Chapter 364: The Beach Landing Battle

It was then Bai Yuan realized that cannons, while operating on the same principle as a firearm, were quite different in use.

A firearm could be handled by one person, but this cannon? A whole crowd was struggling to manage it.

He started pondering silently. Clearly, one cannon required at least one artillery team: someone to load ammunition, someone to aim and fire, someone to clean the barrel and reset it. Lacking practice, it became the present scene of chaos, everyone scrambling around.

When well-practiced, managing one cannon still required at least four or five men.

Alright. Henceforth artillery teams would be trained in groups of five.

Amidst the flurry, it took at least 132 blinks of an eye before the cannon was finally reloaded and its muzzle realigned on the outlaw fleet upon the river.

During those 132 blinks, the outlaw fleet had drawn significantly closer. The Yellow River’s current was fierce, and boats traveling downstream moved fast. Added to that, spurred by getting blasted twice, the outlaws sped towards them, swift as a flash.

Bai Yuan knew each of the two cannons had only one shot left.

He shouted loudly, “Fire! The rest, prepare for battle. Archers, crossbowmen…”

“Boom! Boom!”

The two cannons fired again. This time the bandit army was much nearer. One cannon got lucky, striking an old merchant ship square on. A huge hole exploded in its side, splintering timbers everywhere. Dozens of outlaws leaped into the river.

The other shot missed, merely causing chaos among the outlaws.

But simultaneously, a great many vessels crashed onto the shore beside Qiachuan Port.

The beach landing battle had begun!

The most eager boat rammed headlong onto the sand beach of Qiachuan Port.

A group of fierce bandits surged ashore.

“Shoot!”

Feng Jun bellowed. As the shout was leaving his lips, he felt a trickle and realized his nose was bleeding. He reached up and carelessly smeared the blood across his face into an arrowhead shape. “Shoot! Shoot!”

The Heyang County militia drew back their bows.

Their equipment was chaotic: large recurve bows, small recurve bows, hunting bows, light bows… sending a rain of arrows flying at the fierce bandits who had just landed.

Strangely, the bandits showed no fear. Shields snapped up, bodies crouching behind them. Sounds of: thud, thud, thud, filled the air as many arrows hit the shields; few bandits were wounded.

Bai Yuan instantly understood: “Border army! These are renegade border army!”

Wang Jiayin himself was from the border army. He commanded a large band of such rebels, formidable and fierce. That’s why he became the top outlaw leader among the many fierce factions in the early Chongzhen reign, winning battle after battle. This wasn’t bragging; it was genuine power.

If this border army group secured the beach, outlaws would swarm ashore ceaselessly.

Feng Jun was frantic: “Arrows won’t easily deal with them!”

“Hmph! Border army? So what?” Bai Yuan pulled out his own rifled firearm. He casually took aim at the leading fierce bandit. By his look, that man could be a border army captain, or someone of that rank—a rallying figure.

Bang! A shot rang out. The front of the man’s face blossomed open, and he toppled onto the sand.

The border soldiers beside him gaped in shock: “They have not just cannons! They have firearms too!”

“How can the shot be so precise? Hit the Captain right in the face!”

“What the hell? The shooter just got lucky?”

“Hold your ground! Don’t be afraid!”

Someone shouted.

Bai Yuan was loading ammunition while shouting at Ground Rabbit and Zheng Gouzi: “Do you have any hand grenades?”

Ground Rabbit shook his head: “No, we came out this time under orders to protect the Saint Lady, so we didn’t carry any hand grenades.”

“Damn, then we have to wait for Instructor He to bring the main force.”

Bai Yuan continued loading ammunition, his eyes sweeping over the beach.

After the Captain was taken out, the fierce bandits’ morale was slightly shaken, but true to the border army’s nature, they held the beach, blocking arrows and stubbornly refusing to retreat.

They also occasionally fired two arrows back, hitting the tall wooden palisade.

Following that, three more boats simultaneously rushed onto the beach, and bandits from the three vessels continuously jumped ashore.

Ground Rabbit and others raised their hand crossbows and unleashed a volley at the group that had just landed.

Many bandits fell from arrow wounds; some plunged directly into the river without time to disembark, splashing up huge sprays of water.

But more boats also approached.

Feng Jun stuck his head out from above the palisade to look, just as a bandit fired an arrow that hit his head with a “thud,” startling him greatly but causing no pain.

Only then did he recall he wore a white hat on his head; that hat was woven from rattan, resembling the helmet of a rattan-armored soldier, with quite excellent defensive capabilities.

“Fire arrows, keep firing arrows, don’t shoot those border army troops holding shields!” Feng Jun shouted loudly: “Shoot those fellows on the boats rowing their way over.”

A large number of arrows flew towards the vessels.

The bandits lifted shields, pot lids, wooden planks, even thick cotton coats, using these to block the arrows while rowing swiftly to the shore; the arrows had limited effect on them.

Bai Yuan couldn’t help but recall two or three years ago, when Bu Zhan Ni first attacked Fengyuan Town; Liang Shixian had borrowed hundreds of colorful large bows from Gaojia Village, firing a mass of crooked and feeble arrows that frightened Bu Zhan Ni’s forces into feeling timid and wanting only to flee.

But times had changed! Today’s bandits had grown; they couldn’t be stopped by shooting just any arrows casually.

Bai Yuan sighed inwardly: our side didn’t hold many advantages; relying solely on the Heyang County militia, this pier was troublesome to defend.

Just as he was pondering what to do,

Ground Rabbit, with an arrow embedded in his helmet, hunched over and ran to the cannon beside Bai Yuan, calling out: “Mr. Bai, the enemy force is too close, so we can’t use our cannon, right?”

Bai Yuan replied: “Yes, it’s unusable.”

“Well then, this rabbit borrows a bomb.” Ground Rabbit grabbed a cannon bomb, stuck in a fuse, lit the fuse, and tossed it forcefully toward the beach; the bomb rolled whoosh over to the feet of a group of border army soldiers holding shields.

The border army troops paused: “…”

Bai Yuan murmured: “Huh? Can we even do this?”

The fuse burned out!

“Boom!”

The bomb exploded.

That bomb held no small iron balls inside and wasn’t wrapped in metal sheets, so it wasn’t a shrapnel shell—its killing power was quite limited. But by exploding at the border army soldiers’ feet, it was enough to shatter their formation.

Dust and smoke swirled up; the border army troops fell into disarray, their shields knocked askew.

The militia seized the moment to shoot a torrent of arrows into the explosive smoke; screams rang out from within the haze; some dashed out from the smoke with multiple arrows stuck in their bodies, while others retreated backward and splashed as they tumbled into the Yellow River.

Ground Rabbit laughed heartily to the sky: “Hahahaha! Indeed, only with Mr. Rabbit here can we turn the tide.”