Chapter 938: Contention

Latest website: "Captain Li, lead your troops to outflank from the north; Captain Li Dou, lead your troops to outflank from the south." On the battlefield, soldiers from both sides were engaged in intense fire. Pan Zhang assessed the battlefield situation and called over the two captains under his command.

He ordered them to each lead five thousand soldiers to outflank from the flanks and surround these Franks.

Upon receiving his order, the two captains immediately mustered their officers and soldiers, each moving to outflank the two wings of the frontal battlefield.

To cope with the Marine Corps' offensive, the Franks had committed all their Frankish soldiers to the frontal battlefield, leaving the two wings to be defended by indigenous troops.

By comparison, the two wings naturally became the weakest points.

"Bang, bang, bang..."

Before long, in addition to the gunfire on the frontal battlefield, dense gunfire also erupted from the two flank battlefields.

Because the indigenous troops were only equipped with a small number of flintlocks, most were still holding swords and spears.

The two flank battlefields were essentially covered by the sound of Qin-style Rifles.

To break through the indigenous troops' defensive lines, the Marine soldiers, under the cover of their comrades, moved flexibly between buildings and pushed forward.

Soldiers occupying the rooftops utilized their vantage point to continuously shoot and kill exposed indigenous soldiers.

And the indigenous soldiers hiding in the buildings were often met with hand grenades thrown in by the Marine soldiers.

For a time, the entire flank battlefield was filled with smoke.

The Frankish soldiers had not yet seen the tactics of the Marine Corps, and how could the indigenous troops of Luzon have seen them?

They served the Franks mostly just to have a meal, and there was no talk of loyalty to the Franks.

Upon contact with the Marine Corps, they suffered heavy casualties, and the indigenous soldiers were immediately terrified.

Facing the advance of the Marine soldiers, their battle lines were constantly compressed.

"Bastards!"

The offensive on the two wings of the Great Song army naturally did not escape Balensa's eyes.

But he could only watch helplessly as the indigenous troops retreated in a rout, shrinking their battle lines.

Ferrero had given him too few Frankish soldiers.

Even with equal numbers, they might not necessarily be a match for the Great Song army.

How could a mere eight thousand men cope with a Great Song army of over twenty thousand?

And although the indigenous troops were numerous, their role was clearly more to bolster the momentum.

When fighting a favorable battle, they could indeed clean up some remnants, but when encountering an uphill battle, they were like stray dogs with their tails tucked between their legs.

He was just thinking about how to reverse the war situation when suddenly, intense gunfire erupted directly in front of him, accompanied by continuous explosions.

On a rooftop less than fifty meters away from him, a Frankish soldier stood up to reload, but suddenly clutched his chest, fell down, and rolled onto the ground.

And in the alley in front of the dead soldier, Frankish soldiers kept rushing out from the alley entrance, attempting to retreat.

But before they reached their destination, they were shot and killed on the street.

"Colonel, we can't hold the front anymore. The Great Song army's firepower is too fierce. Their soldiers are as agile as monkeys, able to shoot in any posture, and can even reload while running. This is simply insane." A Frankish officer, under the cover of soldiers, retreated in a panic to Balensa, his eyes filled with terror.

He admitted that the power of the front-loading rifled musket was great, and its accuracy had been significantly improved.

Precisely because of this, they had been able to block the Great Song army on the frontal battlefield until now, rather than collapsing at the first touch like the indigenous troops.

However, the firearms they were very satisfied with appeared inferior once again in front of the Great Song army.

In the exchange of fire, many of his soldiers had to expose their bodies to reload, which led to many casualties.

Of course, there was another fatal point: their reloading speed was too slow.

This not only made their firepower seem insufficient, but sometimes the Great Song soldiers even used the time they spent reloading to push forward.

"Even if you can't hold, you must hold. Behind us is Governor Ferrero. For the honor of the Franks, and for the honor of the Westerners, even if only one person remains, we must fight to the end." Balensa barked at the officer, "Gelun, now lead your soldiers and hold the line for me."

"Yes, Colonel." Gelun opened his mouth, having unspeakable bitterness.

Ferrero, Balensa, and these high-ranking officers had been too comfortable in Luzon for too long.

So much so that they had not personally visited the battlefield for a long time.

With a casual order, he did not know what cruel battles the soldiers on the front line would face.

Returning while risking danger, he was not cowardly, but had a premonition that his soldiers were about to be unable to hold on.

So-called honor could not convince the soldiers in the face of a desperate war.

However, he had to obey orders.

Braving the hail of bullets to return to the front-line position, what Gelun saw were the corpses of Frankish soldiers all over the ground, and many wounded soldiers wailing.

The soldiers who could still fight were struggling to maintain the line.

To prevent the Great Song soldiers from breaking through, there were soldiers specifically responsible for scouting the situation on the streets.

Once the Great Song soldiers pushed forward, the soldiers hiding in the alleys would rush out of the alleys to fire outward.

"Captain, what did the Colonel say?" As Gelun returned, a Second Lieutenant immediately asked.

"The Colonel told us to hold," Gelun said with difficulty.

The officer's eyes immediately dimmed; he and his soldiers had already reached their limit.

They had never experienced such a cruel war.

In just this short hour, more than two thousand soldiers had already been killed in action.

No matter how they defended, the Great Song soldiers were always able to break through their lines.

Even suffering casualties did not weaken their will to attack.

In his view, the training and discipline of these Great Song soldiers even surpassed those of the Britain soldiers.

Moreover, they were using firearms superior to theirs, as well as a type of grenade similar to those thrown by grenadiers.

But the grenades thrown by former grenadiers were similar to explosive shells, clearly not as portable as the grenades used by the other side.

"Boom, boom, boom..." As the two were talking, suddenly several clusters of flame rose at an alley entrance thirty meters away from them.

More than ten Frankish soldiers fell amidst screams.

Gelun and the officer's expressions changed instantly; this was the signal that the Great Song army was about to push forward again.

The other Folangji soldiers also realized this.

The soldiers inside the alley entrance rushed toward the alley mouth to fill the positions of the dead and wounded soldiers.

Holding their muskets, they charged out of the alley mouth.

Sure enough, on the street directly ahead, fifty or sixty Great Song soldiers were charging toward their position.

Seeing the Folangji soldiers aiming at them, these soldiers performed a forward roll on the spot, rolled in other directions, or simply threw themselves onto the ground, taking advantage of the momentum to raise their muskets and fire at them.

The agile movements of the Great Song soldiers caused most of the Folangji soldiers' Bullets to miss.

There were also Great Song soldiers who were hit and fell to the ground.

However, at this very moment, they suffered even greater casualties.

After one volley of fire, the Great Song soldiers replaced their Bullets at an extremely fast speed and immediately launched a second volley.

The other Folangji soldiers who had rushed from inside the alley to the alley mouth were shot dead by the Great Song soldiers before they even had a chance to fire.

Because the Great Song soldiers were approaching the alley mouth, a portion of the soldiers threw Hand Grenades deeper into the alley.

After a burst of explosions, the alley mouth was littered with the corpses of Folangji soldiers.