After the negotiations officially broke down, Yang Yingyuan was escorted by the secret channel of the military intelligence department and moved in the direction of Awa, and on the way, you could see everywhere Burmese civilians fleeing the fighting, as well as groups of soldiers of the Fu Han army.

"I don't know when this battle will end......"

Yang Yingyuan looked at the ragged people and sighed slightly, although he was not the kind of pedantic scholar, but he had some kindness in his heart after all.

However, the officer of the Military Intelligence Department on the side misunderstood Yang Yingyuan's meaning, and he said enthusiastically: "Lord Yang, you should not know that we have achieved an unprecedented victory in the first war against Upper Burma, and the war will be completely over before July." ”

"But you have to fight in Burma......

Yang Yingyuan's face was full of deep meaning, in fact, after he learned that the Annan Protectorate was about to be established, he knew one thing in his heart, that is, the nearby Annan Kingdom, Guangnan Kingdom, Ayutthaya Kingdom and Vientiane could not avoid this day.

What is the Annam Metropolitan Protectorate? Naturally, it is to restore the glory of history, not to mention that the emperor has also added some new things under the current Annan Metropolitan Protectorate system, and when the time comes, the nobles from Nanjing, the consortium and the Northern Chamber of Commerce that Beijing wants to unite, they will choose to use overseas benefits to make up for the loss of interests caused by unification.

The Northern Expedition is naturally a grand event that is conducive to the millennium, but in the short term, it is necessary to bear part of the losses, especially for the nobles and consortia in the south, they are not ordinary people, and they will not support the Northern Expedition because of some superficial slogans, and only the interests that can win them over are interests, that is, the interests of the original north.

However, the emperor saw clearly in this matter that the unification of the north and the south was not only in the war, but also in the integration of other aspects, and if the southern nobles and consortia were allowed to plunder the north, it would only cause a huge rift between the north and the south, and it was not conducive to unification, so after the end of the northern expedition, the principle of equal exchange between the north and the south chamber of commerce would be formulated.

Of course, so far, the overall situation must be taken into account, but for those nobles and chambers of commerce in the south who contributed money and efforts, they were forced to pinch their noses under the pressure of the emperor and admit this matter, but they were a little unhappy in their hearts after all, so the first war in Burma was to find new benefits for these people.

The Annam Protectorate, which is built on this basis, will only have more powerful combat power, greater ambition and digestion than the previous ones, and it will slowly devour all the countries around Annam, and turn them into its own nourishment, which will also be further fed back to the country, fueling the ambitions of the nobles and the consortium to expand outward.

Yang Yingyuan believes that he is by no means the only one who can see through the essence of this matter, and it can even be said that when the sub-sealing system comes out, the stimulation of Da Chu is quite powerful and very beneficial.

For example, generals and soldiers have begun to dream of being knighted, so they bravely kill the enemy on the battlefield, and ordinary people are eager to join the army in order to get knighthood; For example, officials and scholars began to hope to be able to obtain knighthoods through eunuchs, so everyone was diligent and diligent, not only in the implementation of the new policy, but also in the implementation of corruption.

Everyone is working hard for the small country in their hearts, and they express their admiration from the bottom of their hearts to His Majesty the Emperor who made all this.

"This is Qin Zheng!"

The person who said this sentence was not Yang Yingyuan, but Wei Desheng, a Western missionary who lived in Nanjing, who came to Nanjing during the Kangxi period, and later witnessed the entire process of Ning Chu seizing the world after the Han army raised troops, so it can be regarded as a real China expert.

Wei Desheng pinched the corner and said with emotion: "I didn't expect that today's Da Chu has embarked on this road so quickly and decisively. ”

Opposite Wei Desheng, Ernst, who is now the director of the Great Chu Mint Committee and a good friend of Ning Yu, the emperor of Great Chu, was holding a bowl of sweet soup at this time, and said with a smile: "Do you mean colonization?" ”

"That's right, with a little shell to cover up, but in the bones is naked colonialism, when the Great Chu feudal system is implemented, all the careerists will jump out, they carry muskets and seeds, and take the land they fancy into their arms....... And in terms of the force of Great Chu, there will be no one else in the whole of Asia who can stop it. ”

Ernst was noncommittal, he could naturally see the emperor's hidden ambitions, but this was a great good thing for him, in the words of the Chinese, 'learn to become a literary and martial artist, goods and the emperor's family', if the emperor is just satisfied with the status quo, how can his talent be appreciated?

"Mr. Wei, you are a missionary from the West, but I still don't know what country you are....... Listening to the accent seems to be a Frenchman? ”

Wei Desheng glanced at Ernst deeply and said, "Originally, I was just suspicious, but now I am completely sure that the Great Chu Emperor sent you over, there should be a deeper purpose, so let's talk about it." ”

Ernst's brows furrowed slightly, and he said, "That's right, the emperor sent me here to do a very important thing, that is, about the interests of Europe in Asia. ”

"When any country is strong, it can't wait to look around, and the current Asia is mainly the power of Russia, Spain, Britain and France, but I think that the emperor should not be too involved in the pattern of the South Seas before defeating the Russians."

Wei Desheng calmly analyzed, "If there is really any conflict, I think it is the war in Burma, which has begun to make the British vigilant. ”

Ernst smiled and nodded: "Mr. Wei is really not an ordinary person, before I came, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs had already received news that the British East India Company, stationed in Salian, Burma, had suggested to the British king to request an ambassador to China, especially for the interests of Southeast Asia, and asked to be able to share interests with China. ”

"So what you mean?" Wei Desheng was a little unsure of what Ernst meant, or he didn't understand what His Majesty was thinking behind the scenes.

Ernst put down the teacup in his hand and said with a smile: "Your Majesty's meaning is very simple, doing business is naturally about sharing interests, and at the moment, neither England nor France has really established influence in Southeast Asia, so don't be in a hurry to eat this cake of the future, and whether it is a cake or a poison, Your Majesty said it." ”

In fact, in the early eighteenth century, Western countries were still very interested in Marco Polo's China, and there were many private or official adventurers who sailed thousands of miles away on sea ships to reach China, a legendary land of wealth.

Just as Ernst went to the West to recruit so many talents and used a lot of money to attract them to China, these people are often very happy to come and do not resist too much, because they really yearn for this land of wealth.

As early as 1503, the heavily armed Portuguese came to Malacca on a sailing ship and established the first colony in Asia, which at that time was already the most prosperous trading center in Southeast Asia, bringing together spices, rice, gold, porcelain and silk from all over Asia, so that the Portuguese made huge profits from it, and also made the Westerners taste the sweetness.

In the decades that followed, the Portuguese occupied the spice-rich islands of Maluku, Indonesia, and even reached Guangzhou, China, when the Ming court was still in its heyday, so the Portuguese did not dare to take it lightly.

Not to be outdone, the Spaniards, whose eyes were red with envy, soon launched a fleet of voyages, which lasted three years and completed the first circumnavigation of the sea in human history, and successfully came to Asia, occupied Luzon, and established the city of Manila.

However, in Europe at that time, the maritime supremacy of the Portuguese and Spaniards gradually declined, and soon passed to the Dutch and the British, so these two goods did not have the strength to support the expansion in the Far East, until the end of the 16th century, when the then maritime hegemon Holland arrived in Java, and returned to Europe with a full fleet of spices, making them all bigwigs, and all this also made the enthusiasm of Westerners for the East reach its peak again.

Later, the Dutch East India Company was proclaimed, and it also occupied the Portuguese Maluku Islands, and even occupied Taiwan, but fortunately, the Ming and Zheng Dynasty successfully restored Taiwan to prevent Taiwan from falling into the hands of the Dutch colonists.

Despite this, the Dutch at that time still established their position in Asia, and achieved a leading position in the race for the expansion of the Spanish overseas in Asia, and all this was also seen by the British, who were very dissatisfied with the Dutch's control of the Spice Islands, and also formed the British East India Company, demanding a piece of the pie in Asia.

Of course, the British were initially weak and their fleet was not as large as the Dutch, so they had to withdraw from Indonesia after clashes with the Dutch and instead concentrate on India, trading cotton and pepper.

After the outbreak of the bourgeois revolution in England itself, Britain's national power increased rapidly, and in the twenty-two years from 1652 to 1674, there were three colonial wars between Britain and the Netherlands, and these three wars also exhausted the strength of the Netherlands itself, allowing Britain to successfully achieve maritime supremacy.

Although Britain had largely established its hegemony, it had to rely on the East India Company for its current expansion in East Asia, which had been developing in India for decades and suffered a crushing defeat in the Mughal Wars in the late 17th century......

As for France, the East India Company was also established, but it ended in bankruptcy several times before, and although it was finally successfully reorganized in the past few years, it was only a little better, but it did not even have the general results of the British East India Company.

To put it simply, in Asia today, these evil colonists do not have much power at all, such as the British East India Company also opened a trading point in Guangzhou to exchange silver, while the French East India Company held Pondicherry to dry salted fish......

Of course, both the British East India Company and the French East India Company had opened a trading point in Salian, Burma, so that they had some control over the situation in Burma, and this led to the British East India Company's suggestion to the British government that it should send an ambassador to China as soon as possible, so as to cooperate with Ning Chu and also want to be involved in the interests of East Asia.

Wei Desheng snorted coldly: "At present, Ning Chu has not even completely unified the whole of China, and there is no room for interference in the affairs of the South China Sea, how did Southeast Asia become his banne?" ”

For Wei Desheng, who has been educated in Sinology for a long time, he can even speak Chinese better than many Chinese, so he can mix like a fish in water in Nanjing's upper class with his blonde hair and blue eyes.

However, Ernst did not accept him, and he raised a finger and said: "Your Majesty has no intention of fighting an aimless war on the sea with the Western countries - you should understand that your Majesty's goal is only land, especially those in the north that have not yet been recovered, is our real goal." ”

"Russia?"

Wei Desheng's eyes lit up, in fact, his identity is quite complicated, although he is French, but he is also doing things for Britain and France, and even some other European countries will also use him to conduct oriental trade, which can be regarded as an international broker, and for him, all news related to Russia can be sold for a lot of money.

Ernst did not affirm it, but changed the subject, and said with a smile: "You should understand that whether it is the English, the French, the Spaniards, the Portuguese, or even the king of Sweden, they actually hope to find a friend in the East, a friend who can make money together. ”

"If so, what's in it for me?" Wei Desheng's eyes rolled.

"A gold coin or a ...... Friendship from His Majesty. ”

"Deal!"

The two laughed, and neither of them explained whether this so-called benefit was gold or friendship, but for the two of them, they had actually understood, so naturally there was no need to say more.

After Ernst returned to the Imperial City, Ning Yu was holding a glittering long sword in one hand and a roll of soft muslin in the other, slowly wiping the long sword.

Ernst hurriedly stepped forward and saluted: "Your Majesty, I have already been in contact with Wei Desheng, and I believe that with his participation, Britain, France and even Sweden will send ambassadors to the East to establish formal diplomatic relations with my Great Chu." ”

The last time Ernst returned to Europe, Ning Chu did not really go on a northern expedition after all, so the contact with the Westerners was only superficial, but this time it was somewhat formal, and it should be possible to establish diplomatic relations smoothly.

Ning Yu listened to Ernst's report while holding a small bottle, but poured some oil from it, then smeared it on the sword body and wiped it, and said softly: "Some things are better to do earlier, such as declaring the interests of Asia at this time, and it will be more logical to turn the other cheek in the future." ”