The distance is about five kilometers. At this distance, the Ming army's artillery still has a very high shooting level.

Kuznetsov was begging the gods to let the gunners fire more shells and hit the coalition forces more. The entire warship shook violently like an earthquake.

Then, the cannonball that hit the hull and was as high as a man exploded.

The huge explosion force tore the solid armor into pieces.

A complete ironclad ship was transformed back into parts in an instant, and was thrown around with the explosion. The farthest fragments even flew more than a kilometer away.

As for the people on the ship, there is no way there are still alive.

The Ming Dynasty fleet is the most professional fleet in the world, no one can say.

Kuznetsov was disappointed. The gunners only fired a few shells, but countless shells were attracted by the muzzle flash. The three Russian ironclad ships, under the bombardment of countless shells, transformed into orange balls of light.

Soon, the sea became quiet.

Li Xiu issued an order via radio not to fire guns without permission.

It was still very dark on the sea, and you couldn't tell the difference between enemy and friendly warships without opening your eyes.

Although it was only a short naval battle, lasting less than ten minutes, the damage on the shore was huge. One pier was completely unusable. Another pier was almost half blown up.

Almost half of a shipload of munitions that began to be unloaded at midnight turned into smoke.

As for the soldiers and workers on the dock, it is unknown how many died.

Through the light of the fire, you could see people swimming on the sea and floating corpses. The screams of the people on the shore even covered the waves and reached Li Xiu's ears from a distance.

"I didn't expect that the Russian Navy is so smart. It was a mistake of mine to come to me in the middle of the night. Order, those search fleets are back. All the rats have been killed!"

Looking at the fire burning on the shore in the distance, Li Xiu said expressionlessly and continued to go back to the cabin to sleep.

Anyone who is familiar with Li Xiu knows that the commander is very unhappy now. This is understandable, after all, there is such a big mistake in the port guarded by the Ming Navy, and it cannot be saved no matter how hard it is to save face.

It wasn't until seven o'clock in the morning that Li Xiu walked out of his lounge.

Everyone was surprised. The commander was wearing a navy camouflage uniform. His eyes were as sharp as an eagle, and he looked at people with hooks in his eyes.

No one, including Chen Laohu, dared to speak casually. They could only have breakfast with the commander!

The atmosphere in the restaurant is quite strange, no one knows what the commander is going to do.

After breakfast, Li Xiu wiped his mouth.

"Tiger, lead the foreign corps and capture the St. Petersburg Shipyard. Blow up everything there. If there is a complete brick, you won't have to come back." After saying that, Li Xiu threw down the white napkin and walked out of the restaurant.

Li Xiu, who had lost face greatly last night, had wanted to personally lead the troops and wipe the St. Petersburg Shipyard completely from the face of the earth.

But while eating breakfast, Li Xiu figured it out again.

If you lead a team to destroy the St. Petersburg Shipyard, that would be a real loss of face. The Russians would say that the Ming Dynasty's naval commander could not stand the humiliation, so he would take revenge.

Chen Laohu heard Li Xiao's instructions, agreed and left.

The St. Petersburg Shipyard is actually not on the seaside, but at the mouth of the Neva River. It is quite close to the city wall of St. Petersburg. Most of the buildings in the shipyard are made of reinforced concrete.

The garrison of St. Petersburg had no reason to abandon such a fortress close to the port.

However, in Chen Laohu's view, this should not be an difficult task to complete. With the firepower of the Ming Dynasty, the tonnage of all navies in the world combined is not as powerful as the Ming Navy.

So at eight o'clock in the morning, Schlieffen and Grouchy, who were leading troops into Moscow for someone else, suddenly discovered that the Ming fleet was pouring into the port like a tide, which made the already busy port suddenly appear more crowded.

Looking at such a huge fleet, the two people were speechless and at a loss as to what the Ming fleet was going to do.

Because of this, they even forgot about the quarrel between the two people that lasted for several hours.

"Commander, this place is still quite far from St. Petersburg. Our artillery can't hit that far. Only the mountain-class front main gun can hit the city of St. Petersburg."

"That's enough!" Li Xiu stared at the city of St. Petersburg in the telescope like a hawk.

Li Xiu said it was enough, and it was indeed enough. The two Shanzi-class battleships, Kunlun Mountain and Tianshan, had main guns with a caliber of 480 mm.

A cannonball is taller than an adult. A special crane is required to load it into the cannon!

A shell of this level does not need to explode. If it is hit directly on the ground, it will create a pit more than ten meters deep.

If a delayed fuse is used, the explosion can really be described as devastating.

Not even a cockroach can survive within a radius of one hundred meters.

People within a radius of thirty meters will be directly vaporized by the violent explosion.

Even a person 200 meters away will have their clothes torn to pieces by the explosion, leaving them naked and transformed into a corpse. Of course, the person collecting the corpse may not be able to recognize the person.

Because at this time, you are scorched.

A Shanzi-class battleship has two three-liang turrets in front of the main gun, with a total of six main guns.

There are some differences on the rear deck. On the Kunlun Shan ship, there are two triple-mounted turrets on the rear deck. On the Tianshan ship, there is only one triple-mounted turret on the rear deck.

Although it sacrificed firepower, it also saved dozens of tons of weight, and its speed was much faster than that of Kunlun Mountain.

Li Xiao once told Li Xiu, don't just look at firepower. In fact, speed is also very important for warships.

At first, Li Xiu didn't understand what Li Xiao said. The Kunlun Mountain Ship was the product of this situation.

But after experiencing actual combat, Li Xiu changed his mind.

On the rough sea, the shooting accuracy of artillery is actually quite poor. This is different from that on land, just like St. Petersburg now. This thing can't escape here at all. It can be hit no matter how hard it is!

But warships at sea are different, and those things can also run. Several times, the Kunlun Mountain ship found traces of the enemy. However, under the bombardment of long-distance artillery, it fired more than ten rounds, but one of them was hit by someone.

to the enemy ship.

Playing with speed, the giant gunned and heavily armored Kunlun Mountain has a displacement of up to 70,000 tons and a side armor of up to 390 millimeters. The whole thing is a steel fortress floating on the sea, and even the underwater waterline exceeds ten meters.

A thing of this magnitude is a huge test for the power system.

The result of several pursuits and annihilations at sea was that they disappeared without a trace, while Kunlun Mountain was still staggering in pursuit.

Li Xiu was so angry that he wanted to burn down the house, but there was nothing he could do about it. The giant cannon and heavy armor would inevitably sacrifice power. After all, the older Kunlun Mountain ship still used traditional coal-fired boilers.

That power is definitely not comparable to the oil-burning Tianshan ship.

"The other warships retreated further, and the Tianshan and Kunlun Mountains moved closer. Use their main guns to bombard the city of St. Petersburg!" In any case, the cowardice last night was about to come out.

"Here!"

After having the telegraph machine, the command became much more flexible.

The other armies withdrew from the port, leaving only the huge Tianshan and Kunlun mountains behind.

"What are they going to do?" Schlieffen swallowed as he looked at the Ming warships that suddenly entered the port!

"How do I know!" Grouchy replied angrily.

At 8:30, two battleships as tall as mountains entered the port area.

"The front and rear main guns, bombard St. Petersburg, free fire!" Li Xiu had no purpose at all this time, it was just to vent his feelings about last night.

His own fleet was quietly sneaked in by other people's warships, but he didn't know anything about it. This is so cowardly!

"Boom! Boom! Boom!...!" The artillerymen who had been waiting for a long time quickly fired the shells.

The 480mm main gun shells flew towards St. Petersburg in the distance with a sharp whistle.

In St. Petersburg, everyone is working intensively. Officials are recruiting strong men, and many people are training in squares and open spaces.

The old people, children, and women in the city left the city in groups from the north. They were preparing to cross Lake Ladoga and go to the countryside to disperse.

On the city wall, no one saw the signal for the enemy's artillery mass.

No one thought that the God of Death was wielding a sickle, preparing to harvest the lives in the city.

A huge iron block fell on the square in front of the Winter Palace.

The blue-gray stone slabs were smashed and scattered in all directions, and the two citizens who were training disappeared in an instant, leaving only a huge hole on the ground.

Before the people nearby understood what was going on, "Boom!" there was a huge explosion, and everything on the ground rose into the air.

The huge wave of the explosion threw the slates on the ground more than 100 meters high. When they fell, it seemed like a rain of slates fell on the ground.

The tremors of the earth can be clearly felt from a distance of one kilometer.

Everyone was trying to stand firm, and some people even squatted on the ground to steady themselves.

No one knew what happened until suddenly some human body parts began to fall from the sky. Blood and water fell from the sky like raindrops.

Everyone's face and body were dripping with blood.

Soon, they saw the shock wave of the shell explosion.

Although it was one kilometer away, there were houses blocking the way. But the wind caused by the explosion made people unsteady on their feet.

"Bombardment!" Konstantinovich roared in horror, dragging Prince Peter and running into the basement.

"Artillery attack? Didn't you say that the Ming army's artillery range could not reach the city?" Although Duke Peter was also very nervous, he was far from realizing the seriousness of the matter.

"It is true that the artillery of the ordinary Ming army cannot reach the city. However, the main guns of the Ming army's battleships can hit it. The explosive power of those shells is far beyond your imagination."

"Is it that powerful?" Duke Peter felt that what Constantine said was a bit exaggerated. He had never seen large-caliber artillery before. It was not that powerful.

"That thing can kill the Winter Palace with one shot."
To be continued...