Ji Han Grand Commander

Chapter 117. Battle of Dongting Lake (V)
Xu Sheng, who was far away, could not see the specific situation of the Han army clearly because night had fallen, but as soon as Xu Sheng saw the scattered firelight, he knew that the situation was mostly over.

Xu Sheng's heart sank. This situation was equivalent to a battle between his side and the Han army. The situation was not optimistic.

However, the good news is that because Xu Sheng withdrew part of the army, the gap in numbers is not that terrible. However, the gap of 7,000 people can be made up if the command is proper.

In addition, it is now dark and pitch dark. Even if every ship has torches, the visibility is not very good. The Han army may not be able to gain much advantage in a fight.

Zhou Tai, Ling Tong and other generals also looked at the situation in front of them with solemn expressions. All the generals were veterans of the battlefield, so how could they not know what the scene before them represented?
But now they have no way back. If they choose to turn back to the village, there will be only a heavy loss as a result.

A ship is not a person. Even if there are more than 20,000 people on the ground, it will take some time to immediately change the front army to the rear army, and the rear army to the front army, let alone a ship that is inconvenient to turn and dock?
In addition, the Han army was neither blind nor stupid. They would watch the Wu army retreat and would definitely chase them. The Wu army had a favorable wind when they came, but they also had a headwind when they left. If they were chased by the Han army for a while, it would be a question whether the water fort could be saved.

Therefore, even if the fire attack failed at this moment, the Wu army had no way to retreat and could only bite the bullet and fight the Han army. Even if both sides suffered losses, it was better than retreating directly.

"Full sail, full speed!"

Xu Sheng asked the flag soldiers to issue his orders. Now that there was no way to retreat, it would be better to attack with all our strength and catch the Han army off guard!
For a moment, all the large and small ships of the Eastern Wu were at full speed, and the ships took advantage of the wind to ram straight into the Han army's fleet.

"Enemy attack, enemy attack!"

The Han army also saw the movements of the Wu army clearly through the torches and lanterns on the Wu army's ships. The small boats quickly pushed the wreckage of the fire ships into the water, re-formed their formation, and prepared to face the aggressive Wu army navy.

For a moment, the warships, fighting ships, and speedboats of both sides confronted each other, while the Eastern Wu side had a tower ship as tall as a mountain sitting firmly in the middle, which was full of archers.

The tower ship was also the basis for Dongwu's courage to fight the Han army this time. A tower ship could carry nearly 3,000 people, and had extraordinary firepower from its high ground. It could deal a fatal blow to ordinary small boats, even fighting warships, just like Yuan Shao's bow and arrow tactics during the Battle of Guandu.

Unfortunately, Feng Xi had heard of the Eastern Wu's tower ships a long time ago. The main reason why his Luzhai could only use a half-finished catapult was that he had allocated a large amount of resources to the navy and armed the navy with a batch of new weapons.

This situation is very similar to the navy of a crazy militaristic empire in later generations, where they get more and more, while the army can only starve.

"Order all ships to prepare to deploy weapons!"

Zhang Nan gave an order to the messenger, who immediately climbed up to the lookout tower and sent signals to the ships under the illumination of the torches above.

The Han army's ships, both large and small, immediately launched giant crossbows with rollers from the cabins, and also took out strange jars. The soldiers began to load the giant crossbows with arrows as thick as a baby's arm, and then tied some small jars to them.

The Han army did not remain indifferent to the charge of the Wu army, but also hoisted the sails and maintained their formation to charge towards the Wu army.

Soon the distance between the two sides was close enough, and the speedboats of both sides began to shoot arrows at each other as greetings.

When the boats approached, the Wu army wanted to use their advantage of walking on water as if it were flat ground to engage in a hearty naval battle with the Han army. However, as soon as they got closer, they saw the Han army throwing something with fire at their boats in the darkness.

A black shadow with a little fire streaked across the sky and hit the cabin of the Dongwu speedboat.

"Boom!" With a loud bang, the cabin not only caught fire, but also emitted a violent flash and loud noise, which frightened the Wu army soldiers for a moment.

"Boom!"

As the Han army and the Wu army fought more and more, this kind of sound appeared more and more frequently. Many Wu soldiers were frightened by the intermittent roar and fell to their knees in the cabin, kowtowed frantically.

The rumor that "the Shu army are all heavenly soldiers who can use palm thunder" suddenly spread like wildfire, and for a while the Wu army was in a panic.

In addition to those that exploded, there were also those that did not explode but only had flames; even worse, there were some that had nothing at all, filled with some unknown powder that covered Wu Jun's face, but there was no reaction at all.

Of course, there were also those who were stubborn and refused to believe in palm thunder. They jumped into the water and prepared to have a big battle with the Han army in the water.

"Ahhhh! It's hot! It's hot!"

As a result, some Wu soldiers whose faces were covered with white powder by the Han army floated up screaming after a while in the water, scratching their eyes, faces and other parts of the body in pain with their hands.

"The Han army masters are using witchcraft! I heard that the southern barbarians are popular with witchcraft, and the Han army masters must have learned these spells, making us suffer so much that we wish we were dead!"

The superstitious Wu army was frightened and respectfully called the Han army "Master". The Han army was even more dramatic by being described as being skilled in witchcraft.

Of course, there were some people who were not touched by the white powder and did not have any strange reactions after entering the water. Naturally, they could not hear what their comrades above were saying, but held their breath and swam towards the Han army's boat.

"There's a water ghost! Pour it out! - Splash!"

When the Han army noticed that there were people underwater, they acted decisively. They picked up jars of different sizes on their boats and poured them into the water.

"...???"

The Wu army in the water was horrified to see a pile of unknown black liquid flowing straight into the water. With the light of the torches on the lake, the Wu army recognized that these things seemed to be excrement...

Faced with Wu Jun's water ghost tactics, Feng Xi naturally had no good way to completely eradicate them, but he suddenly remembered a scene in his future memory when he went to a swimming pool when he was young.

At that time, Feng Tunan was less than 20 years old. After coming to the big city, he naturally wanted to experience places like swimming pools.

After Feng Tunan swam in the water for a while wearing sunglasses and swimming trunks, he saw a yellow liquid spurting out from the back of the swimming trunks of a middle-aged man with a big belly not far in front of him in the water. This feeling makes him feel nauseous even now.

So Feng Xi felt the same way and asked all kinds of golden juices to be prepared on large and small ships in advance, so that as long as they found that Wu Jun intended to fight them by diving, they would just pour the juices down.

There is a saying in the future that goes, "A mop dipped in shit is like Lu Bu in the world." Although everyone usually consumes some unhealthy things, there is still a big difference between being unknowing and knowing. As Dongfang Shuo said, "Out of sight, out of mind."

(End of this chapter)