Daming: At the start of the showdown, Lao Zhu was stunned

Chapter 1152: Heroic Battleship
"Enemy ships approaching! Beware! Beware!" Soon, a warning clapper was sounded from the mast's observation deck. Zhu Su turned his head and could see the enemy's approaching ships with his naked eyes.

Li Jinglong clenched his right fist, stretched out his thumb and stood in front of him, squinting one eye and gesturing forward. After a few breaths, he seemed to have finally determined the distance, and suddenly opened his right hand and swung it forward.

The messenger who had received instructions long ago waved the command flag on the mast, and in a moment, the Fu ships in the front row began to move. The black muzzles of the guns adjusted their elevations one after another, and then with a few "boom" sounds, the war weapons on the deck of the Fu ships, which were far beyond the scope of this era, made terrible roars.

The first round of volleys had great results. The shells directly smashed through the hulls of two Western-style sailing warships, which slowly sank to the bottom of the sea. The attacking fleet was obviously frightened, and there was obvious chaos and stagnation. But soon, they regrouped and launched a charge towards the Ming army's fleet again.

Zhu Su's eyes narrowed slightly. It seemed that the Western barbarians here had already learned about the news that the Ming Dynasty had developed artillery. They must have heard some rumors, so they did not cause too much commotion because of the appearance of artillery.

One or two rounds of artillery fire did not pose much of a threat to their "ship-sea tactics". Most of their ships were small single-sail boats, and Zhu Su suspected that many of them were ordinary civilian ships that were requisitioned to make up the numbers. It was not a big deal to sink only two of them.

But when they moved forward a little, Li Jinglong ordered the gunners to change the shells of the ship's guns from solid shells to shrapnel shells used in the tiger squat guns. Although this improved shrapnel shell could not be fired too far, it could hit a large area with one hit and would also cause a large area of ​​fire. Sure enough, as soon as those ships entered the range of the shrapnel shells, the losses suddenly increased several times.

At this time, the Western ships finally began to flee, not entirely because the shrapnel began to work, but also because they gradually began to feel the oppression from the Ming fleet: the reason was simple, the Ming warships were too tall for them!
Even if it was just a smaller Fu ship, it was still a huge monster that was impossible to defeat for these single-sail warships whose technical strength was still at the level of the European Middle Ages. It was not bad at first because it was far away. Although it looked majestic, it did not seem very intimidating.

Now that they were close, they finally understood what terrifying war monsters these ships were.

Not to mention, behind the Fu Ship, there was an even taller and more terrifying treasure ship. In their eyes, the treasure ship in front of them was like a mountain on the sea and a moving castle.

How to fight this?
Inevitably, the morale of the barbarian fleet was shaken!

Li Jinglong never knew how to save ammunition in battle, and the Fu Ships kept pouring fire. He skillfully issued military orders, and the treasure ships behind the Fu Ships slowly spread out to both sides, surrounding the enemy ships, as if they were going to eat them up: This was also Zhu Su's order: It was necessary to hurt and scare these people in a battle, so that they would not dare to provoke the fleet again.

Only in this way can we avoid being bogged down in a war of attrition.

Therefore, the Ming army fleet showed all its fangs from the very beginning. Although it was far inferior to the enemy in terms of numbers, it still showed an attitude of devouring the enemy completely and leaving no trace.

Seeing the Ming army's treasure ships trying to surround them from both sides, the enemy fleet was obviously more terrified. Zhu Su, who was looking through the telescope, clearly saw that more ships began to waver, and their forward formation became more chaotic.

Li Jinglong, who was standing next to Zhu Su, also saw the enemy's situation through the telescope. He put down the telescope and said to Zhu Su complacently: "Uncle, it seems that we have already won this battle."

Zhu Su nodded. The Ming army deployed artillery, used Fuzhou ships to bombard, and used treasure ships to surround and pressure, which had already thrown the Western barbarians into disarray.

Although their numbers far outnumbered those of the Ming army's ships, their morale had been lost, and it seemed that they were indeed powerless to turn the tide.

Although Li Jinglong was a bit of a loser in naval battles, he did have some experience, which was still commendable...

"Ok?"

The scene in the telescope suddenly attracted Zhu Su's attention.

The fleet of the Western Barbarians, which had been in a state of chaos and had been trying to escape, suddenly gathered again. Then, a ship with a cross carved on its bow stood out from the crowd. Most of the Western Barbarians' ships seemed to be energized, rushing towards the Fu ship in front in a disorderly but aggressive manner.

"Huh? You still have the courage?" Li Jinglong was quite surprised.

"Perhaps the leading ship has some clues." Tie Xuan had been holding the telescope and keeping his eyes fixed, and he also found the abnormality of the leading ship. He reminded: "After all, the enemy has many ships, so we must not underestimate them."

"Jiujiang, it's better to be careful." Zhu Su also said.

"Don't worry, uncle. I won't have to worry." Li Jinglong's expression became serious. Failure to seize the initiative meant that the next battle would be a tough one of strength. He had already made a promise that he would not lose to this group of Western barbarians just for the sake of face.

Li Jinglong passed down the military orders one by one, and then the treasure ships and Fu ships began to turn their guns and aim at the charging Western Yi fleet. Originally, he wanted to save as much ammunition as possible, but now it seems that the way to win is to implement absolute firepower coverage.

The ship with the cross carved on it took the lead and moved forward without hesitation. Soon, it collided head-on with the roaring cannon shells. Moreover, this time, it was not just the Fu ship, but also the taller treasure ship decks, where larger and more powerful cannons began to roar. However, the sea was wide after all, and several shells were fired, but they all passed by the ship. The ship seemed to be a little harder than the other ships, and the shells occasionally splashed on it, but only produced a little fire, but did not sink it.

Several more ships were sunk, but the others seemed to be inspired by the ship with the cross, and they all charged forward with full sails. Zhu Su frowned, somewhat worried that these ships' suicidal attacks would cause losses to the Ming army. They were now far away from their homeland, and had no way to get good supplies and repairs... Fortunately, Li Jinglong had laid fishing nets with iron hooks on the nearby sea in advance. These fishing nets entangled the oars, affecting the charging ships and forcing them to slow down.

"Go and capture the leading warship." Looking at the soldiers on the deck of the ship who were anxiously cutting the fishing nets, Zhu Su gave his orders.

(End of this chapter)