The art of war: "The art of war: "The law of war, ten is to surround it, five is to attack it, and the enemy is divided, the enemy can fight, if there is little, you can escape, and if not, you can avoid it." For this sentence, I have always taken it as a guideline, and I never dare to forget it.

Although the Spaniards had already marched to Virginia, this did not mean that Veracruz was vulnerable to any weakness - the Castle of San Juan de Urlua and its garrison, led by the Castle of San Juan, were still the presence to which I must look forward to my current strength.

What's more, there are thousands of people who dare to fight for everything for their livelihood - they are not good citizens in the strict sense of the word, and the people who can get along with Veraclus are not easy.

So it's very unwise to confront it, and after a circle, I deeply understand this point - knowing that it is a mediocrity to do it, and I will never do it.

Here I decided to divide the army into two ways - Adicon went to sea with more than half of his ships and did not cause any harm to the port, but refused to allow all ships to enter or leave the port!

As for me, I stayed in this harbor and searched for the legendary short sword of the sun god - of course, the disguise techniques accumulated in two lifetimes have made me look like a taciturn European, as for which country, guess for yourself......

Adicon fully understood my tactics and smiled and prepared to leave. The experienced admiral saw at once that my plan worked, but gave me a deadline.

Because the Spanish navy going to Virginia will come back at any time, even if they don't know the current situation here, but no matter what the situation is there, twenty-five days, a month at most, is the maximum limit I can stay here safely!

Twenty-five days is twenty-five days, I smiled and waved goodbye to the new commander, believing that he will be able to accomplish my intentions well and bring the desired effect!

Adicon was gone, and I stayed. In order to better integrate into the city, I also registered a commercial license under the name "Old Gita of Florence" and exchanged my gold coins for a number of local Spanish double-column silver dollars.

For the next few days, I wandered around the city with a handful of elite, and to outsiders I was seen as a local merchant looking for a business, or a navigator saddled with a debt that would have been a cross of the Caribbean in the sixteenth century.

I don't care what people think of me, in addition to learning about local commerce, I devote my main energy to finding relics of the Aztec kingdom. In the past ten days, the results are still there.

I found that Velacrus' business model was fragile, with war, piracy and exorbitant taxes leading to a virtual standstill in the local manufacturing sector.

People are focusing their attention and energy on the export of resources that can come in faster and hedge against risks. After all, as long as you pay 20% of the trade tax in full, no one will come to you again, unlike industry, just a town security guard has a hundred ways to make you miserable!

This leads to two hidden dangers – first, a strong reliance on maritime transport. Transportation is the lifeblood of Veraclus, and whoever controls the transportation industry will dominate the region!

And my previous vague cognition, Adicon's method of blockading the sea of Velaclus was actually crooked!

This has to be said to be lucky.

Second, Veraclus's dependence on currency is so great that it cannot be increased! Because there are no European bankers to open branches in the region, after all, the risk here is too high, and every minute and every second that happens can cause high non-performing assets, and there is a risk of becoming a debt slave at any time.

It's not in the banker's interest, because savvy bankers won't let their money sit in a wagon that could fall off a cliff at any moment – and the interest rate won't be much.

As a result, Veracruz requires huge amounts of cash on a daily basis. But what was cash in those days? The development of money is vividly reflected here, and the current Veraclus is in the heyday of coinage circulation!

Unlike England, the Netherlands, and other places where gold and silver circulated at the same time, in Veraclus, almost 95% of the trade was carried out through the Spanish silver dollar.

Most of these Spanish silver dollars can be grouped into two categories. One is the more elaborate two-column silver coins struck by the Mexican Mint about fifty years ago, during the reign of Carlos I and Juana, with a denomination of four liels, although there are also smaller ones.

The other is the Spanish silver dollar, or COB Benyang, which was ordered to be minted by Philip II after he came to power. This kind of COB is actually a kind of coinage, to be exact, it should belong to the silver bar, the shape is irregular, but the weight and fineness are appropriate, Europe and the United States are generally called cobmoney, referred to as Kaber.

And whether it is the Spanish coat of arms on the front and the cross on the back, or the cab with a double column on the back of the cross, because of its extremely rough manufacturing process, it seems to me that it is not too easy to copy.

This type of cabal was minted mainly by the three major mints of Bolivia, Veneauxí, Mexico, and Lima, Peru, with Potosí having the largest mint, followed by Mexico and Lima, with a relatively small amount.

Among the three, Bolivia is a landlocked country and difficult to reach, and Peru is on the other side of the Americas, and the silver coins used locally are naturally dominated by the products of the Velacrus Mint!

If, I mean, if we do something on the Mint's side and bring the flow of money to a standstill, or to be destroyed, then that is to fundamentally shake the foundations of Spanish rule in Veracruz! And this could be the deadliest blow to the Spaniards!

It's not hard to understand why, but if I were to attack the Mint, I'd be touching the most important tool of the Spaniards to suck blood from the Americas—and why, look at the importance of the dollar to the United States in modern society.

As for the legendary dagger, there are no clues so far. At first, Grihageus only said that the last Aztec relic might be in Veracruz, but he didn't say who it was, or provide clues or anything.

So my plan is to get the mint done first, and it would be more practical to light another fire in the back of the Spaniards!

While inspecting the mint, and following the advice of the duo of Charlie and Halleha, I arranged for Mavi and Old Tucker to go to the market with a group of men to buy cupronickel in small quantities and many times. As for whether it is tin cupronickel, arsenic cupronickel or nickel cupronickel, it doesn't matter, as long as it is cupronickel.

Another five days have passed, and my plan for the purchase of white copper is in place, and the situation at the mint is clear! All that's left is concrete action!

In the dead of night again, three cloaked carriages drove silently toward the mint on the outskirts of the city. The horses' hooves are wrapped in cloth, and the wheels are specially treated, so the sound is not too loud.

At about two o'clock in the evening, we arrived at the mint, a huge factory built on a large mountain, surrounded on three sides by steep mountains and on one side by a narrow valley with huge iron gates! The gate is heavily guarded and guarded, and ordinary people will never be able to enter!

But unfortunately, the people I brought were not ordinary people, the vast majority of them were ninjas who flew off the wall, and the worst ones were special fighters who had been trained for nearly half a year!

Mo led two people, carrying ropes on their backs, and climbed up the steep back mountain, and in the night I watched their figures become more and more blurred, gradually disappearing from sight.

After more than 20 minutes, a rope was suddenly thrown from above, so I led a dozen people to climb up along the rope, one by one!

The top of the mountain is rocky, but it has brought great convenience to us to set up the pulley device - according to my blueprints, the pulley set made by Halleha and Charlie who worked overtime for several days and nights is very good, and in the middle of the night, we have transported about three tons of white copper to the top of the mountain!

While we were transporting the copper, Mo and a few soldiers had already descended down the ramp on the other side to the inside of the mint! There was almost no defense along the way, and a few people arrived at the warehouse where the silver ingots were hoarded as if they were in a no-man's land!

It is not difficult to understand that under such a steep terrain, as long as you guard the gate of the valley mouth, you can almost be foolproof! But under our special operation, the defense of the Spaniards at Taniguchi suddenly became the Maginot Line, the ears of the deaf and the eyes of the blind - ornaments!

After using incense to make the old man sleep more soundly, the Mo sent people back to the top of the mountain and told us that we could carry it!

Three tons of cupronickel were quickly transported to the warehouse, and in order to meet the shipping demand, the ingots of various metals were almost identical, and it was very difficult to distinguish them, let alone silver and cupronickel of almost the same color!

Effortlessly prie open the back door, and before dawn, we only need to do one thing - put three tons of cupronickel flower arrangements into the silver ingots, and of course, we need to replace three tons of high-purity silver!

For a moment I even wondered if I had found so many more mints and done a few more "deals", would there be no need for the laborious ocean trade?

But then I think about it, how can I have such a wise idea of making a fortune like waiting for a rabbit? He shook his head with a wry smile and drove this unrealistic idea out of his head!

Lazy Spaniards are uncertain about their working hours, and it is usually the old man who guards the treasury who pulls open the heavy iron door of the warehouse, and the piercing sound is like an alarm clock, waking up the sleeping hangover, or other swearing, Spaniards, and swaying to work and mint coins.

As for why I know, it's thanks to Mo and his team for days and nights. Intelligence is really important!

During the day, we were lurking on the hill behind the mint, and although the hill we chose was very secluded, it was not excluded that someone might pass by.

In order to avoid unnecessary trouble, it is more reliable to wait until the dead of night to transport the replaced silver!

As for the carriage, it has long been hidden, and the horse's feet will not be exposed.

This also had the added benefit of being able to get a closer look at the work of the Spanish Mint – if they found out that the silver ingots were fake, it would be confusing, and we would have to find other ways to keep their mouths shut!

But it should be said that they were lucky! At the end of the day, the smoke was billowing from the chimneys of the mint, and the workers were still half-dead to make coins, and the foreman was still in his broken room with windows on three sides, exchanging experiences with his female employees who had specially recruited special types of work for him from morning to night.

Everything was as usual, so calm, so river crab.

When I saw two truckloads of silver dollars being packed and ready to be shipped away, I smiled slightly - you did a good job, I should add chicken legs to you!

Of course, there are still two-thirds of the remaining raw materials, so we will continue to work hard tomorrow!

That night, we returned the same way, loaded the harvest into trucks, and after sweeping away the traces, we took advantage of the cover of night to rush to the dock overnight, loaded the heavy boxes into the ship, and let Hua Mei leave with two more ships.

There is only one ship left waiting for me - because I am not reconciled yet! I've decided to spend the last few days trying my best to find the relics of the Aztec kingdom again!

The next morning, the sun rose and the birds chirped in celebration of another rare sunny day!

The crowd outside is still bustling, and the only difference is the noise of the market area!

The noise is far more lively than usual!

It seems that the drama is about to be staged! I put on my clothes, took the people who had been waiting for a long time, and walked towards the noisy place.