The news that the emperor personally went to Baiyulou to attend Gao Shishi's birthday banquet and invited him to eat at the same table spread in Beijing on May 26.

As soon as this news came out, it was secretly rumored in Beijing a few days ago that the so-called emperor was extremely dissatisfied with the "failure to capture and kill the Tu people" under the excellent situation of high pragmatism, so the battle of Monan, all those who participated in it were rewarded, and the solitary servant was shelved in the cabinet with full powers, and it was immediately self-defeating.

After all, if the emperor was really dissatisfied, how could he go to the courtier's birthday banquet with a smile on his face, and even invite him to the same table? As for the jewelry and cultural toys that the emperor gave when he went to congratulate him, such as "a pair of white bi" and "two sides of the inkstone", it is irrelevant, so don't mention it.

It is difficult for Qi Jiguang, Li Chengliang and other military ministers to be given these things by the emperor, but after so many years, Gao Shishi has long been unaware of how many such rewards he has received.

It seems that the relationship between the emperor and Gao pragmatic is not at all the problems that were rumored to be, and it is still very good.

It's just that in this way, the problem that the high pragmatic reward has been difficult to give birth a few days ago is very abrupt, and the rumors in Beijing have changed in due course, evolving into how the emperor wants to reward him?

After today's incident, none of the officials in Beijing still think that the emperor does not want to give a reward, and everyone can see that the problem now is likely to be that the emperor wants to reward him heavily, but he has some scruples.

What kind of heavy reward actually made the emperor have some scruples?

This question even overwhelmed the main topic of discussion in Beijing recently: the wedding of Princess Yongning.

Princess Yongning's wedding, Gao Pragmatic had already learned the news before he returned to Beijing, and he was still in Changping at that time.

For Princess Yongning, Gao pragmatic feelings are somewhat complex and subtle.

First of all, it is certain that he has never considered Princess Shang, this is caused by the system of the Ming Dynasty, and he is not a person who would consider changing the state system for the sake of personal emotional issues, so it has been decided from the origin of Princess Yongning that they are unlucky.

But having said that, when it comes to Princess Yongning, Gao Pragmatic still has a good impression of her. This kind of good feeling can't talk about love, it's probably the kind that has a positive attitude towards a girl, so he is more or less sorry for the inevitable outcome of Princess Yongning's unfree marriage.

Especially if the other party also makes it clear that they have a crush on him.

After Zhu Yijun left, the bustle of Baiyulou did not disperse immediately, and it was not until it was close to evening that everyone rushed to leave Jianxinzhai before the city gate fell.

Originally, they didn't have to worry about the city gate falling, after all, such a large group of high-ranking officials and nobles, where did the city gate guards dare to stop them? But it just so happened that the emperor came here today, and everyone felt that they still had to give the emperor a face, otherwise so many high-ranking officials and nobles entered the city overnight, wouldn't they treat the national dynasty system as a child's play in front of the emperor? Everyone will be embarrassed by then.

Gao Pragmatic did not go back to the city for the night, because he was more free in time now.

At present, his status in the Zhan Mansion is very high, but he is not the one who is "in charge of the affairs of the government", which is a bit of a "free man in the audience". His status in the Hanlin Academy is not bad, but his main duty in the Hanlin Academy is to be a part-time dispatch-to the day of the feast, so it is not like in the past, he must go to the Hanlin Academy early in the morning to order Mao (his main position is the left concubine of the Zhan Mansion, and the attendant of the Hanlin Academy itself is a part-time official), so that as long as he does not need to speak the next day, he has plenty of time.

Of course, take 10,000 steps back and say, with his current situation, it is difficult to be pulled into pigtails and talk about being late and leaving early - how stupid does he have to be to take such a trivial matter to sue such a favored minister as Gao Pragmatic?

So Gao Pragmatic didn't go back to the city tonight, but just saw Xinzhai to deal with various private matters that had been backlogged for two months.

Jinghua Group is really getting bigger and bigger now, although Gao Pragmatic is a qualified shopkeeper who is very good at grasping the big and letting go of the small, but there are so many branches under Jinghua, even if each department only submits three things that need to be handled by him personally in the past two months, it will take him a lot of time.

The industry has the most things, but there is not much trouble, mainly to report various progress, high pragmatism is probably just to read it, and it is very important to be able to approve one or two sentences, and the vast majority of the replies are just "can", "know", "handle as usual" and so on.

However, there are still two or three things in it, which were approved only after Gao Shishi thought carefully for a while.

The first thing is the progress of the "Taiwan Raiders" that Gao Qi is responsible for. According to Gao Qi, there are still some pirates on the island of Taiwan, but most of them are not in the climate and have complicated origins, some are the remnants of the Fujian Sea Pirate Alliance that were broken up and crippled before, some are the Japanese pirates who can't get along in Japan and can't get along in the Ming Dynasty, and some are even more bizarre, they are actually pirates in the South Seas.

The first two have been introduced a long time ago, and there are probably not many changes, so I won't go into details, while those South Sea pirates are more interesting.

According to Gao Qi's investigation, the number of these people is not large, but the origin is very complicated, there are pirates from several indigenous countries in Nanyang, and the reason why they actually ran to the vicinity of Daming is because they were beaten by the Portuguese and have nowhere to go.

Gao Shishi didn't pay much attention to these Nanyang pirates, but it wasn't until he read the news sent by Annan that he changed his mind and asked Gao Qi to find a way to subdue these Nanyang pirates - at least temporarily, and how to deal with them in the future will be discussed later.

As for the reason for this, it is because of a small trouble.

Annan sent a report saying that when Gao Jing was exploring the sea off Champa in southern Annam, he encountered a fleet of Franc aircraft flying the banner of the Taungoo Dynasty of Burma, and the other party did not know what the reason was, and put on a threatening posture to forcibly drive Gao Jing's fleet away from the sea area where the incident occurred.

Gao Pragmatism learned from the British more than 100 years later in the original history and taught his fleet to dare to "fight when he sees the enemy", so Gao Jing was willing to retreat and directly raised the battle flag, and a naval battle broke out between the two sides.

In this naval battle, Gao Jing did not take any advantage, one armed transport ship sank, one was abandoned with heavy damage, and many others were damaged. However, the other side did not catch well, four battleships suffered heavy losses, and one surrendered after being surrounded.

Judging from the results of the battle, Gao Pragmatic was inclined to think that his own fleet was slightly inferior to the Portuguese, but because the fleet led by Gao Jing had a relatively obvious numerical advantage - he had more than 20 ships of all sizes at that time, while the opponent only had seven large ships but no small boats - so in the end, the Portuguese were the first to evacuate the sea area where the incident occurred.

Theoretically speaking, Gao Jing's fleet won this naval battle, and Gao Jing himself said in his report that he won the "Naval Battle off the coast of Bontulang".

Off the coast of Bontulang? Gao Shishi checked the map, and suddenly found that this place was actually near Cam Ranh Bay in the later generations - the area including Cam Ranh Bay is currently called Bangtulang.

He vaguely guessed what Gao Jing was doing there, and the Portuguese might have had a similar purpose.

However, the fact that the Portuguese were flying the banner of the Taungoo Dynasty in Burma made Gao Shishi a little vigilant, and he remembered that the Taungoo Dynasty seemed to have hired a small number of Portuguese mercenaries in history, could it be that it had already started now?

This...... Shouldn't it have a bad impact on the Indochina strategy that is being prepared? Although Liu Wei is a very capable person, he has never fought with Western mercenaries after all, so I don't know if there will be problems?

No, the next time I see Zhu Yijun, I have to mention to him that I want to change some Wanli styles for Yunnan, at least change Liu Wei's troops, if this can't be done, then at least I have to change his "Descending Japanese Ding", otherwise I have some unconfidence in my heart.

These two things are related to the fleet, although Gao Pragmatic attaches great importance to it, but he is not nervous, after all, his shipbuilding plan is progressing steadily, it is nothing more than spending money and time, Portugal is about to be annexed by Spain, and then their power in Asia will definitely be chaotic for a while, and they still have time.

The third thing was a real surprise to him.

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