Great Tang Southern Emperor

"Yes."

The banquet continued, but everyone's faces were not very good-looking. In their opinion, if the sharp blade hadn't appeared in time, something might really happen to Li Zhen this time, and they would all be finished with it.Therefore, in the following banquet, they not only made the security work to the extreme, but also inspected almost every dish thoroughly, and even replaced the serving plates with wooden plates, and their eyes were still fixed on Li Zhen. , I was afraid that something would happen to him again, so I didn't eat a few mouthfuls of food at all.And being watched by so many people, even Li Zhen couldn't bear it a little bit, she was very depressed, and in the end she could only hastily end the banquet and let them all go away.

……

Li Zhen was woken up by someone: "Your Highness, Your Highness? Wake up quickly..."

"Huh?" Li Zhen opened her eyes with difficulty, still a little confused: "Have we reached Lingnan? Why so fast?"

"Your Highness, wake up." Cheng Chuliang couldn't laugh or cry: "Our reinforcements have arrived."

"Oh, we'll be there when we get there." Li Zhen rubbed her eyes, she was exhausted yesterday, and immediately fell into a deep sleep after the banquet, but she didn't close her eyes for a long time before being woken up by Cheng Chuliang.

"Wait a minute?" Li Zhen woke up suddenly: "What reinforcements? Where did we get reinforcements? We didn't seem to ask for help, did we?"

This is really strange. After a battle yesterday, he didn't ask for help. How could there be reinforcements?

"It was my subordinate who asked for help." Cheng Chuliang explained: "At the beginning, my subordinate didn't know that Your Highness had other arrangements, so after our cannon popped a problem, I immediately sent a letter to Fang Yiai for help. After our rescue pigeon, Fang Yiai set off immediately with Lin Fa and his fleet, and traveled all night, but when they arrived, we even ended the celebration banquet... Your Highness, you don't know , Fang Yiai's face is as black as the bottom of a pot, I'm dying of laughter... Hahaha..."

"What?" Who knew that after hearing this, Li Zhen was shocked and paled: "Why didn't you write to Fang Yi'ai afterwards to relieve the danger?"

Cheng Chuliang didn't notice Li Zhen's face, and continued to say indifferently: "Oh, the situation was so urgent at that time, and there were so many things after the war, how could my subordinates have time to think about this? When my subordinates remembered, Fang Yiai had already Here we come... What's the matter, Your Highness? Has something happened?"

Only now did Cheng Chuliang notice Li Zhen's ugly face.

"Oops, you fell into the enemy's plan to lure the tiger away from the mountain." Li Zhen's face was very ugly, but she didn't say anything, just sighed: "All this is the enemy's conspiracy, from our being besieged to the breakdown of the shells. As well as your request for help, all of this is in the calculation of the enemy, you have been fooled..."

"What? Your Highness, are you saying that the real target of the enemy is Luzon?" Cheng Chuliang is not a fool, he quickly analyzed the enemy's plan from Li Zhen's words - creating a sense of urgency in Cheng Chuliang by creating various desperate situations , and then asked for help from the nearest Luzon Protectorate.Fang Yiai is Li Zhen's absolute confidant, and has been with him since Li Zhen was three years old. It is absolutely impossible for him to see something happen to Li Zhen. Therefore, after receiving the distress message, he will definitely use all his troops to rescue Li Zhen. .

The place where Li Zhen was trapped was at sea, and the only way to effectively rescue her was to use the fleet.

There are two fleets in the entire Luzon, and the closest to Fang Yiai is naturally the Yegang Fleet headquartered in Yegang. The situation is urgent, and Fang Yiai only has this fleet, or only the one stationed in Yegang. The sub-fleet can be called, and Fang Yiai did exactly that. He transferred the elite of the entire Yegang Fleet sub-fleet, leaving only some old, weak and sick left in Yegang to look after the house.

However, there is only this squadron in the entire Coconut Port. Once it is transferred away, the defense of the Coconut Port sea area will become empty, and it will also give the enemy an opportunity to take advantage of it. If the enemy really chooses to attack here, then the light With the remaining shrimp soldiers and crab generals, it really doesn't matter.

Although it is said that there are large-scale coastal defense forts deployed in Yegang, which are powerful, but the coastal defense artillery is just a dead thing after all. If the enemy has a cannon with enough range, they will be able to knock down the coastal defense fort sooner or later. ——After all, coastal defense artillery is only a fixed target, and it is much easier to fight than a moving warship.

Chapter 1130 Consequences of the Fall of Coconut Harbor

Chapter 78 Consequences of the Fall of Coconut Port

Without the protection of coastal defense guns, the entire Yegang would become a stripped flower girl, allowing the enemy to abuse wantonly—although there is still a large army stationed in Yegang, but first the army was cleaned by Li Zhen After reading it again, most of the middle and low-level officers were sent to Prison Island by him, resulting in a shortage of low-level officers here, let alone commanding battles. It is already very good to be able to maintain the current situation without chaos.

Originally, these positions were very important, which is why Fang Yiai has allowed corruption to run rampant in the army all these years and can only watch helplessly. After all, without these officers, there will really be chaos in Luzon.

It's just that recently it happened to be the time for a defense change. Once the defense change is over and these officers are transferred to other places, their deeds in Luzon will be wiped out. This is something Li Zhen does not allow.

Moreover, in Li Zhen's plan, once the defense change is over, there will be a large number of officers flooding Luzon, and it will naturally return to normal here.But before the change of defense is over, the ability to organize battles here in Yegang is very weak, but something went wrong at this time. Once the enemy's target is really Luzon, facing a ferocious enemy, even if you have powerful gunpowder in your hands Weapons, in the absence of a military officer certificate command, they may not be able to withstand it.

What's more, the cleansing of Yegang, including Li Zhen and Fang Yiai, has not been completed until now. Let alone the civilians, even in the army, there are still a certain number of spies planted by the enemy.

These spies may not be useful in normal times, but now Yegang is the weakest time. If the enemy attacks Yegang at this time, their spies should sabotage behind the scenes, burn food, blow up an arsenal, or light two Create chaos or something, or even assassinate one or two generals and lieutenants to spread some rumors, etc. After a few times like this, the entire Yegang defenders will definitely be in chaos.If the enemy chooses to attack at this time, it will definitely be invincible, and Yegang may not be able to defend.

And what will happen after Coconut Port is attacked?

First of all, the enemy will definitely make a lot of money. Yegang is a very famous big city overseas in Datang, and it pays millions of taxes every year-and this is just taxes, and the amount of private assets is absolutely amazing. , as long as the enemy dares to be ruthless and carry out a thorough looting after the capture of Yegang, the money collected must be at least hundreds of millions...

Secondly, the ransacking of Coconut Port was mainly caused by Li Zhen’s previous purges, which led to insufficient defense forces. Once someone blames Li Zhen for this incident, it will definitely bring Li Zhen a huge reputation loss. loss.

And don't forget, since the enemy ransacked Yegang, the people living there would definitely not be willing, and once they resisted, the enemy would usher in a merciless massacre, and even Yegang would be slaughtered, which would also be pacified. On Li Zhen's head—the death of so many people is not a trivial matter. Think about Hou Junji's fate after the Rili massacre. It has something to do with him. If this matter is not handled properly, it may even affect his succession to the throne in the future.

What's more terrible is that once the enemy captures Yegang, the arsenal and ship repair yard located inside Yegang is likely to fall into the hands of the enemy, and the arsenal is nothing more than the arsenal. After that, the guns and cannons will naturally become waste. The problem is the shipyard. Once the shipyard is captured, the technology will fall into the hands of the enemy.

After yesterday's battle, Li Zhen has also discovered that the enemy's cannons are very small. It's not because their cannon production is low. In fact, their production is still very good, at least they have initially reached the capacity of mass production—although the fleet No enemy ships were captured, nor their cannons were captured, but a lot of dumb guns were collected (the keel of a battleship was hit by dumb bombs before), and the performance of the cannons was seen from the craftsmanship of the shells. After all Compared with cannonballs, the manufacturing process of cannons is still very simple.

The reason why the enemy is not equipped with a large number of cannons is purely because the quality of the ships is not good, which is obviously not as good as their own warships. This is probably because their technology is not up to standard.

And this is the most terrible thing, because although Yegang Shiprepair Yard is only a ship repair yard in name, it actually has shipbuilding capabilities. Although it can only build cruisers and destroyers, it cannot build battleships above tier three, but that is just equipment. It’s just not up to the standard and the restrictions of the imperial court. In fact, the workers inside are also very skilled, and for the convenience of maintenance, there are some battleship data and rough design drawings in the shipyard...

Once these materials fall into the hands of the enemy, maybe they can really reverse reasoning through these drawings, and then deduce the design of the battleship - and once the enemy has the ability to manufacture battleships, then everything will be over.They can install larger caliber cannons on the ship, and then create a battleship with exactly the same performance as Datang. Coupled with the huge profits they made in Coconut Port, they can spend a lot of money to manufacture small battleships or even simply Battleships, and then fighting for supremacy with Datang at sea - this is equivalent to creating an opponent for himself by Datang himself, and it will be too late to regret everything at that time...

Even if they don't compete with Datang for hegemony, making trouble for Datang at sea is enough for Datang to be anxious. Moreover, the appearance of a large number of warships will inevitably disrupt the original order at sea. , or increase the number of escort warships, and either of these two options will have an impact on Datang.

If you choose the first one, then not only the current enemies will continue to quarrel with Datang, but with enough weapons of war, those careerists inside Datang who have been hiding will definitely expose their ambitions—to Datang What does it mean to be a courtier?No matter how great a courtier is, he is just a dog.How can you enjoy being the emperor yourself?Anyway, there are so many islands in the sea that have not been occupied by the imperial court. If we find a good place to be the king and become the king of the mountain, wouldn't it be more enjoyable than being a dog in Datang, right?

Not to mention those aristocratic families, I am afraid that some powerful businessmen will think so - isn't that what the later generations of Lanfang Gonghe did?It just failed in the end.

In short, once such a thing happens, Datang will definitely be devastated. God knows how many things will be delayed?

Chapter 1131 The consequences are serious

Chapter 79 Serious Consequences

As for the second option: increasing the number of escort warships, it is even more impossible. Not to mention that each warship is worth tens of thousands of dollars, increasing the number of warships is a great consumption of Datang's finances. It has not been protected yet, and the fleets in some important places have not been allocated enough numbers. Where can I have spare money to increase the strength of the existing fleets?

What's more, if the news of the enemy's warships spreads, those greedy businessmen will not be willing-every time they go to sea, they will give a lot of profits to others. It's just that the situation is stronger than others. At present, only the imperial court has warships, and they have no other way, but if there is news that the enemy also has warships... the merchants will not be happy, they will definitely interfere in this matter.

What's more, even if Datang does not disclose the blueprints of the warships, the enemy may disclose or sell the warships in order to cause trouble for Datang. Not necessarily a battleship.

In short, the enemy's acquisition of warship blueprints is very harmful. Once the enemy's plot succeeds, once they are allowed to manufacture and sell warships in batches, it will definitely bring super troubles to Datang.If you want to contain them again, you can only wait until the popularity of steam warships or even steel warships... But this is still very difficult for the current Datang. After all, Datang has not even completed the formation of the fleet. The output is also not very sufficient. If you want to popularize steam warships-I am afraid that you will have to wait until ten years later to find America...

As for the steel battleship, there is no shadow, it is estimated that it will have to wait 50 years...

"So serious?" Hearing Li Zhen's deduction, Cheng Chuliang became anxious immediately, and instead of the previous calm, he urged anxiously: "Your Highness, if this is the case, then let's go back quickly. Our firepower and speed may be able to block the enemy in Yegang before the enemy captures it, and then we will attack from inside and outside, and it may not be necessary to make a dumpling for the enemy."

"That's the only way to go." Li Zhen sighed: "Now that things have happened, I can only hope that the coastal defense fort and the Yegang army can resist for a while longer."

"I will. After all, they have firearms to help, and the enemy's cold weapons can't get close to them at all." Now, Cheng Chuliang can only comfort himself in this way - completely forgetting that since the enemy can make naval guns, then It should be easier to make cannons for the army.

"I said Cheng Chuliang, did you forget about me?" Just as Cheng Chuliang was about to go out to deliver the order, Fang Yiai barged in with a bluff, with a very ugly face: "Your Highness, I have to ask you I have made an opinion, you should replace this unreliable Cheng Chuliang, this kid is also unreliable, you said that the battle is over, you should at least give us a letter, at least don't make us so anxious, What do you mean by holding a banquet without making a sound? I didn’t even have a bite of delicious food... Ah no, I didn’t even eat a meal. I hurriedly brought someone to rescue you Well, my subordinates are fine, but the brothers below have their own opinions. Some people even say that you are the King Zhou You of the Fenghuo Opera Prince...Of course, don’t be angry, Your Highness, I have punished them severely , Your Highness, how can you be King Zhou You? You must at least be King Ping Zhou who turned the tide... Hey, Cheng Chuliang, let me go, why are you pushing me?"

"Shut up and come out with me." Cheng Chuliang was furious, why don't you know what's good or bad?I pushed you for your own good, what are you talking about?The more you say it, the more unreliable it is. King Zhou You is nothing, so is King Zhou Ping just fine?Since then, the Zhou Dynasty has been completely divided. The princes are fighting for hegemony, and the world is in chaos. You compare His Highness to King Ping of Zhou. Do you want to split the Tang Dynasty?Or do you intend to cause chaos in the world?Look at what nonsense you are talking about?

"Okay, I'll just go out, don't drag me..."

Fang Yiai staggered and was dragged out by Cheng Chuliang: "What are you doing? What are you doing? Is something wrong? I'm coming out, tell me now."

After all, he is not an idiot. In fact, when he first entered, he realized that something was wrong with the atmosphere, so he directed and acted out such a farce, just to liven up the atmosphere, but he was interrupted by Cheng Chuliang and pulled out. He immediately Then he understood the seriousness of the matter - the matter was definitely not as simple as he imagined, but a hundred times more serious.

"It's too late, you hurry up and order your people to sail quickly, and let them go back to Yegang as quickly as possible." Cheng Chuliang said eagerly: "Something has happened, and Yegang is going to be over."

"Don't talk nonsense." Fang Yiai said in surprise, "Yegang was fine when I came out, but it's meaningless for me to say you, how can you curse me when I'm fine?"

"Who cursed you? Hurry up and take your boat away, and we will follow you on board immediately." Cheng Chuliang urged: "I will tell you the specifics later, and now hurry up and give orders..."

"All right, all right, I'll give the order right away, don't push me."

After less than a stick of incense, Fang Yiai came back again and found Cheng Chuliang: "Okay, the fleet has already started to move, you can tell now, what's going on? We're all gone at sea It's been a night and a half day, it's fine if we don't have big fish and meat to entertain us, and we will be driven away without even giving us a drink... Let me tell you, the brothers below have big opinions. If you don't make it clear, then you Just wait to be drowned by the saliva of tens of thousands of my brothers."