In the era without sonar, underwater exploration is an extremely boring, tedious, but attention-consuming, and physically demanding work.

Fortunately, the navy of Huaxia has the help of a standard rope.

With the help of this rudimentary but extremely effective equipment, the workload of the water ghosts has been greatly reduced.

The rope is deliberately made out of a section of excess, even if it is underwater, because of the resistance, the rope cannot be pulled straight. However, the weight on the end of the rope can make the rope as much as possible so that the rope does not deviate too much.

When training the water ghosts, there is a special subject, which is to exercise the water ghosts' underwater ability to sense the angle of the rope.

Each time an underwater channel is measured, the officer will give the maximum angle of the rope underwater.

Subsequently, the underwater water ghost warriors only need to pay attention to whether there is anything blocking the rope under the water while looking at whether the inclination of the rope exceeds the standard, and then they can know whether they can pass their "big boat" on this channel.

If the angle is too large, the water ghosts will manually adjust the angle of the rope with their own body weight.

Once it was determined where there was a reef that would block the fleet, or when the water was not deep enough, the fighters would pull a tip rope attached to the rope and ask the dinghy above to stop and change the course of the course.

Time passed little by little, and the dinghy that the water ghosts were riding in was slowly advancing.

The warships of the Han River Squadron followed the boats in front of them all the way, and the speed was extremely slow, and they moved in the curved snake-shaped channel.

In this way, the "huge" battleship cooperated closely with the sailors on the dinghy, as well as the underwater water ghosts, and walked for three hours before they passed through this section of the channel of about 5 or 6 kilometers.

When they got out of the end of the serpentine channel, the water ghosts couldn't help but cheer.

The team of water ghosts who explored the path in front has been rotated three times, that is to say, every water ghost has been flooded at least three times.

Under the retrograde river, they were consuming their physical strength all the time, and they took turns to go into the water three times, which almost cost the lives of these young soldiers.

Captain Zhou Mingde, the supreme commander of the detachment, was also well aware of the hardships of these soldiers, and immediately ordered that "the water ghost team will record a collective third-class merit and rest for a day." ”

"Roar." The soldiers of the water ghost team shouted excitedly, and the sound shook the sky, which showed the joy of the soldiers.

This rest does not allow the water ghosts to go ashore to rest on vacation, after all, they are now in the territory of the enemy, and they are still in a state of war.

Therefore, this break means that in the next day, as long as it is not a first-level combat readiness, the water ghost team does not need to participate in any work, and can take a good rest.

From this point of view, Captain Zhou Mingde's so-called rest is actually not a big reward, and it does not seem to be worthy of the soldiers cheering in unison.

However, things can't just be taken at face value.

On the warship, this "rest" has another meaning, that is, to drink the alcohol provided on the warship.

Alcohol is forbidden in the army, this is the iron law. (The exception, of course, is the woolly bears' team that uses vodka as water.) ）

On paper, compared with the "17 prohibitions and 54 beheadings" in the feudal army of this era, the military discipline of the army of the United Kingdom of China is very humane.

However, in fact, most of the military discipline of the feudal army relied on the personal will of the military commander, and there was great room for negotiation.

In the Chinese army, there is a strict military law organization, and all military regulations and regulations require soldiers to obey. Especially in some taboo places, the grasp is even stricter.

Just like the prohibition of alcohol, Chen Xin took care of the news and gossip about Mao Xiong's drunken troubles in later generations, and after coming to this era and establishing his own army, the restrictions on alcohol were very strict.

No one, regardless of rank or position, is allowed to drink alcohol in the army.

However, there is no one absolute statement about anything.

This regulation, in the navy, has a different regulation.

The navy has been fighting abroad all year round, and many times, once it goes out, it is a few months or even half a year, there is a lack of supplies at sea, and the materials are not suitable for storage.

The most important problem of fresh water is not easy to solve, and in the absence of a way to produce sealed mineral water, stagnant water is very easy to spoil and deteriorate, and drinking spoiled water is easy to cause non-combat attrition.

Alcoholic beverages are far better preserved than stagnant water, and when you are adrift at sea, this is a life-saving thing.

Therefore, because of this special situation, the navy has relevant detailed regulations on the prohibition of alcohol, and the control in this regard has been relaxed, and when it comes to replenishment, the battleship will always fill a part of the low-alcohol alcohol as a long-term storage of drinking water.

Captains use this part of the reserve when rewarding their subordinates.

When you are out fighting or sailing, you can drink a glass of low-alcohol wine with no peculiar smell and it is simply a paradise on earth, so this reward will always lift the spirits of the warriors.

However, after all, there are other branches of the army that are staring at this treatment of the navy with extremely red eyes, and the naval officers are not too irritating to other arms.

Therefore, when the officers rewarded their subordinates, they tried to avoid words such as "wine", and the commander of each battleship set his own "code words" on the ship, and replaced "wine" with other inconspicuous words.

On the Kokang, Captain Zhou Mingde used the word "rest" instead of "drinking".

Therefore, when the soldiers of the Water Ghost Team heard the order of their captain to "rest" for a day, they were simply overjoyed.

Although it was just some low-alcohol liquor such as beer, fruit wine, milk wine, and rice wine, the soldiers of the Water Ghost Team were already very satisfied to be able to drink it after fatigue and in the envious eyes of other soldiers.

After passing the serpentine bend, the channel ahead is much easier, almost a straight line of the lower reaches of the Han River, which greatly improves the sailing speed of the Han River detachment.

The 5-kilometer route took three hours just now, but the next dozens of kilometers took only two hours.

When the sky was getting dark, the Han River squadron finally reached the outer river of Shangjing.

Captain Zhou Mingde looked up at the sky and gave further orders.

"For the sake of safety and not to be raided by the Houjin Tartars in Beijing, our fleet will dock on the west coast tonight."

"Order the second team led by No. 1106 Fast Crab to go to the upstream area of Shangjing, and find a place to anchor in the direction of the west coast 5 kilometers away from the port of Shangjing. And continue to carry out the interception mission, and before our army conquers Shangjing, not a single supply ship will be allowed to enter and leave the Shangjing wharf. ”

"Contact the Southern Assault Group, inform them of the anchorage of our fleet, and ask them about the progress there, and ask the Southern Assault Group to give us a detailed advance map, and mark the specific locations of all the troops on the front line. We can't even bombard our own family with our artillery. ”