandits in front of us.
The fleet guard saw that the commander's eyes were filled with anger, and then said: Among the thirty-six strategies, retreat is the best. We cannot be too cowardly. We should retreat while warning the enemy. If they still want to chase us, we will overturn their speedboat in the front.
The escort formation accelerated its return north.
The chief naval commander of Zhenla was the commander-in-chief of the naval forces of the coalition of small countries in Southeast Asia . Seeing that Zhenla's naval commander coveted his second daughter, the King of Ma Yi gave his daughter to him with great fanfare in order to win him over. Naturally, he wanted to show the strength of the coalition's military power.
Seeing that the navy of the New Song Kingdom had fled before the battle, this guy laughed heartily and said disdainfully that the navy of the New Song Kingdom was a coward. Don't look at their big ships, we have more ships, come on. This guy personally waved the flag and ordered them to chase after them, caught the navy of the New Song Kingdom and robbed their big warships.
Upon receiving the order, the Zhenla warships rushed towards the escort formation.
This irritated the commander of the escort formation, who immediately ordered to stop sailing, turn the bows of the ships to the west and the sterns to the east to meet the enemy. As soon as his flagship stopped, he fired a volley of artillery at the largest warship of the Nanyang Allied Forces. After correcting the trajectory, the second round of shells immediately fell on the flagship of the Zhenla commander, immediately causing the warship to explode.
This was not enough, as several warships were hit and caught fire one after another from the front, back, left and right.
The mast of the flagship of the Zhenla commander was blown off, the ship was filled with smoke and the fire was getting more and more fierce. The commander was stunned. His fleet did not chase after him, but quickly approached the damaged and sunken warship to rescue people and go into the sea to save people.
By the time Lord Zhenla was rescued by the warships around him, his flagship had already sunk. He watched helplessly as three warships were hit in a short period of time, and became silent and furious. He ordered a pursuit, determined to catch up with the warships of the New Song Kingdom and take revenge.
However, while they were frantically rescuing people, the New Song escort fleet had already disappeared.
When King Ma Yi received a report that the joint fleet had left the port to pursue the New Song Kingdom's fleet, but ended up losing three warships and not even catching up with the enemy, he immediately became alert.
The king personally went to visit the injured commander's son-in-law and naval officers and soldiers. They all said that the New Song navy had no martial ethics, fired cannons from a long distance and ran away after being hit. They were simply cowards and would be beaten to death next time they were caught.
After the king comforted him, he went back and immediately two merchants who had long been supplying his small palace with maritime trade treasures asked for an audience.
The maritime traders nervously reported to the king that they could not fight. The navy of the New Song Dynasty specialized in arresting pirates and would not harm any merchants or civilians. It was the most benevolent and righteous army in the world.
The small ruler pretended that the matter was urgent and quickly arranged for his attendants to go out and pass on the message, telling the merchants not to worry, that our Nanyang Navy would not bully the common people or go to war with other countries without reason.
Little did these two sea merchants know that the naval battle in the distance had already ended. They honestly reported to the emperor what they had seen and heard in Guangzhou and Quanzhou, praising the new Song Dynasty for its clear politics and orderly management. It was no longer the Song Dynasty when corrupt officials were everywhere and anyone who was willing to spend money was considered a superior person.
The New Song Kingdom has fair trade, with a vast array of goods and new and unusual items emerging one after another. Then, a merchant presented a beautiful box.
The little emperor opened it and saw a paper box inside. He frowned in displeasure.
The businessman said with a big smile: "These are cigarettes produced by Xinsong. We have tobacco leaves in our country, but we can't get tobacco leaves of this grade."
The little emperor understood it immediately. He tore open the package and took out a cigarette. He immediately smelled the refreshing and tempting smell of the cigarette. He lit it up, took two deep puffs, and blew out three smoke rings very comfortably.
Wow, it really feels as comfortable as if I were in heaven.
The sea merchants gave the young emperor's attendants piles of newspapers and continued to report: The docks of the new Song Dynasty were lined with masts and large ships. It was said that they had built large ships with iron armor and clad fore-ends. They no longer measured the size of the ships in terms of dan, but in terms of tons, with one ton being about 20 dan. Your Majesty, do you know how much their large ships can carry?
One thousand tons.
The young emperor was confused by the maritime merchants' jumping back and forth between "how many stones" and "how many tons". He waved his hands impatiently and said that he understood. The ships of the New Song Dynasty were big, very large, and had iron armor on the bow, so they were not afraid of collisions. Who would collide with other wooden boats?
The young emperor didn't look at the merchant, but picked up the tea bowl to drink tea, imitating the etiquette of the Song people. The merchant understood immediately and immediately stood up to say goodbye. The young emperor then asked his attendant to give him the newspaper brought by the merchant, and he leisurely smoked while flipping through the newspapers one by one.
Haha, this guy also looks for information in the newspaper.
Zhao Yulin knew that a month had passed since his escort fleet had been fighting against the Nanyang Allied Forces' navy in the South China Sea.
At this moment, he was discussing the cavalry organization in the Privy Council. The Ministry of War recalled cavalry generals such as Gao Jin, Baturu and Zhang Zhi for vacation. The brothers had just sat together to drink tea and chat when Shunfengsi delivered an urgent report from the South China Sea.
