When exploring the Eastern world, His Majesty the Great Tsar naturally does not equip the Cossacks with weapons. He prepares all his own weapons. Basically, each person carries a scimitar and a musket, plus chain mail and a round shield, and a few bows and arrows. and spears.
The war horses all come from the Don River area. If they are injured during the journey and cannot move with the army, they will be replenished at various strongholds. The only advantage is that the warlords in various places will provide the Cossacks with the necessary rations for free.
When the indigenous people of the East were not discovered, each expedition would make a living by hunting and fishing, targeting deer and fish. If you hunt tigers, bears, wolves and other wild beasts, it must be for their fur.
During the expedition, each team ate up to two-thirds of the rations. The rest of the time they basically ate meat and wild vegetables, and the remaining rations were used for emergency purposes.
Fortunately, the eastern world is rich in products, deer can be seen everywhere, wild boars appear from time to time, and there are countless fish in the river, so the expedition team does not have to worry about food.
The brave and capable Cossacks were not afraid of the local tigers, bears, pigs, and wolves. When these beasts encountered the Cossacks, their skins were peeled off and their flesh was eaten.
What made the Cossacks feel uncomfortable was just the local indigenous people. Not only were they unwilling to obey His Majesty the Tsar, but each tribe was also very poor and backward, making it difficult for them to obtain decent trophies.
The Polish cavalry was extremely brave and the Cossacks knew it was difficult to resist them. The indigenous people in the East were weak in combat, but poor and even more miserable than their own lives. This made the Cossacks who chose to explore the East feel very conflicted.
If there could be a place where the natives were both rich and timid, that would be a perfect target. After listening to Captain Korolev's analysis, it seemed that these people in front of him were in line with his psychological expectations.
Although everyone believed that this group of natives was vulnerable, they were still prepared for battle in an orderly manner.
Put on the helmet, put on the chain mail underneath, load the musket, and lead the horse to the rear.
Korolev divided the entire team into three groups, deploying twenty people on the front, ten people on each wing, and the remaining seven were responsible for guarding everyone's supplies and horses.
Based on past combat experience, generally speaking, when dealing with the indigenous savages in the Eastern world, as long as two or three volleys are fired with muskets, the opponent will have the upper hand in time and will be beaten to the point of running away.
Since he still didn't understand the terrain here and the strength of the enemy's troops, Korolev did not take it lightly, but decided to ambush in the woods and wait for the prey to come to him.
Calculated based on the silver found from the corpses, assuming that one indigenous person carries so much silver, the accumulated silver on the bodies of one hundred indigenous people will inevitably reach a very considerable amount.
This was Korolev's most exciting goal. It would be better if he could seize other materials owned by the natives. At least his trip to the northern wasteland was not in vain.
Korolev has not been able to predict the strength of the indigenous savage tribe for the time being, but it should not be too few, and it could be over a hundred, otherwise the indigenous people would not rashly organize troops to come for revenge.
But in the face of sophisticated equipment, especially powerful muskets, the bows and arrows used by the indigenous people seemed very crude, and they were completely unable to compete with thermal weapons.
The Cossacks who came with the team were all experienced soldiers, and each of them had strong combat effectiveness. This was also the biggest asset that Korolev relied on.
"Look! The savages are coming!"
Assistant Karayev reminded Korolev in a low voice that there was no need for binoculars, because the expedition team was ambushing about fifty meters in the woods, and the birch forest was not high, so it was easy to observe the enemy soldiers through light .
"Prepare!"
Korolev asked his eighteen Cossacks to aim at the target first. When the savages came close enough to him, he could give an order and let the Cossacks kill the prey.
At first, there were only a dozen or so scattered people who walked into the woods, but as time passed, Korolev suddenly discovered that there were hundreds of people on the other side, and the team had not yet reached the end.
How could there be so many indigenous savages in such a deserted land?
It really makes Korolev feel incredible!
But the enemy troops were about to surround them, and Korolev could no longer think about this problem.
Korolev discovered a new problem. It seemed that some of the weapons in the hands of these savages were similar in appearance to his own muskets.
Why do savages have muskets?
This seemed to surprise him even more than the previous question.
The Cossacks also saw this situation, so they couldn't help but feel a little nervous. This was something they had never encountered before.
"shooting!"
Korolev suddenly shouted, and his Cossacks immediately lit the match.
Wisps of gray-white smoke immediately rose, and bursts of screams came from the opposite side.
"The Rakshasa people are on the other side!"
"Fire arrows! Use blunderbuss!"
The Zhou army only came with 300 of the King's personal troops, and the remaining 700 or 800 were servants from various counties. The weapons were also various, including waist knives, axes, spears, blunderbuss... and even meteor hammers and flying claws.
In fact, this was a ragtag group of people. Except for a few soldiers who had served as officers and soldiers, they had never killed anyone. The largest animal that many servants had ever killed was wild boar, and it took more than a dozen people to hunt successfully.
They had no experience at all in head-to-head combat. When the enemy suddenly opened fire on them with muskets, these servants neither knew how to dodge nor fight back. They just ran around blindly in the woods in fear.
Fortunately, Zhou Tong used to be the commander-in-chief of the army, and he was somewhat capable of leading troops. As the chief general of the army, he did not panic and ordered his subordinates to counterattack immediately.
"Hurry up and push the cannon up to me!"
After Zhou Tong gave the order, the four soldiers pushed a small Folang machine on a four-wheeled cart to the front of the formation with great difficulty. In order to suppress the Rakshasa people with firepower, Zhou Tong did not dare to underestimate the enemy.
Seeing that many of his soldiers fell to the ground, Zhou Tong became angry. This was the territory of Zhou State, not the Rakshasa people. If these bastards came to the east, they would be dead.
King Zhou spent a lot of money to buy this from the Crown Prince. It was not a second-hand item, but a new factory item. Moreover, the Crown Prince also sent people to train a group of gunners for King Zhou.
Considering that the Folang machine can be loaded and fired quickly without waiting for a long time, it is very suitable for the soldiers and horses of the vassal country to use, so the prince authorized the prince to purchase a batch of brand new Folang machine.
Not counting those princes, the King of Zhou himself purchased five gates. One gate costs 500 taels of silver, and five gates cost 2,500 taels. Including training and ammunition, the total price is as high as 5,000 taels.
You can't be too expensive. If it weren't for the support of the prince, the court would not agree to sell such a powerful weapon to the vassal king, no matter how high the price was.
The price of a small Folang machine is almost equivalent to fifty or sixty blunderbuss, but it's expensive. Use this weapon to bombard the enemy. Even if the enemy is hiding behind a thick tree, you can take the tree with you. Puncture them together.
"Load the gun!"
"Loading complete!"
"Aim at the Rakshasa! Light the fire!"
"Hiss... bang~!"
The first launch of the small Folang machine destroyed a thigh-thick white birch tree. Although it did not seem to hit the Rakshasa people, it also boosted our own morale to a certain extent.
Korolev and his Cossacks on the opposite side were almost extremely shocked by this situation. Even if the native savages had muskets, how could they have artillery?
Are savages with artillery still considered savages?
how so?
Is the other party a savage?
Could it be that we are going in the wrong direction?
Came to another place?
So where is this place?
The Cossacks had a lot of question marks in their minds, but no one could answer them. The other party didn't give them any time to continue thinking, and soon fired a second cannonball.
The commander-in-chief Zhou Tong of this battle carried three small Folang machines. It was the first gun that fired first. In addition to calibration, he also indicated the bombardment target for the other two guns.
After reaching Zhou Tong's designated position, he ordered the other two cannons to fire. Didn't the Rakshasa people have blunderbuss?
Then let’s see which one is more powerful, your own Folang machine, or the blunderbuss in their hands!
The biggest advantage of the Folang series of artillery is that it uses sub-guns to fire ammunition. The loading speed is very fast, even two or three times faster than bird guns.
After the three-door Folang machines approached, they opened fire one after another, and the power should not be underestimated. After a while, the trees on the opposite side were broken, and the mossy stones were exploded, leaving a mess everywhere.
Although the Cossacks had found bunkers in advance, they never expected that the savages actually had artillery, and the rate of fire was very high, catching them off guard.
The Cossacks hiding behind the birch tree thought they were safe. Unexpectedly, after the opponent's shelling, they and the tree trunk in front of them were shot in two, and they could no longer stick together...
The broken limbs fell not far away, and blood sprayed on the entire moss. Seeing this, the other Cossacks became furious and planned to shoot as many of these ignorant savages as possible.
But Korolev observed very clearly that the opponent not only had much more troops than him, but also had superior firepower. Not only did he have muskets, but he also had artillery that could reload ammunition quickly.
Our own side is already at an absolute disadvantage in this contest. No matter how powerful the muskets are, they will never be able to defeat the enemy with artillery in a confrontation.
If the fight continues like this, I am afraid that my team will be surrounded by the group of savages in front of me, and the only way is to retreat immediately.
"Everyone is here! Retreat immediately! Mount your horse and break out to the northwest!"
Without further ado, after losing sixteen or seventeen Cossacks, Korolev immediately decided to lead the rest of his men to break out. Continuing to hesitate can only be a waste of time and lives.
The Cossacks also knew that it was difficult to resist these savages with their own strength, so they followed the captain's order and quickly ran to the rear where the horses were.
"The Rakshasa are defeated!"
"Chase!"
"Kill them all!"
"Hurry up quickly!"
The military units of the prefectures and counties followed the consistent style of the Ming Dynasty's official army. They retreated when the enemy was strong, and pursued the enemy when they retreated. In short, they had to keep a certain distance from the enemy...
Although Zhou Tong was leading a ragtag group of people, given the absolute superiority in military strength, there was no big problem in fighting a smooth battle, not to mention that everyone had the intention to receive the reward.
The prince ordered that a Rakshasa man be worth one hundred taels of silver, regardless of his life or death. The king of Zhou was also very generous, only extracting twenty taels from each tap.
After each county king raised another thirty taels, he still had fifty taels left. This was a lot of money and could buy many locally produced items.
There is no doubt that in the eyes of the servants, Rakshasa people are silver!
Beat them to death or break their legs, and the money won't be able to escape.
It's just that the marksmanship of this ragtag group is really bad, and their archery skills are barely passable.
Facing the Rakshasa people who were facing him from behind, he only shot three or four people during the pursuit.
What most affects the speed of pursuit is nothing but grabbing the victory.
The servants of the same county will not have disputes, but the same is true if they serve the same county king.
If the opponent's troops were not too small, they could take advantage of this opportunity to come back and defeat the Zhou army.
In order to fight for the few results, the entire battlefield was in chaos, which was several times more lively than the battle with the Rakshasa people just now.
What's more, servants from three counties, totaling more than fifty people, fought over a Rakshasa corpse, staging a miniature version of "The Romance of the Three Kingdoms" in the North.
The servants who were injured in the fight for the victory even had more casualties than the Rakshasa people. Seeing this, Zhou Tong had no time to stop him. At the moment, he still had to focus on chasing the remaining Rakshasa soldiers.
With such a group of embarrassing and useful soldiers, Zhou Tong really didn't know whether he should be happy or angry. He could only pray that there were no main force of Rakshasa people nearby, otherwise the Zhou army would definitely suffer a big defeat.
"Quickly retreat! Cancel the original plan! Go west! Go to Yakutsk!"
Korolev, who was focused on running away, had no idea what was going on behind him. It would be lucky not to die at this time, and he had no intention of leading the team south to the Amur Panorama again.
As long as they reach the Yakutsk stronghold, they are considered safe regardless of whether the barbarians equipped with artillery pursue them. The only problem is that it's a bit far, probably more than 500 kilometers.
But first, we need to set a general goal for everyone. We can lead our men out of danger first, and it won't be too late to change it when we find that there are no pursuers behind us.
However, on the west side of the woods, they found no less than two hundred armed savages. They had no choice but to launch a charge-style breakout.
Fortunately, the opponent's combat effectiveness was not high and the formation was very loose. It seemed that the enemy was not expected to appear here at all. With only the loss of five Cossacks, Korolev and his men successfully broke through.
After running about seven or eight kilometers in one breath, after waiting for a while and seeing no pursuers, everyone breathed a sigh of relief and came back with their lives saved.
Why are there so many savages here?
Are these savages equipped with muskets and artillery?
Korolev and a group of Cossacks couldn't figure it out.
After an inventory, including him, there were only twenty men left in the expedition.
The rest were either killed on the spot, separated during the retreat, or captured by the savages.
Korolev had already expected the situation of being captured by savages, and couldn't help but take a deep breath, hoping that God could bless those poor people.
He could only pray like this. With so few troops left, there was no possibility of counterattack. If he could reach Yakutsk alive, it would be a victory.
Even the mink pelts collected previously were lost. Counting the loss of so many Cossacks, this expedition was considered a complete failure.
If you want to defeat hundreds of savages with artillery, you may need hundreds of Cossacks, and you will have to wait until next spring before you can take action...
