The Xunyang River used to be bustling with activity, and the scene of various large and small merchant ships and passenger ships shuttling back and forth is now gone. Especially after dusk, even the last few fishing canoes have disappeared, and only the surging river water is calm and rushing eastward. .
But when it was completely dark, more than 30 small warships suddenly sailed out from the Jiangzhou Water Gate, entered the Xunyang River silently, and silently went upstream against the current. On each boat stood more than twenty officers and soldiers armed with bows, arrows or swords and guns, all of whom had extremely solemn expressions. As the entire fleet headed upstream, except for the clattering sound of oars on the water, there was no sound. There was no other sound.
This fleet was the official team that went to exterminate the fierce dragon under the command of Jiangzhou Governor Lin Henian. In addition to the seven to eight hundred Xiang troops under his command, there were also hundreds of elites selected by Sun Tu. These people are now Sitting on four warships, they stared intently at the dark and calm surroundings, holding the weapons in their hands tightly.
Although these rural soldiers are all very different after two months of hard training, they are still newcomers who have never really been on the battlefield to kill the enemy, and the ones who are going to conquer this time have already had a bad reputation. With the group of fierce dragons outside, they were naturally nervous.
Sun Tu, who was standing on the bow of the small warship at the front, also clearly felt the oppression of the soldiers and horses behind him, so he turned back and whispered to those on the same ship: "They are just a group of bandits like a rabble, you don't have to worry. Wait. When you get to the thief's lair, just follow the same drill as before and follow the command to attack and you can kill the thief."
His words had some effect. The originally nervous country soldiers finally relaxed a little, and the hands holding their weapons were no longer so strong.
After traveling upstream for half the night, the ship acting as a vanguard in front sent out a light signal. However, it had already arrived near the target and ordered all ships to spread out and surround the small sandbar island that could vaguely be seen. Please completely wipe out the evil dragons and trap them to death in their lairs.
Today's strategy and tactics for suppressing the bandits were all determined by Lin Henian alone, and Sun Tu did not raise any objections. As soon as he saw the order coming, he immediately asked the soldiers on the ship to light their lamps and ordered his four boats to disperse. Attack the thieves from the west side of the island.
These officers and soldiers were all selected by Lin Dujian from thousands of men and horses who were good at sailing and swimming. Naturally, they dispersed very skillfully at this time, and then surrounded and slowly approached the island under the cover of night.
When Sun Tu and his several small boats arrived at less than a mile away from the island, lights came on in several other directions. This was a feedback that they were in their respective positions. Sun Tu also asked He quickly responded.
At this moment, instead of sneaking close to the island with the small warships, a red light was raised on the slightly larger handsome ship, and then a loud sound of drums and trumpets sounded from the ship, completely breaking the news. Understand the tranquility of Xunyang River late at night.
Accompanied by the encouraging drums, the officers and soldiers who were already ready to go also let out a burst of shouts. Everyone rowed hard together, and the small boats flew towards the water like arrows from the string. They swooped towards the sandbank and island in front of them, and the archers standing on the bow of the ship had already skillfully bent their bows and arrows to aim forward, waiting for the enemy to show up and hit them head-on.
But just when everyone gathered their strength and wanted to rush forward in one breath,
When we were going to the island, the boat that was supposed to fly in quickly suddenly slowed down. Sun Tu clearly felt that the boat under him was being pulled and entangled by something at this time, and it could not move forward. At this time, they were still a hundred steps away from the island, and it was still pitch black in front of them. Where is the river
This turn of events really caught the officers and soldiers off guard. They screamed one after another for a while. Some people shouted to retreat, while others tried to get into the water to see what was going on below. They were supposed to launch a surprise attack, but the overwhelming offensive was completely disrupted. , and the noise was so loud that the thieves on the island had already known that an enemy was coming.
Sure enough, when the officers and soldiers who entered the water repeatedly exclaimed: "It's fishing nets, they are covered with fishing nets under the water, and the bottom of our boat is entangled with fishing nets...", the originally quiet island suddenly became full of people. The torches were quickly lit, and dozens of figures were already rushing towards the south where Sun Tu and the others were.
When the Xiang troops who were already in disarray saw the enemy rushing towards them, they raised their bows and fired arrows at the enemies on the island without anyone giving orders. However, Sun Tu frowned and said, "We are now We are still more than a hundred steps away from the enemy, how can these bows and arrows hurt them?"
Sure enough, everything was as Sun Tu expected. After the arrows flew through the air, they all fell into the river due to exhaustion, and they were still a long way away from the shore of the island. Woolen cloth.
The dozens of water bandits rushed out of the island without fear, jumped into the river, and quickly disappeared from everyone's sight. This action immediately made the soldiers on the boat who were trapped in a dilemma in the fishing net nervous. Everyone raised their swords and guns, yelling something, staring at the dark water below but not knowing what to do.
"If there is good water, quickly go into the water and cut the fishing net. We can't be trapped here anymore!" Sun Tu ordered urgently. While speaking, he had already thrown off the cumbersome leather armor on his body, held a short knife in his mouth, and jumped into the water without hesitation.
With Sun Tu leading by example, many of the local soldiers on his boat finally put aside their fears and jumped into the water one after another, helping their team members to cut the fishing nets entangled in the boat. Subsequently, the local soldiers on the other three ships also followed the orders and acted. The two months of training had already made them accustomed to obeying Sun Tu's orders. Even if they were panicked now, they still obeyed the orders.
However, Tang Feng and Lu Da, who were on the other two ships, did not lead by example like Sun Tu. Neither of them were very good at water, especially Lu Da, who could stand firmly on the bow of the ship and give orders at this time. It's not easy. Letting him get into the water will only add to the chaos.
However, he was well versed in military affairs and still loudly ordered several local soldiers on board the ship: "Light all the torches for me, pay attention to the movement under the water, and if there are thieves ahead, call them with bows and arrows!" He obviously said They were wary of those thieves who had just launched from the island. They didn't know when these guys would suddenly appear and attack the officers and soldiers who were still trying to get the ship out of trouble.
In fact, Sun Tu, who was cutting the fine fishing nets with a knife in the water, also focused most of his attention on the surroundings, in case an enemy suddenly attacked his home from a dark place. At this time, all the official and military ships here were trapped in fishing nets and could not move. They were the easiest targets for thieves.
But what was unexpected was that after they had been on guard for a long time, none of the water bandits actually showed up.
There were attacks from the side, as if the scene they just saw was fake. Just when everyone was filled with doubts, there was a burst of exclamation from the east, followed by the sound of killing. In a moment of astonishment, Sun Tu understood that the thieves seemed to be entering the water from the west, but in fact they came from the east and attacked from the west. They had already taken a detour. Heading east, they launched a surprise attack on the unprepared officers and soldiers.
At this time, a cry came from the island again. Even in such an environment, Sun Tu and the others heard the sound of heavy objects falling into the water from ahead. Before they could guess what the other party was going to do, the fire suddenly lit up from the other side of the island, and then the exclamations were even louder than before: "It's a fire ship, they actually used fire to attack!"
Amidst the screams, several small boats on fire took advantage of the wind and rammed straight into the warships in the east that were already in a mess due to the surprise attack. The warships that had not yet escaped from the fishing nets were gone. As for the attack, he couldn't even dodge. He could only watch helplessly as the small boats, which were piled with fire starters and already burning, approached from far away, and then slammed into the bow of their own ship, setting off the fire. At the same time, it was brought to his own body.
This made the Xiang army, who had already lost their sense of control, panic even more. They screamed and jumped off the boat one after another, but they happened to fall into the hands of the water bandits. The screams immediately echoed on the river.
Although the other official ships were intent on rescuing, they were still entangled in the fishing nets and could not escape. The only thing they could do was to try their best to remove the tangled fishing nets under the ship. After cutting it open, all that was left was to yell at those cunning thieves.
Of course, not everyone was unable to provide assistance. The flagship ship that had not launched the attack with the fleet before moved towards the west under Lin Henian's order. Standing on the bow of the boat and watching all this, Lin Dujian's face was already distorted with anger: "Leave closer, those fishing nets can only entangle the small boat, but they can't stop our big boat..."
But just after the boat advanced for more than half a mile, it suddenly stopped. The officers and soldiers who were rowing hard to make the boat move forward immediately shouted loudly: "Du Jian, the water here is shallow, we The ship can’t get past it at all…”
When these words reached Lin Henian's ears, his body trembled violently, and fire almost burst out of his eyes: "How could this be!"
Before he could come up with a countermeasure, the surrounding officers and soldiers exclaimed again: "Fire... the fire ships are coming again!" However, they saw that several fire ships were once again put down on the island over there, but this time they could not Facing the wind, they even let a few thieves personally drive the boats and rush towards the officers and soldiers, which made everyone even more horrified.
Seeing the fire ship approaching, the soldiers were completely panicked. They could only instinctively fire arrows at the fire ship. However, because the target was too small, they panicked again, and almost all of the arrows fell into the air.
With a muffled bang, the first fire ship finally crashed heavily into the warship at the front. Flames had already risen on that ship and spread quickly, but the thief who controlled the ship was The moment the two ships collided, he jumped into the river and disappeared.
At this time, the small warships huddled together in the east were already surrounded by flames, and the screams of the officers and soldiers came one after another, resounding through the night sky!
The Jiangzhou officers and soldiers, who thought they would be able to win the battle, suffered as soon as they came into contact with the enemy. They were hit with a sap in the head!