Song Chuyi was already very clear about where these death warriors’ fatal weakness lay. Having dealt with them so many times, she knew they were all people who only followed orders to the death. Since the other side had given them the order to kill her, they would single-mindedly and stubbornly focus only on killing her. That’s why she had always remained standing on the ship without going anywhere, drawing all their people over.

There was another advantage to being on this ship—she had already studied the ship extremely thoroughly. How many people the deck could hold, how many people the bow could hold, how many people could stand around the ship’s body, and if that batch of people couldn’t board from around the ship, where they would try instead—she had made ample preparations for all of this beforehand. She had to thank Huangjue Temple for that incident with those bandits, which had let her practice. Only then was she able to execute on this one-third acre plot of the ship the strategy she had long contemplated.

Qing Luo and Qing Tao followed close behind her, both somewhat worried as they came up to ask: “If another batch with this many people comes, I’m afraid we still won’t be able to defend against them. Our people have been struggling all night—they probably can’t hold on much longer.”

Moreover, if this continued, they wouldn’t even need people to attack—the ship would sink on its own. They had all noticed that the ship’s body had sunk considerably lower.

Song Chuyi turned back to look at the only remaining intact large ship behind them. What Qing Luo and the others said was true—once the ship sank, even if she were an immortal descended from heaven, two fists would still have difficulty opposing four hands.

However, what was fortunate was that, firstly, because they had brought few people, the other side felt the forces they had deployed were already sufficient, and secondly, because they still needed to reserve more strength to deal with Zhou Weizhao, Ye Jingkuan, Lai Chenglong and the others, the manpower allocated was limited. Ye Jingchuan had already decimated one batch of their people, and now she had decimated another batch. The forces on their side probably didn’t have much left.

Since they didn’t have much left… Song Chuyi turned back to look at the people surrounding her protectively, carefully examined them all once through, and selected ten people to ask: “I have an extremely urgent task to entrust to you all. I wonder if you dare to do it?”

When Zhou Weizhao selected people for her, he had been extremely meticulous and had specifically consulted with Ye Jingkuan, only then choosing these sixty men from among the Prefecture Guards that Ye Jingkuan had brought. Since Ye Jingchuan had additionally instructed them to protect Song Chuyi’s safety, they naturally responded with one voice.

Song Chuyi then nodded: “Then I’ll trouble you all. You ten should divide into two teams—five on the left, five on the right—and go into the water to drill holes in that ship. Not really drilling, but the commotion needs to be quite loud.”

Ye Jingchuan had gone to pursue the person in charge who had given the order to ram the ship. He had taken away over forty people from this side, so that side would certainly need to send about the same number of people to protect that person in charge. Even if there were still some people on this large ship, the numbers would be limited. The small boats on the river surface had also been destroyed for the most part, so there was no need to worry about not being able to enter the water.

After Song Chuyi finished her instructions, she selected another twenty people: “The group of people below us left some small boats. Four or five of you to a boat, take these long hooks. If anyone comes out from the large ship, you should know what to do, right?”

Chang’an couldn’t help but click his tongue inwardly. This Sixth Miss Song was planning to lure the snake from its hole while creating a diversion in the east to strike in the west. But immediately he became somewhat worried and objected: “If thirty people leave all at once, only half will remain. Moreover, all the long hooks will be taken away—what will you do?”

Song Chuyi turned to glance at him: “How could relying on long hooks alone be enough? Besides, the offensive and defensive positions have already switched now. Don’t I still have over thirty people here? There are also bows and arrows on the ship.”

Chang’an finally understood why Song Chuyi had insisted back then that when his young master selected people, he must choose over twenty from among the archers. He nodded dumbfounded, and Song Chuyi had already given the order.

Ten people quickly entered the water first. The rest also boarded small boats according to Song Chuyi’s instructions, rowing the small boats to beneath the large ship, then climbing up the ship’s gunwale and hiding.

The commotion from drilling the ship was quite loud. Even on this ship, Chang’an could hear the banging sounds. He covered his ears and listened for a while, and sure enough, he saw people beginning to emerge successively from the opposite ship’s cabin.

His eyes shone with light as he impatiently ordered: “Quickly shoot arrows, quickly shoot arrows!”

Song Chuyi raised her hand to stop his words, frowning: “It’s not time yet.”

Chang’an felt somewhat disappointed, not understanding what she wanted to do. He stood behind her, watching helplessly as the batch of people drilling the ship made increasingly loud commotions.

The people on the ship finally couldn’t stand it anymore. After several people came out successively, another batch emerged, sticking their heads out to look below. This sticking out of heads wouldn’t have mattered, but their eyes were poked through.

Screams echoed across the water surface in the deep silence of night. More people emerged from the ship’s cabin successively.

Calculating the ship’s capacity and glancing at the approximate number of people on the ship, Song Chuyi softly commanded: “Wait until the ship is a bit closer, then shoot your arrows.”

Today’s wind was blowing from the northeast. Combined with the fact that the previous ship had also turned around following Song Chuyi’s ship, the distance to this main ship had accelerated and drawn closer. Chang’an finally had nothing more to say. This main ship couldn’t move, but that large ship was constantly moving. No wonder Sixth Miss had refused to shoot arrows at first—firstly, the distance was too far, and even if they shot, the hit rate would be low; secondly, she was waiting to catch them all in one net. He couldn’t help but touch his own neck—he wondered if Sixth Miss would take to heart all the sarcastic remarks he’d been making these past few days.

The ship drew closer and closer. Song Chuyi finally raised her hand, and the thirty archers immediately stepped forward to draw their bows and nock their arrows.

In front were those with long hooks who hit their mark with every stab, and behind were these archers shooting to their hearts’ content. Very soon, a large swath of people on the opposite ship had fallen.

There were also those who jumped into the water still thinking of swimming to the bottom of Song Chuyi’s ship to climb up. They were all stabbed down one by one by the soldiers with long hooks stationed on the ship.

Even in this night, through the moonlight, one could occasionally see patches of scarlet red mixed in the water floating up.

Song Chuyi watched coldly as the ten people she had previously sent to pretend to drill the ship climbed aboard that large ship, signaling for the soldiers in small boats with long hooks to follow as well. She stood on the ship for another half hour or more, watching as that ship finally had no more movement, before finally letting out a soft breath of relief—the ship she was on had sunk about as far as it could go and probably couldn’t hold out even another quarter hour. If that ship over there was different from what she had anticipated and still had remaining forces, then she truly couldn’t hold out any longer.

She led Qing Luo and Qing Tao onto a small boat, then had planks laid out to board that large ship lying haphazardly strewn with many corpses. Before she had time to steady her footing, she heard Chang’an let out a cheer: “Young Master has returned! Eh… isn’t that…?”