my steam dam

Chapter 64 Fire!
On Taihu Lake.

The three giant ships are still galloping on the waves.

Peng Ke kept looking at the surrounding lake, looking at the small islands in the lake that were crossed by warships, his face was full of interest.

In Taihu Lake, there are 42 islands and 72 peaks.

Most of the islands are small and don't even have a single source of water.

However, because Taihu Lake is a freshwater lake, even if there is no water source on the island, there will still be quite a lot of small animals, which will not affect the animal ecology.

But the common people rarely settle on these palm-sized islands.

Among the 42 islands in Taihu Lake, less than ten islands have people settled.

Most of them are only one village with a scale of 200 people.

Most of the people who settled here migrated to live on the island in the lonely lake to avoid the wars of the year.

Later, Daming was established, because they were used to this kind of island life, and they did not migrate back to the shore.

On the contrary, the government of Ming Dynasty sent officials to these inhabited islands.

Even if there may be only a few dozen people living on an island, there must be a system of officials ranging from 5 to 8 people who are responsible for the livelihood of the people on the island.

But there are exceptions to everything.

In the middle of Taihu Lake, 22 miles from north to south and 30 miles from east to west, there is no imperial official on "Xiake Island", the largest island in Taihu Lake, which is comparable in size to Hong Kong Island.

Although the whole world, could it be the land of the king.

However, due to some historical reasons, most sects that have been passed down for hundreds of years have their own ancestral property.

Even if the ruling dynasty keeps changing, the residences of these sects still belong to them, and the succeeding dynasty will not make any changes to them.

There is quite a feeling of a country within a country.

Previously, Bilian Mountain belonged to the Buyan Sect, and Wanxiang Mountain was also the ancestral property of the Diancang Sect.

This is because the dynasties of all dynasties have relied on these Jianghu sects to resist the invasion of barbarians around them, so these sects are a special case.

Before the Ming Dynasty, most sects, including Xia Kedao, enjoyed very high salaries. Not only did they not do production, but they were regularly supplied with various kinds of money and food every month, and they were given land.

Basically, all martial arts sects don't have to worry about money and food, and can practice martial arts with peace of mind.

And the same, enjoy the privilege, you need to pay the obligation.

Before the Song Dynasty, the disciples of these rivers and lakes sects had been active in the front line against the barbarians around China, advancing and retreating with the official army.

This is why Emperor Hongwu wanted to settle accounts after autumn.

Seeing that Daming is now thriving, all directions are peaceful, and people's livelihood in the country has almost recovered.

Steam technology has also been proved through countless tough battles that it has great potential, far exceeding personal force.

Then Emperor Hongwu will naturally liquidate these Jianghu sects.

If you are not guilty, there is no problem, the ancestral property is still yours, and the disciples trained every year are the same as before, participating in the country's foreign wars.

But for the guilty sect, the fate will not be so good.

After sailing for an hour, the three giant ships of the Taihu Squadron arrived outside the Knight Island.

Standing on the deck of the bow, Penke could already see the shapes of some buildings on the shore of Knight Island.

The fleet commander walked quickly to Penke's side and asked in a low voice, "My lord, are you launching an attack now?"

"Bring me a telescope." Peng Ke said to Ah Hu.

Immediately, the captain in charge of the lookout trotted forward and handed the binoculars in his hand to Peng Ke.

Picking up the binoculars, which resembled the single-aperture telescope of the later generations, Penke looked at the buildings on Knight Island.

With the help of the telescope, he immediately saw the situation clearly.

This knight island is very big, so it is difficult for the disciples of knight island to take good care of the surrounding area of ​​the island. They can only build four watchtowers and camps around the big island for warning purposes.

"Such a big island can support 10,000+ people, but there are only a few hundred disciples. Life on the island is really good."

Looking at the big island in front of him that can't be seen at a glance, which is equivalent to the size of Hong Kong Island, Peng Ke laughed mockingly.

The island is big and there are few people.

What do the disciples of the Knight Island guard the island with?
"Ready for shelling!"

After Peng Ke gave an order, and through the semaphore, the three giant ships turned their bows under the driver's control, aligned side by side, and aimed one side of the ship at a watchtower camp on the coastline of the island.

Through the binoculars, Peng Ke could see that the disciples of the Knights Island on the sentry tower camp on the shore had also spotted them, and silhouettes flew up from the camp, shouting in horror.

Because it was too far away, even though he was born with martial arts and had good hearing, he couldn't hear what the disciples on the island were shouting at all.

But you can guess it, it's nothing more than words like "enemy attack!" "Dodge!"

While holding a binoculars to observe the disciples of the Knight Island on the shore, Peng Ke said with a sneer:

"Start shelling, let the gunners aim at the point, and plow a smooth path for the soldiers to land!"

"Remember to use flower bombs!"

The Knight Island is too big, and it is impossible for the three giant ships to hit the core of the Island in the center of the island directly. After all, they still have to land on the beach.

But before the soldiers landed, the shore had to be cleaned up.

Penke's order was quickly and accurately conveyed to the gun decks of the three warships.

Each warship faces the three-story gun deck on the side of Knight Island.

The navy soldiers manipulating the cannon were in groups of two, and one of them opened the screw breech breech at the tail of the cannon beside him.

The other immediately loaded a projectile filled with shrapnel and gunpowder and weighing several kilograms into the barrel.

Then, they stuffed a separately packaged ammunition package into the barrel, and then closed and locked the screw breech block again.

These soldiers are training how to shoot every day. It can be said that each of them is an elite gunner.

Although it is filled manually, everyone's movements are carved out of the same mold.

The entire filling process is not smooth, it looks like a mechanical assembly line operation.

It took less than 1 minute in total!

The artillery on the three warships completed the ammunition loading almost simultaneously.

"Shooting ready!"

When the three warships have a total of 150 artillery pieces of different calibers, they are all loaded and pushed into the launch window.

The commanders on the three warships shouted at the same time: "Launch!"

150 artillery pieces fired together, and there was a loud noise that shook the sky and the earth. Under the influence of the huge recoil, the three warships retreated several meters in unison.

The charge in the barrel was fired, generating a large amount of high-temperature gas, which not only ignited the fuze of the projectile, but also pushed the shell to fly out of the barrel at a high speed due to the huge kinetic energy.

A rain of 150 explosive shells flew straight to the sentry tower camp on the shore of Xiake Island.

Before the disciples in the camp could react, most of the shells fell into the camp accurately.

Then violent explosions sounded one after another.

The shock wave caused by more than 100 shells immediately blasted the disciples in the camp flying around.

The entire camp instantly turned into a sea of ​​flames.

Seeing the outstanding effect of the naval gun salvo, Penke nodded in satisfaction.

"First shell three rounds, and then organize soldiers to land on the island!"

(End of this chapter)