Water warfare is different from land warfare, the land warfare of that year was generally chosen after autumn, when the weather turned cooler, and the water war was generally in May, when the weather turned hotter. Pen? Interesting? Pavilion wWw. ｂiquge。 The reason why info chose to start the war when the weather turned hot was also so that the sailors could survive after falling into the water. If it is in a cold winter, in fact, there is no need for a cold winter, the water in early spring and late autumn is already very cold, and after a person falls into the water, it generally does not last long before the energy is drained by the cold water.

On the eighth day of the fifth lunar month of the fifth year of Kangxi, the Ming army advanced by land and water, advancing in the direction of Yuezhou.

The Ming army on the expedition had one town of cavalry and five towns of infantry, with a total of 60,000 soldiers of the land division, including 10,000 cavalry, 40,000 infantry, 10,000 artillery, and more than 1,000 artillery pieces; 30,000 sailors, more than 2,000 large and small warships; The auxiliary soldiers and the people added 120,000, a total of 200,000 troops, and marched down the river to attack Yuezhou.

The Ming army went down the Xiangjiang River, because Shi Lang arranged a large number of underwater piles, artificial reefs and barrages and other obstacles in the river to block the Ming army's water division, so before entering Dongting Lake, the Ming army needed a land division to cover the water division.

Wang [Fu] Chen was already the commander of the Iron Cavalry Town, and his more than 10,000 cavalry were responsible for taking the lead.

Speaking of which, Wang Xinyu still trusts Wang [Fu] Chen very much, and even the ironclad heavy cavalry led by his younger brother is under Wang [Fu] Chen's iron cavalry town, after all, he knows that his younger brother's talent is far inferior to Wang [Fu] Chen, and this person is indeed proficient in cavalry warfare, and he is a rare good general.

At present, it is still fighting in the water network area, the Ming army can advance by land and water, and cover the infantry with water divisions, and the cavalry of the Qing army does not dare to harass the Ming army within the range of naval guns, so the importance of Wang [Fu] Chen's iron cavalry town has not yet been reflected. If you arrive in Jiangbei, cavalry becomes especially important, when the infantry is marching, the two wings need to be protected by cavalry, otherwise in the process of marching, they will be constantly harassed by the Qing cavalry, and their morale will quickly decline.

Wang [auxiliary] ministers sent out rangers everywhere to spy on the military situation in front and constantly provide intelligence to the Chinese army.

Shao Lingzhi and Bai Guangyong were originally the personal soldiers of Wang [Fu] Chen, these two people were strong in martial arts and brave in battle, and now they have both been promoted to ranger officers.

The Ming army rangers were equipped with double-barreled long guns, firing needle thunderbolt short guns and pulley bows, as well as their own cold weapons, and each ranger was carefully selected from the elite of the cavalry. The Ranger is mainly used for reconnaissance, and compared with the same horseback night does not collect, the Ranger mainly fights on horseback, and the night does not collect is dismounting, but whether it is a ranger or a night no, it can be both on horseback and dismounting.

Bai Guangyong rode a tall Don hippopotamus and carried a double-barreled long gun, which was a new weapon of the Ming army, and the length of the gun was not very long, much shorter than the bird's gun, flintlock pistol and rifled gun, the total length was less than three feet.

But the barrel is shorter, which reduces the difficulty of rifling a lot, saves a lot of costs, and makes it much easier to reload bullets. The range of this firearm is not close, and it can hit more than a hundred paces away, which is much farther than the sharpshooters of the Eight Banners. Of course, the downside was that it was impossible to reload on horseback, so the Rangers were also equipped with pulley bows that allowed them to shoot arrows on horseback. Because the pulley bow pulls the bow and arrows to save effort, it can shoot the effect of the step bow on horseback, but the bowstring stroke of the pulley bow is longer and the bow opening time is longer, but the long range makes up for the shortcomings of the long bow opening time.

The Rangers' horses also had rattan armor on their heads and arrow-proof curtains around their necks, which were able to resist feathered arrows fired from the front. However, in order to reduce weight, there were no horse armors on the sides and behind the horse, and in fact they were light cavalry.

There were more than 100 rangers under Bai Guangyong's command, and all the brothers were scattered and scattered in groups of ten. Bai Guangyong himself also took nine brothers and went deep alone to spy on the Qing army.

"There's a Tartar up ahead!" Bai Guangyong's cavalry encountered a Qing scout on the way.

Looking at the twenty cavalrymen who came in front, I saw that those cavalrymen were wearing high lightning rod helmets and cotton armor, and a Ming sergeant shouted: "It's still a real Tartar!" ”

In such a hot weather, the scout cavalry of the Qing army was still wearing cotton armor, and it was really difficult for those Manchurian Eight Banners. The scorching sun was in the sky, the sun was shining on his body, and every Qing cavalry was sweating. The rangers of the Ming army were covered with thin rattan armor, which was not bad in protection, and it was not hot when worn on the body.

"The Tartars are coming up! Get ready for battle! Bai Guangyong shouted.

The Ming army scouts had ten cavalry, but the Qing army scouts were twenty cavalry, and the strength was twice as many as the Shang Qing army, but in terms of weapons, the weapons of the Ming army scout cavalry were far superior to those of the Qing army.

Bai Guangyong took off the double-barreled long gun from his horse, shouted, and rode his horse towards the Qing scout cavalry. The nine cavalrymen behind also hurried up and charged at the Qing scout cavalry. A skirmish began, with the two sides hedging from a distance of two hundred paces.

There were still a hundred steps away from the Qing army, and the double-barreled short gun in Bai Guangyong's hand fired, only to see a flash of fire, a puff of white smoke erupted from the mouth of the gun, and a high-speed rotating bullet flew a hundred steps away, and a Qing army Eight Banners soldier fell off his horse.

"Bang Bang Bang" Nine scout cavalry opened fire one after another, each firing two bullets.

The Eight Banners cavalry on the opposite side fell from their horses like leaves swept away by the wind. Ten Ming soldiers fired twenty bullets in one go, and eight Qing soldiers were killed in a row.

At the same time, the Qing soldiers also used their bows to shoot feathered arrows. These Eight Banner scouts are all elite, the average Eight Banners soldiers use a riding bow to shoot arrows on horseback, and can only shoot twenty paces away, while the elite Eight Banners can shoot a bow on horseback a hundred paces away. Of course, it is almost impossible to accurately shoot the feather arrow in the eye on the back of a bumpy horse, and no matter how powerful the archer is, it is very powerful to shoot an arrow on horseback at a hundred paces.

The feather arrows shot by the Eight Banners shot seven Ming scouts, five of which hit people, and two arrows were shot at the face door of the Ming scout cavalry, but they were blocked by iron masks, and the feather arrows fell to the ground; Three other arrows were shot at the scout cavalry, two were blocked by rattan armor, and one shot into the lower arm of a cavalryman, who was slightly wounded.

There were also two feathered arrows that hit the war horse, and after one arrow penetrated the anti-arrow curtain, the strength was offset by ninety percent, and only one percent of the strength was left to hit the horse, and the war horse was slightly injured; Another arrow hit the horsehead and was blocked.

In the first round of firefighting, the Qing army killed and wounded eight people, three of whom were killed even with men and horses; In addition, although the three Qing cavalry were fine, the war horses were killed, and only nine Qing cavalry were left who were still charging. On the side of the Ming army, only one person was slightly injured, one war horse was slightly injured, and ten Ming soldiers continued to charge.

There were only thirty paces left between the two sides, and while the Qing army fired a second round of feather arrows, the Ming army fired with a thunderbolt.

"Bang Bang Bang" can be six consecutive bursts of thunderbolt short guns spewed out fire, the Qing soldiers on the opposite side fell from the horse's back one after another like dumplings, and the ownerless war horse continued to gallop a few steps, and then stopped.

Bai Guangyong shot again and again, and he alone shot down three Qing cavalrymen, but he was also hit by two arrows and was slightly wounded.

It's just that in the blink of an eye, there is only one person left on the Qing army's side, and only two people in the Ming army have fallen off their horses. The last remaining Qing soldier was dressed in armor, and the lightning rod on his helmet stood high, like a non-low status Bayara, and his equestrian skills were very exquisite. Bai Guangyong aimed at him and fired two shots, but he was dodged by hiding in his stirrups.

"Dog Tartar!" Bai Guangyong saw that the other party had dodged two shots in a row, so he turned the muzzle of the gun slightly, and the last bullet hit the head of the opponent's mount, but at the same time, the man hid under the belly of the horse and shot an arrow, which also shot at the side of Bai Xianyong's war horse, and the two rolled to the ground at the same time.

"My horse!" The Don hippopotamus was hit by an arrow on the side without any protection, the force of this arrow was very strong, piercing from the horse's belly, and the entire arrow shaft was almost submerged into the body of the war horse, seeing that the horse was not saved, Bai Guangyong shouted in pain, pulled out his knife and slashed at the Qing soldier.

The other cavalry went to chase and kill those who had fallen off their horses and were fleeing for their lives, and the two cavalrymen passed by Bai Guangyong's side, originally wanting to help with the thunderbolt short gun, but seeing that their main general was entangled with the Qing soldiers, they were afraid of accidentally injuring the main general, so they did not dare to shoot indiscriminately, and the speed of the war horse had increased, and it was not easy to stop.

The cavalry rode over, and the Eight Banners who fell to the ground and got up fled for their lives on foot, but how could two legs escape from a four-legged war horse! Soon the five fleeing Eight Banners soldiers were caught up, and the Ming rangers did not give them a chance to fight in close combat, but only killed them one by one with a thunderbolt from a distance.

Bai Guangyong's side has also ended the battle, after all, he is a fierce general trained by Wang [Fu] Chen, and it is not much difficult to kill a Bai Jia Bayala of the Qing army.

The sword flashed, and Bai Guangyong slashed through the neck of the white-armored soldier, and the white-armored soldier's head rolled to the ground, and a pair of eyes as big as bull's eyes were still wide, as if he was dead.

While the rangers attacked everywhere, spying on the enemy and showing the way to the infantry, the infantry on both sides of the strait advanced steadily, and along the way, they barely encountered any effective resistance from the Qing army.

On the river, the small boats of the Ming army explored the road in front, and the two banks were protected by infantry and artillery.

"Boom, boom, boom" A series of sky-high water columns rose on the surface of the river, and the small boats of the Ming army dropped mines, blowing up the underwater piles and barrages that Shi Lang had painstakingly managed.

When the Ming army boat encountered a place with an artificial reef, it also dropped mines to blow it up. Some artificial reefs are too large for mines to blow up for a while, so boats attach a floating lighthouse to the reef to guide the fleet and prevent the ship from hitting the artificial reef.

As long as he leaves the Xiangjiang River and enters the Dongting Lake, which has a vast water area, then Shi Lang has no hydrological conditions to take advantage of, and can only rely on his strength to fight.

However, when it was still twenty miles away from Dongting Lake, there were forts on both sides of the front bank blocking the way. (To be continued.) )