Chapter 863 Pursuing the remnant bandits

On the morning of April 23, Liuheng Island in the East China Sea.

Although both the coalition command and the Sanlin Gang issued a truce order after nightfall yesterday, the two gangs who had already killed each other on the island still had several small-scale battles in the dark of the night, during which both sides suffered casualties.

The gangs have had several armed conflicts in the past because of the competition for territory. However, because they were afraid that other forces would take advantage of the situation, the troops invested by both sides were very limited, and the casualties could not be said to be serious. But yesterday, both gangs were in a state of uncertainty.

In the case of retreat, no room was left after the fight. By the time the statistics were counted at dawn, the casualties on both sides were in three digits. Even looking at the entire East China Sea, this was a fierce conflict that was rare in recent years.

The coalition fleet sent a few military doctors to the ship early in the morning to bring medicine, and Lin Si took them to the Sanlin Gang's fields in the west to help treat the injured. Several people from the staff also went to learn from the Sanlin Gang.

The battle situation last night and the current situation of the Haisha Gang. Takahashi Minami led two companies of the army, and then went to the local area in two expedition-class warships, preparing to respond to the Sanlin Gang, who was said to have suffered heavy casualties.

Linde, who was commanding the battle here, did not show any joy after the victory when he saw his second brother - yesterday was a great victory for the coalition fleet, but it was an extremely fierce battle for the Sanlin Gang. Even Linde

I also lost in yesterday's battle.

"I was hit by Fangui's fire gun from the Haisha Gang. Fortunately, my life was not seriously injured!" Lin De pointed to the area on his arm wrapped in gauze and said, "The ghost's fire gun soldiers are indeed powerful.

, I asked my brothers to charge three times, but they failed to break through their line. On the contrary, many people in my family were injured. Now I can only guard this pass to prevent them from continuing to flee westward."

The pass Linde was talking about is located at the eastern end of Liuheng Island. In this area, Liuheng Island is cut off by a hill called Shuangtang Ridge. There is only a flat pass about a hundred feet wide on the northern coastline. In the past, this pass

To the east is the area completely controlled by the Haisha Gang. Now it is being squeezed bit by bit by the coalition forces. The escape route at sea has been completely blocked by the coalition fleet, so the remaining Haisha Gang members can only try to escape westward.

Entering the territory of the Sanlin Gang.

Although Shuangtang Ridge is not high and it is not too difficult for scattered people to climb over it, it is not easy to transport heavy baggage there. When the Haisha Gang withdrew from the port area, they also took away a large amount of gold and silver money and

They were reluctant to abandon all the valuable goods and give their opponents an advantage, so they still confronted the Sanlin Gang here, hoping to seize this pass and quickly transport the baggage to the west. Now the only escape route left for them is to rush to Sanlin Gang.

The Lin Gang grabbed the boat and left, but before that, it was necessary to defeat the Sanlin Gang's defense line.

Lin Si sighed: "That ghost's fire cannon team is one of the most powerful in the entire East China Sea. It is not easy to hold on for this night. The Haihan Army will arrive soon, and the Haisha Gang will end here today."

Already."

Linde did not witness the scene where the coalition fleet broke through the Haisha gang port yesterday. Hearing this, he asked dubiously: "Are the Haihan people really so powerful?"

Lin Si nodded heavily and replied: "Yesterday, I saw with my own eyes the Haihan fleet entering the port of the Haisha Gang. It was as simple as chopping melons and vegetables. The Haihan army was almost entirely made up of firecrackers, which was much worse than the Haisha Gang's.

I don’t know how much more powerful they are, but when you see them later, you will know why my eldest brother insists on joining them."

At the same time, the atmosphere in the Haisha Gang camp east of the pass was even more desolate. More than one-third of the Haisha Gang members were lost in yesterday's first round of naval battle, and the three leaders decided to abandon their territory and retreat.

When heading to the inland area of ​​the island, the Haisha Gang had consumed almost half of its combat strength. The only good thing was that Gomez's Musketeers retained most of their strength, otherwise they would have encountered the Sanlin Gang during their retreat.

When intercepting, you may not even have a chance to stabilize your position and organize a counterattack.

The Sanlin Gang did not have many long-range attack weapons, but even so, Gomez's musketeers still failed to break through the opponent's defense line at the pass ahead, which made him very dissatisfied. The opponent trapped the Haisha Gang here by virtue of its geographical advantage.

Apparently, they were waiting for the Haihan people to form a siege after finishing their work in the south, leaving little time for the Haisha Gang to escape.

At present, the Haisha Gang still has about five to six hundred combatable soldiers, about one-third of whom are Gomez's musketeers. If they can't break through the Sanlin Gang's defense line this morning, then Gomez really

We should consider giving up useless resistance and surrendering to the Haihan people.

However, Li Luotou and Motegi Shinobu had deeper resentment towards the Sanlin Gang. They were too far behind the Haihan people in terms of strength to defeat them. The Sanlin Gang had secretly colluded with the Haihan people at some point to take advantage of the situation. Motegi

Shinobu had already summoned a group of desperadoes from Japan, planning to break through the blockade and directly kill the Lin brothers' home, so as to catch them by surprise. Although Gomez felt that the feasibility of this plan was extremely low, he did not

They planned to dissuade these two people from taking risks - if they could attract the enemy's attention with this action, they would have more chances of escaping.

Before the action, Li Luotou ordered people to open several silver boxes and gave each of the personnel who were about to go into battle twelve taels of silver to boost their morale. This move was really common, and many people became as excited as if they had been given a shot of chicken blood.

, completely forgetting the brutal battle with the Sanlin Gang yesterday. However, the three leaders knew that at this time, these people under their command were already in a state of being strong but weak. They fled in a hurry yesterday and carried very limited supplies. Some of them have not eaten since yesterday.

Having a few mouthfuls of food and sleeping in the wild without bedding at night has greatly affected their physical condition. If they can't break through this line of defense today, even if their opponents don't step up the encirclement, this group of people will soon be unable to survive.

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The two companies led by Takahashi Minami arrived at the coast behind the Sanlin Gang's defense line at nine o'clock in the morning. Since the beach here was too shallow to dock directly, the participating troops had to transfer to shallow-draft boats to land. However, Sanlin

There are indeed many ways to help this local snake. Under the orders of the Lin brothers, a dozen small fishing boats were quickly mobilized to the shore, and then a simple trestle was built using springboards.

Linde finally met the legendary Haihan Army. Most of these soldiers from the southern region were generally dark-skinned and short in stature, but their bodies were quite strong. They wore uniform gray cotton combat uniforms with lace-ups on their feet.

They were wearing mid-cut canvas combat boots and a gray visor hat. Each of them was carrying a musket about four feet long and a bulging canvas backpack on his back. Some of the officers-looking men also had a belt on their waist.

Holding a short firecracker nearly a foot long. After landing, these Haihan soldiers lined up in an extremely orderly manner. No one except the officers spoke. The silent atmosphere contained a murderous aura that sent chills down the back.

Lin Si stepped forward and introduced his brother Lin De to Gao Qiaonan. Gao Qiaonan said a few words and got to the point: "I heard that the brothers of the Sanlin Gang had suffered a lot of casualties before, so we took over the position here first.

Please ask Master Lin San to lead his men to the back to rest and support."

"Thank you!" Linde had long been looking forward to evacuating his family, and quickly ordered them to make way for the people from Gaoqiao South to enter.

In order to resist the Western-style musketeers of the Haisha Gang, the Sanlin Gang built a parapet here yesterday as a temporary bunker. In addition to the Juma and Luzhai made of bamboo and wood, the bunker also included gravel, door panels, and large

There were tree branches, and even a few tattered small sampans sandwiched in between. Although the shape was not very neat, it did successfully cover the Sanlin Gang from yesterday's attack, and the effect was quite good.

Takahashi Minami ordered his people to clear several artillery positions from the middle, and deployed the several artillery guns he brought in place, while others rested on the spot, waiting for the opponent to appear. Linde was very curious about the Haihan people's battle, and deliberately gathered them.

Watch closely how Takahashi Nan arranges his troops.

Takahashi Minami and his men did not wait too long. The sentry found in the telescope that there were groups of armed men marching towards this direction in the distance. As the short and powerful copper whistle sounded, the people who were originally on the defense line

Afterwards, the Haihan soldiers, who were sitting on the ground in squad units, immediately grabbed their weapons, stood up, and entered combat positions under the command of the officers. This process was still busy and not chaotic, reflecting the Haihan Army's extremely high military literacy and combat experience.

.

In order to achieve better results after the war started, the Haihan Militia were not in a hurry to fly their own flag on the battlefield today. They just arranged their positions and quietly waited for their opponents to take the bait.

Sure enough, the Sea Sand Gang did not expect that their opponents had changed after the fortifications. It was still the same as yesterday, with Gomez's Musketeers in the middle, the Ming pirates under Li Luotou and the Japanese Japanese pirates who obeyed Shinobu Motegi.

On both sides, press towards the defense line bit by bit.

"There are about twenty musketeers in a row, about 200 people, and there are more than a hundred scattered armed personnel on the left and right. The weapons are mainly cold weapons, and no heavy weapons have been found."

Before the opponent entered the range of the infantry muskets, Takahashi Minami had already listened to the military intelligence reconnaissance report. For the Haihan militia, which was loaded with live ammunition and equipped with several artillery pieces, the opponent's level of armament was actually no different from being unarmed.

The difference. Before the war even started, it was destined to be a one-sided massacre.

Gomez walked in front of the team at the beginning, but the further he walked, the more he felt guilty because he did not see the flag appearing behind the Sanlin Gang's defense line in front of him. He clearly remembered that when he attacked this place yesterday, the defense line at least held up

There are three or four flags with the word "Lin" - one of the few Chinese characters he knows. In a battlefield like this that requires desperate efforts, flags play a great role in boosting morale and stabilizing the morale of the military. If you can't see your own flag,

The soldiers are likely to become mentally loose and fearful of war. Since the opponents showed their flags yesterday, it is impossible not to understand this truth.

Li Luotou happened to be walking by Gomez at this time. Gomez quickly stopped him and told him what he felt was wrong. Li Luotou blinked and replied, "Is it because Lin knew he was invincible?"

, withdrew overnight?”

"But there are still figures moving behind the defense line," Gomez reminded.

"Withdraw the main force, leave some scattered soldiers to scare us, and take the opportunity to delay, but this guy named Lin is really good at planning!" Li Luo, however, just kept thinking in the direction he guessed, and did not understand Ge at all.

What Max wanted to express.

But Gomez himself was not sure whether his opponent was real or not. Seeing that Li Luotou insisted on attacking, he did not dare to object anymore. Besides, if he was still afraid of fighting at this time, his men would have to use money to stimulate their desire to fight.

It completely collapsed. Thinking that there was still baggage worth millions that needed to be transported out through this pass, Gomez no longer persisted and just quietly changed his position to the back of the musketeers.

After reaching a distance of a hundred steps, Gomez saw that there was still no movement on the opponent's position, so he felt relieved and ordered the musketeers to stop and start lining up to load ammunition. The skirmishers next to him were waiting for the musketeers to disrupt the opponent's position.

, and then launch a charge together.

However, just as the musketeers had finished lining up, they heard a sharp whistle from the opposite position, and a row of people stood up behind the parapet. The weapons displayed were no longer the knives, guns and harpoons of the Sanlin Gang.

, but a barrage of muskets. Then the opponent moved several places on the defense line that were blocked by branches, and what appeared behind them were all desperate artillery pieces.

"The Haisha Gang is about to end!" As soon as Gomez had this thought in his mind, the cannon on the opposite side fired.

A cannonball as big as an adult's fist came out of the barrel, roared through the air, and smashed into the dense crowd of the Haisha Gang's musketeers. Flesh and flesh could not stop the huge kinetic energy of the cannonballs, and the musketeers screamed in agony.

Before the pirates could figure out what was going on, they were hit by rows of lead bullets flying towards them. At this distance, the bullets fired by Shanghai-Han rifles were enough to penetrate ordinary iron armor, so in the team

Although the people at the front had certain protective measures, their iron armor and vine shields had no effect, and they all fell to the ground after being shot.

"It's an ambush! It's an ambush set by the Haihan people!" Seeing this formation, Gomez finally understood what happened and shouted loudly. However, his own camp was already in chaos at this time, and the survivors of the Musketeers began to change their ranks.

The front team turned around and ran away, while the teams of Li Luotou and Motegi Shinobi were even more chaotic. Some people wanted to charge desperately, while others wanted to escape back. Gomez saw Li Luotou and

Motegi Shinobu shouted in the chaos, but it was difficult to achieve the command effect.

The firing of the Haihan infantry was not slowed down by the chaos of the Haisha Gang. The order they received was to fire ten rounds of rapid fire first. Each soldier completed reloading with steady movements under the command of the officer's whistle.

, a series of tactical actions such as raising the gun, aiming, shooting, and giving way, forming a highly efficient killing machine.
Chapter completed!