Chivalry can be hilarious at times, and it's not surprising that Captain Corina would blurt out that Takagi-san, whom he had never met, for not having had chivalry at times, and that it was not surprising that European chivalry was in decline, but far from the end.

However, the reason for the Spaniard's fury did not stop there—Captain Corina did not fail to see the combat intentions of the opposing Jinghua fleet, on the contrary, it was precisely because he saw it that he was extremely angry.

Because he found that the tactics of the opposite side were very similar to those "English pirates who had a damn ten thousand times", especially the famous English pirate Drake who had a confrontation with him.

At that time, Corina was serving in North America as a first mate, and Drake was plundering the Spaniards of more than 20,000 pounds of gold and silver near Noble d'Êes on the Isthmus of Panama, and Corina's fleet was ordered to pursue it.

In the process of pursuit, they encountered once, and from the hard power of both sides, it was obvious that the Spanish fleet was enough to crush Drake's "small broken ship".

However, the fact is that the Spanish fleet was hit by dozens of bullets in front and back, and many warships were damaged, although none of them sank, but it looked like they were indeed being hoisted, on the other hand, Drake's small wrecked fleet almost retreated.

Captain Corina remembers most of Drake's tactics and the long guns on board.

At this time, the main operational idea of the Spanish Navy was "large ships, many soldiers, and broadsides". There is no need to explain the number of soldiers, but it is necessary to explain why Spain is obsessed with broadside warfare - because Spain is not only the supremacy of the sea, but also on land, Spain is also in the highlight, and Gonzalo's Spanish phalanx is even more famous than the Swiss mercenaries.

The Europeans' usual style is to be unforgiving, and since the Spaniards are so good at close combat, it is natural that they must maintain this advantage in naval battles, so they are keen to lean on and cut directly - of course, this tactic is also easier to capture enemy ships and achieve more "fruits of victory".

Drake was obviously well aware of the advantages of the Spaniards, and the English were not known for their hand-to-hand combat in wars, so his privateer fleet was equipped with a lot of long and heavy guns, and the proportion far exceeded that of the Spanish fleet.

With this advantage, tactics are easier to guess – yes, the classic term used to play games in later generations: flying kites.

Although the ships of your Spanish fleet are large, the larger the ship, the less flexible it becomes, so I will play around in circles, and when I find an opportunity, I will take advantage of the range advantage to kill you a few shots, and if you want to get close to me, continue to run.

In a word, drag the tired, drag down, slowly bleed.

But why did the Spanish fleet, which was obviously much larger, inferior in terms of long and heavy artillery? Because the Spaniards had not yet encountered a truly evenly matched opponent at this time, they themselves were full of confusion about how to use the newly invented artillery in Europe. So, the Spaniards decided to give it all a try.

As a result, the Spaniards' shipborne artillery became varied and varied. Whether it was breech-loading, heavy main battle guns aimed at destroying ships, or breech-loading small guns aimed at killing people, the Spaniards piled up all the guns they could find on the ships, quite a kind of "wives and concubines, rain and dew" style.

However, they have at least dozens of models of various types of artillery, and if they have to be divided, it is not impossible. These guns, regardless of heavy and light artillery, can be divided into three main types:

The first is the potgun, which is an extremely stubby gun, somewhat similar to the perrier, which can be considered the precursor to the mortar, which was originally just the name of some of these gun types;

The second type is the cannon, the cannon family is a number of thick medium-range guns, the first of which is the semi-cannon, which looks like a crouching monster, with a 9-foot barrel and a 6-inch wide borehole, which can shoot 32-pound solid bullets directly, and the range varies according to the weight of the shell, which can be regarded as the ancestor of the 18th-century carronade;

The third is the longgun, which is the ancestor of longgun in the 18th century.

The Spaniards fully armed all three types of artillery, but their proportions were clearly out of order.

Since the Spanish Navy had no national army to rival them, the only threat they faced was pirates, and the early pirates were not all equipped with long and heavy guns like Drake's fleets, and often did not even have a few guns, if any, but only light guns.

As a result, the Spaniards did not have much power to equip long and heavy guns, so the vast majority of Spanish fleets were now only equipped with long and heavy guns in the bow and stern, and the side of the ship, which was the largest part of the gun, was equipped with medium and light guns - to be able to flexibly counterattack even when besieged by pirates.

In this way, Captain Corina's anger is easy to understand at the moment - it's not that he really has a tendon in his brain, and he refuses to fight a broadside gun battle with the Jinghua Forward Fleet without asking questions, but he knows that he will definitely not be able to fight a side gun battle.

The opponent's fleet made it clear that the flanks were almost all long and heavy guns (in fact, not all), and the effective gun distance reached an astonishing distance.

In fact, Corina did not expect to achieve any results at the beginning, but intended to scare the other party away, thus completing the task assigned by Sir Diego. However, he did not expect that after the other side faced the shelling of his own expulsion formation, which had obvious superiority in tonnage and the large fleet behind him that could be supported at any time, not only did he not leave, but he also got involved with him, and immediately started an artillery battle with his color.

Captain Corina didn't know why the other party was here, or why he was so aggressive, like some grumpy felines, he blew up at the slightest touch.

But he was well aware of his situation - all the ships were full of goods, and the people did not want to fight at all, but only wanted to pull these goods back to the homeland as soon as possible, and make a lot of money one by one. Then, whether it was to the tavern or to the J courtyard, I could let loose for a while until the wind changed direction and set sail again.

"Damn, for every shot we fire, the other party can give us at least five shots!" Captain Corina cursed, "Some damn megalomaniac should be stuffed into the barrel of a cannon and fired with a 'boom'!" ”

The people around Captain Corina also looked extremely ugly, and only the first mate insisted on his responsibility as the captain's deputy, and reminded him: "Mr. Captain, the person you mentioned is, after all, the secretary of His Majesty the King and the younger brother of the Governor of the Philippines, and we should maintain due respect for him......"

"Huh, respect?" Captain Corina raised his chin and said proudly, "I am also a knight, my dear first mate. And I'm not like him, I'm not an illegitimate child, I became the captain of a ship with a glorious bloodline and excellent performance over the years, why should I have respect for an illegitimate child? ”

The first mate sighed and said with a wry smile: "Captain, I'm just out of professionalism...... Well, Captain, I suggest we focus on the current situation first. ”

"The current situation is unobstructed." Captain Corina said: "The other side has more long and heavy artillery than us, if we can't catch up with them and can't take over the battle as soon as possible, we can only be beaten!" But, gentlemen, I would like you to observe carefully—the hard sails of the other side may not be strong enough in the stormy Atlantic, but here they are clearly better than ours! ”

Captain Corina crossed his waist with his left hand, and pointed to the unreachable Jinghua Forward Fleet in front of him with his right hand, and said his point of view without any knightly demeanor, scolding: "Gentlemen, you should take a closer look, now we are longitudinal and downwind, they are transverse and crosswind, in this case their sails can still effectively eat the wind!"

After fighting for so long, with the continuous shelling of both sides, we are still about 0.7 nautical miles (about 2.6 city miles) away from them! What does this mean, gentlemen? I tell you, that means if they turn around and run away, we won't be able to catch up! ”

Everyone was stunned, and the first mate pondered, "I always feel as if I've seen their tactics......"

"Nonsense, of course you've seen you, when you were working as a lookout on the St. Vincent, you've seen that damn English bastard of Drake use similar tactics!"

Captain Collina, who was clear-minded but short-tempered, said unceremoniously: "And these Ming ships have a greater advantage than Drake's mongrel ships, and the tactics they execute are more sophisticated and perfect—damn it, there are still people in Castile who think that the Ming are no different from the Aztecs and the Incas, and that they should all be shelled!" ”

The first mate smiled bitterly: "Captain, it's useless to talk about this now, the current question is: what should we do?" ”

Corina sneered: "The best way is for us to hurry back and join the Grand Fleet, if the other side still wants to fight, the Grand Fleet will be formed in a ring shape and face the enemy with all the long and heavy artillery, but if we go back now, that bastard will definitely put the responsibility on me......"

Before Captain Corina could finish his sentence, a half-grown child, probably only 12-13 years old, stumbled to the door and reported loudly: "Captain, our mainmast rigging has been broken by broken wood, and Mr. Alcides says that it cannot be repaired temporarily, please order!" ”

It is not uncommon for half-grown children to go on ships in Europe, and 12-14 years old is the age when Europeans consider it most suitable for training future naval talents, and later the British Royal Navy also popularized this training method.

What's more, before the age of 12, he went on the ship to "exercise", and there were many powerful figures among them. In the classic naval battle movie "Angry Sea Battle" in later generations, there is a young officer who has a lot of ink, and it has also caused some Chinese fans to be incomprehensible, asking "Why did such a young child go to the ship to be an officer?" ”

In fact, the child's official position should be called "cadetmidshipman", which translates to "cadetmidshipman" or "cadet". 、

But the alternate is the alternate, the officer is the officer, and his status is higher than that of those big-headed soldiers, and this rank difference will not be smoothed out because of age.

The boy who had come to report to Captain Corina at this moment was of the same nature, and his origin was even more unusual: his father was an earl. It's just that he himself is the fourth child in the family, and he can't inherit the title, so he can only come to the navy to struggle, but even so, he starts as an officer candidate, and the starting point is much higher than that of ordinary seamen, and the "upper limit" in the future is much higher.

Corina actually liked this kid because it always reminded him of himself more than 20 years ago. It's just that he seems to have been much luckier than this kid back then, at least when he was a teenager, the Spanish Navy didn't seem to have been beaten to the point that he could barely fight back.

"Order: Inform the ships of the formation that the mainmast of the flagship is damaged and cannot maintain speed. In view of the strong firepower of the opposing side, the continuation of the pursuit may result in serious damage to the cargo carried by the ships of this formation. Therefore, I will exercise my command authority and order, in the name of the commander of the formation, that the original task of expelling the opposing fleet of each ship has been completed and that it will be cancelled immediately. From now on, cover the return of the flagship to the Grand Fleet. ”

Hearing this order, the others were silent, only the first mate hesitated: "Captain, if you do this, you may face charges afterwards......

"Then let them accuse." Captain Corina replied calmly: "I, Carres de Corina, have been in the navy of the Kingdom of Castile for thirty-one years, and have experienced many battles, large and small, that even I cannot remember clearly. In these thirty-one years of naval life, I have never shrugged away from war, and God can attest to my loyalty to His Majesty Charles V and His Majesty Philip II.

But as a captain, I cannot watch my lads die in vain, nor can I watch the wealth of the ship belonging to His Majesty be buried at the bottom of the sea because of the stupidity of some...... It is my duty to be responsible for my crew and the king's wealth. ”

The first mate was also silent.

But the boy couldn't help asking, "But what about the glory of Castile, captain?" ”

Corina looked at the young man covered in sea water and oil, stepped forward, helped him straighten the crooked hat on his head, and replied lightly: "Perhaps we have won so many victories that everyone forgets that Castile has failed many times...... Teodoro, maybe in the future you will help me restore the glory that I lost in Castile today? ”

The boy named Teodoro looked into Corina's eyes and nodded vigorously, "Yes, Captain, I will." ”

"Good, I'm looking forward to that day." Corina exhaled a breath of turbidity and said loudly again: "Gentlemen, don't be stunned anymore, immediately convey the order I just had!" ”

With the new flag of the flagship of the Spanish expulsion formation, it was announced that the confrontation, which had only lasted about an hour, had come to an end.

And Takagi San on the "Red-Eyed Bee" also quickly noticed the changes in the Spanish fleet, he hesitated slightly, and ordered: "All ships stop shelling, speed up their detachment, keep the distance from the enemy fleet before this battle, and then count the losses, step up repairs, and wait for the arrival of the commander's main force." ”

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