My younger brother Zhuge Liang

Chapter 180 Conquering Wang Lang
Lu Yi asked his personal servants and pilot sailors to board the large sea ship brought by Bu Zhi, and abandoned the Lu family's own small broken boat on the Shengsi Pirate Island, where it was repaired and replenished.

The next morning, the navy continued to move south and headed straight for central Fujian.

When Bu Zhi came, he only brought 2,000 Danyang soldiers and a small number of sailors. Now, with the addition of the hundreds of pirates captured on the Shengsi Pirate Island and the people brought by Lu Yi, the total force suddenly exceeded 3,000, which was 30% to 40% more than when they set sail from Hailing.

Fortunately, the number of ships was already over-equipped. With the size of this large ship, more than 2,000 people would definitely not need more than 50 ships. Bu Zhi brought so many ships when he set sail, and he was ready to recruit another group of anti-Sun heroes in Wujun.

The fleet's material reserves were also very sufficient. There were already some savings on the island, and the pirates would also store up food in advance for the winter.

The food on the island was originally enough to feed six or seven hundred people until the famine ended in the spring of the following year. Now it can feed three thousand people. The number of people has increased fourfold, but it can still last for more than a month, which is enough to make up for the consumption of Bu Zhi's previous voyage and stay.

After replenishing supplies at the Shengsi Islands, Bu Zhi no longer needed to stop in the area controlled by Sun Ce and could sail directly to Dongye.

……

The Lu family's ancestral home is in Wu County, and they are a prominent family in Wuzhong. They make their living by the sea. Lu Yi knows a lot about things at sea and has a natural talent for naval warfare.

Moreover, he studied military books for four years and took charge of family affairs at an early age, so he was more mature in this aspect.

After only sailing with Bu Zhi for a day or two and helping to pilot and give directions every day, Lu Yi gradually became familiar with the performance of this new large ship.

And the more he practiced it himself, the more Lu Yi respected and admired the Zhuge brothers.

"General Fubo really knows everything. No wonder His Majesty gave him the name Fubo. It's not just to imitate Ma Yuan's pacification of the barbarians in the south, but also to imply that he has the ability to clear the seas. How could he come up with such a good ship, sailing at such a fast speed and so smoothly?"

On the morning of the third day after setting sail, Lu Yi looked at the sun rising from the port side. He stood in the morning light and looked far to the south, and couldn't help but sigh.

While Lu Yi was sighing, Bu Zhi had already washed up and came to the deck.

He walked up to Lu Yi and started a conversation: "As the saying goes, southerners sail and northerners ride horses. My dear brother, you have been in Wuzhong for a long time, and some of your clansmen are involved in maritime commerce and shipping. Why don't you tell me how this new ship is worse than the old one?"

Lu Yi smiled self-deprecatingly: "That's too much. If you ask me, the warship built by General Fu Bo is not huge in size. The people in Wu County who are good at building tower ships can build a large ship that is more than twice as heavy as this one.

But the largest building ship was only as long as this ship, but nearly twice as wide as this ship, and its bow and stern were square, making it difficult to break the waves, and more people had to row. Even the warships, which were known for their lightness, were not as slender in length and width as this ship, and their speed might not be able to catch up with this ship.

Moreover, I have seen that the masts and sails of old ships do not have a horizontal bar (flying beam) at the bottom of the sails to tie the sails. The sails are hung down entirely by their own weight, and it is difficult to make them wider than the hull. This new sail becomes wider towards the bottom, wider than the hull, and catches more wind, so it is no wonder that the speed is getting faster.

Historically, the most advanced tower ship during the Three Kingdoms period could carry two thousand soldiers, had a full load displacement of about 700 to 800 tons, was more than 30 meters long, about 10 meters wide, and had a draft of more than 10 feet.

But that was at the end of the Three Kingdoms period, when Du Yu and Wang Jun sailed to Yizhou to destroy the State of Wu. Another sixty or seventy years of technological confrontation and development had passed.

It was only the beginning of Jian'an, and the largest tower ship in the world could only carry about 1,200 people and 500 tons at full load, and was no more than 25 meters long and 8 meters wide. In history, by the time of the Battle of Chibi and the Battle of Ruxu, the tower ship gradually developed to 1,500 people and 600 tons at full load. These technologies were upgraded little by little in the confrontation.

The boat that Lu Yi was sitting on now was designed and improved by the Zhuge brothers a year and a half in advance. It was the first generation of warships with a main keel.

If we also take into account the previous year's work on modifying the bilge keel of an old ship for stability testing, the Zhuge brothers have invested a total of two and a half years in shipbuilding, and the results are naturally extraordinary.

The length of this ship is over twelve zhang, or twenty-eight meters, ten zhang longer than the largest building ship today, but its average width is only two zhang, and the widest part at the waist is only two zhang and four feet.

The length-to-width ratio has reached 1:5, which is much thinner and longer than the 1:3 ratio of the tower ships and fighting ships of the same period.

This is one of the advantages of having a main keel structure. It allows the ship to be built more slender, and it does not need to be almost the same width from the beginning to the end. It can have a fish-shaped or shuttle-shaped waterline surface, which greatly reduces sailing resistance and there is no need to worry about insufficient longitudinal structural strength.

To be frank, Zhuge Jin could say that the ship he planned was the ancestor of the later Fuzhou ships, or an early experimental model. Before he built this type of ship, the original seagoing ships of the Han Dynasty were at most flat-bottomed boats such as sand ships.

If you are sailing in the Yellow Sea north of the Yangtze River estuary, the water is shallow and there are many undercurrents, so a flat-bottomed boat is also good. But in the East China Sea south of the Yangtze River estuary, especially in the waters near Fujian, the seaworthiness of northern boats is simply no match for the newly emerged keel Fujian boats.

It can be said that the Han Dynasty did not originally develop this type of slender, deep-draft ship simply because the South was too little developed and there was no such demand.

The Lu family originally took an old-fashioned boat to Kuaiji, which took three or four days to sail from Wuxian to Juzhang, and seven or eight days to reach Linhai.

Now that we have a new boat, we arrived at Juzhang early in the morning on the third day, which saves at least a whole day compared to the original time and increases the speed by more than a quarter.

Lu Yi observed and tested it again. On the afternoon of the fifth day, the fleet had passed Linhai, and the speed increase ratio was further confirmed.

When they reach central Fujian where the water is deeper and the sea conditions are more complicated, the speed gap will only be widened. Lu Yi estimates that it will be easy to surpass the old warships by more than 30%.

The Izu Strait has been called the "Black Water Channel" since ancient times because the water in the strait is deeper than other coastal areas along the Chinese coast, so the seawater is black. Therefore, the coastal sea conditions in the central Fujian area are the most complicated in the country.

Lu Yi thought to himself that if Brother Bu was willing to let him lead a naval force, although he was not sure that he could repel the powerful enemy, he could definitely fight when he wanted to and run when he wanted to.

When you meet someone stronger than you, hide; when you meet someone weaker than you, attack. This will ensure you are invincible.

……

After passing Linhai, the fleet was completely away from Sun Ce's sphere of influence, and there was no need to leave the coastline too far. They could sail within visual sight of the mountains by the sea.

Lu Yi occasionally saw Bu Zhi take out a brass tube and look at it. At both ends of the tube were two pieces of fire beads similar to the crystals of Donghai County, which seemed to allow vision to reach far, but Lu Yi had not had the opportunity to experience it yet. With this thing, it seemed that he could gain a huge advantage in searching for enemies at sea later.

(Note: In Ban Gu's "Fu on the Western Capital" in the Eastern Han Dynasty, transparent beads and crystals with a focusing effect similar to convex lenses were called "Huo Qi", named after their ability to gather light and ignite fire. However, the people of the Han Dynasty did not try to summarize the optical mathematical principles involved, but simply observed this phenomenon.)
The fleet sailed for another seven or eight days and finally arrived safely at the mouth of the Minjiang River near Dongye County.

The appearance of Bu Zhi's fleet made the Dongye defenders feel like they were facing a formidable enemy. Although Wang Lang was weak, he still forcibly sent out a team of pitiful warships, set up a water formation at the mouth of the Minjiang River, and tried to intercept Bu Zhi's attack.

Fortunately, Bu Zhi had no ill intentions, and he sent a patrol boat to deliver a talisman to reveal his identity. The other party carefully confirmed it again and again, and finally, out of caution, let Bu Zhi anchor his fleet at a coastal anchorage outside the mouth of the Minjiang River, and then sent a small boat to pick him up.

Bu Zhi didn't mind, so he let Zhang Duo and Lu Yi lead the fleet in case of an emergency, and he went in person to negotiate with Wang Lang's army.

After some trouble, Bu Zhi was transferred to the flagship of Wang Lang's navy, where he met a general wearing black armor. The general chatted with him for a few words before politely saluting:

"So it's Bu Zhonglang under the command of the General of Chariots and Cavalry. I'm sorry. I'm He Qi, the commander of Kuaiji. It's really because the thief Sun is pressing forward step by step, killing the people, and chasing the Lord that our army has to be on guard. Just now I thought it was the thief Sun who was cheating and sending his navy to come over the sea, intending to take advantage of the chaos to land."

Bu Zhi said in a friendly manner, "Captain He is loyal to his duty, so how can I blame him? I came here this time on the orders of the General of Chariots and Cavalry. First, I hope that Lord Wang will cooperate with you to respond to the imperial edict and put the blame on the traitor Sun for the civil strife in Yangzhou. Second, I also secretly help Lord Wang with troops to help him defend a corner of Fujian and prevent the traitor Sun from succeeding. The General of Chariots and Cavalry now has to deal with Huang Zu, who is also a traitor who killed the angel of the court, so he has to be careful. In the future, when the General of Chariots and Cavalry has time and seizes the opportunity, he will definitely do justice for Lord Wang."

"General Chariot and Cavalry is so righteous, the Lord will surely be grateful! I am also deeply grateful!" Hearing this, He Qi finally felt like a long drought had finally ended. The Lord of the Palace had lived a miserable life in the past year and a half.

Not only did they suffer a series of disastrous defeats, but they also lost only two of the twenty counties in Kuaiji Prefecture. However, Sun Ce still refused to let them go and insisted on killing them all.

While He Qi was explaining, he ordered the fleet to return to the shore and enter the city. Dongye County was very simple and had no water gates. The city was located on the north bank of the Minjiang River, and the dock was outside the south gate.

It was the first time that Bu Zhi came to central Fujian. When he saw the city wall of Dongye County, he couldn't help but feel a chill in his heart: the defense facilities of the cities in central Fujian were really too poor!

The city wall is lower than Shanyin and Juzhang, probably only about ten feet high. The quality of the rammed earth is not very good, and the color is just ordinary raw soil, without any pretreatment before building the city.

If you want to defend a city like this for a long time, you must have a lot of troops. If the defense facilities are poor, you can only make up for it with numbers.

Given the productivity of central Fujian, the output of bows, crossbows and arrows would not be very high, so they could only frantically stockpile rolling logs, stones, ash bottles and firewood (for boiling water and gold juice) in advance.

After Bu Zhi observed for a while, he was led into the city by He Qi. After some twists and turns, he arrived at the temporary Kuaiji prefectural government.

Bu Zhi walked straight into the inner courtyard and saw a middle-aged scholar with a long beard in his early forties greeting him in the courtyard, along with a strategist with a goatee in his thirties.

Bu Zhi bowed and stated his identity in a dignified manner. The middle-aged scholar and the goat-bearded counselor also introduced themselves and greeted each other. They were the governor Wang Lang and the county magistrate Yu Fan.

Given Wang Lang's current miserable situation, he certainly didn't dare to put on airs as the governor of Kuaiji to the envoy sent by Liu Bei. So Bu Zhi took a tougher stance and bluntly said that Wang Lang was incompetent in commanding the army and had been repeatedly defeated by Sun Ce.

"… Lord Wang, you have Zhongxiang (Yu Fan) in literature and Gongmiao (He Qi) in martial arts, both of whom are loyal and brave warriors. Why don't you organize your troops? After six or seven years in the county, you still can't resist the sudden rise of Sun Bofu. In such a chaotic time, it is useless to only focus on improving moral governance."

Wang Lang's face turned red, but there was nothing he could do. He had figured out from Bu Zhi's attitude that Liu Bei wanted to control him or use him to contain Sun Ce. But he had been beaten so badly that he could only lower his posture and cooperate with Liu Bei in whatever way he was asked to.

If he were still in Shanyin, he would have more confidence to discuss the terms of cooperation. But now that we have reached Dongye, there is no room for negotiation.

Wang Lang thought to himself, "Although Bu Zhi is aggressive, he may be a man who has risen to prominence and is eager to make achievements. I have heard of Liu Xuande's reputation for benevolence and righteousness, so he should not push him too hard. Besides, it is better to follow Liu than to be threatened by Sun Ce. Liu Xuande was recommended by Lord Tao, and I am also a talented person recommended by Lord Tao."

Thinking of this, Wang Lang lowered his posture and said sincerely: "I can't defend the land, I can't govern the people and eliminate the bandits. I feel ashamed of the court and the people. However, things have come to this point, and there is nothing I can do. I am originally under the rule of Liu Yangzhou, so I should serve him. Please teach me, sir."

Seeing Wang Lang was so sensible, Bu Zhi quickly stopped his initial attack and persuaded him gently, "Lord Wang, you don't have to do this. After all, you and General Tao were both recommended by you. When General was in urgent need, you sold grain to Mi Zizhong. That's why General sent me to come all the way to rescue you.

Because it is not easy to cross the sea, we only have 3,000 soldiers. I hope that Lord Wang will not be discouraged. If Sun Yu crosses the sea to pursue us, the expedition of thousands of miles will not last long. As long as we intercept his retreat and firmly defend the city, fortify the walls and clear the fields, so that he has nowhere to get food, his army will collapse before summer comes.

As long as Sun the thief sees the scorching heat and malaria in central Fujian in summer, and the difficulty of getting support, he will naturally know that the uncontested land in central Fujian is not worth spending so many lives and money, and the position of the governor will naturally be consolidated. In the future, when the general of chariots and cavalry goes to war with the thief Sun, as long as the governor responds in the name of the governor of Kuaiji and calls on the local people, the general of chariots and cavalry will allow the governor to rule central Fujian for a long time when Sun is destroyed. "

As soon as Bu Zhi put forward this condition, Yu Fan, who was next to Wang Lang, couldn't help but raise his eyebrows and wanted to refute, but gave up after calming down.

Wang Lang was a little emotional, but then he thought, he had lost most of Kuaiji, even if Liu Bei counterattacked in the future, it would be Liu Bei's ability, how could he have the face to come back. At most, he could give Liu Bei a face and nominally help him to rally the people of Kuaiji.

In the future, even if the southern Zhejiang region was recovered, it would still be Liu Bei who had the final say. Liu Bei allowed him to be a local official in Fujian for the rest of his life, and it was already very benevolent for him to enjoy himself and assimilate the barbarians in this place where military strategists did not fight for him.

Wang Lang hesitated for a moment, then agreed to the request made by Bu Zhi on behalf of Liu Bei.

Now that the division of the spoils had been agreed upon, the follow-up would be easier. The two sides soon began to discuss the issue of defensive preparedness.

Wang Lang also told the truth, saying that when he fled to central Fujian, he had no more than one or two thousand soldiers, mainly the guards led by He Qi, the commander of Kuaiji, when he broke out of the siege.

But now, after a month or two of gaining a foothold, they have recruited more than 3,000 people, bringing the total back to 5,000. However, these 3,000 new people have not undergone rigorous training, and more than half of them are Shanyue people from central Fujian.

Among them were 600 county soldiers under the command of Houguan County Magistrate Shang Sheng, 600 county soldiers under the command of Dongye County Magistrate Zhang Ya, and 2,000 men led by the chieftains of the Shanyue tribes around Dongye, Zhan Qiang and He Xiong.

Bu Zhi nodded after listening to this: "Since you have 5,000 soldiers of your own, and the General of Chariots and Cavalry has another 3,000 soldiers to help, as long as we ensure that the city is not breached, the Sun thief will definitely not be able to last long. Please make sure to fortify the city as soon as possible, and gather all the young and strong people from the surrounding tribes to defend the city. This will prevent the Sun thief from "taking food from the enemy" or capturing Shanyue people as auxiliary troops when he enters the city.

I can also divide a thousand soldiers to serve as the backbone to help in the city. As long as the prince and Captain He can hold the city, the remaining two thousand of our army can patrol the sea. Once Sun's army is short of food, it needs to send the fleet back to Juzhang and Linhai to collect food for a long-term siege. Our army can surprise them at sea and kill their food fleet. In the end, Sun will run out of food and flee. "

Taking advantage of the absolute speed advantage of Liu Bei's warships, they broke the attack at sea, allowing Sun Ce's army to reach Dongye, but the subsequent food and supplies could not be transported, and finally had to collapse. This was the strategy against Sun that Bu Zhi discussed with Lu Yi during the ten days of his journey south.

Well, in fact, 70% of this strategy was contributed by Lu Yi, who came up with the initial idea. Bu Zhi only contributed about 30%, mainly responsible for making some minor changes and making detailed arrangements.

However, at this moment, the strategy proposed by Bu Zhi still surprised Wang Lang.

After all, Wang Lang and Yu Fan had never seen Lu Yi's warships, and they had no idea how likely it would be to succeed in intercepting the enemy's follow-up supply fleet in the near sea.

Yu Fan was more careful and immediately spotted the problem, and couldn't help but refute it.

Bu Zhi did not intend to explain, but just smiled and said nothing. He planned to invite Wang Lang and Yu Fan to visit and then respond to their rebuttal.

Bu Zhi knew that there were some things that people who had never seen them could not imagine, and no matter how much you explained it to them verbally, it would be useless.

Fortunately, the captain He Qi immediately stood on Bu Zhi's side. He had just been ordered to patrol and intercept Bu Zhi's fleet. He had witnessed the speed and flexibility of Liu Bei's fleet outside the mouth of the Minjiang River. Although it was only for a short moment, it left a very deep impression on him.

He Qi then spoke up, "My Lord, the Magistrate, I think this may be a good idea. You haven't seen the warships under the General of Chariots and Cavalry, which come and go like the wind, far from being seen in ordinary times. If we can be more informed and know in advance when Sun Ce's grain fleet will arrive, it should not be difficult to intercept and kill them.

I originally had no confidence in holding on to Dongye for long. But as long as we fortify our walls and clear the fields, gather our manpower, and encourage our soldiers, letting them know that Sun Ce won’t hold out for long, then their morale will be strong.”

Wang Lang saw that the only general he could rely on, He Qi, was standing opposite him, so he could no longer refute. He had already accepted his fate. If he won this time, he would be an idle local official in Fujian for the rest of his life and would not struggle anymore.

Wang Lang said dejectedly, "Since this is the case, I will have to trouble Bu Zhonglang and He Duwei to discuss the military affairs. Thank you for your hard work. I don't know how to fight. When I was in Shanyin, I forced myself to take command and wanted to defend Zhejiang with the navy. As a result, I was defeated miserably by Sun Jing's trick and made a big mistake.

Last year, I also heard a famous saying from Danyang, which seemed to be said by General Fubo, "There are different levels of learning, and different specializations in different fields." I think so. General Fubo is really a wise man in the world. Let's listen to his advice. Thank you for your hard work."

He Qi and Bu Zhi bowed to Wang Lang, which meant they had taken over the military command.

(End of this chapter)