Chapter 79: Battle Of Queyue
The fleet sailed majestically across the river surface. Gan Ning carefully examined the map inside the cabin of the leading tower ship. He pointed at Queyue City and asked the surrendering Deputy General Kan Huang: “May I ask, General Kan, how many troops are there in Queyue City in total?”
Kan Huang also came from the prominent family Kan of Jiangxia. His father Kan Ze had once served as Prefect of Wuling Commandery. The Kan family’s mansion and ancestral hall were both located in the former E County, so Kan Huang chose to surrender and become Gan Ning’s subordinate rather than a prisoner of war.
Since he had chosen to surrender to Gan Ning, Kan Huang naturally did not want Huang Zu to take back southern Jiangxia Commandery. If Huang Zu took it back, his surrender to Gan Ning would implicate his family.
“Reporting to my lord, Queyue City previously had over 65,000 troops. This subordinate led 10,000 to rescue Wan County, leaving 55,000. This subordinate does not know how many men Huang Zu brought to attack Wuchang County, but Queyue City is definitely garrisoned by his son Huang She. But there is one point I must remind my lord of: Huang Zu has already sought aid from Liu Biao, earnestly requesting Liu Biao to send troops to help him retake southern Jiangxia. It is possible that Queyue City now has Liu Biao’s troops.”
Gan Ning nodded and smiled as he asked: “Isn’t the administrative seat of Jiangxia Commandery Xiling County? Why has Huang Zu been staying inside Queyue City?”
“My lord may not know this, but Xiling County is not along the Yangtze River and has inconvenient transportation. It is only nominally the administrative seat. Ever since Queyue City was built, Huang Zu moved all the officials of Jiangxia Commandery inside Queyue City, including his own family.”
At this point, Kan Huang suddenly somewhat understood his lord’s intention. He said in surprise: “Could it be that my lord wants to besiege Wei to rescue Zhao?”
Gan Ning nodded. “Wuchang County has over 10,000 troops garrisoned. For Huang Zu to take Wuchang County, two or three myriad men are not enough; he needs at least four or five myriad. Therefore, Queyue City must be weakly defended. If I attack Queyue City and force Huang Zu to return to its aid, the siege of Wuchang County will be lifted.”
Kan Huang sighed softly. “I’m afraid that at that time, my lord will have to fight a major battle with Huang Zu again!”
Gan Ning smiled faintly. “I have powerful firearms, which will surely catch Huang Zu off guard.”
Kan Huang’s face reddened as he said: “My lord’s fire oil pottery bottles are indeed very powerful. There has never been such a battle tactic before!”
In the Three Kingdoms Period, naval battle fire attacks basically involved preparing firewood and sulfur, piling it on ships, igniting it, and charging into the enemy ship formation—like the Battle of Chibi. Even setting fire to barracks mostly used torches, oil, and sulfur, such as Cao Cao’s fire attack on Wuchao in the Battle of Guandu, and so on.
There was no such individual firearm combat method as Gan Ning’s.
Even when fierce fire oil appeared on the battlefield in the Song Dynasty, it was used in fierce oil fire cabinets to spray fire for combat. It was not until the Ming Dynasty that fierce fire oil was put into porcelain bottles as individual thrown firearms. Thus, Gan Ning’s individual firearm method was 1,300 years ahead.
It is not that the ancients lacked this wisdom, but fire attack was after all only an auxiliary combat method. It was not used in most campaigns, nor was there a need to research it deeply.
However, Gan Ning’s firearm has relatively low technical content; it is just an idea. Once Gan Ning uses it first, Huang Zu and Sun Quan will quickly follow suit.
The key is here: Gan Ning must severely damage Huang Zu’s navy with individual firearms before Huang Zu learns to use them, rendering him unable to compete in naval battles in the future.
The fleet quietly arrived at Xiakou at night. Gan Ning sent scouts to probe the enemy situation. At the first watch, the scouts returned and reported the military intelligence.
Inside the cabin, Gan Ning used wooden blocks to demonstrate the military situation to everyone.
“This is Queyue City. Currently, there are only 5,000 troops garrisoning it, but Liu Biao has sent his nephew Liu Hu and Han Xi leading 5,000 troops to support it, so Queyue City has a total of 10,000 troops.”
“May I ask my lord, where are they stationed?” Strategist Xu Shu asked.
“This is the interesting part. Huang She leads 5,000 troops stationed inside Queyue City, but Liu Biao’s troops are living on 100 tower ships, moored at the dock to the east. The dock to the west is Huang Zu’s shipyard, surrounded by a water fence, with 6,000 mengchong warships docked inside.”
At this point, Gan Ning smiled and said: “Could it be that the strategist has an idea?”
Xu Shu stroked his beard and smiled. “I have a plan: strike by water and land, and we will surely annihilate the enemy army completely!”
The Yuzhang Army’s 30 mengchong warships had approached the water fortress camp palisade. These 30 mengchong warships were all equipped with oars, without long oars. The greatest advantage was eliminating the 12 oarsmen, replacing them with four men pedaling the oars, thus freeing up eight soldiers for combat and doubling the combat power.
Not far behind the 30 mengchong warships were 30 doujian, each with 100 men: 20 oarsmen and 80 combatants. These 30 doujian were responsible for supporting the mengchong warships.
On either side of the water fortress gate were watchtowers built in the water, each with two soldiers on guard.
In the darkness, several black-clothed water ghosts emerged from the water and climbed toward the watchtowers with water spikes on their backs. They suddenly jumped into the watchtowers, raising their water spikes to stab the sentries viciously. The two soldiers were instantly pierced through the chest, screaming as they fell. The watchtower on the other side was the same: two sentries were killed by the water ghosts.
On the watchtower, a fire starter was waved three times. To the east appeared a large tua warship, followed by 30 mengchong warships. But they did not go through the gate; instead, they prepared to ram open the camp palisade to the east.
This place was closest to Liu Biao’s 100 tower ships, less than 100 paces away. Going through the water gate would be two li away.
The tua warship suddenly accelerated. With a ‘boom’ there was a loud crash, and the water fortress enclosure was rammed open with a gap over ten zhang wide. The tua warship charged in, and the 30 mengchong warships behind accelerated one after another, rushing through the gap into the enemy water fortress, straight for the 100 tower ships moored 100 paces away.
“Dang! Dang! Dang! Dang!”
The sentries on the tower ships urgently rang the alarm bells. Soldiers awoke in panic from deep sleep. They hastily put on shoes, had no time to don armor, and rushed out of the cabins holding spears.
By now, the mengchong warships had closed in, throwing lit fire oil cans onto the large ships. Soon, blazing fires erupted on the decks of the 100 tower ships, with thick smoke billowing. The soldiers immediately panicked.
Deputy General Han Xi had realized the ships were about to be engulfed in flames. He shouted: “Rush to shore! Rush to shore!”
Soldiers desperately charged through the flames. Many slipped on fire oil, fell into the blaze, and were instantly consumed. Many others had their hair ignited, screaming as they ran wildly, collapsing moments later, curling up as they burned.
But over 4,500 still successfully rushed through the flames and fled toward the shore. Unexpectedly, as several thousand reached the shore, arrows came like a sudden rain. The soldiers were caught off guard and fell pierced by arrows. Han Xi, running at the front, was hit by over 100 arrows. He had not had time to don iron armor and was instantly turned into a porcupine, dying on the spot.
Over 1,000 soldiers were shot dead or wounded, scaring the others into lying flat on the ground, not daring to move. They only heard arrows whizzing overhead, filling all with terror.
Suddenly, the arrows stopped. Over 10,000 Yuzhang Army soldiers charged from all directions. The shore was filled with screams; the enemy were slaughtered, crying for father and mother. The Yuzhang Army shouted in unison: “Those who surrender will not be killed! Those who surrender will not be killed!”
Liu Biao’s soldiers finally found a way to live and knelt to surrender one after another.
At the same time, a beacon tower was lit at the highest point of Queyue City. The beacon fire shone brightly in the night, urgently calling for aid from Huang Zu’s army 200 li away.
Huang Zu was at that moment leading 50,000 troops and several thousand warships to besiege E County. A beacon tower was lit in Zhu County across the great river, and Queyue City’s call-for-aid beacon fire reached Zhu County.
