The Revolt of the Three Feudatories: All-in at the start in Beijing

Under the intense firelight, the allied fleet was laid bare: eighty main warships and armed merchant ships, dozens of still-burning wrecks, and planks and corpses floating on the sea—all were clearly visible.

Zhang Huai'an saw the high platform.

The high platform was built on the summit of the largest island in the South Heavenly Gate, at least thirty feet above the sea.

A person stood on the platform. The distance was too great to see his face clearly, but his figure was slender, and his bright red official robe was illuminated by the firelight, making him look like a burning flame.

It was Metsuiko.

The nearly eighty-year-old Governor of Malacca, a former Dutchman, is now a high-ranking local official of the second rank.

He stood on the high platform, holding a long pole with a signal firework attached to the end.

Zhang Huai'an saw the firework being lit, a green light shooting into the sky and exploding in mid-air, followed by a second one, which was red, exploding next to the green light.

Then Zhang Huai'an heard the sound of oars and shouts.

Hundreds of ships rushed out from both sides of the strait.

They were all sand barges, each only fifteen or sixteen meters long, with a flat bottom, no deck, no cabin, just a flat board with side planks on both sides. There were no sails or cannons on the boats.

Each sand barge carries ten people. Eight of them hold long oars and sit in pairs on either side of the gunwale. The other two squat at the bow, holding something Zhang Huai'an has never seen before—much thicker than a matchlock gun, with a barrel as thick as a thigh and a muzzle like a trumpet.

The Allied fleet had obviously spotted the sand ships as well, and a burst of laughter came from the British flagship, loud enough to be heard hundreds of feet away.

Someone was shouting in English, their tone extremely contemptuous.

Because the boat was so small, it couldn't carry cannons, and it was even too low to board their decks.

Laughter was also heard on the Dutch flagship, with someone loudly mocking in Dutch, roughly saying: "The Han Dynasty only has these small boats left. Damn Metsuiko, how did they let Malacca be occupied in the first place?"

No matter how the allied forces mocked them, the sand ships did not slow down. Like two unfolded fans, they flanked the allied fleet from the side. The eight men rowed desperately, while the two men at the bow held the spray nozzles and aimed straight ahead without moving.

The Allied warships finally began to turn their guns, but their ships were too big and turning around was too slow. Moreover, the gun ports on the sides, which were originally aimed at the Fujian ship defense line, would take at least half a cup of tea to turn around and deal with the small boats coming from both sides.

And that half-cup of tea was the fatal moment.

The first batch of sand ships had already come right up to the noses of the Allied warships. The captain of the British flagship, the Royal Oak, stood on the side of the ship, looking down at the sand ships that were more than ten times smaller than his own, and did not even give the order to fire.

He also felt that these flat-bottomed boats were not even suitable for boarding. The gunwales were so high, how could those Han soldiers climb up? Did they fly up?

Soon after, a dull bang was heard.

The two men at the bow of the sand barge pulled their triggers almost simultaneously, and a thick stream of fire shot out from the muzzle—not bullets, but a ball of burning, viscous liquid.

The liquid spurted from the gun muzzle, arcing through the air before splattering onto the hull of the Royal Oak.

The liquid was black and viscous like tar, mixed with sulfur, asphalt, pine resin, and other things.

It burst into flames the moment it touched the hull; the flames weren't red, but incandescent, and the temperature was incredibly high. (Remember this name: Remember this domain name: Good books never get lost.)

Then more sand ships came up, three hundred sand ships, each with two nozzles at the bow, firing seven or eight hundred streams of fire at the allied warships at the same time.

Within ten breaths, the Royal Oak's sides had turned into a wall of fire, with the sails being the first to catch fire.

The canvas coated with tung oil ignited upon contact with fire, turning the entire mainsail into a giant torch that illuminated the deck brightly.

Flames spread along the sail ropes to the mast, and then from the mast to the barge; the entire ship was ablaze from top to bottom and from left to right.

British sailors on deck screamed in agony as some molten slag fell on them.

Some people were jumping into the sea, while others were pouring buckets of water onto the fire. But the viscous oil burned even more fiercely when it came into contact with water, spreading like a living thing in all directions to the west.

The people inside the cabin tried to rush out, but the hatches were already sealed off by flames. The cannon barrels protruding from the gun ports were glowing red-hot, and the gunpowder in the cannons detonated on its own under the high temperature, exploding one after another and shattering the hull of their own ship.

Zhang Huai'an stood on the wreckage, stunned.

The British Royal Navy flagship, with its three decks and seventy Western guns, turned into a giant candle floating on the sea in less than the time it takes for an incense stick to burn.

Flames burned from the bottom of the ship to the top of the mast, enveloping the entire ship in a white-hot light, obscuring even the outline of the hull.

The Dutch flagship fared no better; its stern was hit by at least ten streams of fire, and its wheelhouse was engulfed in flames.

Dutch soldiers were desperately cutting the mooring lines in an attempt to get the ship moving, but the oars and sails were burned, and the ship was spinning in place.

Flames spread from the stern into the ship, engulfing everything on the deck, and many fire-breathing figures jumped into the sea.

The situation of the fifty armed merchant ships was even more appalling. They did not have the thick hulls of main warships, and the kerosene had seeped into the gaps in the wooden planks, burning from the inside.

Flames had burned through the decks of several merchant ships, and sparks fell into the gunpowder barrels in the hold—then the entire ship was reduced to pieces with a deafening roar.

In just two hours, 30% of the eighty allied ships had their gunpowder compartments burned and exploded into pieces on the sea surface within half an hour.

The remaining 70% did not explode, but they lost all their sails, like birds without wings, drifting on the sea unable to move.

Those Allied sailors who managed to escape the flames jumped into the sea and swam desperately towards the shore.

However, on the islands on both sides of the strait, behind the flames, stood burly soldiers wielding flintlock muskets, giving them no chance of survival, and they were all shot dead on the beach.

The main force went to Bavaria to exterminate the natives. The boatmen who just rowed the boat were all Han Chinese immigrants recruited by the authorities. Only in this way could they ensure that nothing went wrong.

……

"The Poison Dragon Flamethrower, this is truly a fine weapon! No wonder His Majesty forbade its dissemination!"

Metsuiko sighed at the scene. Luckily, he had surrendered to the Han Dynasty with his two sons beforehand. Otherwise, if his two sons had been captured in Nanjing, they probably wouldn't have been able to hold onto Bavaria and Malacca.

He never expected that, besides having a large population, many scholars, and a good system, the Han Dynasty also possessed such advanced technology that it could spray such gunpowder.

This ship is the bane of warships. No matter how big your ship is, I only need a fast ship to get close and use the fire that cannot be extinguished in a short time to deliver a fatal blow.