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The city of Batavia is divided into two parts by the Tiger Canal, forming two rectangular halves in the east and west.

The canal was also built by the Han people and was undertaken by two Han merchants at that time. The moat can be connected to the canal, and the river flows around the city and extends to protect the castle.

The castle is separated from the city and is built due north of the eastern half of the city, with moats on all sides. There are several vegetable plots to the south of the castle, and further south is the northern wall of the East City.

At the four corners of the castle are four bastions, connected by four sections of straight walls.

It is impossible for the Datong Army to land on the front, and it is easy to block the landing on the west. Go around three or four miles to the east, then put down the boat, land on a beach, and then head southwest through the farmland.

Instead of attacking the castle directly, capture the city first.

Two hot air balloons took off one after another, giving a clear view of the city's defense situation.

One of the lookouts descended from the hot air balloon along the rope and handed over the quickly drawn city defense map: "General, please take a look!"

Tie Hong took it and took a look. The drawing was crooked, but the basic information was clearly marked.

The situation in the eastern half of the city is as follows: On the east wall, there are three gates and three enemy towers. At the southeast corner is a large acute-angled enemy tower similar to a bastion. There is a city gate and two enemy towers on the south wall. There is also a sharp-angled enemy tower similar to a bastion at the southwest corner.

The situation in the western half of the city is as follows: On the west wall, there are two gates and an enemy tower. There are sharp-angled enemy towers similar to bastions at the southwest and northwest corners. The south city wall has no gates or enemy towers. There is a bridge across the canal connected to the eastern half of the city.

The situation of the castle outside the city is as follows: four bastions, a three-story tower in the middle, and moats on all sides. There is a bridge to the south that leads to the eastern half of the city. There is a gap on the north side, next to the bastion, which leads to the coast.

There are also several circles drawn on the drawing to mark where there is a fort and how many defenders there are.

When the Datong Army used a hot air balloon for observation, Governor Rainiers stood on the castle and was also observing with a telescope. He had a headache and said: "What kind of device is this? It can rise to high altitudes. Our troop deployment has been People have completely figured it out.”

Army commander Clapp led troops to defend the city. Through the telescope, he could clearly see that there were Chinese people on the hot air balloon observing.

Clapp immediately mobilized his troops to test, and then he soon discovered that the Chinese lookouts on the hot air balloon continued to play flags to demonstrate this mobilization.

The Javanese servants standing on the city wall, facing the two mysterious hot air balloons, even shouted and knelt down one after another.

Clapp said to the herald: "Go and tell those Javanese soldiers that what is in the sky is not a god, but some kind of Chinese machine. Fire and knock down those two balls!"

"Boom boom boom!"

Cannon fire continued from the east wall, but the balloon was too high and too far away. At best, the cannonballs can hit the luck and break the rope pulling the balloon, and even if it breaks, it doesn't matter, the balloon will just float with the wind until it runs out of fuel and lands.

Those Javanese soldiers saw that the artillery was unable to shoot down the hot air balloon, and they became even more convinced that the Chinese army had divine help.

The Dutch soldiers walked along the city wall and kept waving their whips: "Stand up, everyone, stand up, no more kneeling, that is not a Chinese god!"

A civil servant ran out of the castle and crossed the moat to the city.

Panting, he climbed up the city wall and came to Clapp and said: "Your Excellency the Governor has an order to recruit all civilians to fight. After the victory of the war, the property left by the Chinese will be rewarded to the soldiers according to their military merits. Those Chinese farms outside the city , let the soldiers plunder, and those who have made great achievements can still get the land!"

Group after group of Dutch soldiers, armed with weapons, were recruiting soldiers in the city, and at the same time punishing those who were still stealing property secretly.

Even the Indians and Arabs were forced to defend the city walls.

Sanjay Gutap, with his clansmen and men, was responsible for defending a small section of the city wall. After the Dutch soldiers left, the wealthy Indian businessman quietly went to the next door: "Gaul, don't be too desperate. The Chinese are not Banten bandits, nor are they Matalan bandits. Malacca is occupied by the Chinese, and the Indian businessmen there are not We were robbed. If we resisted too fiercely, we would be killed."

The Indian businessman named Gao Er said: "I know that I will not defend it. As long as the Chinese soldiers attack from here, I will give up the city wall immediately."

This is the dividend of a good reputation.

In the previous offensive and defensive battles of Batavia, whether facing the Banten army or the Matalan army, all races in the city would unite and resist to the death.

Because Wan Dan and Ma defeated the blue army, they would definitely plunder the city if they conquered it.

If they were to break through the castle and completely occupy Batavia, Banten and the Mata Blue Army would not kill people indiscriminately. The two sultans also want "long-term development" and they will charge a high head tax, which is several times the tax amount of the Netherlands.

In order not to be robbed and not to pay the high poll tax, Indians and Arabs always actively helped the Dutch defend the city.

Now, they have no motivation to defend the city.

Who doesn’t know what happened in Malacca? The Chinese army will not rob randomly, and the head tax is lower than that of the Netherlands.

If they were not afraid of dying in battle, Indians would even want to help the Chinese army fight for the lower head tax.

On another section of the city wall, several wealthy Arab businessmen were also passing news to each other. Once the Chinese army attacks a city, do not resist, flee back to your own community immediately, and then wait and see how the situation develops.

Before the battle started, the defenders were already demoralized.

Javanese soldiers and Javanese civilians were kneeling on the city wall to worship the hot air balloon. They were beaten by the Dutch soldiers and stood up tremblingly. The Indians and Arabs pretended to defend the city wall, but were ready to escape at any time.

Clapp already felt that something was wrong in the atmosphere, and said to the herald: "Go to the Governor's Mansion and ask the Governor to issue weapons to the slaves, so that all the slaves can come to defend the city wall."

In order to prevent slaves from escaping back to their hometowns, slaves in Batavia were all transported from outside.

The number of black slaves was very small, and most of them were indigenous to small islands like Bali.

Bali actually has no specialties. The Dutch committed massacres there purely to capture slaves. Men could be captured as slaves, either for their own use or for sale. The women were captured and sold to the Han people as wives. After the Han people settled down and established a family, they would not think of leaving Batavia.

Historically, the Dutch conquered Bali more than two hundred years later. The indigenous people of Bali were very tough. They first fought hard, but when they couldn't win, they committed collective suicide. Even members of the royal family committed collective suicide in front of the Dutch army. Because they had been bullied by the Netherlands for nearly three hundred years, and knowing that they would end badly after being captured, they would rather commit suicide than be prisoners.

One after another, slaves were assigned simple weapons and brought to the city wall to prepare for defense.

Some slaves looked around, ready to surrender or run away at any time. But there are also many slaves who are very motivated to fight because their masters have promised many benefits, such as finding wives for them.

The Chinese army outside the city did not attack the city immediately, but set up camp in the farmland.

About half a day later, Sun Jie and Su Dingguo came with an army of Han landlords. They also gathered many urban Han people who had fled to the countryside.

"This is General Tie Hong, the commander of this battle." Sun Jie introduced.

Su Dingguo looked at Tie Hong in a daze. Why was the commander of the Chinese army a tall black man?

Sun Jie whispered: "This is a hero from Conglong. Before Your Majesty raised his troops, he followed Your Majesty to rob Chaoguan. If he hadn't been born too dark, I'm afraid he would have already become a marquis."

Su Dingguo did not dare to neglect, and quickly handed over his hand: "The common people pay homage to General Iron!"

"There is no need to be polite," Tie Hong said to Zhang Xianzhong and Sun Kewang. "These Han rebels will be given to you to command."

"Easy to say!"

Zhang Xianzhong was overjoyed, but he was worried that he had few soldiers.

Zhang Huangyan is the governor of Luzon and Kuang Hong is the governor of Palembang. They are not allowed to leave their jurisdictions without court orders, so the army is completely under the command of Tie Hong.

The force arrangement is as follows: Tie Hong personally leads 2,400 Datong troops, Zhang Xianzhong leads 400 ronin and 1,000 Han rebels, Sun Kewang leads 400 ronin and more than 600 Han rebels, and the prince of Johor leads 1,500 Johor soldiers.

The chief envoy Liu Hanyi and the deputy envoy Sun Jie did not intervene in the military affairs when they arrived on the battlefield. They only coordinated and arranged logistics work and were responsible for appeasing the Han people who came one after another.

Many of the small guns on the navy ships were dismantled and taken outside the city for exploratory bombardment.

On the second day of landing, the shelling of the city walls began.

Johor soldiers and Chinese civilians, as well as Javanese serfs brought by Chinese landowners, were assigned to cut down trees and dig soil.

Siege engines needed to be built and the moat had to be filled with earth.

This stalemate lasted for more than half a month, and the moat was still being filled. The Dutch Castle had sufficient food, but the food in Batavia City was getting less and less.

The food needed in the city comes from Han landlords and is transported to the city through the Tiger Canal every month.

The Han landowners also kept a secret, always storing grain in the countryside and not selling too much to the city at once, in case the Dutch and Javanese suddenly turned against each other.

Su Dingguo said: "The food stored in the city can be eaten for another month or two at most. We don't have to rush to attack, and there is no need to rush to fill the moat. Try to avoid too many casualties. After one or two months, the food in the city should be eaten. It's over. Then it will depend on whether the Dutch are willing to use the food in the castle to support them. If the food is transferred from the castle, the food in the castle will be consumed. If the food is not transferred from the castle, the Javanese, Indian, and The Persians (Arabs) will starve.”

Tie Hong said with a smile: "Then take your time and besiege the city for two months first."

Before the fighting started in Batavia, fighting had already broken out in Buriangan (Bandung) and Palembang.

When the noble landowners of Matalan in Brian's heard that Batavia was besieged, they immediately organized an uprising. They first killed the Dutch missionaries, robbed the missionaries' plantations, burned hospitals and schools (all missionary sites), and then surrounded the city of Briangan, which had only 30 Dutch soldiers (and a large number of servants).

This uprising quickly spread to Cirebon on the seaside, and then to Semarang further west.

There was a Han uprising in Semarang, and the surrounding Matalan aristocratic landowners responded one after another.

The puppet Sultan of Madaram originally gathered ten thousand troops to rescue Batavia. As soon as he heard that an uprising broke out in Semarang, he was so frightened that he immediately returned to the capital halfway, and was blocked outside the city. However, it was the leaders of the city who united with the nobles to rebel.

Sultan Matalan was so frightened that he led his troops to retreat to the eastern city. As a result, the aristocratic landowners in the east also rebelled, and various rebel armies began to encircle and suppress the Sudanese army.

Twenty years ago, Ma Daran could still raise an army of 100,000, but now it has declined to this state.

Before Ma Daran's puppet Sultan died, three Sultans appeared among the rebels. The three rebel sultans all came from the aristocratic and landowning classes, and all claimed that they were orthodox members of the Matalan royal family. It is estimated that after they destroy the puppet Sultan, they will continue to fight for a few more times until someone wins the final victory.

In addition, the Han rebels in Semarang actually produced a sultan, who seemed to want to establish a city-state in Semarang. Of course, he is only known as Sultan internally, and as the Governor-General of China externally.

On the other side of Palembang, the Dutch fleet returned, and the Indian Ocean fleet was also there, with more than 30 large and small warships trying to attack the Han port.