Mediterranean islands, luxury villas with sea views, warm sun, soft sandy beaches, blonde beauties, what do you associate with this qiē? What the? A leisurely and comfortable holiday? A beautiful and romantic encounter? No, you're in the 21st century, and in the middle of the summer of the 46th year in the first half of the 17th century, most of the time here was just killing and destruction!

As the first city on Crete to be conquered by the Ottomans, the port of Chania was counter-attacked by the Venetians last year. The 12,000 Ottoman soldiers who remained in the harbor were in spite of their frustration, but with the help of muskets and cannons from the east coast transported from the Egyptian side, they were able to easily defeat the doomed Venetian counterattack and hold their stronghold on the island of Crete.

However, while most of the 100,000-strong army withdrew to Anatolia for the winter, the Ottoman army left on the island had a hard time. Many of the small Venetian towns they had previously captured were also recaptured by the Venetians, and some of the ships transporting supplies to the island were repeatedly ravaged by the Venetian fleets, and they even lost a fast cruiser imported from the east coast, which seemed to be in a rather bad situation.

By the beginning of this year ('46), the Venetian army had reached the outskirts of the port of Chania, but by this time they were also at the end of their crossbows. After a few days of fighting the panicked Ottomans, they gradually retreated, and then the two sides began a long standoff and siege.

After the beginning of spring, before the Ottomans could regroup, a serious upheaval occurred in their front-line army: many front-line commanders who had participated in the previous battles were suddenly dismissed. He was then summarily executed. Their public accusation is that they are ineffective in combat. But the private gossip was that Sultan Ibrahim was angry that his front-line generals had failed to grab enough spoils for him. Therefore, he executed some generals to express his displeasure. Of course, there are also people who mysteriously say that these people were killed because of factional strife, which involved the teacher of the Queen Mother Kosem Sultan and Ibrahim Sultan Cincey. The political struggle between the Haukas, perhaps mixed with disputes between the different factions of the Garni Shari Guards, is a mess and foggy, and perhaps no one can figure out the truth about the murder of these military generals.

Mo San also did not know why these generals were executed, and he was not interested—nor daring to be interested—to figure out the reasons for their deaths. They are basically middle and high-level generals, and many of them have drunk coffee with Mo San and received gifts from Mo San. It's also a general acquaintance. But now Mo San just wants to completely dissociate himself from them, the Nima political struggle is too terrible, and the majestic general of the forbidden army will kill him when he says it, this Ottoman style is really bold enough. It is said that every change of imperial power of the Ottomans was accompanied by bloodshed, and the current reigning Sultan Ibrahim inherited the throne as the only surviving male direct blood relative of his father, Sultan Murad IV, which shows the cruelty of the Ottoman Empire's political struggle.

At this time, Mo San was nesting in a manor villa near the pier in the port of Chania. He was the former Grand Vitsemin who was recently appointed Supreme Commander of the Ottoman Army. Muhammad Pasha was urgently invited, and the incompetent commander, who was known for his sycophants in Istanbul, gave Mo San a big gift as soon as he arrived. He made it clear that he intended to reduce all the Greeks on Crete who had secretly helped the Venetians the previous winter to slavery. Hearing that the East Coasters were in dire need of all kinds of labor or women of childbearing age in the development of the New World, he could decide to sell them all to the East Coast - and at a fairly favorable price, provided that the East Coasters paid all the sums within six months.

In the knowledge of Saimin. Muhammad Pasha means later. Mo San was suddenly surprised and delighted. In order to facilitate this business, the other party also gave a confiscated Venetian aristocratic manor on the island to Mo San and his entourage to live temporarily. And also gave him some beautiful Greek maids, and it seems that if Mo San agrees to his conditions, there will be more benefits for him.

Saimin. Mohammed has heard of this person Mo San a few times, this gentleman used to do the position of the Great Viqi of the Empire, and he was the "Emperor" Xinxi. Hauka's puppet. This time, he was brought to Crete to be the commander of the Ottoman army, and I don't know how many fierce confrontations and political exchanges have been behind it. Because after the Ottomans resumed their offensive against the Venetians on Crete, most people could have predicted that as long as the Ottomans did not make a fool, the defeat of the Venetians was only a matter of time, and the Ottoman officers at all levels at the front thought so.

In such a situation, the Ottomans have been rather scattered and disorganized since the first half of the year. Convinced that the Venetians had once again retreated to their capital, Candia City, in the face of tens of thousands of Ottoman troops, the Ottomans slowly "recovered" the rest of the island's towns abandoned by the Venetians, plundering the spoils of war, and the Greek inhabitants of the island were suddenly in a miserable situation.

The Ottomans' insistence on booty was understandable, as the officers who had been executed a few months earlier would not have been executed if they had given enough loot to Ibrahim. The latecomers, of course, took them as a warning, and in such a situation, countless Greek residents of Crete were imprisoned on charges of "collaborating with the enemy", and then their family property was confiscated and became the spoils of war by Ottoman officers of all ranks.

In this way, countless gold and silver goods fell into the pockets of the Ottoman officers and soldiers, and countless Greek residents who had welcomed the Ottomans to "liberate" them from the Venetian colonists were suddenly reduced to slavery, while the attack on the Venetian capital city of Candia was delayed indefinitely. Only a handful of hapless troops were sent to spy on the Venetians, who appeared to be struggling to build forts and gun emplacements, while the rest of the island was merrily plundering.

It was mid-to-late August, and the main Ottoman army had not been able to advance under the Venetian garrison. Many officers who had made a fortune were transferred after honoring their superiors and the Sultan, and then a new group of people came to continue to make a fortune. Muhammad Pasha remained in the port of Chania, and instead of gathering troops and making plans to attack the city of Gandia, Muhammad Pasha discussed business with Mo San, the plenipotentiary envoy to the Ottoman Empire on the east coast, which is really strange.

Sometimes Mo San wanted to ask these Ottoman officers how long they were going to continue this war? Know that your Adriatic coastline is being relentlessly attacked by the Venetian fleet, with many villages in ruins and many people reduced to slavery. Venice's economy had recovered greatly from the Great Depression of previous years, and they had received material and personnel support from the Papal States and other Christian states, so that their naval strength recovered quickly. How can you ignore the rapid rise of an Ottoman supply fleet near Naxos last year and the destruction of an Ottoman naval detachment in the Adriatic Sea this year?

However, Mo San didn't bother to care so much, and he had been in the Ottoman Empire for two years, and he had seen a lot of strange things in the past two years. The country, which looks like flowers and is in its prime, is in its twilight and chaos, and has been on a downhill road for a long time.

He didn't care anything about what happened next for the Ottoman Empire, he only cared about how to fulfill his mission. He now ostensibly served as a diplomatic envoy plenipotentiary in the Ottoman Empire, but in reality he was mostly playing the role of an arms broker, a slave trader, and an import/export merchant, dealing with all kinds of people in Ottoman politics: court eunuchs, military officers, ministers, empress dowagers, imams, Jewish merchants, and local warlords. For these people, he generally has only one invincible move - that is, gift-giving. This move is indeed difficult to "defend", so he is very comfortable with Osman.

In June of the first half of this year, a merchant ship came from the mainland, which brought him the expected news that the local executive committee had approved the export of the battleship Bayezid to the Ottoman Empire, and instructed him to do his best with the Ottomans to implement the originally promised projects such as the opening of treaty ports and the construction of infrastructure, and to form a treaty as much as possible. In addition, he also had to pay attention to collecting more materials and people, and the money for the goods shipped to the Ottomans for sale in China could be temporarily withdrawn after the formalities were perfected, and used to purchase the Ottoman surplus copper, lead, tin, mercury and other minerals; livestock such as Turkmen horses, Rascek horses; Tatar herders who went to fight in the Far East, Egyptian Mamluks, etc., were hired.

In addition, there is the most important task, which is to find a way to collect as many people as possible. The Executive Committee had made it clear to him that relations with Spain were now strained, and that war might break out, so he should take advantage of the fact that shipping was still open to collect more people to return to the mainland. Ideally, this population should be dominated by women and children, and not too many adult men.

Now that the boss has given him the power to act cheaply, Mo San will no longer hesitate. Saimin. He planned to eat all the more than 2,500 women and children in Muhammad Pasha's hands, and the total price was only more than 110,000 yuan, which was really a big profit. As for the remaining more than 1,600 adult men, Mo San planned to wait a little longer to see how much of his funds were left after purchasing the minerals such as copper, lead, and tin that were urgently needed in the country before making a decision.

After leaving a few retinues to squat in the port of Chania to attend to business, Mo San hurried to Istanbul on an Ottoman ship, ready to begin his business negotiation journey. (To be continued......)