Chapter 134: Liu Xiang's Scheme

“Are we still waiting?” The person standing next to him, responsible for liaising with Liu Xiang, spoke. It was a woman’s voice.

Aragones glanced with dissatisfaction at the woman beside him. She was wrapped in a black cloak, like a monk, with long curly hair peeking out from under the hood.

“Li, I believe I am the captain of this ship. You are merely a liaison sent by Chief Liu.”

“That’s right. But in another hour, the tide will turn. By then, you will neither be able to enter the port with the rising tide, nor will you be able to leave the port with the ebbing tide.”

Aragones knew the woman was right. For a clumsy ship like a Spanish galleon, turning and maneuvering were not easy. Although it could be towed by longboats, entering and leaving the bay with the tide was still the best choice.

He just disliked a woman telling him what to do with his command, even if this woman was very beautiful and could speak fluent Spanish.

“Let’s begin,” Aragones ordered. After dealing with this, he would continue north to find trouble with that Zheng Yiguan.

Fifty sailors, who had been waiting on deck, climbed over the side and into two longboats. Most of these sailors were Southeast Asian natives from the Malay Peninsula, many of whom were once native pirates who rowed canoes and waited for opportunities to rob merchant ships. This was their old trade. The few Spaniards were gunners. Each longboat had a 2-pounder light cannon—Chief Liu seemed to be very afraid of the enemy’s firearms and insisted that the Spaniards bring enough muskets and cannons.

On the ships behind them, Liu Xiang’s men also switched to sampans. These small boats were said to be carrying Chief Liu’s best warriors. Aragones was not interested in this. Anyway, he was just cooperating with Chief Liu to capture a few of their fast boats and some prisoners—Chief Liu was afraid of the enemy’s firearms.

“Monkeys, serve the Catholic King well,” Aragones made no secret of his contempt for these dark-skinned, shifty-eyed native sailors. If it weren’t so difficult to supplement Europeans in Southeast Asia, how could such low-class heathens be allowed on the ship? Their slanted yellow eyes always flickered with a cruel and cowardly light. Aragones knew that he was like a circus animal tamer, and he had to keep the whip and candy with him at all times, otherwise he would be eaten alive.

For a Spanish galleon to enter a river port like Bopu, besides having to ride the tide, it also needed to be towed by longboats. The sailors on the longboats were completely exposed and easily injured by shore artillery and muskets, which was very risky. If Aragones were facing a well-fortified port in Europe or America, he would not dare to do so. But the native sailors were just cannon fodder. He didn’t care if some of them died. Besides, this was China. Aragones was convinced that the Chinese knew nothing about naval warfare, let alone how to fortify a port. His predecessors had robbed ships in the Pearl River many years ago, moving about as if in an unmanned territory.

The gunners on the ship were already at their posts. The gunports on the sides had been opened, and the dark muzzles were pointed at several possible targets on the shore. He had full confidence in his artillery superiority. Could those Chinese cannons even be called cannons? They were just crude imitations of cannons from a century ago.

According to the plan, the “Countess of Scarborough” would support Liu Xiang’s landing operation with artillery fire in the bay. Liu Xiang would use sampans to transport 500 men ashore, with the aim of capturing the 4 iron fast boats moored on the shore. Liu Xiang had already learned about the combat effectiveness of these boats from the people who had defected from Zhu Cailao’s side. Obviously, these boats were extremely attractive to any pirate.

The naval battle between Zhu Cailao and the transmigrators had given Liu Xiang a few basic impressions:

The iron fast boats were very sturdy and could not be penetrated by ordinary cannons. They were agile and very fast. The people driving these boats had no cannons. Zhu Cailao’s men said that the boats were armed with something like a large crossbow, which was not accurate at all, but they had very powerful muskets that could shoot far and accurately.

Based on these impressions, the pirates would mainly rely on the artillery fire of the “Countess of Scarborough” to suppress the enemy. No matter how powerful the muskets were, they were no match for cannons. Under the cover of artillery fire, one group of pirates would pass through the mangrove forest of Bopu and wreak havoc on the enemy’s camp to attract the attention of these Orientals. Then another group of pirates would take the opportunity to rush into the port and seize at least one of the iron fast boats moored in the port. Liu Xiang had given his leaders instructions to capture a few “Australians” at all costs.

For this purpose, the Spaniards had sold them 8 longboats and special towing equipment. After the pirates succeeded, they would use the longboats to tow the iron boats out of the port. The intended target was to capture at least one.

Aragones had no objection to this plan, but he could not quite understand why this Chinese pirate chief was so obsessed with these iron boats. In his view, this kind of iron boat was too strange. A boat that could move on its own without sails or oars was either a miracle of God or a creation of the devil—in his opinion, the latter was more likely.

The longboats began to slowly tow the “Countess of Scarborough” towards the harbor. The small boat measuring the water depth led the way in front. Everything was calm.

“What I want to tell you is,” Aragones said to Li Siya beside him, “my ship must leave at low tide, regardless of whether you have captured the boats or not.”

“An hour is enough,” Li Siya smiled faintly. Although she had not personally formulated the plan, she had participated in it. Among the pirates, she was the only one who had dealt directly with the Australians. Last year, the Australians’ beautiful attack had greatly damaged her self-esteem, and even Yiguan had become suspicious of her. In a fit of anger, she claimed that her ship needed repairs and returned to Macau. In Macau, she sent people to inquire about the Australians. They had left behind houses, goods, and servants, but they themselves had disappeared as if they had evaporated from the face of the earth.

It was not until recently that news came that a group of people had appeared on the coast of Qiongzhou, with shaved heads and short clothes, and a huge iron ship. The characteristic of shaved heads and short clothes immediately reminded her of Wen Desi. Wasn’t that Australian sea merchant also with a shaved head and short clothes back then?

To find out the truth, she set sail again. Zheng Zhilong was busy with the matter of pacification in Fujian, so she joined Liu Xiang in Guangdong as a guest official—Li Siya was a lone operator on the coast. Although she sometimes took refuge under a large gang and paid protection fees, she never participated in the battles between the gangs herself, and was only interested in robbery and adventure. With her superior fast ship and cannons, she always lived a free and easy life.

“Wen Desi, are you on the shore too?” she said in a low voice, a chilling smile on her face.

“Captain Li?”

”?”

“Why did Chief Liu send 400 men ashore during the day?” Aragones had always been very puzzled by the fact that the Chinese pirates had sent 400 men ashore during the day. In his view, such an action was purely suicide.

“To let the Australians win a battle,” Li Siya said. “Although they claim to be from Australia, they have not denied that they are of Chinese descent. After a victory, the Chinese like to drink and make merry.”

“We Spaniards are the same.”

“After drinking and making merry, they won’t be so vigilant.”

“To make them lose their vigilance, you sent 400 men to their deaths? God!”

“You can get such a result for 400 piastres. Do you think it’s not a good deal?” Li Siya glanced at Aragones. Compared to the Chinese, the Spaniards, who only knew how to barbecue people, were like virgins in a convent. Even the lovely Italians knew that a man who does great things should not be bound by any moral code, but should only consider whether the effect is beneficial, not whether the means are harmful. What was even more amazing was that these cannon fodder actually thought they were serving Zhu Cailao. That idiot Zhu Cailao would probably have a headache in the future. Thinking of this, she felt it was wonderful.

Aragones was very surprised that the pirate chief could unhesitatingly treat his own compatriots as consumables, while the woman in front of him only calculated how much silver was spent to recruit them. In his heart, he was extremely contemptuous. However, the life and death of the heathens had nothing to do with him. The matter of saving souls should be worried about by the priests—and he, Aragones, was the last person who wanted to deal with priests.

He suddenly remembered that the woman in front of him had half Portuguese blood. “Captain Li, are you still a lamb of Christ?”

“I go to church often, as often as you do,” Li Siya replied with a teasing smile.

“There’s a sampan!” The person in charge of observation pushed Xue Ziliang.

“Continue to observe!” From the moment the ships began to turn towards Bopu, Xue Ziliang knew that things were not good. This sea attack might begin at any moment.

“So many sampans!” the observer exclaimed. “They’re densely packed, countless—”

Xue Ziliang snatched the binoculars. The scene in the lens was truly spectacular. No less than thirty sampans were advancing towards Bopu on the sea, with the large ships following behind.

250 meters…

200 meters…

In the lens, he could already see the pirates, bare-chested and with knives in their mouths. Xue Ziliang even felt that he could see their ferocious smiles clearly.

“Report to Bopu, quickly!”

“Re—report—captain,” the team member who was calling suddenly became terrified. “The phone is not working!”

The moon sank, and the water and sky became dark again. Xue Ziliang had not yet heard any alarm from Bopu—he didn’t know if the sentry on duty on the beacon tower had seen this situation. Seeing the sampans getting closer and closer to the port, he grabbed an SKS and fired a shot at the nearest sampan.

“Bang!” In the quiet night, the gunshot was particularly crisp. A tracer round cut through the night sky, as fast as a meteor. In that instant, a figure on the small boat seemed to sway and then fall.

Li Di, who was already a little drowsy, was startled by the gunshot—he had almost fallen asleep! He quickly grabbed his binoculars and looked in the direction of the gunshot. After adjusting for a while, the sampans and ships on the sea suddenly became clearly visible. He was so scared that he almost sat on the ground. He scrambled to the duty room on the beacon tower, where there was a hand-cranked siren, and began to crank it frantically.