Jinghong Tower

Chapter 439 Strong Enemy
The soldiers of the Fujian Navy hurriedly boarded the ship, and just as they hoisted the sail, a torpedo hit them.

Torpedoes are not uncommon, as the Fujian Navy also has them. However, they soon discovered that these torpedoes not only have a high hit rate, but are also more powerful, and can be fired continuously!
This naval battle did not last long. Two hours later, this mysterious army quietly left.

In this battle, the Fujian Navy lost eighteen warships!
Warships are different from ordinary ships, and the Fujian Division suffered heavy losses in this battle.

The Fujian Navy was originally founded by the Du family, one of the four great families, fifty years ago.

At that time, the Du family's business mainly came from the sea, and they suffered from pirates, so they invested in establishing a navy.

When the navy was first established, there were only a dozen ships and more than 500 people, but it was more than enough to deal with small-scale pirates, and the Du family's business became more and more prosperous.

The other three families were also eager to make a move. However, it was time-consuming and laborious to build a navy from scratch like the Du family did. So after discussion, the three families found the Du family together.

The four great families in Fujian are related by marriage and are inseparable. Moreover, if the navy wants to continue to develop, it must continuously invest manpower and material resources. To put it bluntly, this is a bottomless pit that requires constant investment of money.

Although the Du family was wealthy and powerful, they began to feel the pinch after just a few years.

Now, these three companies are willing to invest money, which is what the Du family wants.

Therefore, the four parties hit it off immediately. Now, several decades have passed, and the navy has increased from ten ships to more than eighty ships, making it a veritable maritime force.

When talking about the navy in Fujian, it is not the imperial army, but the navy built by the four great families.

In addition to being a part of the four great families' army, the Fujian Army is also used by local government offices and other families. Of course, it is impossible for them to use them for free, as there are invisible interests involved.

The reasons for this situation are, firstly, that the emperor is far away, and secondly, the incompetence of the imperial court and the corruption of officials at all levels.

Therefore, this navy belonging to the civilian forces has always existed openly, and even the local imperial general has to be respectful when meeting the commander of the Fujian army.

The four great families abided by the agreement made that year. For decades, the chief commander of the Fujian Army has always been a member of the Du family. Although many children from the other three great families also serve in the army, there is only one chief commander, and he can only have the surname Du.

The current head coach of the Fujian Division was named Du Qiucheng. He was thirty-eight years old, which is the age when men are most lustful.

Coach Du recently gained two new female confidantes, they are inseparable and wish they could be together all the time.

Tonight is another happy night of eating barbecue. A fleet attacked at night, but I don’t know whether they had no time to report to him or they didn’t dare to disturb Du Shuai’s interest. In short, when Du Shuai knew about this, those ships that appeared like ghosts had disappeared without a trace.

Fortunately, this is just one of the several camps of the Fujian Army, otherwise we would have been wiped out.

Du Shuai's mansion was far away from the seaside. When he rode over on horseback, people from the other three families had already arrived before him.

Deputy Marshal Chen's face was as black as the bottom of a pot. He had just received accurate information that his nephew was among the dead and injured.

He also has only one younger brother, and he is the only male in his brother's family.

He now doesn't know how to face his younger brother and his parents.

Seeing the two dark circles under Du Shuai's eyes, Deputy Commander Chen went up and punched him without saying a word.

Du Shuai was knocked off balance and his personal followers rushed over to help him, but they were still a step too slow and Du Shuai fell face up on the beach.

Others came over in a hurry, some tried to persuade Deputy Commander Chen, some tried to support Commander Du, it was a mess.

Commander Du was beaten so hard that his nose was bleeding and he looked in a miserable state. He and Deputy Commander Chen had been disliking each other for a long time, but they endured it because the four great families were closely related.

He didn't expect that the man named Chen would no longer care about his face and actually beat him in public. He couldn't swallow this humiliation.

Commander Du knew that Deputy Commander Chen had been practicing martial arts since he was young. If they fought one-on-one, the three of them would not be a match for Deputy Commander Chen.

But the Du family has been in charge of the Fujian School for many years, and the number of people loyal to the Du family is more than that of the other three families combined.

So Commander Du raised his arm and called out, and the children of the Du family and their supporters rushed forward. Deputy Commander Chen was not to be outdone. The Du family has people, but the Chen family has no one?

By the time the elders from the four great families rushed over after hearing the news, dozens of people from the Du and Chen families had already been killed or injured.

By the time the two families had settled down and the people from the four great families were sitting together to discuss the night raid, it was already nightfall.

A whole day has passed since the night attack, and they wasted this day on internal strife. It is still unknown where those ships that attacked at night came from.

But one thing they were clear about was that the enemy's ships were more sophisticated than theirs, and the torpedoes had a higher hit rate and greater power.

Huang Jian was the survivor of last night. Even now, recalling everything that happened last night, he still found it hard to believe that it was real.

"Those ships approached us silently like ghosts. When our people found them, they were already very close to the port.

Those torpedoes are definitely not torpedoes. I have never seen such fierce torpedoes. "

The Du clan elder asked in a deep voice: "Compared to Wang Jinsheng?"

Wang Jinsheng was the largest pirate in the East China Sea. It was said that he had more than a hundred ships, large and small.

More importantly, Wang Jinsheng was on good terms with the Japanese and even helped in their civil war.

Jing Chongguang always hoped to get help from Japan, but until his death, he never had the chance to meet the Japanese general.

But Wang Jinsheng was different. It was said that he was a guest of honor of the Japanese general and even swore brotherhood with the general.

However, these are all rumors. Over the years, Wang Jinsheng and Fujian Normal University have maintained an attitude of non-interference with each other. Although there is no contact between them, there is no hostility either. Therefore, Fujian Normal University's understanding of Wang Jinsheng is limited to rumors.

When Huang Jian heard the Du clan elder mention Wang Jinsheng, he shook his head. Although the Fujian Army was not an enemy of Wang Jinsheng, they had seen Wang Jinsheng robbing ships at sea more than once.

Huang Jian said: "There is no comparison. I mean Wang Jinsheng's boat is not comparable to those boats last night."

The elder of the Huang family glared at him, thinking that this young man must be frightened silly, otherwise how could he say such nonsense in front of the elders of other families that would boost others' morale and destroy his own prestige.

The Huang family elder was about to say something to cover up the foolish words of his young generation, but he heard the Du family elder ask: "What do you mean? Why can't we compete?"

Huang Jian's eyes flashed with fear: "Although Wang Jinsheng has many ships, there are only twenty that can be called warships.

But last night's boat
I have never seen such a ship. It is very big, bigger than our tower ship. There are cannons on the ship, not just one, but ten cannons that can fire in different directions.

What’s even more terrifying is that these artillery pieces can fire continuously. After one shot is fired, the second shot will come right after.

Moreover, just last night, I saw at least ten ships. Don't underestimate these ten ships. I dare say that all of Wang Jinsheng's ships combined are not as powerful as these ten ships. And I guess this is definitely not all they have. They must have more ships, more ships!"

There was total silence in the meeting room, so quiet that you could hear a pin drop.

Even the elders of the Huang family pursed their lips at this moment, no longer having the intention of blaming the younger generation.

They all believed that Huang Jian was not exaggerating.

Even though the beach is some distance away from the city, people living in the city could hear the sound of artillery fire last night.

Fortunately, the people in Fujian have not experienced the baptism of land artillery fire, so even if they heard the sound of artillery, they only thought of firecrackers, and might even secretly curse who set off firecrackers at night.

If the people knew that the Fujian army was badly damaged by the artillery fire, the city would probably be in chaos by now.

Suddenly, the elder of the Chen clan, who had been silent, said, "Hearing your description, it reminds me of the Thunder Cannon."

Although the Du and Chen families had reconciled at this time, everyone in the four great families knew that this was just on the surface. A legitimate male child of the Chen family had died, and even if the Du family took out a thousand taels of gold, the matter would not be let go, not to mention that the Du family had not paid a penny.

It will be difficult for the Du and Chen families to return to their previous state.

At this time, the words of the elder Chen surprised everyone present.

"You mean the Thunder Cannon? How is that possible? Doesn't that belong to Ran Jun?"

The elder of the Chen clan said coldly: "Didn't you hear what Huang Jian said just now?

He said the guns on those ships could fire continuously, and there were ten guns on one ship!

We also have cannons on our ships, but don’t you know what they are like?”

Everyone was silent. Twenty years ago, the Fujian Division spent a huge amount of money to buy two cannons from a red-haired merchant. Over the past ten years, the world has been in chaos. Although Fujian has not been affected, the four major families are in danger. So they spent more gold and silver than before and bought two more cannons from the red-haired merchant.

In other words, the Fujian Division now has four artillery pieces.

The four guns were on four large ships.

Each red-haired cannon cost about a thousand gold coins. In order to be able to withstand the world-class cannons, the Fujian division spent a lot of money to build four tower ships, which took three years to build.

These four warships carrying red-haired cannons are the soul of the Fujian Division and the confidence of the Fujian Division.

But now, these four proud warships were reduced to rubbish compared to the warships described by Huang Jian.

Each of their ships had ten cannons, but our ship only had one. Moreover, we had dispatched ten such warships last night alone!

How does this compare?
Not only Wang Jincheng is incomparable, but Fujian Normal University is also incomparable!

But the Thunder Cannon.
The elder of the Du clan nodded slowly: "Yes, I heard that the Thunder Cannon is very small and can be pushed by a cart, and it can fire continuously. If it weren't for the powerful Thunder Cannon, how could Jing Chongguang and the little emperor run to Fuzhou? Alas!"

During the Jiangnan Campaign, the Benlei Cannon became famous all over the world. It is said that the person who created the Benlei Cannon was a young woman from Jiangnan.

At this time, Elder Huang completely understood why his younger generations were so scared.

"Are those ships from the Ran Army? Are the Ran Army attacking us?"

The elder of the Jiang clan kept shaking his head, "Impossible, absolutely impossible! The Ran army came from Jin, and they are all landlubbers from top to bottom. It was only when they were in Jiangnan that they recruited some southerners, but so what? Those people can only swim at best, and they don't get seasick after getting on the boat. When we Fujian people were fighting pirates, they were still singing fishermen's songs on the Yangtze River."

The elder Jiang spoke in a humorous tone, but no one present could laugh.

The Ran army has arrived. Regardless of whether these people can only sing fishermen's songs on the Yangtze River, they also have at least ten warships equipped with thunder cannons.

Although the Fujian Army had several times more warships than them, they only had four warships equipped with artillery, which meant they were still inferior to Wang Jinsheng.

So, can you still say that the Ran Army can only sing fishermen's songs on the Yangtze River?

Everyone looked at the Chen clan elder. Among the four great families, the Chen family had the most people. Therefore, the Chen family also had the most sources of information.

"Did your Chen family really not get any news? Your family still has a queen."

This is a bit disgusting, but the head of the Chen family is not in the mood to quarrel now.

His face was as gloomy as water, and he said, "Jing Chongguang came to me and wanted to borrow the Fujian teacher, but I refused."

In fact, he did not refuse outright. He kept Jing Chongguang hanging until he died.

It was no secret that Jing Chongguang was determined to conquer the Fujian Division, and the other three great families had known about it for a long time.

On this point, the four great families agreed that they could lend the Fujian Master to Jing Chongguang, but Jing Chongguang would have to pay a high price for it.

What Jing Chongguang lacked most was money. The Yonghe Emperor's harem was already filled with the daughters of the four great families, and Jing Chongguang had nothing left to give to the four great families.

For this reason, Jing Chongguang wanted to establish a navy of his own.

Unfortunately, he sold Emperor Yonghe at high prices and low prices dozens of times, and his navy was still just a prototype and could not be compared with the Fujian navy.

The Chen clan elder thought for a moment and said, "Jing Chongguang asked about something. Now I think he was asking about this fleet. He said there was a new group of pirates near the Nameless Island. They were very good at fighting and very secretive. He asked me to borrow a boat to deal with this group of people."

Although Jing Chongguang did not have a strong navy, the difference between him and the people from the four major families was like the difference between regular army and militia.

Jing Chongguang has excellent scouts and can obtain first-hand intelligence even at sea.

Just like Jing Chongguang himself, he grew up in a family of military generals and began listening to his father reading military books while he was still in his mother's womb.

And his scouts were all trained since childhood.

The four great families are just the opposite. Although they have controlled the navy for decades, when it comes to deploying troops, they combined are no match for Jing Chongguang.

It can be said that the fact that Fujian Normal University has been able to stand tall in the East China Sea for fifty years was built with silver.

Before this mysterious army appeared, they had the most sophisticated warships and the most soldiers in the East China Sea, so neither the Japanese nor the pirates dared to provoke them.

And now, when a fleet that had obviously received military training, had better warships than theirs, and had more and more professional soldiers appeared, everyone knew that the real rival of the Fujian Division had appeared!