A family of loyal martyrs, starting with nine wives to continue the family line.

Ke Zhenchuan's fleet ultimately chose to change course.

As the moon was completely swallowed by the clouds, the lookout on the flagship's mast suddenly let out a suppressed gasp.

"Madam Shang! Their...their lights are moving!"

Shang Wanqing rushed out of the cabin almost instantly. She hadn't slept at all; she had just spent another half an hour at the table studying the nautical chart.

She snatched the binoculars from the sailor beside her, pressed the cold, copper tube against her eye socket, and fixed her gaze on the faint, moving point of light in the distance.

Through the telescope, the few remaining lights of the pirate fleet were slowly moving westward.

No, not due west.

It's in the southwest.

That's the direction of Quanzhou!

"That old fox!" Shang Wanqing cursed under her breath, her last bit of hope completely extinguished.

Ke Zhenchuan spent two days off the coast of Mingzhou, seemingly worn down by Liu Jingshuang's cavalry formation and her fast ships. In reality, he never intended to confront her head-on in Mingzhou.

Everything he did was to paralyze Xinwu's defenses, making everyone believe that his only target was Mingzhou.

Now that he saw Mingzhou as a tough nut to crack, he didn't hesitate to turn his ship around, intending to take advantage of the night to attack another gaping hole in Xinwu's defenses—Quanzhou. He was betting that Quanzhou's defenses would be less formidable than Mingzhou's.

"Damn it, he actually guessed right."

Shang Wanqing put down the binoculars, her face expressionless, but her eyes were as cold as ice.

She did not order a pursuit.

Ke Zhenchuan's main fleet consisted of more than forty ships, and with the wind at his back, her fifteen fast ships would chase after them at night. If they were entangled, they would be easy prey for the enemy.

"Send a ship, the fastest one, to sneak up from the shadows and follow them without letting them spot you."

She said to the captain beside her, "I need to know in half an hour whether they have all left, and how many have left."

"yes!"

Like a lone wolf separated from its pack, a speedboat silently broke away from the main fleet, lowered most of its sails, and almost skimmed the surface of the sea, disappearing into the vast darkness of the night.

The half-hour wait felt longer than a century. No one on board spoke; the only sounds were the waves crashing against the hull and the whistling of the wind whipping the ropes.

Half an hour later, the speedboat returned, like a ghost, silently approaching.

The scout on the ship leaped aboard the flagship, his voice trembling with excitement:

"Madam Shang, look closely! Their main force has taken at least twenty large ships! They're heading southwest at a considerable speed, and their destination is Quanzhou!"

Shang Wanqing nodded; everything was as expected.

"Send a signal!"

Without the slightest hesitation, she turned to the messenger and ordered, "Use the highest-level beacon fire signal to tell the people of Quanzhou, 'The wolf is coming!'"

A specially crafted arrow, piercing the clouds with a piercing whistle, shot into the dark night sky. When it exploded at its highest point, it wasn't the usual red, but a strange, blood-dripping purple firework.

This purple beacon fire was the highest level of combat readiness personally set by Wei Zhao, signifying that the enemy's main force had broken through the outer defenses and was about to besiege the city.

Almost at the same time, in Quanzhou Port, a hundred miles away, on a beacon tower built by the sea, the sentry on night duty was suddenly awakened from his slumber. He rubbed his eyes and looked at the fleeting purple light at the horizon, and the color drained from his face instantly.

"Enemy attack! Top priority enemy attack!"

The piercing sound of bugles shattered the tranquility of Quanzhou.

Liu Jingshuang's command tent was set up on the highest hillside inside Quanzhou Bay.

When the bugle sounded, she was facing a huge map of Quanzhou's coastal defenses, holding a vermilion pen in her hand, seemingly lost in thought.

A bodyguard stumbled into the tent: "General! A high-level signal has arrived from the direction of Mingzhou! The main force of the pirates... is rapidly approaching our waters!"

The expressions of the several deputy generals inside the tent all changed simultaneously.

Liu Jingshuang didn't even raise her head. She simply used the vermilion brush in her hand to draw a circle on the map in a sea area called "Crescent Bay" outside Quanzhou Port.

She had expected this.

After autumn arrived, she determined that if Ke Zhenchuan wanted to head south, Quanzhou was a better target than Mingzhou. The port there was wider and the waterways were deeper, making it more suitable for his large fleet to operate.

Therefore, she had already secretly transferred 5,000 elite cavalrymen from Yuezhou to Quanzhou, where they set up a second line of defense.

"What's the panic?"

She finally raised her head, her gaze calmly sweeping over the crowd: "When the bait is cast, fish will eventually bite."

She stood up, walked to the tent entrance, and looked at the firelight that was beginning to stir in the direction of the distant port. Her voice was not loud, but it carried a reassuring calmness.

She only said two words.

"Wait."

The following evening, as the last rays of dawn were swallowed by churning dark clouds, Ke Zhenchuan's fleet finally appeared off the coast of Quanzhou.

More than twenty main warships, plus a dozen or so supply ships and light fast boats following behind, totaling more than forty ships, slowly came to a stop on the sea about four miles from Quanzhou Port. Instead of rushing to attack, they leisurely lined up in formation, their bows all pointing towards the port, like a pack of hungry wolves surveying their prey.

They could see the continuous beacon fires already burning on the shore, and the guards standing ready in the port, but they did not see any large-scale naval fleet.

On Ke Zhenchuan's flagship, a one-eyed pirate leader lowered his binoculars, grinned maliciously, and said to the person beside him:

"It seems that General Liu has moved all the ships to Mingzhou! Quanzhou is indeed just an empty shell!"

No sooner had he finished speaking than the pirate on the mast suddenly cried out in alarm, "General! From the south! A ship is coming from the south!"

Everyone looked south.

Under the cover of night, fifteen fast ships painted entirely in black appeared silently to the side and rear of their fleet, like a group of ghosts emerging from hell.

It was Shang Wanqing's fleet. They hurried along and finally caught up with them before nightfall.

Instead of charging, the fleet stopped about three miles from the main force of the pirates. The fifteen ships faced the coast, forming a huge angle with the dark mass of cavalry on the shore.

Shang Wanqing stood at the bow of the flagship, her clothes fluttering in the sea breeze.

She knew very well that this formation was a killing scheme that she and Liu Jingshuang had simulated countless times on the sand table.

If you want to attack Quanzhou Port, I will attack your flank from the sea and push you towards the shallows on the shore.

If you try to turn around and run south, I'll cut off your retreat from behind and trap you on this open sea.

If you want to fight me to the death, those five thousand cavalrymen on the shore, ready for battle, will charge up from any beachhead you can land on and tear your beachhead troops to shreds, as soon as they find an opportunity.

This is a dead end.

Ke Zhenchuan clearly saw the viciousness of this formation, and his fleet remained stationary, hesitant to make any further moves.

The two massive fleets stood silently facing each other on the sea as night deepened.

Shang Wanqing turned around and glanced at the sailors behind her who were gripping their weapons tightly in tension. Her voice carried clearly to everyone's ears in the howling sea wind.

"I'm not sleeping tonight."

She paused, then turned her gaze back to the silent steel jungle in the distance, a cold smile curving her lips.

"Let's wait and see if they can hold out, or if we can."