Daming Military Empire

Chapter 181
This person tends to get carried away when he is proud, no, Zheng Zhilong found that when he was proud, he said what he shouldn't have said.He hesitated for a long time, and finally took off a gold ring from his hand, handed it to Zhu Cijiong, and then said bitterly: "This is the seal of my Zheng family's order. There are dense patterns on it. Others can't imitate it. I don’t even look at the handwriting, I only look at the dense pattern on the seal.”

Zhu Cijiong took the ring and looked at it curiously. It was a large gold ring with a square seal on the front, and a strange "Zheng" was engraved on it. He couldn't tell what the dense pattern was. Yes, but it doesn't matter, just confiscate it.

He put a condom on his finger, and found that his slender fingers couldn't hold such a big ring at all. He couldn't help but glanced at Zheng Zhilong annoyed, you said you get a seal if you want it, why make it into a ring How do you let others take it?

At this time, there was a burst of laughter from the group of women on one side. It turned out that Zheng Chenggong was hugging his younger brother and acting cute there. It seemed interesting that a child was hugging another child. Zhu Cijiong rolled his eyes, and there was a With an idea, he waved to Cao Huachun who was in the distance, and Cao Huachun naturally stepped forward immediately and respectfully, waiting for orders.

Zhu Cijiong laughed and said, "Eunuch Cao, go find a gold chain, and ask for a thicker one."

Without further ado, Cao Huachun immediately took the order to resign, and after a while, a sandalwood tray was brought up with a piece of red velvet cloth on it, and there were more than a dozen gold chains of various kinds on the velvet cloth!
Zhu Cijiong was going to choose the thickest one, but he gave up after holding it upside down in his hand. It is cruel to hang a chain that weighs more than one catty on a child's neck all day long. In the end, he chose the one that was only three or four taels. Heavy, studied the structure of the interface with great interest, and then put Zheng Zhilong's gold ring in.

Zheng Zhilong looked at Zhu Cijiong inexplicably, the emperor wanted to hang a gold chain around his neck?This, this, doesn't look like a nouveau riche, but seems to have lost his mind. Of course, he didn't dare to say that, so he could only watch silently from the sidelines.

Of course Zhu Cijiong was not out of his mind. After putting on the gold ring, he immediately stood up, gave Cao Huachun a follow-up look, and walked towards the group of women.

He had already told everyone that all customary rituals would be exempted during the Chinese New Year, so everyone didn't react too much when they saw him coming, and continued to tease Brother Zheng Chenggong there.

Zhu Cijiong walked forward with a smile and hung the gold chain around Zheng Chenggong's neck, and then said: "Success, this is the token of your Zheng family's orders. Wear it well and don't lose it."

Zheng Chenggong looked bewildered, Zheng Zhilong hid his face and couldn't bear to look directly at it, the girls didn't have any special reaction, this golden hanging around the neck is also very beautiful, only Xiaoqi Zuoemon was jealous, and he yelled in a childish voice: "I I want it, I want it too."

Zhu Cijiong grabbed the thickest gold chain from the wooden tray with his backhand, hung it around his neck, and coaxed: "This one is the biggest, here it is for you, play with it."

Xiao Qizaemon held it in his hand and looked at it, then glanced at the gold chain on his brother's neck, and found that the one on his neck was much bigger, he couldn't help but lifted it up and showed off: "It looks good, doesn't it look good?"

All the girls couldn't help but praised again and again: "It's so beautiful, our Xiaoqi is the most beautiful."

Xiaoqi?Why does it sound so familiar, such a distant memory, Zhu Cijiong slowly walked back to his seat with nostalgia for his previous life.

Seeing him sitting down, Cao Huachun asked softly, "Your Majesty, do you want these?"

Zhu Cijiong looked at the gold chain, then at Zheng Zhilong, and teased: "Do you want Zheng Aiqing to have one too?"

Hearing this, Zheng Zhilong shook his head quickly and said, "Thank you, Your Majesty, for your kindness. Forget about this humble minister. This golden and shining humble minister is dizzy." It's fine for his two silly sons to wear this dog chain-like thing, and he is determined not to wear it. will bring.

Zhu Cijiong saw that he didn't answer, so he had no choice but to give up teasing him. He waved his hand lightly to make Cao Huachun retreat, and then continued to ask about the situation of the pirates: "What are the names of your brothers, and how strong are they? ?”

Zheng Zhilong replied carefully: "At the beginning, it was Weichen's three brothers, Shi Daxuan, Hong Xu and Gan Hui, who led the rest of his men to Semarang to make a living. Thousands of horses."

The three pirate chieftains each have more than 2 people under their command, adding up to 7 to [-] people. This is quite a force. Zhu Cijiong continued to ask: "Can your brother Zheng Zhihu find them?"

Zheng Zhilong nodded and said: "It's usually Zhihu who contacts them, and Zhihu knows where they are the best."

Zhu Cijiong thought for a while, and said seriously: "In the future, you don't need to worry about their affairs. If you need them, I will ask Zheng Zhihu to contact them. If you don't need them, I will find a place for them to retire in peace. You Just take care of Western commerce and trade for me."

The New Year's Eve is over soon, and the time has entered the seventh year of Chongzheng. The most important event of this year is the Jiaxu Ke Palace Examination. What Zhu Cijiong lacks most now is talents, so he will devote his thoughts to this group as soon as the New Year is over. The student has gone to him. As for the issue of pirates, raising pirates is too immoral after all. He really can't be so cruel, and this matter can only be postponed for the time being.

Speaking of which, since Zhu Cijiong started to promote steam-powered machinery, various factories in Daming have sprung up like mushrooms after a spring rain. If there are more factories, there will naturally be more things produced. The sales in Goa are very good, and the profits are quite high, but The journey was too far, and it would take at least two or three months to go back and forth. Many merchants in Ming Dynasty began to look closer.

The profit of selling things to the surrounding small countries is much lower, but the advantage is that the distance is relatively short, and with the promotion of steam machinery, the production cost continues to drop, and the output continues to rise. Although the profit is low, the volume can still be increased. Make a lot of money.

Dongying and North Korea can be said to be relatively rich countries around Daming, so many Ming merchants chose to expand their business to Dongying and North Korea. This is naturally a good thing for Daming. The bigger the market, the greater the prospects for development. Now Portugal is in There are not many colonies in the Nanyang region. The economy of Ming Dynasty may soon reach a bottleneck relying on colonial trade alone. It is the right time to develop peripheral trade.

It was a good thing for Ming, but it was a terrible thing for Holland. The reason why they occupied Dongpan was to monopolize the trade between Dongying and North Korea. It won't cause much impact, but now that Daming's productivity is up, it's no small matter. The goods dumped to Japan and North Korea even surpass the Netherlands, and the price is much lower than the Netherlands. Knowing that the sales of Dongying alone accounted for more than [-]% of the overall sales of the Dutch East India Company, this is simply ruining their jobs!
The Netherlands has never been merciful when it comes to matters of interest, and they resorted to their old tricks, and batches of pirates began to be active along the coast of the East China Sea of ​​Ming Dynasty and the waters near North Korea and Japan.

Now the merchants in Daming are miserable. Pirates are so ruthless. They not only rob goods, they even rob people and ships together. In the meantime, the provinces of North Zhili, Shandong, and South Zhili were filled with mourners, and memorials reported from all over the country came like snowflakes.

Zhu Cijiong looked at the mountains of memorials in front of him, his face was livid with anger, no need to ask, this must be the fault of the Dutch, he is soft-hearted, but the enemy is so ruthless, how can we not let him out of anger!
As soon as he gritted his teeth, he immediately delivered an order to Zheng Zhihu to inform Shi Daxuan, Hong Xu and Gan Hui to rush to Dongdaying in batches immediately, preparing to transform the blessing boat and receive weapons. At the same time, he ordered Wang Gong Factory and Dongdaying Artillery Factory to copy a Francois cannons and Dutch artillery, if you want to play, I will accompany you to play the big ones.

As for the pirates on the coast of the East China Sea of ​​Ming Dynasty and in the waters near North Korea and Dongying, Zhu Cijiong ordered Jinyiwei's spies to go out and investigate immediately, and at the same time let the Beiyang navy be ready to attack at any time. Once the pirates' dens are detected, they will immediately surround them up!
The efficiency of Jinyiwei's spies was quite high. In less than half a month, news about the pirates came back to the capital one after another.Sure enough, it was the work of the Dutch. Recently, there have been a lot of cheap cloth, porcelain and other Ming specialties in Dongfan. Needless to say, these are all looted by pirates, and Jin Yiwei also found out that there is a band of pirates who often haunt Dongfan. And the waters near Ryukyu, there are a large number, no less than 5 to [-] people, and their leader is Liu Xiang who has not dealt with Zheng Zhilong very much!
Since you are not benevolent, then don’t blame me for being unrighteous. Zhu Cijiong’s ruthlessness is quite terrifying. Wang Gongchang and Dongdaying Artillery Factory began to frantically imitate Frang machine guns and Dutch artillery, Shi Daxuan, Hong Xu and Gan Hui The fuchuan below were all transformed into quasi-battleships with 22 artillery pieces. Batches of bird guns and earthen guns were also sent to them. Zhu Cijiong even equipped them with more than [-] grenades. These three batches of pirates armed That's outrageous, even a small boat that can only accommodate more than a dozen people is equipped with earthen guns, and each pirate is equipped with at least two bird guns and a grenade. Now the only thing they lack is a super battleship. It is not estimated that they would dare to go directly to Java Island to rob the headquarters of the Dutch East India Company!

Daming's current military strength is quite terrifying. Under the supervision of Zhu Cijiong, all three batches of pirate ships were remodeled in less than a month.

In the end, he even personally interviewed Shi Daxuan, Hong Xu and Gan Hui who came secretly, and he gave them only one order, that is, to seize every Dutch merchant ship desperately. Grab the boat together!As for the Spanish merchant ships, it's enough to make some sense. The main thing is to pile up the Dutch's goods to Manila, so that the Dutch can find trouble with the Spaniards.

While the Dutch were secretly complacent, a disaster was quietly befalling them. Shi Daxuan, Hong Xu and Gan Hui were not ordinary people. They all got the true biography of Zheng Zhilong. It exceeded Zhu Cijiong's expectations, and in the end they even developed into a country with a large scale.

(End of this chapter)