In September of the twelfth year of Chongzheng, the second batch of fifty super battleships sold by the Ming Empire to the Kingdom of Spain finally arrived at the port of Valencia, at this time, there were large and small warships on the sea outside the port one after another, and even King Philip IV of Spain specially rushed to Valencia from Madrid.

After several days of assembly, the number of warships outside the port of Valencia has reached more than 1,000, and the Spanish Armada has finally regained its glory, and it is time to launch a full-scale counterattack!

Philip IV directly appointed Admiral Antonio. Morality. With Okundo as the commander-in-chief, he led the Armada and escorted 20,000 troops to the Spanish Netherlands, using the port of Dunkirk as a base to attack the Netherlands by land and sea, eliminate the rebels there, and reintegrate the seven northern provinces of the Netherlands into the Spanish territory!

He had a very good idea, now among the anti-Habsburg alliance powers, the strongest naval strength is the Netherlands, as long as the Netherlands is defeated and all the Netherlands are recovered, Spain will definitely regain its dominance of the sea, and at that time, as long as the English Channel is blocked, the Habsburg alliance will become a piece of scattered sand, and the final winner of this war will be the Habsburgs!

Will the anti-Habsburg coalition be so easily defeated? Of course, it was impossible, as soon as the huge Armada entered the English Channel, it was discovered by the Dutch and British sentinels, and Britain, the Netherlands and even France, Sweden and Denmark all reacted one after another, and countless warships and troops began to gather in the Netherlands, a major war was inevitable, and it was unknown who would achieve the final victory.

At this time, a news began to circulate secretly throughout Portugal, that is, the Duke of Bragança is a descendant of João the Great, he is the legitimate heir to the Portuguese throne, and he will lead everyone to drive out the Spaniards and restore independence!

This is not fake news, the first Duke of Bragança, Alfonso, was really the son of João I, but he was an illegitimate child, as many of the Portuguese nobility knew.

In fact, the Portuguese have long been like getting rid of Spanish rule, it doesn't matter if the news is really or not, as long as someone comes out and leads them to drive out the Spaniards, as soon as the news spreads, the nobles around the country began to secretly form armies, swore allegiance to the Duke of Bragança, an independence movement is quietly brewing, and the countdown to the restoration of Portugal has begun.

When Zhu Cijiong received the news, it was already more than ten years ago, Spain had finally made a move, and Portugal was finally going to become independent, so did he really want to go to Europe to be a peacemaker?

The European powers are the main opponents of the Ming Dynasty in the struggle for maritime supremacy, and Spain and Portugal are one of the few European countries that cannot unite with the great powers to deal with the Ming Dynasty, so it can be said that they are destined to be the enemies of the European continental powers.

Why? Mainly because Spain and Portugal had too many colonies around the world, you must know that they were the beginning of the Age of Discovery, the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries can be said to be the century of Spain and Portugal, at that time, almost all the colonies in the world were Spanish and Portuguese.

In 1493, Pope Alexander VI even divided the Papal Meridian for them, with all the lands west of the line going to Spain and everything to the east to Portugal, as if the two countries were dividing the whole world equally!

Of course, in fact, there were still many countries in the world that were not colonized by Spain and Portugal at that time, but the geographical location was relatively good, the resources were relatively rich, and it was relatively easy to occupy and colonize, and almost all of them were divided up by the two countries, that is, the good places were almost occupied by them, and the later European powers had almost no advantage to take advantage of!

Naturally, the European powers could not tolerate this kind of thing, so the Thirty Years' War broke out on the European continent in order to defeat Spain and re-divide the colonies, so Spain and Portugal were destined to be the enemies of the European powers.

The enemy of the enemy is a friend, so Spain and Portugal are the natural allies of the Ming Dynasty, Zhu Cijiong naturally can't let Spain be easily defeated by the powers, and at the same time, he can't let Spain return to the hegemony, because Spain has too many colonies, if he is allowed to become the hegemon of the sea again, then the Ming Dynasty will have to be his little brother.

What if you can't let him lose, and you can't let him return to the hegemon? Of course, it is to prepare a competitor for him to contain him, and Portugal is the first choice, as long as the Ming Dynasty supports Portugal, even if Spain defeats the anti-Habsburg alliance in the future, it is impossible to dominate the European continent, let alone become the hegemon of the sea again.

Portugal is still very fragile at this time, if there is no foreign aid to help, they will definitely not be able to fight Spain, in history Portugal is looking for Britain, the result is that Britain has become the hegemon of the sea, Zhu Cijiong of course can not let this history repeat itself, so he decided to set off immediately and go to Europe to act as this foreign aid.

Due to the rush of time, he did not gather too many people, and only brought the Beiyang Naval Division and the Beihai Fleet and the First Army of the Praetorian Guard, but he brought a lot of people from the royal industry such as the Daming Royal Rixing Bank and the Daming Royal Xinglong Firm, because Portugal would lease a port to Daming, so it was natural to bring more people to build it well.

The itinerary for this journey is also very simple, just resupply at the Star City Port base and Goa, and then go straight to the European continent.

At this time, the troops recruited by the nobles from all over Portugal had been secretly assembled in Lisbon, and the number was not very large, less than 30,000, but it was enough, because almost all the Spanish troops had been transferred to the Western Front, and there were less than 2,000 troops left in Lisbon.

The Duke of Bragança, with the assistance of Schvera, equipped more than 20,000 people with weapons secretly sent by the Ming Dynasty, and then began the restoration operation.

This action is actually very simple, because the Spanish garrison in Lisbon is too small, it does not pose a threat to them at all, he just asked Schvera to take 20,000 horses to surround the camp of the Spanish garrison, force the Spanish garrison to surrender, and then take the remaining thousands of people directly into the Lisbon Palace, and catch the Spanish Minister of State, and then, there is no then, the restoration operation is successful!

The next day, Portugal announced the deposition of King Philip IV of Spain, and made the Duke of Bragança the new king, called João IV.

This restoration operation seems to be a bit too simple, and it was succeeded so easily, it is a bit of a child's play, but historically, Portugal's restoration operation is so simple, but the struggle with Spain is more complicated later.

Of course, Spain will not let go and recognize the independence of Portugal, but His Majesty the Emperor of the Ming Empire has made a special trip to mediate, will they still fight?