On November 12, due to the collapse of the East Sands on Chongming Island, the army moved to Liujiagang, a material transit station during Zheng He's voyage to the West.

In addition to the First Fleet, Yi Xin, the chief soldier of the Second Fleet, and Zhu Zhen, the chief soldier of the Third Fleet, also came to Liujiagang on a battleship to attend the meeting.

Although Yi Xin and Zhu Zhen were not well-known in later generations, they were one of the most outstanding generals of the Ming Naval Division in this era.

In the ninth year of Yongle, Yixin participated in the Nuer Gandu Division, responsible for the suppression and operation of bandits at sea, and made great contributions.

And Zhu Zhen is even more remarkable, in three of Zheng He's four trips to the West, he served as the highest military commander, although Zheng He was restrained, but his military level was quite affirmed.

Tang Jing, the commander of Wang Jinghong's third fleet selected by Zhu Zhanji, is Zhu Zhen's long-term assistant, and he is much inferior to Zhu Zhen in terms of prestige.

In Liujiagang, the chief officers of the three fleets conducted in-depth discussions on different tactics and strategic objectives. Decisions were made with strategic objectives as the primary purpose and tactical objectives as secondary objectives.

In other words, regardless of whether the Japanese invaders caused losses to the Ming Dynasty this time, the main purpose of the fleet was not to exterminate the Japanese invaders, but to capture the main members of the Japanese invaders. And use this as evidence as a means of exerting diplomatic pressure on Dongying.

Around this strategic purpose, of course, some adjustments will be made to the tactical means. The three fleets will adopt the method of luring the snake out of the hole and catching the turtle in the urn, and let the Japanese ships enter the encirclement.

The strategic and tactical objectives were determined, and on the second day, Zhu Zhanji raised the tent of the central army, and all the main warships and generals above the general participated in the expedition.

Zhu Zhanji and Mao Dayong, the squire of the military department, issued a troop leader talisman to Zhu Zhen and Yi Xin, confirming the right of the two of them to lead the troops.

The subsequent expedition was read out by Zheng He, and Zhu Zhanji did not steal the limelight from the generals under his command, and only when the soldiers were rewarded with silver, Zhu Zhanji personally came forward.

If you want to give out the money, you must let everyone know who gave it out.

Unlike the usual broken silver, this silver is all silver dollars that are molded from silver.

The appearance of silver dollars is not unusual, and in recent months, the imperial court has been comparing the difference between silver dollars and broken silver for many days, and the people have also accepted silver dollars that are more fidelity than broken silver.

When many soldiers received the silver dollars, they excitedly pinched them between their fingers, blew on them, and then put them to their ears and listened to the echo in obsessiveness.

November 14. Jiazi month. Bingxu day.

It is advisable to migrate and open markets. Do not enter the house and be buried.

In the sound of neat drums, Zhu Zhanji and Zheng He wore military uniforms and boarded a giant treasure ship converted from a blessing ship.

For 400 years, this treasure ship has been the largest ship in the world.

The treasure ship uses ironwood as the ridge, first builds watertight cabins, and then arranges the watertight cabins neatly, and uses the assembly mode to connect the watertight cabins together.

After that, it was connected with iron and wood outside the watertight cabin, and a double-layer plywood design was adopted, which closely connected the thick giant trees to form a double-layer outer deck.

The thick and long giant wood is dried, soaked in tung oil, fastened with wooden wedges, iron bolts and hemp rope, and then coagulated with pine gum mixed with oyster shell powder as a binder, forming a strong structure.

This treasure ship is nearly one hundred and forty meters long and nearly fifty meters wide. An anchor requires more than 200 people to twist, and each of the twelve fan-shaped sails requires more than 50 people to twist.

According to Zhu Zhanji's estimates, the displacement of such a treasure ship should reach about 20,000 tons, and the cargo capacity can reach 10,000 tons.

Boarding this ship was the same pride he had when he boarded his own Ranger.

Seeing such a huge ship, Zhu Zhanji was really amazed by the exquisite skills of today's craftsmen.

However, this kind of ship is also a huge waste of resources, like the giant wood on the hull of the ship, I don't know how many towering trees are consumed.

Zhu Zhanji suspects that future generations will never be able to build such a treasure ship, on the one hand, because of the loss of technology, and more likely that they will never find a giant wood suitable for building a treasure ship in the future.

The deck of the treasure ship is concave, low in the middle and high at the ends. There are four floors above the deck at the stern, and the drop from the middle deck is nearly ten meters.

Boarding such a huge ship for the first time, Zhu Zhanji was completely shocked. Although he had seen countless ships larger than this one in later life, it was far less shocking than this ship.

Zheng He was accustomed to this kind of ship, because when he went to the Western Regions, he usually used this kind of treasure ship as his flagship.

This ship alone required more than 400 sailors during the voyage, and nearly 1,000 sailors in two shifts. Together with the maintenance personnel, logistics personnel, this ship can carry more than one thousand two hundred people.

"Your Highness, would you like to see it everywhere?"

Only then did Zhu Zhanji come back to his senses, looked at the excited soldiers around him and said: "Everything is focused on going out, wait for the ship to set sail, and look around alone." ”

Zheng He said with a smile: "Then please ask Your Highness to personally beat the drum of the expedition to strengthen morale." ”

This time, Zhu Zhanji did not refuse, and under the leadership of Zheng He and Shi Guorui, the commander of the treasure ship, he climbed the wooden staircase all the way to the top of the stern deck.

The three drums were set up on a high platform about five or six meters high from the deck, and this time, Zhu Zhanji only went up to the high platform with a strong drummer, and then stood in front of the big drum with a diameter of nearly two meters.

The drumming of the Ming Dynasty has clear regulations, and there are different rhythms for expeditions, celebrations, and sacrifices.

Zhu Zhanji is no stranger to these, but after confirming with the drummer, he picked up the drumstick with both hands. Knock Knock...... Knock knock knock...... The drums sounded.

Thousands of soldiers gathered on the deck, knelt on one knee, and shouted: "Long live the Ming Dynasty, win the Ming Dynasty." ”

After three consecutive drums, the other two big drums also beat the big drums to the rhythm of Zhu Zhanji, and the drums spread farther and farther, and the big drums on the other ships also sounded.

To the sound of the drums, all the soldiers moved quickly. They struggled to lift the anchor, or to lift the sails, or to pedal the paddlewheels that had been lowered on either side of the ship in the cabin near the water.

This kind of large sea vessel is the most troublesome to start when it is not in the driving rhythm. Just to make this behemoth move, it will take countless manpower to work together.

According to the formation of the fleet, other ships have already begun to slowly leave the port. In the sound of neat gongs and drums, with the joint efforts of everyone, the flagship also began to start slowly.

Zhu Zhanji handed over the drumstick to the drummer, got off the high platform, and watched the hard sails rise, and his heart was stirred.

Such a large ship is a miracle of this era. With him for a day, this miracle will never be lost.

Lying on the guardrail more than half a person high, Zhu Zhanji looked at the rudder made of a whole tree more than ten meters long and adjusted its direction in the water. Ichikiko and Hyun Jin pulled his belt tightly, for fear that he would accidentally flip it over.

In the days when there was no communication system, the guide from the watchtower at the bow of the ship needed more than a dozen people to coordinate the direction of the ship to the wheelhouse below the stern.

Although science and technology cannot be reached, Daming skillfully uses manpower to make up for the gap in science and technology.

The ancients may be inferior to their later generations in terms of knowledge and experience, as well as their understanding of society, but this does not mean that they are stupider than later generations.

In terms of wisdom, there are outstanding people in any era.

"Your Highness, would you like to go to the herald's room or your bedroom first?"

Zhu Zhanji turned around and waved his hand and said, "Don't worry, I want to take a good look at this big ship." Commander Shi took Gu to see everywhere, including where the guards lived, and Gu had to go and see. ”

Shi Guorui said with some embarrassment: "Your Highness, the bottom of the boat is indecent, I am afraid that it will insult Your Highness's elegance." ”

Zhu Zhanji said disappreciably: "I'm not afraid...... Lead the way. ”

Above deck, there were three turrets in the bow and stern, and only one battery in the belly.

Zhu Zhanji and the senior generals lived on the upper deck of the stern, but when they reached the deck, it was like entering another world.

Such a large ship, without modern equipment, went down below deck, and the view everywhere was much worse.

The crew lived all around the ship, relying only on a little light from the patio on deck.

Everyone lives in bunks, about five people live in a pigeon cage, each with less than two square meters of space and only one meter high.

That is, everyone can't stand up at all in their own bed, at most they just sit down, and they need to stuff themselves into it to sleep.

There is less space here than in prisons, and the air is dirtier. It's still sunny days, and if it rains and the patio is covered, the environment here is even worse, and I'm afraid there will be no light at all.

One level further down is the operation room. Here is a little higher than the waterline, there is a paddlewheel drive compartment, most of the people are naked, holding a wooden stick in their hands, pushing hard, turning the paddle wheel.

Inside the rudder room, there is a bit of steampunk industrial beauty, and each of the huge rows requires fifteen people to paddle.

There are ten people who need to push hard, and after pushing the rocker into place, there will be five people below who will use ropes to rely on their own weight to press the rocker, and the rocker will be fixed at an angle, and after pressing it, it will return to its original position.

In order to save on the fabric, almost no one wore clothes, and although it was November, everyone was steaming hot.

Li Liang looked at the tendons and flesh of those sailors with some envy, and then looked at his little arms and legs, and couldn't help but sigh.

Of course, he was more envious of the fact that they still had two eggs hanging from their crotches, and he only had one gun left.

At the bottom and in the middle of the ship are warehouses, with more than a dozen patios with booms that can be loaded into the hold or hoisted out.

Although the atmosphere of industry is not obvious, it is undeniable that before the establishment of Jiajiang Industrial Zone, this is the closest place to industrial civilization in the whole Ming Dynasty.

It's just a pity that the social model of the East has limited this development, and in the end it even goes backwards.