Chapter 383: The Great Banner Presses Forward

Lin Qian then said to Fan Di, "Open the city's north water gate and let the Sea Wolf into the canal."

Fan Di was stunned by this wildly imaginative tactic: "A… a naval warship sailing into a canal? It would run aground far too easily."

Lin Qian said, "Just do it."

While they spoke atop the city wall, three dull wooden drumbeats sounded from the distance.

The sound rolled like muffled thunder, carrying extremely far.

Lu Ruoteng's gaze sharpened, and he said, "They're here!"

Everyone looked into the distance and saw the edge of the rainforest look like a kicked-over anthill, as countless yellow-brown figures poured out.

These men all wore white headcloths. They had no orderly steps, no battle formations, no commands — like a startled swarm of locusts filling the sky.

Their vanguard quickly spread across the grassy flats at the forest's edge and surged toward the Great Xia army's formation.

Within the formation, Li Yu shouted, "They're here to waste our ammunition! Pass the order — load canister shot and hold fire until they're close!"

Riders on fast horses galloped to the left and right wings to relay the order.

"Load canister shot, hold fire until they're close!"

The white-turbaned troops in the distance stood at least one pace apart from each other, staggered front to back, covering a full three kilometers of frontage.

The soldiers in the front ranks wore no armor — not even shirts or shoes. Slung diagonally across their backs were bags filled with dirt, and in their hands they raised rattan shields to protect their heads and chests. Their weapons were a motley assortment: bamboo spears, short knives, and even axes and slings.

This mass of cannon fodder ran in every conceivable style — some hunched over in short strides, some charging in great bounds, some glancing left and right, some muttering to themselves, and some who tripped and fell simply played dead and refused to get up again.

Behind the white-turbaned troops stood black-turbaned overseers, holding long spears and shields in a single line. Whenever they saw a fallen cannon-fodder soldier on the ground, they stabbed down with their spears without a word of warning — those pretending to be dead spat blood on the spot and died struggling.

Seeing this, the rest of the fakers scrambled back to their feet and charged forward with hoarse screams.

Soon, the front ranks of the white-turbaned troops closed to within fifty paces.

From the Great Xia formation came a cascade of orders, one after another.

Along the entire front line, guns and cannons fired together. Muzzle flashes diffused through the fog into a swath of orange-red, and gunsmoke shrouded the formation for over a li.

The sharp whistling of bullets and shot filled the air all around.

The charging white-turbaned troops slammed into an invisible wall, and bursts of blood exploded through the human tide.

Wherever the canister shot swept through, men toppled in waves. Mud, shredded rattan, severed limbs, and clumps of thatch and wood splinters blasted backward five or six meters.

Within the yellow-brown human tide, a dozen-odd blossoms of flesh and blood bloomed in succession.

Gaps were blasted into the Mataram ranks, but the openings were filled in an instant by the tide of men surging up from behind.

The overseer squads screamed behind the white-turbaned troops, ordering the soldiers not to stop. Anyone who moved too slowly was stabbed down by the overseers.

The rear ranks of white-turbaned troops could only trample over the corpses and blood of the men ahead and keep charging forward with their heads down.

Immediately after, a row of white smoke rose from the position, and sharp reports crackled in a continuous chain.

The running white-turbaned troops slammed into an invisible wall — shields and soldiers' bodies were pierced through at once, and the front ranks fell in a layer. Some were hit in the chest, their torsos punched clean through, the dirt bags on their backs bursting open in an instant, spraying yellow-brown earth mixed with blood.

Several men had their lower legs shattered and collapsed screaming into the mud, only to be trampled underfoot by those behind them moments later, their screams quickly drowned out. Before Li Yu's eyes, the Mataram came surging up wave after wave like the tide, were blown to pieces by gun and cannon, and then another fresh wave surged forward — as if endless.

Everywhere in the fog were swaying shields, brandished spears, and figures toppling one after another.

The two sides had been locked in battle for less than the time of a single meal, yet it was already brutally fierce. The sugarcane field before the new army's formation was soaked through with blood, turned into a quagmire of mud. The Mataram army was too numerous, and the white-turbaned formation too loose, so that even with guns and cannons firing all at once, the spectacle was astonishing but the casualties were limited. A gun captain on the Great Xia right wing shouted outright, "Traverse the guns left — prepare for enfilade fire!"

His men did not hesitate for a moment, swinging the six-pounder's aim around, jutting straight out from the line of infantry, facing the left side of the battlefield.

The six-pounder roared, its carriage gouging a foot-deep furrow through the sugarcane field.

A charge of canister shot scattered like a puff of black smoke — and moments later, a diagonal, cone-shaped trench of blood was carved through the Mataram ranks.

That single shot killed too many. The blood mist even tinged the fog pink, and the southeast wind blew the bloody, foggy air straight into men's faces.

Seeing this, the left-wing gun crew refused to be outdone. They too swung their cannon out of the infantry line and fired diagonally to the right.

With a thunderous roar, another trench of blood was carved diagonally to the right through the white-turbaned troops.

Mataram flesh, blood, and severed limbs were carried by the canister shot, scattering through the air. Many soldiers, before even getting close, were drenched crimson by the spray of blood, their white headcloths stained red.

As guns and cannons reaped them round after round, the white-turbaned troops closed to within twenty paces and fired bamboo bows and bamboo spears at the Great Xia army.

At the same time, on the Great Xia army's left and right flanks, white-turbaned troops braved the gunfire to fill in the approach trenches.

These approach trenches had been dug by the Mataram themselves, and were now being used by the Great Xia to protect their flanks.

The Mataram could only pay an enormous price in casualties, filling the ditches with their own lives.

Along the front line, the occasional lone brave soldier made it to the formation's edge, only to be run through by three or four bayonets.

The two protruding gun crews were already surrounded by Mataram soldiers, yet the crewmen showed no fear — fighting hand-to-hand with the white-turbaned troops while snatching moments to reload their cannons. When the loading was complete, the gun captain bellowed, "Fire!"

The canister shot left the barrel, and in that instant blasted the several white-turbaned soldiers blocking the muzzle into pulp. The shot, wrapped in flesh and blood, rampaged through the crowd, forcibly carving a two-hundred-pace-long wound of gore through the white-turbaned ranks.

In all the wars ever fought on the island of Java, there had never been such a terrifying rate of killing.

Under the appalling casualties, the white-turbaned troops began to rout in great numbers — only to run headlong into the overseer squads.

At the centurions' shouted commands, the overseer squads formed a wall of shields with spears pointed forward and advanced slowly. Any white-turbaned soldier who came within reach was stabbed dead on the spot. Across the battlefield, screams and wails rose up from everywhere, nearly drowning out the thunder of gunpowder.

The white-turbaned troops had lost all will to fight and fled in panic — but the Great Xia's firepower could not stop. The moment the shooting ceased, the white-turbaned troops would surge forward like a startled herd, smashing the formation apart.

Caught between enemies front and back, the white-turbaned troops were dying at a horrifying rate.

The Great Xia line of infantry could no longer maintain disciplined volley fire. Everyone fired at will, lead balls zipping wildly across the entire battlefield, and the white-turbaned troops melted away like snow under boiling water.

By now the sun stood at its zenith and the morning fog had fully burned off. The white-turbaned troops on the main front were all dead to the last man, though a small number had escaped around the flanks of the overseer squads. Some had also circled around to the Great Xia formation's flanks and rear.

But these men were utterly terrified, fleeing in headlong panic without any regard for direction.

And on the Great Xia army's main front, there was no chance to catch their breath — the black-turbaned troops in their shield formation were already pressing slowly forward.

These men had been following right behind the white-turbaned troops, and by the time their meat shields were all dead, they were only fifty paces from the Great Xia formation.

Behind the shield wall stood Mataram soldiers armed with matchlock muskets. Every time the shield wall advanced twenty paces, the muskets would extend through the gaps in the shields and fire a volley, suppressing the fire of the Great Xia infantry line.

Further back still were the Mataram's bronze cannons — more than ten of them — though they fired solid stone shot with extremely poor accuracy.

From the very start of the engagement, Batavia had sent out troops to provide support — precisely the marine corps that had just returned from Yogyakarta. Accompanying the marines out of the city were twenty twelve-pounder cannons.

The cannons had now been brought up into the formation, and Li Yu ordered them to be integrated into the line of infantry.

Moments later, the cannons finished loading, and a volley of grapeshot fired in unison.

An entire section of the Mataram shield wall, like the broadside of a warship, was instantly riddled with holes—splinters of rattan and wood flying everywhere—while the ranks of spearmen and matchlock musketeers behind were mowed down in droves, their bodies flung backward by the force of the grapeshot.

But the Mataram shield wall stretched nearly four li across; however brutal the scene at one spot, it was nothing more than a pinprick along the whole line.

Compared to the White Turban Army, the Mataram shield wall held a tighter formation and higher morale—gaps were quickly plugged by the men behind.

The shield wall advanced within twenty paces; thousands of feet landed in unison, each footfall hammering against the heart like a sledge.

No chaotic shouts came from within their ranks—only the terse commands of officers at every level, keeping the shield formation in perfect order.

"Bang, bang…" A close-range volley of musketry.

Lead balls thudded into the wet rattan shields with dull "puff, puff" sounds; bursts of blood mist erupted behind the shields, and an entire layer of the shield wall toppled. At the same time, the tiger-crouch cannons of each banner company fired in turn, spraying grapeshot across the Mataram shield wall like flung water.

With another volley from the twenty twelve-pounder cannons stacked in support, the Mataram shield wall's front suffered grievous losses in an instant.

The frontal shield wall was punched straight through; three patih were shot dead on the spot, and the lordless army immediately fell into chaos.

Some stood rooted in place, frozen; others turned and fled—the formation began to loosen.

Li Yu ordered the several cannons nearby to concentrate grapeshot fire on the gap in the enemy formation.

After one volley, even those who had hesitated and held their ground lost all morale and turned to run.

Dense grapeshot converged on a single point, punching through layer after layer of the human wall, and carved a deep furrow through the Black Turban Army like a plow cutting earth. Even the supervisory squads and royal guards following behind the Black Turban Army were caught in the blast.

Seizing the moment, Li Yu immediately ordered the two banner companies nearest him to charge forward and drive straight into the gap in the enemy formation.

"Kill!" The two banner companies ceased fire, leveled their muskets—bayonets glinting coldly—and plunged into the opening, while Wang Ruzhong sent his marines to plug the gaps in the line of infantry.

Flintlock muskets, tiger-crouch cannons, six-pounders, and twelve-pounders all seized this opportunity to pour firepower forward with savage intensity.

The Black Turban Army's front suffered horrific casualties in an instant; then the two armies clashed blade-to-blade along the entire line—shouts of killing, screams of agony, and wails of despair nearly pierced the eardrums. On the walls of Batavia.

Lin Qian raised his telescope to look: across the flat sugarcane fields, the dun-brown and crow-blue armies collided and churned like two tides, and where they met ran a single line of blood-red.

In this age, melee combat between armies was usually extremely brief—typically decided at the first moment of contact.

Prolonged hand-to-hand fighting usually meant both sides kept feeding in fresh troops, fighting and pausing, locked in a back-and-forth slog—not the same wave of men fighting to the death without respite. Yet the melee between the Xia and Mataram forces here was brutally fierce, lasting nearly three full minutes with the outcome still hanging in the balance.

Before the two sides crossed blades, a savage burst of firepower from the Great Xia army had thrown the Mataram formation into complete disarray. Now the Great Xia army held the tighter formation, their bayonets standing like a forest, dominating the melee as their line pressed forward step by step.

But the Mataram army, despite suffering enormous casualties in so short a time, showed no sign of collapse—the rear ranks charged forward recklessly, fearless of death.

Li Yu had no choice but to commit several reserve companies to the line.

Lu Ruoteng watched this scene and could not help but stare in astonishment: "These natives truly are ferocious!"

Just then, a cook carried food up onto the city wall, his gaze turning to Geng Wu. Geng Wu glanced at the situation outside the city, then at the king's expression, and gave a slight shake of his head: "Just leave the food here."

Two more minutes passed before the front finally saw a verdict: the Mataram left behind a wall of corpses reaching knee-height and retreated in frantic disorder.

Lu Ruoteng and Geng Wu could not help but secretly breathe a sigh of relief.

Seizing this moment of respite, the new army gathered its soldiers and re-formed its ranks.

And farther off, the Mataram's crimson banners advanced slowly, their war drums thundering, the entire army erupting in a hysterical cheer. "That is the great standard of Sultan Agung!" said Lu Ruoteng.

In the southeast wind, the great standard snapped and rippled—on its vivid crimson field were emblazoned two crossed Malay krises, beside them a crescent moon.

Countless royal guards in red headcloths clustered around the great standard like a surging lake of blood.

Sultan Agung was taking the field in person; the Mataram army's spirit soared at once, and they quickly re-formed their lines and surged forward.

By this time, twenty Sea Wolf ships had already anchored within the city of Batavia.

Bailangzai stood at the bow of the lead Sea Wolf ship, shouting toward the southern sluice gate: "What's the water depth now?"

At Batavia's southern sluice gate, Fan Ti was personally measuring the water level. He drew in his sounding line, then shouted back: "Water depth: two meters!" The Sea Wolf ships drew nearly three chi of water—roughly two meters—and given the uneven riverbed, the minimum navigable depth would have to be 2.3 meters, or even 2.5 to 3 meters to be safe.

Hearing this, Lin Qian said to Geng Wu: "Go tell Bailangzai—ask him if this depth is enough, provided he stays to the middle of the channel."

"Yes!" Geng Wu hurried down from the wall; moments later he came sprinting back: "Commander Bai says it's enough!"

Lin Qian gritted his teeth: "Open the gate!"

The sluice gate at Batavia's southern gate opened slowly, and water rushed swiftly into the canal.

Aboard the Sea Wolf ships, supplies were being tossed overboard—grain, hawsers, anchors, fresh water, bedding, clothing—everything superfluous except cannons and weapons was thrown into the river.

The Sea Wolf ships' draft gradually decreased.

Before long, the sluice gate was fully open, and the Ciliwung River and the city's canal reached the same water level.

Bailangzai took the helm himself and called out: "Pass the order to the rear ships—follow the lead vessel, no veering off course!"

A signalman climbed onto the quarterdeck and shouted the order to the ships behind.

At the same time, Bailangzai said: "Raise sail—we're underway!"

The Sea Wolf ship moved slowly forward, and then two thunderous booms echoed across the canal—a bridge blocking the way was blown apart, sinking into the water and throwing up a massive spray.

Bailangzai piloted the Sea Wolf ship smoothly over the wreckage of the broken bridge, the hull grinding against brick and stone with a piercing screech.

Even Fan Ti on the shore heard it clearly.

Suddenly the hull shuddered with a thunderous crash—Bailangzai felt the ship sink slightly, and the ship's carpenter in the hold called out: "The forward compartment is taking on water!"

The sounds of hammering nails and caulking seams drifted up through the deck, and crewmen were already bailing water in relays. Bailangzai said not a word, gripping the helm steady. Through everyone's efforts, the Sea Wolf ship's bow slowly rose again, its keel nearly scraping the bed of the Ciliwung River as it sailed out of Batavia. With Bailangzai's lead ship breaking the way with its own hull, the ships behind followed smoothly, filing out of the sluice gate one after another.

Once the last Sea Wolf ship had cleared the gate, Fan Ti immediately ordered the sluice closed and continued raising the water level of the Ciliwung.

He looked back at the city's canal—the water was still churning, hawsers and buckets floating on its surface, and at the broken bridge, wisps of gunpowder smoke still lingered. The Ciliwung was a shallow river with an extremely high silt load; in the dry season, the center was barely a meter deep, passable only by small boats.

In the twenty years the Dutch had occupied this place, the best use they had conceived was building canals and flooding the fields with overflow irrigation.

And these Great Xia men, without a second thought, simply sailed their ocean-going ships straight in?

Fan Ti stared blankly at the scene, muttering to himself: "My God! What a bunch of madmen!"

No sooner had the words left his mouth than Batavia's southern gate swung open, and a column of cavalry rode out, galloping toward the battlefield, a dark-red shield-and-halberd banner raised aloft, snapping loudly in the wind.

Fan Ti rubbed his eyes in disbelief: "Madness—this is absolute madness!"

On the front line, Sultan Agung, kris in hand, came personally to the fore; wherever he went, his soldiers fought with frenzied zeal, as if injected with stimulant. The assault column formed by the royal guards drove into the Great Xia army's formation like a blood-stained wedge, tramping through the corridors cleared by their comrades, over corpses and broken spears.

At the same time, large numbers of Mataram soldiers appeared on both the left and right flanks of the new army, locking them in desperate, unending combat.

The approach trenches used to defend the flanks had already been filled with Mataram corpses, and the follow-up troops stepped on their comrades' bodies as if on flat ground, surging endlessly forward.

Fortunately, the Mataram army all fought independently with chaotic command, and not many units attempted to circle behind the Xia army's rear.

The reserve force in Li Yu's hands had been completely expended, and Wang Ruzhong's marines had also all been thrown into the line.

Although Mataram casualties were ten times, even dozens of times, those of the Great Xia army, their numerical advantage was enormous and their morale was high.

Under Sultan Agung's brainwashing, everyone harbored a death-defying resolve to avenge their families, and their attacks were extremely ferocious.

Even before Li Yu himself, several gaps had been torn open. Without a word, he picked up his great spear and joined the fray. With a few flourishes of the spear, five or six royal guards fell to the ground clutching their wounds, their assault forced back a step, and the Great Xia line soldiers retook the breach.

Beneath the great banner, Sultan Agung's face was flushed red, veins bulging on his neck, his eyes shot through with blood, his voice already hoarse from shouting—yet he was utterly unaware. Under his encouragement, Mataram soldiers launched wave after wave of fearless charges, and the dead soldiers nearly carpeted the entire battlefield, piling into a waist-high wall of corpses before the Great Xia formation. When the Mataram soldiers attacked, they could even swoop down from above.

Under this grinding attrition of successive suicide charges, even the Great Xia new army showed signs of fatigue, the frequency of gun and cannon fire growing lower and lower.

Suddenly, someone beside Sultan Agung said, "Look! A troop of cavalry is coming!"

Sultan Agung gazed into the distance and saw dust filling the sky. Beneath the yellow sand, a troop of cavalry came galloping—some twenty-odd riders—with a dark red banner unfurling and fluttering in the wind.

"Hmph, a mere twenty riders, no need to mind them," Sultan Agung said in a hoarse voice.

But the next moment, an earth-shaking roar erupted from the Great Xia formation, drowning out even the battle cries of the tens of thousands of Mataram troops. Immediately after, as if injected with a shot of stimulant, the Great Xia army began a fierce counterattack, and the sound of guns and cannons suddenly rang out once more.

The royal guards charging at the forefront met a head-on blow and were forced back again.

Sultan Agung asked those around him, "What's going on? What are they shouting?"

A minister said, "Those Han are shouting 'King!'—the Xia King has come."

Sultan Agung was stunned on the spot for a moment.

Amid the clamorous roar of guns and cannons, someone urged, "Your Majesty, our troops are already greatly exhausted."

Hand-to-hand combat is the most physically draining. From dawn until now, nearly six hours had passed, and the Mataram army's stamina had long since reached its limit. Moreover, Java Island lies in the tropics, and it was now past noon—under the sun, even standing still made one sweat. The Mataram soldiers, marching and fighting, were drenched in sweat, and having marched before daybreak without eating lunch, they were tormented by hunger and thirst.

The Great Xia army, by contrast, was well-nourished in peacetime and fought at ease in wartime, with far greater stamina than the Mataram army. Added to that, the Xia King's arrival had boosted morale greatly, and they steadily held the upper hand in melee combat as well.

By now, Mataram's chances of victory were slim. With their organizational structure still intact and their strength not yet spent, withdrawing early to regroup and face the enemy in a standoff would have been the wise move. But Sultan Agung turned a deaf ear. Gazing at that dark red banner, he thought of the great enterprise of unifying Java, thought of the humiliation he had suffered, and the fire in his eyes burned ever hotter.

He picked up a scattered shield from the ground and, under the horrified gazes of his ministers and generals, strode forward in a great charge himself.

"Your Majesty!"

"Protect Your Majesty!"

All the Mataram men went mad, snatching up weapons and surging forward, abandoning all formation as they charged with reckless abandon.

And at that moment, a large red Chinese hard sail had appeared on the Ciliwung River in the distance.

The Ciliwung River's course was winding, and the Sea Wolf had sailed a long way around—but it arrived precisely at the critical moment when Mataram's entire army was pressing forward.

At this time, both the Xia and Mataram armies were locked in close combat on the west bank of the Ciliwung River, fighting inextricably, and the Mataram army's left flank was completely exposed to the fleet. Both sides had killed until their eyes were red, and neither noticed the Sea Wolf's arrival.

Bailangzai gripped the helm, his heart pounding nervously, his palms slick with sweat. His eyes were fixed on the river, as if he had become one with the hull. The silt-laden riverbed of the Ciliwung scraped against the keel, the rasping sound traveling up through the keel and deck into his feet. He held on tightly, always keeping the ship steady in the middle of the channel. Whenever the wind shifted, he would quickly make fine adjustments to the rudder, changing the angle of the sails to the wind, using the helm to counteract drift, buying time for the sail handlers to trim the sheets.

At last, the fleet reached three hundred paces from the Mataram army, and Bailangzai shouted with all his strength, "Open fire!"

The Folangji cannons on the Sea Wolf's port side had long since been aimed at the shore. The gunners had waited long and, the moment the order came, fired at the fastest possible speed.

Loading powder, securing the breech, igniting the fuse, withdrawing the chamber... The gunners moved so fast they nearly left afterimages.

As the distance closed, more and more Sea Wolf ships entered range, and the cannon fire grew so dense it nearly merged into one continuous roar—like the thunderous eruption of a volcano.

Yahei

Pink Round

Pen