Chapter 139: Sea Specter

The fireballs were fast, drawing closer and closer, scorching nearly half the sky crimson.

Firelight illuminated the surrounding sea. It was clearly dozens of fire ships, and around them on the water, small sampans were rowing away.

The lookout was so terrified his mind went blank; once he snapped out of it, he shouted an enemy attack and scrambled up the mast in a panic.

The sentry also recovered from the chaos and struck the alarm bell at the bow.

In moments, alarm bells rang out across the entire fleet, one after another. Crewmen roused from deep sleep had no time to dress before being driven up onto the deck.

"Enemy attack off the port side!"

"Damn it, stow your hammocks!"

"Open the gunports, all hands to stations!"

"Weigh anchor! Weigh anchor, now!"

Cohen was pulling on his clothes as he stepped out of the cabin, and this was the scene of pandemonium he saw.

Out on the distant sea, dozens of fire ships bore down with the wind, moving fast — truly unstoppable.

The firelight dyed even Cohen's pupils a fiery orange.

He roared: "Where are the Zeeland Griffin and the Night Watchman? Why haven't they raised the alarm!"

The first mate explained in panic: "The enemy lit no ship lamps, it's too dark on the sea, and with the wind and snow, we truly couldn't see a thing!"

Cohen snarled: "Damn it! No time to wait for the anchor — have the sail handlers raise sail at once and dodge the fire ships!"

"Aye! Raise sail, now! All of you, up the masts!"

"Boom-boom-boom!" A burst of firelight flared in the distance, followed by dense cannon fire.

Then another spot on the sea opened fire as well — clearly two ships were exchanging broadsides.

The first mate glanced at the position and said in terror: "It's the Night Watchman — the Night Watchman has engaged the enemy!"

"Fire ships, one hundred paces!" The lookout scrambled up to the crow's nest at the fastest speed of his life and reported breathlessly.

The Batavia had only just raised sail, her speed not yet built up, and with the anchor still not weighed, she was even slower. With the fire ships bearing down, there was no avoiding them now.

"Fire ships, fifty paces!"

Cohen could only shout: "Prepare sand and seawater, prepare to fight the fire!"

The sand had long been readied; seawater was drawn from the sea by a pump on deck, with over a dozen crewmen hauling buckets to catch the flow.

"Fire ships, ten paces!"

Cohen could now see the fire ships in their full blazing glory — they were clearly dozens of Ming-standard warships, with iron hooks and barbs fixed to their bows.

Fire attack was precisely the Ming's most favored method of naval warfare!

Cohen's heart was filled with bitter regret. Had he known the Ming navy would be so decisive in declaring war on the Dutch, he should have struck the Ming fleet first after finishing the plunder at Qiongzhou Island!

But regret came too late now. The Batavia could not avoid it — a fire ship slammed into her port side, its iron barbs driving deep into the hull planking.

The crewmen waiting at the side poured seawater and sand down without cease, but the fire ships were loaded with tung oil — how could a little sand and seawater put out such a blaze?

After dozens of buckets of sand and seawater were dumped, the fire did not weaken — the flames only leaped higher. Even the soldiers on the bulwark felt scorching heat and dared not lean out over the rail.

Moreover, a northeast wind was blowing, and the flames, driven by the wind, licked fiercely against the Batavia's hull.

The sailors could only desperately sluice seawater over the hull to hold back the raging tung-oil fire.

Meanwhile, the Batavia's anchor had not been raised, and she could not outrun the fire ships at speed — for the moment, there was no way out.

In the midst of the crisis, Cohen hit on an idea. He hurriedly told the first mate: "Have the ship's carpenter go below and saw away the hull plank where the fire ship's spike has pierced!"

While the Batavia thrashed in her death throes, the Polaris behind her was struck by three fire ships at once.

The Polaris was smaller than the Batavia and had almost no chance of survival — within barely a dozen minutes she was swallowed by flames.

The fire followed the Polaris's port side, spreading all the way into the cabins and across the deck, until at last it caught the sails.

The sails had no fireproofing whatsoever and were highly flammable to begin with; sand and water could hardly be thrown up that high. In only moments, the lower sail, topsail, and royal sail caught fire in sequence.

Soon, all three main masts, rigging and all, were wrapped in roaring flames.

With a vessel of such tonnage ablaze, the fire churned with terrifying fury, illuminating the surrounding sea bright as day.

Even from a great distance, one could feel the wave of heat against one's face.

The Polaris's crew scrambled overboard in a desperate bid for survival. In the firelight, the sea looked like a pot of boiling dumplings — it was thick with Dutch sailors struggling for their lives.

Behind the Polaris, several Dutch warships had each been hit by fire ships to a greater or lesser degree and were catching flame.

For a time, the entire expanse of Lingding Bay blazed with astonishing brightness — visible clearly even from General Mountain.

"Your Excellency! Your Excellency! Come look quickly — something's happened! Someone has launched a night fire-ship attack on the red-haired barbarians!"

Xu Zhaokui had no time to dress. Barefoot, he came out of his tent and hurried through the snowy winter night to the hilltop to see.

One glance showed him the roaring flames, and he stood frozen in place, struck speechless.

His personal guards and servants caught up with clothes, shoes, and socks, and helped him dress.

Xu Zhaokui asked those around him: "Do you know which naval force has come?"

The men around him were silent. The night was so dark that from the hilltop they could only make out the fire ships and the burning Dutch vessels — they could not even tell how many warships the attackers had, let alone which army they belonged to.

But one thing was certain: whoever had come, it was the Ming navy.

Only the Ming navy would use such large-scale fire-ship tactics. Even if the foreign barbarians wished to imitate it, they did not have that many fire ships.

The Guangdong Regional Military Commissioner thought for a moment, then clasped his hands and said: "This humble officer ventures to guess that it may be the force under Regional Commander Ma of Zhelin Bay."

Xu Zhaokui thought to himself that this was right. According to the memorial from Vice Regional Commander Ma Chenglie of Nan'ao, on the twenty-eighth day of the twelfth month last year, he too had used fire ships in a night battle to defeat Li Dan's forces.

This battle's tactics were exactly the same as last year's — was this not Regional Commander Ma's customary method of war?

For the coastal defenses of Fujian and the two Guangs to produce a commander of Regional Commander Ma's caliber — truly a blessing for the nation!

Thanks to Regional Commander Ma, the red-haired barbarians had not been allowed to look down on the Ming.

Once dressed in clothes, shoes, and socks, Xu Zhaokui gazed out at the sea. He saw that the dozens of fire ships had all sailed to surround the Dutch fleet.

Most had not struck the Dutch at all, but drifted to the shore and ran aground; a small number had burned themselves up on the open water.

But even the remaining fire ships dealt a heavy blow to the Dutch fleet. From the hilltop, one could see with the naked eye that two Dutch ships had been engulfed by flames, and three more had been rammed by fire ships, the Dutch scrambling to put out the fires.

Further out on the dark sea, flashes of fire and cannon fire came intermittently, as if ships were engaged in an artillery duel.

The cannon fire was extremely dense, almost unbroken.

The Patrol Inspector and Maritime Circuit Vice Commissioner listened intently for a long while, then said with delight: "That's the sound of heavy Folangji cannons!"

The officials around him nodded in agreement, and even Xu Zhaokui wore a smile on his face.

To be honest, these men couldn't tell the difference between the sound of heavy Folangji cannons and Siren cannons. They simply saw the fire ships and assumed, from first impressions, that the force at sea was the Ming navy—and since it was the Ming navy, it naturally would be equipped with Folangji cannons.

Amid the dense barrage, a single tremendous boom interjected, and then the cannon fire ceased.

The sound was astonishing—even from as far away as General Mountain, it made one's heart tremble at its core.

The distant sea surface was illuminated by the light of an explosion. A warship was burning, and through the flying snow, firelight, and thick smoke, one could vaguely make out a massive gap blown open in the middle of the ship, as if some sea monster had bitten away a huge chunk of flesh.

After a moment more, the ship suffered several consecutive smaller explosions, and the fire grew ever more intense.

This pattern of one large explosion followed by smaller ones had occurred before during the naval battles between the Portuguese and the Dutch.

All the officials knew—the ship's powder magazine had blown.

By the light of the flames, they could barely make out the ship's silhouette. It was a red barbarian warship. For a moment, the officials on the hilltop all felt elated, joy written on their faces as they congratulated one another.

The firelight illuminated the surroundings, revealing a massive shadow moving across the sea surface, radiating an overwhelming sense of pressure—truly like the back of a sea monster breaking through the waves.

The shadow flashed past, and before long, cannon fire erupted once more from the pitch-black sea.

The thunder of the guns was earth-shaking, scarcely inferior to a full broadside volley from the Dutch fleet.

After a dozen or so rounds of bombardment, the sea fell into silence, returning to stillness. Gazing out, there was only boundless darkness.

The officials could not see what was happening, nor know the state of the battle. They felt as though a hundred claws were scratching at their hearts. They craned their necks, widened their eyes, held their breath, and searched the black sea.

At the São Francisco bastion, the captain, the priest, and the other defenders were startled awake by the firelight, thick smoke, and cannon thunder.

They stared blankly at the scene before them.

On the sea, the blazing inferno of the Dutch fleet illuminated the entire beach in perfect detail. Countless Dutch sailors who had frozen to death were being pushed up onto the sand like dead fish.

In their ears, they could still hear the panicked commands and screams of the Dutch.

Further along the beach, in the Dutch camp, soldiers had also been roused from sleep and stared dully at everything before them.

The priest's voice trembled slightly: "Captain, is this the Portuguese navy?"

The captain shook his head, his face wooden: "The Macao warships have all sunk. In the Far East, Portugal only has forces left at Malacca and Goa. Those two places are too far away—they couldn't possibly come to support us. And even if they did, they couldn't bring this many fire ships."

The priest's eyes lit up, firelight reflected in his pupils: "Then this... this is divine punishment..."

"Priest, what did you say?"

"I said, this is God's wrath, this is divine punishment! God has come to punish the heretics!" The priest rose to his feet, spread his arms wide, and proclaimed loudly to the defenders.

"Go to Macao, spread the word of God's will! Tell everyone—the time has come to take up arms and strike back against the heretics!" The priest's face was fervent, his voice like a great bell, resounding and stirring.

The defenders around him, infected by his fervor, picked up their weapons and rose to their feet.

St. Anthony's Church.

The doors and windows had been barricaded with tables, chairs, and wooden planks. Only a few candles were kept burning for illumination, leaving the sanctuary somewhat dim.

The women held wooden clubs and candlesticks, taking shifts to stand guard through the night.

Hearing the thunderous cannon fire outside the city walls, they were all afraid. They hurriedly woke their pillar of strength and said: "Mistress Qin, do you hear... is it... have the Dutch broken in?"

Mistress Qin was the one who had organized the women to defend the church earlier. She had been asleep for less than an hour when she was roused. Hearing the rumbling cannon fire, she too felt afraid, but she did not show it on her face, forcing herself to appear calm.

"Boom!" A tremendous explosion like thunder rolled in from the distance.

"Ah—" All the women were startled into a shiver. Some dropped their clubs to the ground, and others let out piercing screams.

"Silence!" Mistress Qin snapped at the one who was screaming.

That woman was already hysterical with fear and kept screaming regardless.

Mistress Qin and the nuns worked together to subdue her, binding her hands and stuffing a cloth strip into her mouth.

After finishing this, Mistress Qin climbed onto the raised platform and said to the others: "I can tell the cannon fire is still far off. Everyone, don't panic. But just in case, stay alert for the rest of the night. Guard the windows and the candles. If there's the slightest stir in the streets, follow the plan we discussed!"

After these words, the women's nerves settled somewhat. Each returned to her post—some went to stand guard, others went to soothe their crying children.

Mistress Qin descended from the platform. A teenage girl walked over, took her hand, and said in a low voice: "Mother, don't be afraid. I'm here."

Mistress Qin smiled softly, stroked her daughter's head, then hugged her and whispered into her ear: "If the wokou should get in, you run for the back door. Do you hear me?"

The girl said: "We'll go together."

Mistress Qin smiled gently: "Of course we will. When the time comes, you go move the boards blocking the door, and Mother will be right behind you."

The girl felt somewhat reassured and clung to her mother without letting go.

Aboard the Batavia.

The ship's carpenter, braving the thick smoke and searing heat, finally cut away the hull section that the fire ship had rammed into.

Coen immediately ordered the sails raised and the anchor weighed, his eyes fixed intently on the situation on the distant sea.

Judging by the tremendous explosion, the Watchman had been sunk when its powder magazine detonated. Now all he could hope for was that the Zeeland Griffin would hold the enemy back.

If it could buy just a little time—enough for the fleet to break free of the fire ships and escape this stretch of water that had become a target range wreathed in flames—his fleet would still have a fighting chance.

Of course, his fleet had been ambushed and suffered heavy losses, and they were in the open while the enemy lurked in the dark. With all these disadvantages stacked against him, any commander with half a brain would order a retreat.

But there were still more than eight hundred men of the landing force ashore!

It wouldn't matter if those Japanese ronin and native mercenaries died, but the soldiers of the Dutch East India Company could not die—at least not abandoned by their Governor-General to wait for death.

Even setting that aside, even if the Dutch navy escaped intact while the landing force was wiped out, his entire expedition plan would be declared a failure.

The subsequent strategic vision—harassing Ming's Jin and Xia, pressing toward Penghu, and then advancing on the Eastern Barbarians—would all become empty words on paper.

This would be a colossal strategic failure, with losses too great to count, and he might well lose his position as Governor-General outright.

Therefore, even at a disadvantage, Coen had to gamble everything. He knew full well that there were no other Portuguese warships in these waters—the enemy could only be the Ming navy.

Once they broke free of the fire ships and the Dutch fleet formed its line of battle, the decrepit Ming navy would be no match for the Dutch!

On this point, Cohen was absolutely certain!

"How much anchor is still out?" Cohen shouted toward the winch at the bow.

"About a quarter left." The boatswain's voice came through the darkness.

Almost there! If only the Zeeland Griffin could hold out a little longer—just ten more minutes!

The Zeeland Griffin was a medium-sized yacht, and with its twenty-four cast-iron cannons alone, it was more than enough to tangle with the antique ships of the Ming navy.

That was what Cohen thought to himself.

As for the Night Watchman being hit in its powder magazine, that was just luck on the Ming side.

In a single naval battle, such good fortune could never strike twice!

Across the sea, cannon fire continued to sound—then suddenly, it stopped, and the sea fell into silence.

Only the moaning wind and the sound of waves remained in Cohen's ears. He strained his eyes, searching the sea's surface, but all he saw was blackness and flecks of foam—nothing at all.

Were he not the Governor-General, he would have screamed the Zeeland Griffin's name at the top of his lungs!

A ship that big—how could it just vanish without a trace? Why had it stopped firing?

Could it be... sunk?

In an instant, Cohen's heart sank to the depths.

How was that possible? They'd only exchanged a few volleys! Could those toy-like firearms and broken-down warships of the Ming truly sink a proud Dutch naval vessel?

Even if it had been sunk, the cannon fire should have faded gradually—how could it simply cease all at once?

Could it be...

Cohen suddenly understood, and his heart pounded violently. The blood in his veins ran colder than the howling wind and snow over the waters of Lingding Bay.

The enemy had actually finished the battle long ago. The continued cannon fire was nothing but a ruse—the main force had already used the cover of night to sail toward the remaining Dutch ships.

The remaining Dutch vessels, including the Batavia, were all within the range of the firelight—nothing less than living targets in the dark!

Using every ounce of strength he had, he screamed hysterically: "Raise the sails! Full speed ahead!"

The anchor was not yet fully raised, and sailing at full speed was extremely dangerous.

But the crew was accustomed to obeying the captain's orders without question. The sail handlers on the yards loosed the sail ties, the snow-white canvas dropped, and the ship slowly gathered speed, heeling to starboard from the drag of the anchor.

Just then, a burst of firelight suddenly flared across the sea not far away.

In an instant, the thunder of continuous cannon fire rang out across Lingding Bay, and solid iron shot came flying in nearly flat trajectories.

The Batavia took five or six hits to her stern, suffering heavy blows. Fortunately, the yacht had no sterncastle—otherwise, it would surely have collapsed.

Even so, the Batavia was grievously damaged.

The helmsman gave the wheel a slight turn, but the ship showed no response at all. The wheel, which normally required two men to turn, now spun with ease. He had no choice but to report loudly: "Rudder damaged! Steering is lost!"

This volley had originally been aimed at the Batavia's midsection, but the Batavia's forward motion caused most of the shots to miss—yet it still damaged the fragile rudder. It would have been better not to have moved at all.

Cohen's heart gave a lurch. He ordered: "Return fire at the enemy's muzzle flashes!"

Fortunately, the Batavia was heading southeast, so even without turning, she wouldn't give herself away for the moment.

For a time, the Batavia exchanged fire across the sea with an enemy ship she could not even see.

By the light of the enemy's cannon flashes, Cohen could dimly make out that the enemy vessel had towering sides and two gun decks, with nearly thirty guns along her broadside. Even calling her a first-rate European warship would not be an exaggeration.

Such firepower not only crushed the Ming navy—it surpassed even the Batavia.

Even more astonishing was that the enemy ship showed not a single light from bow to stern. Apart from the muzzle flashes, there was not the slightest glimmer—like a ghost upon the sea.

The Batavia was downwind, and the smoke from the enemy's black powder drifted over with the wind. Combined with the wind and snow obstructing their view, the gunners truly could see nothing and could only fire into the darkness by feel.

After one volley, all they heard was the sound of shot splashing into the water.

Not a single sound of hull breaking or sailors screaming.

This only deepened the terror in the Batavia's gunners.

After three more volleys, they still hadn't hit anything, while the Batavia had already taken more than twenty hits.

The gunners' fear had reached its peak. Some had already left their posts, pulling out crucifixes and kneeling in prayer.

The gun captain roared: "Get up! Load the guns! A crucifix won't scare off—"

A tremendous crash sounded against the Batavia's hull. A solid iron shot smashed through the ship, then blasted out through the starboard side.

When the gunners came to their senses, the gun captain was nowhere to be seen—only the remains of a pair of legs lay sprawled on the deck, surrounded by large pools of blood.

One hundred meters off the Batavia's port side.

The Santa Ana sailed parallel to the Batavia, moving quietly across the sea.

At Lin Qian's direction, the Santa Ana had been given a new Ming-style name—she was now called the Tianyuan.

The Tianyuan had entered the dockyard for refitting at the start of the eighth month, and the work was completed at the end of the tenth month. After a brief sea trial, her first engagement was a battle of this caliber.

Fortunately, after several exchanges, Lin Qian had discovered that the Dutch ships' individual combat capability was far inferior to the Tianyuan's—which was why he had ordered the Tianyuan to seek out the Dutch flagship for a decisive duel.

At this moment, astern of the Tianyuan were the Changfeng, the Yunfan, and the three captured Dutch armed merchantmen—the Voyager, the Cape of Good Hope, and the Spice Route—five ships in all, each hunting for Dutch warships to engage.

The Dutch anchorage was lit up brightly by the fire ships, and their warships were all living targets on the sea—there was no danger of mistaking friend for foe.

In the chaos of night combat, the command system was essentially paralyzed; every ship fought on its own.

This was exactly the effect Lin Qian had wanted to achieve. Before the battle, he had repeatedly and clearly assigned each ship captain his task.

That was: to inflict maximum damage on the Dutch fleet under cover of darkness.

Once the Dutch left the illumination of the fire ships, or once the sun rose and the sky brightened, every ship would withdraw from the battlefield.

As long as they accomplished their mission, how each ship maneuvered and fired was entirely up to its captain.

In fact, after dealing with the Dutch's two sentry vessels, Lin Qian's fleet had stopped even maintaining a line of battle.

This kind of freewheeling command style, in this era, was practically defying the heavens themselves.

Even veterans like Bai Qing, Bailangzai, and Lei Sanxiang had their doubts.

But judging from actual combat, the results were excellent.

After all, Nelson, the famous British naval commander born more than 140 years later, commanded his fleet in exactly this manner.

Military theorists even gave this style of command a summarizing name: "mission-type command."

Lin Qian knew well that the Dutch navy was powerful—even if he let them clash with the Portuguese first, it would be hard to achieve a mutual destruction—and, inspired by the night battle on the twenty-eighth day of the twelfth month last year, he devised this tactic of fire attacks and chaotic engagement.

And "mission-type command" was precisely the command style best suited to such a chaotic battlefield.

The Dutch warships other than the Batavia had grown accustomed to maintaining a line of battle with their flagship.

Accustomed to a rigid, by-the-book tactic of following the flagship's orders.

They had even formed the rigid mindset of fighting at sea by day and resting by night.

Suddenly struck by Lin Qian's nighttime assault, and deprived of the Batavia's flagship command, they were at a loss for what to do.

Some captains with experience ordered their ships to weigh anchor, hoist sail, and flee toward the open sea.

Others ordered their ships to hold position and fire back at the flashes of the enemy's cannon muzzles.

Still others simply panicked, frantically urging their lookouts to obtain orders from the flagship.

Amid the blaze of firelight and wind-blown snow, the Dutch fleet was like a pod of seals surrounded by killer whales, huddled on the ice, waiting for death in silence.

The ship captains under Lin Qian's command—such as Bai Qing, Zheng Zhilong, Zheng Aqi, Shi Kai, Mu San, and others—were mostly of the Tanka boat people origin, rich in maritime experience, some exceptionally gifted, and every single one of them had been honed through repeated real combat.

Every time the "fishing" fleet of the Eastern Barbarian Strait set sail, except for Bai Qing, who was permanently assigned as captain of the Long Wind, the captain of the Cloud Sail was changed each voyage—all for the purpose of training talent.

After a full three months of arduous "training," today was finally the day to test the results.

Aboard the Tianyuan, Lin Qian keenly noticed that the enemy flagship was having difficulty turning, and ordered a half-turn to starboard as a test—sure enough, the enemy flagship showed no reaction.

Lin Qian then gave a risky order: "Turn to starboard, heading southwest!"

(End of chapter)

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