Chapter 365: The Dutch Cutting Tactic

Along the Candle Dragon's broadside, thirteen 18-pounder and thirteen 24-pounder cannons fired in rolling sequence from bow to stern. The orange muzzle flashes engulfed the entire hull in an instant.

With the new guns installed, the recoil of the rolling broadside had increased markedly. The shudder began at the bow deck and surged aft like a wave, one crest after another — a continuous, dense low-frequency vibration that traveled from the soles of the feet up through the leg bones into the chest, rattling men's jaws and making their hands and feet tremble. The hull planking and deck beams let out a series of teeth-grinding groans of straining timber.

The Candle Dragon, a thousand-ton behemoth, was even pushed into a lateral drift to starboard by the recoil, the hull heeling slightly to the right, forcing the helmsman to apply a touch of port rudder to bring her back on course. The bore of a 24-pounder was nearly five inches across, and its shot was the size of a pomelo — a man couldn't lift one with a single hand.

Ships of this era rarely carried heavy naval guns above 18 pounds; 24-pounders were typically used for coastal defense.

Yet the Candle Dragon had a full gun deck lined with them, firing thirteen rounds in one sustained burst — a display of power so astonishing it defied belief.

On the left wing of the Dutch fleet, the leading Zealand had been struck repeatedly.

Even from over a hundred and fifty paces away, Lin Qian could hear the thunderous impacts against the Zealand's hull.

Each hit produced a deep, heavy "thump," the low-frequency concussion carrying far across the water.

Judging by the sound, the Zealand had taken six hits, all landing solidly on her bow.

Every shot blasted great showers of splinters from her bow, and with six hits accumulated, a yellowish-brown haze of wood dust rose from her forepart, drifting a dozen meters aft before dissipating.

One shot struck the Zealand's starboard anchor dead-on, sending the chain flying apart in an instant; the anchor, weighing over a hundred catties, crashed heavily into the sea, throwing up towering spray. Combined with the shots landing on both sides of her hull, the water around the Zealand was nothing but white columns.

As the spray subsided and the powder smoke thinned, several shallow craters were visible in the Zealand's bow, the timber at their edges splintered and peeled upward.

The Zealand's figurehead was a rearing lion with a red body and golden mane — and now the lion's head had a great hole blown through it, one clawed foreleg blasted off and fallen into the sea. It looked utterly pitiful.

The Candle Dragon sailed on under full canvas without pause, continuing forward after her broadside to give the Heaven's Origin behind her room to move up.

The Zealand was closest to the Heaven's Origin, offering the truest angle of fire, and so she endured another full broadside from that ship.

By now, the sound of splintering planks and screaming men aboard the Zealand had merged into a single cacophony.

"Water coming in the port bow! Get the carpenter up here!"

"Haul taut the shrouds!"

"Surgeon! Surgeon! His leg's broken — carry him down to the orlop!"

"Damn it! Our stern's facing the enemy — we can't return fire!"

Even as they shouted, another dense volley of cannon fire rolled in from the distance.

The lookout screamed at the top of his lungs: "Enemy guns firing!"

The next second, the already riddled bow took another heavy blow. The sailors could feel the violent shudder traveling through the hull, the creaking of splitting timber, and the muffled screams from below decks, all carried through the ship's frame.

The barrage had barely ended when the sailors, still gasping for breath, heard the lookout shout again: "Chain shot! Chain shot off the port side!"

The words had scarcely left his mouth when a shrill whirring cut through the air, like a great iron chain being whipped through the sky. The crew didn't need to look up to feel a vast shadow descending upon them.

The Zealand's foremast was then engulfed by chain shot — shrouds and sail lines snapped one after another, some of the severed rigging tangling with the chain shot, others lashing across the deck like whips.

Sail handlers screamed as they plummeted from aloft, the sickening crunch of broken bones carrying clearly across the deck to every sailor's ears.

One sailor failed to duck in time and took a chain shot square in the neck — decapitated as if by a giant scythe, his head flying a dozen meters before landing in the sea with a splash.

The wound at his neck was hideous beyond words, blood spurting three or four meters into the air; even as his body crumpled to the deck, it continued to pump blood.

Three more chain shots struck the hull but failed to penetrate, embedding themselves in the planking — the impact sounding even more alarming than solid shot punching through. In the chaos, the foremast's brace was hit and severed, the yard swinging completely out of control. The Zealand's speed dropped sharply, her bow yawing side to side. The boatswain, bent low, bellowed at the sail handlers: "Furl the foresail! Furl the foresail, now!"

The sail handlers were just about to climb the mast when the lookout shouted: "Chain shot! Off the port bow—"

A moment later, the chain shot screamed in. One round struck the Zealand's mainmast crow's nest dead-on, and the lookout dissolved into a spray of shredded flesh and blood, raining down onto the deck from on high.

Out on the water, the Great Xia fleet's line of battle had not yet fully deployed — the ships spaced seventy paces apart bow to stern, twenty-three warships in all, already stretching nearly three or four li from front to back.

Standing on the Candle Dragon's stern deck and looking back, the teak wall of hulls on the sea ran straight to the horizon, cannons jutting from the fleet's broadsides — dense, countless, without end.

With each rolling broadside, the muzzle flashes spread down the fleet's side like a serpent of fire. From the first gun firing to the last completing its shot took three or four minutes, during which time more guns would finish reloading and continue firing.

Seen from afar, the Great Xia fleet's broadside fire never ceased — like a colossal dragon lying athwart the sea, wreathed in flames.

Aboard the Hercules, Lucaszoon saw this and knew he had fallen into Lin Qian's trap.

If he had faced the enemy with a single ship, he could simply turn about and run for port. But his fleet numbered thirty-four vessels — ponderous in the extreme. Turning before the enemy would throw the entire fleet into chaos, and they would be sunk one by one.

At this point, regret was useless. There was nothing left but to stake everything on one desperate gamble.

The Dutch were the greatest seafaring nation in the world, and the two fleets were evenly matched in size — even in a head-on clash, Huo Jianren was no match for the Dutch.

With that thought, Lucaszoon gritted his teeth and said: "Bring her level, course due north — we charge them!"

At that moment, the Hercules was about half a cable from the enemy's line of battle — roughly a hundred meters.

The Great Xia fleet, waiting at their ease, had already formed their battle line first.

The Dutch fleet was currently in a pursuit formation of three columns; executing a hard port turn would make deploying into a battle line extremely slow — practically offering themselves up as target practice. Better to lean into the mistake and charge straight in for a melee.

If they could just survive the Great Xia fleet's crossing-the-T fire, the Dutch fleet could use its three-column formation to cut the enemy line into four segments, then concentrate superior firepower and sink the enemy ships one by one!

This tactic wasn't something Lucaszoon had dreamed up on a whim — European navies often used it to counter a line of battle, and it even had a proper name: the "cutting tactic," or the "breaking tactic."

Roughly two hundred years later, off Cape Trafalgar, British Vice-Admiral Nelson used exactly this maneuver to defeat the combined Franco-Spanish fleet.

Aboard the Candle Dragon, the lookout shouted: "Enemy fleet at fifty paces!"

Bailangzai ordered a switch to grapeshot to clear the decks, for by now the Candle Dragon had sailed up alongside the Zealand — at this range chain shot couldn't spread properly, but grapeshot was just right.

Off the Zealand's bow, meanwhile, was the Wave Breaker, which kept firing solid shot. From the Wave Breaker's angle, a solid ball could punch clean through from bow to stern — if it struck true, its killing power far exceeded grapeshot.

"Boom! Boom! Boom…"

In that instant, the Candle Dragon, Heaven's Origin, Zheng He, Soaring Azure, Horizontal Azure, and Wave Breaker — six warships in all — formed a semicircle and concentrated their fire on the Zealand. In one rolling broadside, counting the small guns on the open decks, nearly two hundred cannon opened fire, from Folangji breech-loaders to 24-pounders — guns of every shot weight, firing solid shot, chain shot, and grapeshot alike.

And with the two sides so close, the gunners of every ship held nothing back, all firing at maximum speed.

For a time, the thunder of cannon was unbroken, the shots landing true and hard, pouring into the Zealand without mercy.

The water columns along her sides rose tall and dense, nearly screening the entire ship from view. The dull thud of impacts came in an unbroken rhythm, the sounds of shattering timber piling atop one another, still clearly audible even through the rolling thunder of the guns.

Even though the Candle Dragon and the Zealand lay broadside to broadside, the Zealand's return fire was feeble.

Moments later, a flash of fire appeared amid the spray, smoke, and splinters — then the flames swelled abruptly, and the entire hull seemed to burst from within, tearing itself apart from the middle.

A terrifying roar overwhelmed every other sound on the sea. A black mushroom cloud shot skyward, while burning planks, rigging, and severed limbs rained down onto the water like a storm.

The Zealand's makeshift powder magazine had detonated. A ring of enormous waves blasted outward across the sea, and her hull split in two, both halves ablaze. The surviving Dutch sailors leaped overboard, desperate to save themselves.

The thunder of the magazine explosion carried immense distances — even Batavia could hear it faintly.

On the ramparts of Batavia's bastion fortress, the councilors' faces grew even darker.

If it were Lucas Son's one-sided crushing victory, the battle would have been dominated by boarding actions; the magazine explosion indicated the fighting had been extremely fierce. Seeing the high-stemmed wine glass empty, a servant refilled it with bright red wine.

Councilor Van der Meer was already beside himself with agitation. He snapped at the servant, "Get out!"

The explosion of the Zeeland had blocked the shipping lane, slowing the Dutch western-line fleet slightly, while the center and eastern lines continued to press hard through the cannon fire toward the Great Xia battle line.

Lin Qian commanded in a low voice, "Prepare for simultaneous port turn!"

Bailangzai and Bai Qing were both startled. Bai Qing thought Lin Qian had misspoken and reminded him, "Your Majesty, the enemy is coming up to board. We should make a simultaneous starboard turn."

The Dutch fleet was now on the port side of the Great Xia fleet; a simultaneous port turn would send them head-on into the enemy.

But charging head-on was exactly the effect Lin Qian wanted. Against the Aceh fleet, the Great Xia fleet could execute simultaneous turns to maneuver, open the distance, and kite them. That was because the performance gap between the two sides' ships was enormous—oar-and-sail galleys sprinting at full speed would run out of steam in at most a little over half an hour.

But Dutch warships were nearly equal in performance to Great Xia warships; simultaneous-turn maneuvering could not shake the enemy off.

Moreover, the larger the fleet, the harder it was to command. In the decisive battle against the Acehnese, Great Xia had a total of fourteen warships; now there were twenty-three—nearly double.

The difficulty of passing orders and the time needed to execute commands had also doubled. Trying to evade with simultaneous-turn maneuvers was pure fantasy.

What Lin Qian needed to do was to clash head-on with the Dutch before the fleet had fully deployed its battle line, avoiding exposing the vulnerable bow and stern to the enemy.

Once the two fleets crossed each other, what followed would be a chaotic melee where passing further commands would be nearly impossible.

As a sailing enthusiast, almost no one was unaware of the Battle of Trafalgar. Lin Qian knew every advantage that had secured the British victory.

And now, all those advantages lay on the Great Xia side. Lin Qian had no fear whatsoever of a melee.

That was why he ordered the simultaneous port turn and charged head-on.

But on the battlefield, with every second counting, Lin Qian had no time to explain his intent. He simply repeated the order. Bai Qing and her brother had absolute trust in Lin Qian; knowing he had not misspoken, they felt at ease.

The helmsman of the Zhulong roared out Lin Qian's order in repetition.

The signalmen fired signal cannons, hoisted flag signals, and lit the port-side running lights. Afterward, the Zheng He and the Tianyuan relayed the order in sequence.

On the Zhangzhou following close behind, the signalman saw the command and shouted a report up to the quarterdeck, then the Zhangzhou likewise hoisted flags and lit ship lights, and each ship in turn relayed the order down the line.

At the same time, the entire fleet remained in the advantageous T-head position, pounding the Dutch with relentless bombardment.

The Dutch flagship Hercules, with its enormous tonnage and thick hull, had so far escaped with only light damage.

But the Hoorn, leading the eastern line, was only a fourth-rate ship. Focused by four Great Xia fourth-rates, its bow was riddled with holes from solid shot, the gun decks suffered heavy casualties, the foremast had been snapped by chain shot, and the mainmast rigging was severed in many places. The ship's speed dropped sharply, dragging down the speed of the fleet behind it. Before the melee had even begun, the Dutch fleet had already lost one fourth-rate to a magazine explosion, had one fourth-rate heavily damaged, and its main flagship was covered in scars. Compared to two hundred years later, Great Xia's shipbuilding technology was far inferior to France's and Spain's, but its gunners' training was vastly superior.

In rapid-fire mode, the average Great Xia sailor could fire one eighteen-pounder shot per minute—a figure on par with the British at Trafalgar, and twice as fast as the French and Spanish navies of that era.

And compared to the British, the Dutch formation was three columns deep, needlessly putting one extra ship in the line of fire.

In such an unfavorable situation, even if Lucas Son were commanding—let alone Nelson himself—they would suffer a severe disadvantage.

Soon, the two fleets were barely thirty-odd paces apart.

Lin Qian ordered the turn while having the signalmen fire three red skyrockets—the signal for each ship to command its own fight.

Aboard the Hercules, Lucas Son watched the Great Xia fleet at point-blank range, his face twisted with savagery. After being hit head-on for so long, the situation had finally reversed—now it was the Dutch fleet's turn to shoot at the Great Xia ships' bows and sterns.

But unexpectedly, three fireworks burst from the Zhulong, and every ship in the entire battle line turned simultaneously, hardily tucking away their fragile bows and sterns. Before Lucas Son could even register his shock, the two fleets had already crossed. The Dutch, who had been beaten down for nearly fifteen minutes, finally got to vent their fury. From first mates to gunnery chiefs, everyone was screaming orders for the gunners to fire.

Moments later, the entire sea erupted in fierce cannonade. The two sides' broadsides crossed at a distance of less than twenty paces—the cannons were practically firing point-blank into each other's faces.

At this range, even grapeshot couldn't spread; the effect was like solid shot, capable of punching through two layers of hull planking and leaving a gaping hole.

Muzzle flashes, gunsmoke, screams, the splintering of wood, and clouds of sawdust all mingled into one chaotic mass. On the ships where fighting was fiercest, nothing could be seen or heard—men simply fired on instinct.

Both fleets had reduced sail to half, extending the window for crossing broadside exchanges. But sailing warships were behemoths of nearly a thousand tons that could coast a long way on momentum alone. After brief contact, the Hercules pulled out of the exchange.

Lucas Son looked back and, as he had expected, the Great Xia fleet had been split into four parts. Those six fourth-rates disguised as transports were surrounded by the Dutch center and eastern line fleets.

Lucas Son immediately ordered, "Fleet, assemble to the east side! Sink those six fourth-rates first!"

The helmsman shouted the order in repetition. The Hercules then fired two signal cannons, and a blue flag rose from the poop deck—the signal for all ships to turn in sync with the flagship.

But the Dutch ships in the rear were all locked in close-range cannon duels with the Great Xia fleet. The gunsmoke over the sea was as thick as heavy fog; the flagship's flags were impossible to see, and the signal cannon blasts were drowned out by the dense artillery fire.

The Hercules turned alone. Some of the Dutch ships behind followed its turn; others went hunting on their own.

Meanwhile, the Hoorn came under ferocious concentrated fire from the Jingming and three other ships. Already heavily wounded on its charge in, moving sluggishly, with its gun crews badly understrength and barely able to return fire, the Hoorn was caught and pounded relentlessly by the Great Xia fourth-rates.

The Great Xia fleet had just been rapid-firing from its port side for a long while, and the gun barrels were running dangerously hot. Now it switched to rapid fire from the starboard side—firepower didn't drop, it actually increased.

The Hoorn soon could no longer hold out. Shattered planks blasted off its hull covered a vast stretch of the sea.

Seeing the Hoorn under siege, the surrounding Dutch ships rushed to its rescue, in turn bombarding the Jingming and the others with everything they had.

But the Jingming and her consorts were all fourth-rates—thick-skinned and tough. The Dutch fleet's standard twelve-pounder cannons could be absorbed by the Jingming by the hundred. For the Dutch fleet to sink four intact fourth-rates—how could that be faster than four fourth-rates concentrating fire on the Hoorn?

After a dozen-plus rolling broadside volleys, the Hoorn was utterly unable to resist. Both its sides were riddled with holes, hardly a single intact plank remained, vast stretches of gun deck lay exposed, and its gun crews had been nearly wiped out.

Near the Hoorn's waterline, there were a dozen-plus cannon holes. Tons of seawater poured in, flooding the entire hold. The wounded were all soaked in water, and those lightly wounded who could still move—along with the surgeon—all ran up to the gun deck.

On its open deck, the sailors manning the bilge pumps were mowed down by grapeshot wave after wave. The winch was plastered with blood and gore, too slippery to grip. And once the pumps stopped, seawater flooded in, and the whole ship began listing to port at a visible rate. Many cannons even snapped their recoil tackles and tumbled straight into the sea.

The Dutch fleet had only six large galleons in total. Now the Zeeland had exploded and the Hoorn was flooding and sinking—they were in a very unfavorable position. At the same time, the two fleets on the sea kept tangling and merging, crossing and slaughtering each other. More and more ships joined the cannonade, and the sea within ten li in every direction was churned into constant turmoil by falling shot.

The Dutch East India Company's fleet was only a second-rate navy by European standards. Apart from those six large galleons supplied by the home country, the rest were large yachts whose crews traded in peacetime and were hastily conscripted in wartime—their training level was extremely low.

The Great Xia crews, by contrast, had participated in countless drills and real battles alike. Every man had been fed on hundreds of cannonballs. Their maximum rate of fire was nearly twice that of the Dutch.

The Zhulong was the most extreme of all. Not only were its crew top-notch, even its cannons were overwhelmingly superior—the twenty-four-pounders on the lower gun deck were devastatingly powerful, while the nine-pounders on the open deck fired at an extremely rapid rate.

A medium yacht would suffer considerable damage from a single rolling broadside volley, and be crippled after five or six.

At the same time, the marines aboard were sweeping the enemy decks with heavy muskets. Though the casualties they inflicted were limited, the bullets whizzing wildly through the air still kept the enemy pinned down, afraid to raise their heads.

On the Zhulong's deck, Lin Qian turned to look back. The Zheng He had already fallen behind; only the Tianyuan was still following. The battle line had completely scattered, and the entire sea had turned into a chaotic mess.

When he had ordered the simultaneous port turn, the Zhulong had in fact been on the western side of the Dutch fleet. The port turn had sent it wheeling around to intercept the enemy's rear.

The Dutch trident formation placed all the large galleons at the front, with tonnage decreasing successively behind them, and the rearmost were all small yachts with full-load displacements of no more than three hundred tons. Each carried only thirteen cannons total, of which the most powerful were six-pounders—and even those numbered only six. Such firepower was no more than mosquito bites to the Zhulong. The Zhulong drove straight in diagonally, bow toward the enemy, handing the T-head position to the Dutch. The three small yachts—the Swift, the Merchant, and the Courier—fired at maximum speed for all they were worth, but the shot that struck the Zhulong was utterly harmless. At medium to long range, they couldn't even penetrate the Zhulong's hull, and could only watch helplessly as the Zhulong sliced across their path.

When they saw the Zhulong's two tiers of gun decks sweeping past before them, every sailor on the Courier's deck fell silent, and all of them, as if by unspoken accord, stopped what they were doing.

One sailor's eyes went wide, and he pulled out a cross: "Oh God..."

The next second, fire burst from the Zhulong's broadside. From bow to stern, the ship's guns rolled out a full broadside volley. The two sides were less than twenty paces apart—for a naval battle, that was face-to-face. Almost no shot could miss.

Thirteen twenty-four-pound shots swept through the Courier's gun deck with devastating force. Hull planking, ribs, deck beams, cast-iron gun barrels, gunners—everything in the path of the raging iron balls was smashed to pieces.

A dozen or so cannonballs tore in through the stern and burst out through the bow, planks and bodies flying into the sea along with the shot.

At the same time, on the open deck of the Candle Dragon, nine-pounder guns were loaded with grapeshot and fired down at the Messenger's deck from above.

Dutch sailors who had been alive a moment before all turned into clouds of blood mist. After just one broadside, the Messenger lost its ability to fight and turned to port, trying to flee the battle.

The Tianyuan's cannon fire followed right on its heels. One broadside flattened the Messenger's sterncastle outright, killing the captain and first mate alike.

The remaining sailors abandoned ship in terror, while the small yachts behind the Messenger were blocked off and cut apart from the main fleet. The Candle Dragon did not pause for a moment, pouring fire wantonly in every direction — every small yacht that took a hit was basically crippled, either striking sails and flags to surrender or fleeing the field.

The scene was like two orcas charging into a seal colony, slaughtering at will for sport.

About an hour later, all ten of the Dutch small yachts had withdrawn from the fight — half had fled, and the other half were either crippled and dead in the water or had surrendered.

Lin Qian gazed out across the sea and could see a Daxia yacht taking on water, slowly sinking.

Looking over the whole sea, though the Dutch fleet had suffered heavy losses, the four large galleons including their flagship were still basically intact, locked in fierce combat with the four ships of the Jingming. Both sides' hulls were riddled with cannon ports and holes — the fighting was brutal.

And the Daxia yachts had weaker firepower than the Dutch large yachts, putting them at a disadvantage.

Daxia's three fifth-rate ships and three fourth-rate ships joined the fight, and for a time suppressed the Dutch large yachts.

Seeing this, Lin Qian said, "Set course northwest — we'll go pincer their flagship!"

Yahei

Pink Round

Pen