On the first day of the first month of the fourth year of the Apocalypse, Zhu Youxiao was still like in previous years, first worshipping the ancestral spiritual position with his family, and then accepting the New Year's greetings from the ministers, and then bringing his younger brother, sister, Empress Zhang Yan, and the second concubine to the Queen Mother to pay New Year's greetings.

On the first day of the New Year, Zhu Youzhen also rushed back from Wudang Mountain, Hubei Province for the New Year, it seems that Wudang disciples are indeed extraordinary, only fourteen-year-old Zhu Youzhen after a year of practice, physical fitness has changed significantly, no longer as thin as a year ago, the height has been more than five feet, and the complexion is no longer as fierce as a little Zhengtai, in addition to learning a set of Wudang boxing methods, mainly to self-cultivation and internal strength, perhaps the reason for leaving home incognito, Zhu Youzhen now speaks, things are very steady, It has a faint taste of adults.

In the afternoon, Zhu Youxiao summoned the three imperial uncles in Beijing, Zhu Youxiang, the prince of Shu and several other people to talk together. It is said that these three imperial uncles were originally a little dissatisfied with Zhu Youxiao for not letting them settle the domain, but later found out that after Zhu Youxiao sent them to the Daming School of Administration, they didn't just ignore it, plus Zhu Youzhen, a perverted version of the study maniac, forced them to work hard. Ruiwang Zhu Changhao has been involved in political affairs in the cabinet, and he has quarreled with several cabinet members, and he has grown a lot of knowledge in the process of participating in political affairs, plus he has studied for two years, and he can be regarded as having a certain ability, and he is no longer as greedy and stingy as before, and he knows that he should bear a certain responsibility as a royal disciple. As for King Hui and King Gui, Zhu Youxiao also let them go to the local office anonymously to exercise after they finished their studies, so as not to be blind when they were left alone in the future, Zhu Youxiao planned to let them all go overseas to become the king of a vassal country and become a satellite state of the Ming Dynasty.

After the fifteenth day of the first month, Daming Institute of Technology continued to recruit students, and set up a branch in Nanjing, and let Li Zhizao serve as the dean, the main campus in Beijing was Song Yingxing, and Sun Yuanhua, who was transferred back from the northwest, was appointed by Zhu Youxiao as the provost, responsible for coordinating the school's teaching work. The two academies are preparing to enroll 5,000 students this year, and these people will be the backbone of skilled workers in two years' time. With the different focus of the imperial court examination, the style of study in the Ming Dynasty in the past two years has also changed, the pure dead reading, the number of people who read the dead book is gradually decreasing, the atmosphere of learning to apply is gradually taking root in the hearts of the people, examples of changing living conditions through learning technology abound, students have begun to accept, so more and more people join the ranks of the examination.

At the beginning of February, when the spring was cold, Qi Jin came back with the fleet, but it was an ironclad ship that came back, and it was dragged back. There was a problem with the ironclad ships that originally made Zhu Youxiao full of confidence, and the steam engines of the three ironclad ships were damaged to varying degrees, the most important problem was the power system, and the twelve steam engines were basically scrapped. Only then did Zhu Youxiao think that this was all experimental things, although it was expensive, it was not resistant to use, so Zhu Youxiao was also prepared.

In the study of the Qianqing Palace, Zhu Youxiao received Qi Jin and his entourage, and Qi Jin entered the door to give a salute: "Your Majesty, the minister Qi Jin is back, fortunately, he did not disgrace his life, recaptured the Penghu Islands, and escorted Lord Chen Minwu to Taiwan, originally planned to pacify the South China Sea and exterminate the pirates, but the ironclad ship was used badly, and the largest pirate in the South China Sea, Li Dan, has hundreds of warships, and there are no ironclad ministers who are afraid of being outnumbered and failing to do their work, please ask Your Majesty to surrender." ”

"Haha, haha." Zhu Youxiao smiled, "General Qi Jin, your task has been completed very well, as long as you drive the Dutch away, as for Li Dan, don't worry, the imperial court will allocate funds when you go back, and we will also build a large number of warships that can go to sea." You take a rest first, wait a few days, and then go to the Nanjing shipyard to find some shipbuilders, go to Quanzhou to get a big dock, prepare more materials, study the manufacturing structure of Western warships, and we will also build some big ships. In addition, we use hard sails, and the Westerners use soft sails, to see if we can take the advantages of both and make better warships. These three ironclad ships will temporarily enter the dock for maintenance, Song Yingxing and Zhu Ling have already developed a better steam engine, go back and let them install it and try again, let them continue to improve, and strive to build an all-ironclad fleet in the future, and then we will run rampant across the ocean. ”

At this time, the honest Yu Hualong spoke: "Long live Lord, the steam engine is too impatient to build, many people can't serve him, just my ship, I broke it last time, that time it was a headwind, and I was about to chase the pirate ship, I said hurry, hurry, the result was broken, the technician said overloaded, Lord Qi Jin also fined me for a month, I really didn't mean it." ”

Zhu Youxiao Yile: "General Yu, it's okay, this ship is for combat, and this machine is made by people, this is originally for experimentation, it's okay, you can spoil it casually, if it's broken, let Song Yingxing build a better one, and when you don't spoil it, it means that we can make ironclad ships in large quantities, and let Song Yingxing and them invite you to drink when the time comes." ”

Xiao Hailong said: "Long live Lord, now the situation in the South Seas is chaotic, the English, Dutch, and Spaniards have many warships in the South Seas, and Li Dan's fleet also has hundreds of ships, although our warships are strong in combat, but we are afraid that the ants will gnaw at the elephants, if they suddenly surround us, even if we are not afraid, we will inevitably have losses!" ”

Zhu Youxiao said: "This is a problem, so let's do it, General Qi, when you supervise the shipbuilding, let Xiao Hailong lead the team and expand the combat force to 20,000 people, of which 10,000 will be trained as marines, and the number of warships will be expanded to 500, and then there will be 80 'Iron Bulls' brought by the Tieniu Machinery Factory to install them on the third-class Fu ships, and four on each ship, see how about it?" By the way, patrol around Taiwan, train new recruits with combat training, and if possible, escort merchant ships to Wadao to do some business, I think merchant ships will definitely like your escort. You can also escort the merchant fleet of the Ming Royal Trading Company to do some trade in the Nanyang area, as far as possible to avoid a major conflict with the Westerners, and by the way, also learn about all kinds of information about the Westerners in the Nanyang, so as to lay the foundation for our future actions. ”

The Ming Royal Trading House is now amazing, it monopolizes the manufacture and sales of new commodities in the Ming Dynasty, and in recent years has brought nearly 10 million taels of silver to Zhu Youxiao and the household department, like what iron nails, sewing needles, new furniture, glass mirrors, glass teacups, new farm tools, etc., as long as they are new in manufacturing and selling. Niu Venus, a fortune-telling genius, thinks of what can be done quickly with a machine, so he uses a machine to make something, to put it simply, what is needed to eat, drink, and sleep, Niu Venus can think of making money.

For example, this time Zhu Youxiao asked the Ming fleet to go to the South Seas once, he inquired about the overseas market in Quanzhou, and found that it was more profitable to go to the Japanese country, so he did not hesitate to discuss with Qi Jin, and used more than a dozen Dutch transport ships captured by Qi Jin, loaded with Ming native products and glass products to go to the Japanese country. Qi Jin knew that Niu Jinxing was a delicate person, so he followed his suggestion, handed over the transport ship and the twenty third-level fortune ships that had just been loaded with the 'Iron Bull' to Yu Hualong, and let him be in charge of escorting, so he ran this trip, and Niu Jinxing earned nearly five million taels of silver, and then Niu Jinxing monopolized this route. Niu Jinxing has these five million silver at the bottom, and he has full confidence to go to the South Seas again, but when he goes to the South Seas, Qi Jin resolutely does not allow the use of transport ships anymore, although it has been refitted, he is still afraid of being discovered by the Dutch. Qi Jin's idea was indeed correct, the Dutch were really looking for the missing fleet, but it was only a year later that the truth about the battle of the Penghu Islands was learned from the mouths of the merchants who went to Penghu Island in the South Seas, but it was too late, the Ming Dynasty had already built a large fleet that was enough to defeat any force, and it could run rampant throughout the South Seas.