Chapter 1160: It's Dark, and the Fighting Has Begun

California, Flood Valley, the tenth day of the ninth month.

When the scattered gunfire began to ring out, Don Juan José, who had been busy for nearly the whole day, was dining with his senior officers inside a large tent that had just been pitched. In this era, the high-ranking generals of Europe's monarchies were almost all great aristocrats who had been fortunate in their birth, and in their thinking there was no such thing as sharing hardships with the common soldiers. Even at the front, they had to put on the airs of great nobles and properly enjoy their aristocratic lives. Don Juan José was no exception — tonight, in the tent where he dined, not only was a great spread of carefully prepared delicacies and fine French wines laid out, but there were also several attendants in wigs and embroidered coats waiting on him, and even someone playing the violin.

Just as Don Juan José, the Marquis of Gaspar, and several other generals from Spain or Germany were enjoying the fine food amid the beautiful music of the violin, the faint sound of gunfire suddenly came from the north.

"What's going on?" Don Juan José set down the stemmed wine glass in his hand, his brows knitting slightly.

The aging Marquis of Gaspar at his side cocked an ear and listened. "It should be coming from the middle of Flood Valley. Perhaps the Third Infantry Regiment we placed there has run into the enemy's vanguard."

"But it's nighttime now!" said an officer who had taken part in the war to overthrow the Toyotomi in Japan. "Orientals have a very high rate of night blindness!"

"It's not a hundred percent!" Another Spanish officer who had served as an instructor in the Qing army shook his head. "The Eight Banners troops in the Qing army have almost no night blindness. I've also heard that some units of the Ming army are particularly skilled at night fighting."

"Night fighting?" Don Juan José's brows knitted even tighter.

Night fighting was a severe test of a unit's organization and morale. Only well-trained troops with extremely high morale could carry out field operations at night. Ordinary troops could only hold their camps at night; if they were forced out, officers would find it very hard to control the soldiers, and the soldiers would either go through the motions or simply desert — basically, they would not fight hard.

"The Third Regiment won't have any problems, will it?" Don Juan José glanced at the Marquis of Gaspar.

"There won't be any problems!" the Marquis said with a smile. "The Third Regiment has a very solid camp. Unless the enemy has brought artillery, they simply cannot break through the Third Regiment's defenses. Once it's light tomorrow, the Third Regiment can withdraw south according to plan."

"That's good, then." Don Juan José breathed a sigh of relief, picked up his wine glass again, and took a large gulp of wine.

He knew exactly how much his New Spain army was worth — although the backbone of this army came from Europe, most of the soldiers had been recruited locally in the Americas, and quite a few of them were mixed-blood whites — that is, whites with some Indian ancestry (in later generations these people would be called Indian-descended, but right now they preferred to be called mixed-blood whites). Their fighting will and spirit of endurance were really nothing to speak of.

Boom, boom, boom!

Don Juan José had not even swallowed his mouthful of wine when several muffled, thunder-like roars suddenly came rolling over.

"Th-this is..." The Duke of Florida coughed twice, clearly having choked on his wine.

Boom, boom, boom...

Another dense volley of roaring sounds followed, and all the Spanish generals dining with Don Juan José grew tense.

How many cannons must that be? So dense — it must be dozens of 3-pounder guns firing, right? How did they manage to transport them here?

It was still the experienced Marquis of Gaspar who reacted first. "Your Grace, those are grenades... it's the Chinese grenadiers!"

Grenadiers had already appeared in the armies of the various European countries by this period, and without exception they were elite troops!

The Marquis of Gaspar had already set down his utensils, removed his napkin, and risen to his feet. "Your Grace, I should go take a look at the Third Regiment's position."

Don Juan José nodded. "Take a cavalry company with you, and be careful on the road!" He thought for a moment, then added: "Tell the Third Regiment to hold on as long as possible. If they truly cannot hold, lead them in a withdrawal to the south. I will place ambush troops on the slopes on both sides of the long valley to delay the enemy."

In Don Juan José's view, his dispositions were close to perfect; there was no need to abandon them entirely — only minor adjustments were required.

After sending the Marquis of Gaspar off to oversee the battle, and dispatching two battalions up the hills to set the ambush, Don Juan José ended his meal and prepared to get a good night's sleep, so as to meet tomorrow's decisive battle in the best possible state of mind.

When Don Juan José went to bed, he did not know how terrifying the enemy was that his Third Regiment, placed in the middle of Flood Valley to lure the enemy, had actually lured in!

What his Third Regiment encountered tonight were four Ming army Young Guard infantry regiments personally led by Qi Yuanbi and Yu Daren!

Nearly 10,000 officers and men of the four regiments had set out from Riverside Fort, each man carrying 50 jin of marching rations and ammunition, plus their weapons and all necessary equipment, without armor. They had marched a full 20 days through 800 li of mountain terrain, and the number who fell behind was less than 1,000.

By this afternoon, their vanguard had already reached the northern part of Flood Valley and discovered the Spaniards advancing north.

But they did not choose to immediately throw themselves into battle. Instead, they withdrew from the valley and rested on a relatively gentle slope outside the valley, waiting for the follow-up units to arrive and for night to fall.

Unlike the Red Iron Cannon Army, which liked to fight open, aboveboard battles head-on in daylight, the Ming army's Young Guard, though also capable of fighting formation battles, preferred to fight melees under the cover of darkness. This was because their organization was higher, and their officers and men had stronger fighting will — they would throw themselves into battle on their own without much urging, and they could carry out infiltration operations by platoon and squad.

In the view of Zhang Cheng, Chiliarch Zhang, commander of the Young Guard's Sixth Regiment, who led the vanguard attack on the night of the tenth day of the ninth month, it would be sheer madness to deploy his regiment in the open and trade volleys with the enemy. His regiment had been formed precisely to carry out all kinds of difficult and complex missions.

And attacking at night a valley camp garrisoned by an unknown number of Spanish infantry was clearly just such a difficult and complex mission.

Of course, such a mission was not enough to stump the officers and men of the Young Guard!

The tactics they adopted were not complicated: use the cover of night to close in, then use flintlock fire at long range to draw the enemy's fire; once the enemy exposed their positions, send the grenadiers crawling forward, and once close, throw wooden-handled grenades.

Because it was impossible to haul cannons over the mountains, Zhang Cheng's men had brought a great many wooden-handled grenades — every man carried eight, and the whole regiment had brought twenty thousand!

Therefore tonight, they had more than enough grenades to throw.

In addition, all officers and men of the Young Guard could serve as grenadiers — it was just that in formation battles, the grenadier role was usually taken by pikemen with greater arm strength.

And tonight, the number of officers and men assigned to throw grenades was as many as a thousand!

Over a thousand grenadiers, covered by roughly the same number of flintlock musketeers, crawled forward from the west and north (the east side of the camp was a river) to within less than 20 paces of the camp's perimeter wall (made of earth mounds and wooden palisades), and then, in a kneeling position, began continuously throwing grenades with lit fuses. In the blink of an eye they had thrown out four or five thousand, two-thirds of which successfully exploded, instantly blasting the Spaniards holding the front line into chaos.

Seeing that the grenadiers' surprise attack had succeeded, Zhang Cheng, commanding on the front line, made a prompt decision and gave the order for a general assault.

The order was transmitted by suona horns. Amid wave after wave of piercing, shrill suona blasts, the thousand-plus flintlock musketeers who had been deployed in skirmish formation for medium-range fire (sixty or seventy paces) all completed a reload at top speed, then fixed bayonets to their flintlocks, and with a great shout charged toward the Spanish camp, which had already been blasted into a sea of flame by the grenades.

The first climax of the Battle of Flood Valley had arrived!

(End of Chapter)