Chapter 378: A Plan Within a Plan

"Your Highness, Yanzhou is poor, and these pirates have always looked down on this place. Now they come here again and again to disturb us. I'm afraid the matter is not simple. Read М" Chang Wei's eyes were full of murderous intent.

Being bullied by Beidi and Xiliang would be fine, but now a small pirate is coming to bite them.

Do they really think they are stubborn?

"It's really strange." Zhao Xu said.

He became suspicious when the pirates burned the ship's office last time.

However, there were no core personnel from Wufeng Island among the captured pirates, so he didn't get anything out of the interrogation.

The only information he got was the order from their island owner.

This time the Japanese pirates came again, and they directly attacked Jinghai County, which made him even more confused.

"Is it revenge?" Zhao Xu touched his chin. He hung the pirates' bodies on the wooden stakes on the coast for the purpose of warning the pirates.

However, it seemed a bit too stupid to mobilize a large force to attack Jinghai County for revenge.

After all, even if there were pirates who escaped by chance, they would definitely know that Yanzhou had artillery.

"Oh no!" An idea suddenly popped up in Zhao Xu's mind, and a layer of cold sweat suddenly broke out on his back.

He said to Chang Wei: "You immediately send 20,000 troops to Pingcheng to strictly guard the shipyard of the Ship Department. Don't let the warships under construction get into trouble."

Chang Wei immediately came to his senses, "Yes, I will mobilize troops right away."

Pingcheng is the center of the Yanzhou waterway.

Not only is there a canal leading to Jinling, but there is also a river called Haihe that passes through Pingcheng and flows eastward into the ocean.

The King of Yan built a shipyard in Pingcheng to facilitate the warships to go to sea.

But since Yanzhou's ships can go to sea from there, pirates can naturally enter the hinterland of Yanzhou from this river.

The first target of the pirates was the Ship Department.

This time may not be the case. In addition to revenge, attacking Jinghai County may also be a strategy of feinting to the east and attacking in the west.

"Your Highness, do you want to take these shaved cannons?" Wang Ying pointed to a row of twelve cannons and said.

The conversation between the King of Yan and Chang Wei obviously meant that they were going to fight again.

"Well, that makes sense." Zhao Xu said, and he immediately ordered the artillery to pull the artillery back to the barracks.

Today, he and Chang Wei were looking at the shooting effect of the first batch of cut artillery.

Before cutting, the effective range of these artillery was 1,500 meters, and the maximum range was 3 kilometers.

But now it has reached an effective range of 2,000 meters, and the maximum range is 5 kilometers.

This basically reached the peak range of smoothbore cannons during the contemporary Opium War.

To further improve, in addition to designing rifling, it is to change a more explosive gunpowder.

After instructing to pull the improved artillery away, Zhao Xu turned around and went back to the palace.

He was going to Jinghai County. This time the pirates made such a big fuss, there must be some core figures in it.

If he could catch them, he might be able to interrogate something, so he could also understand the current situation outside Dasong and prepare early.

"By the way, the improved artillery is very good. Next, cut all the artillery of the army." Zhao Xu said after getting on the horse.

Thinking of something, he said, "There are still chariots, everything should be done as soon as possible."

"Don't worry, Your Highness. Now the Armory Department is dedicated to manufacturing armaments for the royal army. There is no problem." Wang Ying said.

There are many skilled craftsmen among the people who came from Sizhou this time.

When the government sent these people to build roads and bridges, they also asked him if he needed craftsmen.

He took the opportunity to select another 5,000 people to rush into the Armory Department, and the manpower was unprecedentedly sufficient.

Zhao Xu nodded and rode away.

After changing into military uniforms at the royal palace and waiting for an hour, he set off for Pingcheng with Chang Wei.

Halfway, Chang Wei led 15,000 people to Pingcheng, and he led 5,000 people to Jinghai.

On the way to Jinghai, he was very calm.

Bai Shang was stationed in Jinghai. If he couldn't even deal with these pirates.

This captain would not have to do it.

...

Jinghai County.

The pirates left behind 80 corpses and retreated again, and the battlefield fell into silence.

"Lai Xi, you lead 3,000 men out of the south gate and outflanking the north. Dazu, you lead 3,000 men out of the north gate and outflanking the south, and we will catch them all in one fell swoop." Bai Shang said to the general beside him.

"Yes, Captain." The general left in response.

They fought for an afternoon yesterday, and the pirates did not attack the city again at night.

Early this morning, the pirates continued to attack.

Now more than 900 pirates have died in Jinghai County.

But even with such losses, the pirates still have no intention of retreating.

This surprised him.

Calculating the time, he felt that the King of Yan should know the news now.

So he decided not to continue playing the game of defending the city with the pirates.

If the King of Yan was coming, he would encircle and suppress the pirates before the King of Yan came, and present the bandit leader to the King of Yan.

"Li Cheng, kill the pirates' artillery!" Turning back from his thoughts, Bai Shang said to the artillery general beside him.

The pirates' artillery was quite powerful and could pose a great threat to his soldiers.

Although in his opinion, these clumsy heavy artillery was not as powerful as Yanzhou's city defense artillery.

"Damn it."

While Bai Shang was dispatching troops, Yamada Ichino gritted his teeth at the crew members who retreated in embarrassment.

Yesterday, his men rushed into Jinghai City. He thought he would face a group of soldiers wearing armor and holding swords.

But he didn't expect that after a very familiar burst of gunfire, the subordinates who rushed into the city never came back.

Only then did he know that the Yanzhou army also had muskets.

Next, he organized several more charges, but they were all defeated by the defenders in the city.

Now, he finally understood that Jinghai County was a tough nut to crack.

Their revenge was likely to fail.

"Lord Yamada, what should we do now? The soldiers and horses in Yanzhou seem to be different from those in other places. Fighting like this will only increase casualties." A pirate asked nervously.

Yamada Ichino looked back at the warships on the sea.

At this time, only 30 of the 72 warships on the sea were left, and 42 disappeared.

This time they came back to Yanzhou and attacked Jinghai County to kill two birds with one stone.

One was to avenge the King of Yan, and the other was to sneak into Pingcheng from the Haihe River at night and burn the warships being built in Yanzhou.

For this matter, someone gave their island owner a heart-warming amount of silver.

"Stay here, even if you can't take the city, you have to continue the feint attack." Yamada Ichino looked at Jinghai County with hatred.

As soon as he finished speaking, he suddenly saw flames on the city wall.

Then a huge roar sounded, and then he heard a scream behind him.

Turning back, he found that a crew member in front of a cannon was hit in the arm and the whole arm was broken.

Yamada Ichino suddenly became nervous.

Dozens of shells fell near their cannons.

The Yan Wang soldiers in the city were obviously shooting at their cannons.

Three hundred meters away, this is the reasonable distance for the cannons to be placed.

Because it was too far, the crew could not see the target clearly.

Most importantly, he underestimated the range of Yanzhou's cannons.

In his mind, Dasong could not build a cannon more powerful than the one on their ship.

When attacking the city, the cannons on the city only fired at about 200 meters, which gave him an illusion.

But now, he felt that he was deceived.