France, Yvelines, south-west suburb of Paris.

The town of Versailles is particularly beautiful in June, with a two-story red brick house in the middle of the forest, surrounded by trees that stretch up the hillside.

The green carpet meadows in the forest are dotted with wildflowers, hiding the legs of the galloping horses in the distance.

Wu Zhong grabbed the reins, and the horse under him neighed, and the two front hooves were raised high and stepped on the ground.

Behind him, the French minister Charlotte also followed, raised her horsewhip, and introduced with a smile: "Lord Qincha, the red brick building in front is called the Palace of Versailles, which is the hunting palace of His Majesty the King!" ”

According to Charlotte, it was originally a forest-swamp wasteland, but the old king Louis XIII bought it for 10,000 livres thirty years ago and built the Palace of Versailles as a hunting residence.

The palace where the kings of France lived was the Louvre on the banks of the Seine in Paris, and the current king of France was Louis XIV, who was not yet in power.

This is the outskirts of Paris, more than 30 miles away from the Louvre in the center of Paris, the Ming mission has just arrived, Wu Zhong plans to stay at the Palace of Versailles for two days, and then go to the Louvre to meet the King of France.

In front of the Palace of Versailles is a large French-style garden with unique trees and flowers, and the scenery is beautiful and tranquil.

Wu Zhong stood in front of the main palace and looked into the distance, the artificial river like a jade belt was sparkling, the sail shadow was dotted, and the big trees on both sides were towering.

He couldn't understand why Charlotte, the French minister to Portugal, only let a dozen people from the Ming delegation enter the French mainland, and he was sneaky along the way, for fear that others would know.

In the middle of his thoughts, the sound of horses' hooves gradually came, Wu Zhong looked back, and saw a group of knights galloping over quickly in the woods dozens of meters away.

These knights wore their heads bowed and their horses' bellies, all dressed in hunting suits, and carried fine hunting equipment such as shotguns on their shoulders.

Wu Zhong could see at a glance that their horsemanship was superb, and this person should be the escort of the French nobles.

As if sensing danger, a team of brocade guards quickly rode over and guarded in front of Wu Zhong, staring indifferently at the row of horses whistling past.

When the cavalry approached, one of the young knights at the head glanced back, immediately pulled the reins, and the horse under his crotch neighed, and stood tall.

The young knight shouted to the guards behind him, then turned around and rode towards the Ming Mission, and shouted with a smile, "Charlotte! ”

As if seeing an old acquaintance, Charlotte also greeted him excitedly, waved her hand and smiled: "Duke of Anjou!" ”

Wu Zhong carefully looked at the young knight, and saw that he was only sixteen or seventeen years old, with curly hair, and he looked like a golden lion king.

Charlotte smiled and pointed at the young knight and said to Wu Zhong: "Lord Qincha, let me introduce you, this is the younger brother of His Majesty the King, the Duke of Anjou!" ”

The Duke of Anjou was slender and handsome and round-faced, and he bowed slightly on his horse, smiling politely, and looking very cultured: "It's a pleasure to meet you, friends from the East. ”

Wu Zhong listened to Charlotte's translation, and his face was full of smiles, but he was thinking in his heart: A normal royal child is still very young, how can he be familiar with the French ministers?

This should be a chance encounter carefully arranged by the King of France, but I don't know what to do.

Moreover, Wu Zhong carefully found that Charlotte seemed to have a sense of fear for the young duke......

After the politeness, the Duke of Anjou smiled and said, "Charlotte, are you here to hunt?" If yes, then let's go together! ”

As he spoke, he made a "please" gesture, as if he was not in the habit of asking for the opinions of others, and rode directly to the depths of the forest.

Charlotte smiled awkwardly at Wu Zhong and said, "I'm sorry, the Duke of Anjou is this temper, I hope your envoy doesn't mind." ”

Wu Zhong waved his hand and said: "Children of the royal family, it is inevitable that they have strange temperaments, who doesn't have a bit of personality, let's go and have a look." ”

The forest around the Palace of Versailles served as the royal hunting ground of the French royal family, and in addition to many birds, there were also many wild boars, sika deer and other animals.

If not, wouldn't every hunt by the French royal family be tantamount to blowing the wind? How embarrassing that is!

Although Charlotte had a shotgun, it was more like an ornament in his hands, and he fired dozens of shots in the morning, and he didn't even shoot a single bird feather.

On the contrary, the young Duke of Anjou was so good at marksmanship that he almost missed a shot, and with each shot, the birds above his head fell and hung all over his horse's buttocks.

Young people prefer to be competitive, and the Duke of Anjou sometimes glanced at Wu Zhong proudly, and the meaning of provocation was self-evident.

Although Wu Zhong has a generous temperament, as an envoy of the Ming Dynasty, how can he allow this yellow-haired boy to provoke?

Inadvertently, Wu Gonggong performed a lifelong mastery, issued three silver needles in a row, the needle hit the bird, and the third needle actually carried out the neck of a bird and nailed it directly to the treetops.

This operation made the Duke of Anjou stunned, like a blinded golden lion king shouting.

The surrounding French guards were shocked and nervous, and after reacting, they all protected the duke's side, and everyone was like a great enemy.

The Duke of Anjou immediately retreated, but he did not want to apologize, and the scene was a little embarrassing for a while.

At this time, a wild boar that did not know whether it was alive or dead broke into everyone's field of vision, breaking the embarrassing atmosphere.

The Duke of Anjou's eyes lit up, and he slowly held the musket, but did not fire, and only when the boar was approaching was he pulled the trigger unhurriedly.

A crisp gunshot rang out, and the boar fell in response, and the guards cheered at the same time.

The Duke of Anjou was proud, handed his musket to the guards beside him, and rode his horse to the wild boar that was rolling and struggling on the ground.

What made Wu Zhong even more curious was that this young duke, who could also be called a prince (Charlotte introduced him as the second son of the old king Louis XIII), was very cruel.

I saw the Duke of Anjou come to the wild boar, turn over and dismount, and without saying a word, twitch the sword at his waist and hack the struggling wild boar to death, and then dragged the heavy boar to the river, skinned and rinsed, and pulled out the heart for a while, and pulled out the bloody intestines for a while, without asking a guard to help the whole time.

Wu Zhong secretly exclaimed, this kind of royal child is in Daming, at the age of sixteen or seventeen, he dared to slaughter the beast so neatly, not disgusted with dirty and bloody skinning cramps, torn flesh and blood blurred, I am afraid that only Emperor Tianwu has this courage, and other royal children are afraid that it will not work.

He became more and more curious, who was this in front of him? Are the royal children of France so martial and so awesome?

The Duke of Anjou washed his bloody hands in the river, and personally went down from his horse to the iron shelf and other things, and put on the barbecue the wild boar meat that had been cut into several portions.

He glanced at Wu Zhong, who was observing him, and asked with a casual smile, "When does the Ming envoy plan to return to China?" ”

Wu Zhong said with a smile: "After the audience with the king of your country, the mission will return to Lisbon, Portugal, and return home." ”

The Duke of Anjou looked a little surprised and asked, "Aren't you going to England?" ”

The top leaders throughout Europe have inquired about it, and the relationship between the Ming and England is very good, and before the alliance with Portugal, England was the most friendly Western power in the Ming Dynasty.