Accompanied by the rustling and dense footsteps, Zamparini slowly moved forward with the drum beats of military music. As the platoon leader, he stood at the right platoon of the platoon, with two ammunition-loaded pistols hanging on his waist, holding a 32-year-old mechanical non-commissioned knife in his hand, a copper whistle hanging around his neck, wearing a breastplate and a helmet on his head, covering his whole body tightly. On his left is his old partner An Dahai, who is also fully armed, but he is holding a 32-C flintlock rifle in his hand, and a 41-year-old steel bayonet hanging around his waist, and a standard infantry musketeer equipment.

A few meters away from Zamparini's right side, the artillery brothers were shouting and neighing to pull several field artillery to the front line. These were 8-pound short-barrel howitzers, which could fire solid bombs, explosive bombs, grape bombs, shotguns, and chain bombs, which were powerful weapons for field combat. At this time, several artillery had been pushed to the front line. The artillery soldiers were baking the ground with fire, while using shovels and engineer shovels to dig simple artillery positions and fortifications quickly.

In this battle with the Qing army, artillery was the protagonist - in fact, the artillery was the protagonist in every battle between the East Coast people. For this reason, they mobilized a total of twenty field artillery pieces to accompany the infantry to fight. Such firepower is unique in Shandong. You should know that Ye Chen, who attacked Taiyuan, only had more than 30 red-clothed cannons under his command, and this heavy artillery was extremely inconvenient to operate. It took a long time to transport it to the front line.

As the company deputy Gao Shan blew a sharp copper whistle, the troops stood at the right spot and stopped. This was the front of the left wing of the battlefield. Behind them were two infantry phalanxes arranged in a neatly arranged manner, among which the Eight Banners New Army Infantry Battalion were five infantry squadrons, with a total of more than 1,500 people. The officers and soldiers of the Eight Banners infantry battalion were wearing helmets and armor. They held a 3.5-meter standard infantry spear, with a space of one meter five between people, and the formation was neat and orderly, looking quite imposing. The appearance of the forward team looked much inferior. Half of them were holding spears of varying lengths, while others, such as the Shandan people, held harpoons, bear hunting spears, big swords, step bows, Japanese samurai swords, and Koreans were holding bird guns. Anyway, it gave people a feeling of chaos, so they were decisively transferred to the back by Mo Ming.

On the right side of the 104th Company is a narrow artillery position, with 20 large and small artillery pieces placed in turn. While unloading the pull-up horses that pull the cart, the artillery urgently set up artillery and loading ammunition. At the same time, a barbed wire was quickly pulled out in front of the artillery position, sprinkling a piece of iron caltrops to protect. On the right side of the artillery position is the 105th Company of the Army, and behind the 105th Company is another infantry battalion of the Eight Banners New Army. Behind the Eight Banners New Army are also five forward squadrons. Behind the Eight Banners New Army are a large number of baggage vehicles. At this time, the soldiers of the army were unloading the pull-up horses, and then trying to connect the chariots to form a ring formation.

In this way, there were about 4,600 troops on the east coast on the battlefield at this time (including 1,000 soldiers). In addition, there were about 500 cavalry, more than 180 security scouts, and 1,500 soldiers in the rear of Anqiu County. They were currently commanded by cavalry officer Yang Mingyang and were gathered at the city gate and were ready for attack.

The officer issued another command, and Zamparini carefully checked the medicine in the pistol pot to make sure that they were not blown away by the wind. Then, the fixed ammunition in the ammunition bag on his waist, the strips on the side of the barrel, and the bayonet on his waist were checked. Zamparini looked indifferently at the battlefield ahead through the gap between the front row soldiers. This was not the first time he had fought with people. Now he was able to deal with these scenes with a very calm attitude.

The trumpeters behind the artillery position blew the March of "Victory belongs to the Army" which I don't know how many times. The enemy in front had already appeared in sight, and the officers standing on the side frequently raised their telescopes to observe the enemy's movements. The artillery had also begun calibration test firing. Several intern staff from Dingyuan Military Academy raised their telescopes to observe the landing point of the shells, while combining the landing point and estimated wind speed, letting each artillery adjust the firing parameters again.

The enemy's formation seemed a little chaotic, especially after several 12-pound cannons tested to the limit of more than 800 meters under strong loading, they made a scream. Their formation was obviously a bit chaotic, but under the strong suppression of the officers, they finally remained basically. After the artillery fired, they stopped, then adjusted the elevation angle of the artillery, loaded the launching medicine bag, projectiles, and induced medicine, and then quietly waited for the officer's orders.

Although it was a sunny day today, the sun was still very small, like a faint fireball hanging in the air, and the temperature outside was hovering around zero. At this time, another cold wind blew, and Zamparini, who came from the warm Italy, was a little uncomfortable. The weather was too cold, especially when people stood here and could not move. However, his complaints did not last long. With the rumbling sound of cannons, the battle was about to officially begin.

At a distance of six or seven hundred meters, four 12-pound cannons were fired first! One of these heavy iron eggs was directly deviated, but the other three fell into the enemy formation. The person who touched was either dead or injured, and directly plowed out three bloody paths in the dense crowd. When did the Ming army of Zhang Ruxing's troops see such a scene, many people hesitated. However, under the scolding of the officers and the intimidation of the two thousand elite cavalry of Li Rutai's troops in charge of the battle in the rear, these people finally barely continued to move forward. At this time, their speed was much faster. After all, no one was willing to stay in place and be beaten slowly, but this also made their formation gradually chaotic and disconnected. They might have to stop and rectify the enemy formation, otherwise they would not be able to enter the battle.

After getting closer, the 8-pound cannons and 12-pound howitzers also joined the battle. Especially the short-barrel howitzers that fired explosive bombs, the shells that exploded in the air caused huge casualties and psychological pressure to these former Ming soldiers. Although the bombs of the East Coast people were not reliable, and the dud rate of the shells fired was as high as more than 60%, they still caused nearly 100 enemies to fall to the ground.

Zhang Ruxing's troops were immediately in chaos facing the unprecedented intensive fire strike on the Far East ground. The artillery fire of the yellow-clothed thieves continued to cover their heads, and their casualties were also increasing sharply. Solid iron balls, bombs and even chain bombs used to fight cavalry were hit on their formation. Now they are three or four hundred meters away from the stair formation of the hateful yellow-clothed thieves, but their 2,000-man army has already suffered more than 330 casualties. Some soldiers on the edge of the array could not bear such high casualties and began to run to the field regardless of the officer's orders. Under their leadership, more soldiers began to escape, and their formation quickly collapsed.

"Less than 20% of the casualties dispersed, and Zhang Ruxing is getting worse and worse." Mo Ming, who was riding on the war horse, held up a telescope and said, "But Li Lutai actually used these new affiliated troops as cannon fodder. Two thousand people, haha, it's also cruel."

"If 20% of the casualties still insist on not dispersing, it would not be the ancient army. With these insufficient training and low morale, I looked down on them. It was not that I could set up a complete military formation now. "Mao Desheng also put down his telescope and looked forward. The artillery was still shooting continuously, and the trend of the two thousand people in Zhang Ruxing's army being dispersed has become increasingly difficult to curb. The officers have given up their plan to reorganize the formation. The two thousand cavalrymen of Li Shutai's Han flag, who were supervising the battle in the rear, were also a little disturbed. Although Zhang Ruxing's army was unable to bear the battle, they did not expect that they would be defeated so quickly and so miserably.

More than twenty minutes later, two thousand people in Zhang Ruxing's army had already collapsed from both wings to the rear, and were then taken in by the soldiers sent by Li Shutai to the scene one after another, removing the killed and injured, trampling on each other during the collapse, and fleeing to the field. More than 1,200 people in Zhang Ruxing's army were admitted, and many of them lost their weapons and suffered a considerable mental blow. The morale was low and they could not be further increased. At least they could not join the battle today.

Zamparini looked at the enemy troops who had already escaped in front with some ease, and was also somewhat sympathetic while despising them. If they were in that position, facing the bombardment of so many large and small caliber artillery artillery, although they would not have disbanded in just a few meetings like them, but he would not be sure of the battle to lose a lot of money and he would not be able to hold on. This is a cruel topic.

The officer's command sounded again, and the musketeers in the first row raised their guns. Zanparini looked forward through the gap and saw that the enemy's cavalry had moved. They moved from the original garrison in batches, then slowly accelerated and rushed towards the east coast's army. However, their posture did not seem to be planning to shake the tight defense of the east coast's people - Zhang Ruxing had already completed the task of firepower testing well, but was preparing to detour from the side.

The army musketeers who were originally planning to shoot and retreat into the spear formation were disappointed and a little grateful. However, with the officer's command, they were led by the platoon leader and soon got into the spear formation, ready to shoot at the cavalry that might rush over. Liu Zhong, the commander of the Eight Banners New Army, stood in front of the formation, yelling to eliminate these "Manchu Puppet Flags", while ordering the outermost soldiers to insert the handle of the spear into the ground, pointing the spear tip diagonally forward, and the soldiers behind placed the spear on the shoulder of the person in front in turn, and set up a hedgehog formation.
Chapter completed!