On April 3, 1629, Governor Qin Xiangping personally held a departure ceremony at Fubo Harbor in Taipei City, and presented the flag to the Chinese troops of the Australian and Song National Defense Forces.

The sky was blue, the sun was shining, and it was a good day to fight.

After two and a half years of the fleet's deterrent visit to Japan, the ambitious soldiers of the Republic are finally going to set foot on Japanese soil once again. The difference is that last time only warships that could not go ashore were sent to roam the Gulf of Tonkin, this time thousands of land forces armed to the teeth were about to be thrown into battle.

Zhao An, who had already received orders from the Ao-Song people, did not return to Fuzhou. In order to better understand the strength of the Ao-Song people, and to reassure the shareholders of the shipyard, Zhao An has been exploring the details of the Austral-Song Expeditionary Force in Taipei in the past few days.

What gradually relaxed him was that although the Ao Song people looked contemptuous of the shogunate army, they were still meticulous in the details of the battle.

In the past few days spent in Taipei, Zhao An has an intuitive understanding of the military strength of the Australian Song people.

The troops, who received the order in advance to depart from the south, had already arrived in Taipei yesterday. As a "friendly merchant of the Ming Kingdom", Zhao An was allowed to enter the military port for inspection. Taking advantage of this opportunity, Zhao An saw the soldiers getting off the transport ship up close.

The Australian and Song officials who accompanied him to inspect the port introduced the troops who disembarked very calmly, which were army soldiers recruited from Lanfang, all of whom were descendants of the Song colonies of three or four generations.

The soldiers grew up in Luzon, thousands of miles from the Australian mainland, but behaved exactly like the troops transferred from Australia. They say the same thing, wear the same uniform, carry the same guns, obey the same discipline... Except for a slightly darker complexion, there is almost no difference between them.

The Zhao An family cooperated with Qi Jiguang to exterminate the Japanese invaders decades ago, so he has a little in-depth understanding of military affairs. In the unimpressed introduction of the port officials, Zhao An saw the strength of this force that quietly disembarked the ship.

Whenever he thought of the army that got off the ship without saying a word, lined up without saying a word, and left without saying a word, Zhao An would be moved by the cold will contained in the silence.

"That's the power of discipline!" He said this to me.

"I only heard from the elders in the family that General Qi's subordinates also had such discipline in the past, so they were invincible."

He sighed and said with some regret: "But the Qi family army is only rare, and unorganized and unrecorded shrimp soldiers and crab generals are the general situation in the Ming Kingdom..."

After visiting the disembarkation of the army mobilized to Taipei yesterday afternoon, Zhao An no longer doubted whether the Ao Song could defeat the shogunate army, but began to think about how far the Song people would win.

After returning to the rented hotel, Zhao An quickly wrote a few letters and handed them to the buddy to take back to Fuzhou. He was determined to exercise the power of the executive president, and directly ordered to increase the cooperation with the Australian Song people, and must take a larger share of the cake of the Australian Song people... Incidentally, the position of "CEO" has also become popular on the southeast coast in recent years.

Let's turn our gaze back to the present, on this sunny morning.

The entire port of Fubo has been turned into a sea of troops, and more than 1,000 soldiers who are going to set off from Taipei are standing in the warm sun, maintaining the strictest military posture in the blowing of the sea breeze.

On the rostrum in front of them, Governor Qin was sitting upright in the center, and on either side sat Colonel Qi Haiping, commander of the Taiwan detachment, Lieutenant Colonel Qian Ran, commander of the expeditionary force, and several military and political officials.

As the port bell rang, the time came to 9 a.m. The Governor slowly rose from his seat and walked to the podium with a tin horn.

He coughed lightly, adjusted his posture, and brought his mouth closer to the flare.

"My loyal and brave Wehrmacht soldiers!"

"It's an honor for me to present you with a flag, a banner for you to conquer Japan and sweep away the thieves!"

"Soon you will have to cross the ocean, cross thousands of miles, and vent the anger of the people and the will of the republic on the thieves who dare to challenge my Great Song Dynasty!"

The officers and soldiers of the army below are motionless, like coconut trees standing on the seashore. Their eyes were fixed on the military flag that fluttered beside the Governor, and their eyes were filled with fiery passion.

On the viewing platform on the side, Zhao An also changed into a pale robe, sat on a chair and looked here, looking at the governor and officers and soldiers who were speaking.

"Our Motherland needs you to defend it! We need you to fight for our interests! Our dignity needs to be guarded by the blood and death of our enemies! ”

The governor's voice gradually rose up, and the passionate voice passed through a distance of hundreds of meters and entered Zhao An's head.

He subconsciously looked around and noticed that all the listeners were breathing heavily, mildly or heavily.

Zhao An smiled a little self-deprecatingly. Basically, all of them are Taiwanese residents, and each of them has a more or less connection with the Australian Song people, so they can feel the emotions of the Australian Song people more and resonate with them. And Zhao An himself is already a middle-aged man in his forties, and most of his life has been spent in the Ming Kingdom, and he has become accustomed to being a Ming person, not a Song person, although the Song people have always claimed that the Song and Ming are one and the same bloodline.

But Zhao An looked at a young man in front of him in front of him with some surprise. The man was wearing a traditional large-sleeved shirt of the Ming literati and a hard-wrapped square scarf that is rare in Taiwan, and he looked like he should be a scholar from the mainland.

But... Why does this person look more Australian and Song than the Australian Song people? His face turned red, his hands clenched into fists, and he looked ready to be drafted into the army at any moment.

Zhao An patted the man's shoulder with some curiosity and whispered, "Little brother, are you okay?" ”

The man's head was still looking down, and he leaned over and said "I'm sorry", but his eyes were firmly fixed on the flag fluttering on the rostrum.

"Comrades, brave and fearless Wehrmacht officers and soldiers! For the interests of the people, for the dignity of the motherland, for the honor of the soldiers! I, Qin Xiangping, hereby award you the military flag! Ladies and gentlemen, Wuyun is prosperous! ”

"Wan Sheng! Wansheng! Wansheng! ”

The scrappy soldiers cheered. When Qian Ran received the military flag in the hands of the governor on behalf of the expeditionary force, the atmosphere in the port reached a new climax. The cheers of thousands of amateur guys resounded in the sky, and the desire to win gave them unlimited power.

Led by the officers, Wan Sheng's cheers were slowly replaced by a neat chorus.

All the audience spontaneously stood up and sang loudly along with the officers and soldiers.

Zhao An also stood up a little embarrassed. Since he didn't know the lyrics, he and the young man in front of him could only vaguely follow a few words, but this did not affect them to feel the passion and blood around them.

"Destiny has come to the world

Rising over the vast horizon

Forward Forward Forward

to the blue sea level"

In the passionate national anthem of the Australian and Song Songs, representatives of Taipei citizens walked through the military town with flowers and snacks in their hands, offering blessings to the soldiers who were about to sail away.

Zhao An looked at the Australian and Song soldiers who were talking and laughing with the citizens with a complicated expression, thinking of the Ming Kingdom separated by a strait, where the soldiers were as lowly as beggars and serfs, how could they contact decent citizens like the Ao and Song people?

"Yellow sand wears gold armor in a hundred battles, and if you don't break it, you won't return it!"

The soldiers began to board the ship.

The infantry of the two battalions boarded four transport ships under the leadership of the officer, and they were accompanied by cannons dragged by horses, which was the greatest guarantee of the invincibility of the Austro-Song field.

The expedition to Kyushu will not reach Nagasaki directly. According to the plan I was given, the fleet would go to Jeju Island under the escort of the Taiwanese detachment, where it would join forces with the Donggang Association from western Korea. After the detachment lifted the blockade of the shogunate navy, it went to Nagasaki and landed.

I was appointed by Qian Ran as the deputy commander of the expeditionary force, responsible for commanding the Dongjiang Army.

Qian Ran is my old acquaintance. The last time he deterred Japan, he was the captain of a destroyer, the same rank as I was at that time.

Supposedly, with my academic qualifications, it is time to be promoted to lieutenant colonel. It's just that because he took too long of leave, his merits fell a lot, so now he is Qian Ran's subordinate.

After the troops began to board the ship in an orderly manner, the noisy atmosphere in the port area finally calmed down, and only the banners that read "Long Martial Luck" and "Pray for Death in Battle" were still fluttering in the wind.

Zhao An was about to leave, but the young man sitting in front of him turned around and saluted and apologized to him: "I was greedy to watch the Song people go on the expedition before, and I didn't treat Mr. with courtesy, and I hope to forgive my sins." ”

Seeing him speak like this, Zhao Anxin was sure that this was a scholar from the Ming Kingdom, so he also arched his hand and said, "Where is it." ”

"Mr. is also Akito, right?" The young man asked with a smile, his words were as warm as a spring breeze, and he naturally exuded the style of a gentleman, and it could be seen that he had been well educated.

Zhao An's smile became more and more sincere—people with excellent family education must have a good family background, and it is worth paying energy to socialize—he smiled: "Yes, I came to Taipei a few days ago to do some business with the Song people." ”

"Little brother, what are you here for?"

The young man said with a smile: "The law of Song personality is far better than that of the Ming Dynasty, so I came to study here." I hope that the stones of other mountains can be used to attack jade. ”