Ottoman Edirne, a city located northwest of Constantinople, in Europe.

Although the nominal capital of the Ottoman Empire is Bursa, it was the territory of Issa, the younger brother of the current Ottoman Emperor Mehmed I.

Muhammad I did not belong there, so the actual capital today is Edirne.

When Samsun, who had fled to Taikilda in a hurry, he ran nearly 200 kilometers in just one day and night. The news that the Ming fleet had broken them and the Byzantine fleet and entered the Sea of Dardanelles directly was passed to Mehmed I.

For the Ottoman Empire, this news was like a dark cloud, and the entire royal city was in a panic.

The Ottoman Turks were originally a small tribe under the Sultanate of Rum, to which the Seljuks belonged.

The area where they originally lived was the Khorezm region of Uzbekistan, which belonged to the Turkish Kayi tribe and was a vassal of the Khorezm dynasty at that time.

Since ancient times, he has been engaged in nomadic herding and lived in pursuit of water and grass. Two centuries ago, the Mongol Yuan began to expand westward, forcing them to migrate. Initially, they attached themselves to the Sultanate of Rûm, founded by the Seljuk Turkmans, and were given a fief on the banks of the Sakarya River, adjacent to the Byzantine Empire.

After the death of the tribal chieftain Ertogrul, his son Osman succeeded him as tribal chieftain.

In 1299, Turkey took advantage of the division of the Seljuk Sultanate of Rum and officially declared its independence with the title "Ghazi", laying the prototype of the Ottoman state.

At the beginning of their founding of the country, they had a natural fear of the East, because the Mongolian Yuan in the East was the source of nightmares and fear for all nomads.

Although they dared to compete for land with the seemingly invincible Roman Empire, he did not dare to take a single step to the east. This fear of the East is the shadow left by several near-extinctions in the past few hundred years.

Their suzerain, the Romani Empire, was nothing more than a branch of the Mongol Yuan Empire, the Seljuks, and for them, the Eastern Empire was a huge force that could not be defeated.

Fifteen years ago, his father, Bayezid I, who conquered the Balkans and brought Serbia under his command. Facing a branch of the Mengyuan Dynasty, Timur State, was captured alive by the other party and tortured to death.

This made the proud Ottomans, who were gradually swelling, recognize themselves again.

In his first year, Bayezid I led his people to defeat the former suzerainty of the Sultanate of Rum, then conquered the Balkans, and then defeated the coalition forces of the Holy Roman Empire, which was called the hammer of the god of war by the European countries.

But this emperor, who had never tasted defeat in his life, faced the eastern state of Timur, and the only defeat led to his death.

The Ottoman Empire was torn apart, and it took Mehmed I ten years to reunite the Ottoman Empire.

They have a natural fear of the East.

The arrival of the Ming Dynasty frightened them from the beginning, these Europeans did not know the Ming Dynasty, but he knew very well that this Ming Dynasty had defeated the invincible Mengyuan Empire and reunified the huge empire of the rich land in the East.

Although there are fine porcelain, soft silk, countless teas, and mountains of spices, the Ottomans will never dare to challenge the power of the Ming Dynasty.

They could only go through merchants, get some goods from there, and sell them to Europeans at a high price.

But now, this Ming didn't know when, he ran to distant Europe, and even came to the Ottoman Empire from the west.

He really wanted to trade with Da Ming, but he was afraid of the other party's power, and when he was still hesitating, Da Ming actually made a move.

What frightened him even more was that Da Ming defeated their and the Roman fleet with only forty ships, and according to the information he received, Da Ming came with more than 600 ships this time.

On land, the Ottomans had a natural fear of the Orientals, and on the sea, only the Venetians surpassed the Ottomans in water power in all of Europe.

But now, there is another Daming.

He urgently convened a court council to take measures to deal with it. He didn't believe that Daming traveled tens of thousands of miles just to conquer them, on the contrary, it should only be for trade.

If the needs of the Ming were met in terms of trade, then war could probably have been avoided.

Seeing the ministers gathered in the main hall, he couldn't help but sigh. His fief was in Edirne, so although the Ottomans still had Bursa as their capital, he spent most of his time in Edirne.

But Edirne was too far away from the base camp of their Ottomans, and the only people who were able to gather in this hall were a few nearby tribal elders.

He had already decided in his heart that the appearance of Da Ming could not allow him to put all his energy on the West anymore. He was supposed to relocate the capital back to Bursa so that he could control the entire empire. Or simply take Constantinople in one go.

But before they could make a decision, the second group of messengers had already arrived in Edirne, bringing the news that the Ming had destroyed the fortress of Kerribhar within six hours.

When Muhammad I heard that the Ming fleet had arrived at Canakkale but had not captured it, because Kairaz had not attacked the Ming fleet, he was truly determined.

"Immediately send an order to the tribes to raise gold and silver, and I have decided to make a huge deal with the Ming Dynasty."

And in Constantinople, receiving the news that the fortress of Kerbahar had been destroyed in six hours, and that more than 2,000 soldiers could only surrender to the Ottomans, Manuel II, who was already fifty-eight years old, could not even fire and was in a hurry.

Sixteen years ago, Constantinople was almost occupied, because of Timur's westward advance, the capture of Bayezid I, and the Roman Empire, which had only a few castles left (without sacredness refers to the Byzantine Empire, they have always called themselves the Roman Empire, but it is not the same thing as the Holy Roman Empire). Leaves a respite.

But Manuel knew very well that the Ottoman Empire, which had occupied the Balkan Peninsula, including most of Greece, was no longer just a few castles, and the Roman Empire on the Morea Peninsula could withstand it.

For more than ten years, he has been strengthening the defense of the Morea Peninsula, and at the same time contacting Venice, the overlord of the sea, if Constantinople really can't hold on, he can only retreat to the Morea Peninsula.

The sudden appearance of the Ming Empire brought surprises to other countries, because it meant that the trade routes between Europe and the East had been opened.

But for the Roman Empire, this seemed to be a catastrophe, because the emergence of the Ming Dynasty would inevitably inspire the Ottomans to change their policies. Whether they wanted to go east or west, they would first settle Constantinople, which was located in the hinterland.

He didn't understand why the Ming Dynasty turned a blind eye to the invincible Ottoman Empire, but had to target the already crumbling Roman Empire.

If it was really because the soldiers of the Kerbahar fortress opened fire on them, Manuel did not believe it.

But believe it or not, he must now face the artillery fire of the Ming fleet. Outside the city of Constantinople, the Ming fleet was already eyeing it.

Although they had only forty ships, each of them was larger than theirs, and they had artillery on board, which they could not withstand without artillery.

They had Greek fire on their ship, but the range of Greek fire was too close, and when they couldn't get close to the Ming fleet at all, they had nothing to do with the Ming fleet.

At this time, the messenger of the Ming Dynasty brought a letter, and when he saw this letter of state written by the grandson of the Ming Emperor himself, Manuel couldn't help but vomit blood.

Da Ming really came to trade, if he had known this, why would he risk blocking it, now he has lost dozens of ships, lost a strong fortress, and lost thousands of soldiers!

Constantinople's location as the gateway to Eurasia is indeed very important.

According to the understanding of people in this era, this must be a place where soldiers must fight.

But Zhu Zhanji knows very well that although the location here is important, it is a powder keg.

What Zhu Zhanji needs to do is to contain Europe, not get involved. This powder keg is still left for them to fight, and it is good to watch the excitement by themselves.

Rather than ask for this powder keg, the Ming would have better buy a piece of land on Crete with the Venetians as a trading center.

The Greek island of Crete is located in the heart of Asia, Europe, and Africa, and is now the territory of the Venetians.

But the Venetians now only control part of the area, and the island, which covers an area of more than 8,000 square kilometers, was initially coveted by the Byzantine Empire, and after the decline of Byzantium, it faced the prying eyes of the Ottomans.

After the Ottoman capture of Constantinople, a large number of Greeks fled to the island and shared with the Venetians to defend it against the Arabs.

But in the seventeenth century, after more than twenty years of war, the Ottomans finally seized the island and later allowed it to govern itself.

Until the 19th century, the island became part of Greece in union with Greece.

Zhu Zhanji has no interest in the land of Europe, and there are still too many places in this world waiting for the Ming Dynasty to occupy.

But the lack of interest in land does not mean that the Ming do not want to set up military bases, trade centers.

The Mediterranean was the commercial center of three continents, and in the west Juzhan wanted to occupy Ceuta and Gibraltar, where he would set up military bases and trade centers.

But in the east, there is no better place to be a center of trade than Crete.

It can radiate the whole of Arabs, Ottomans, West Asia, Eastern Europe, and most of North Africa, but the distance to trade with them is within 300 kilometers.

It was also for this reason that the mission responsible for leading the contact with Venice was Wang Jinghong, the deputy chief of the fleet.

In mid-September, Wang Jinghong arrived in Venice, the commercial center of Europe, and he brought with him a large number of samples and trade wishes, which were also warmly welcomed by the Venetians.

Although in the Mediterranean, the Venetians are well-deserved sea overlords, but their land power is not strong, not to mention other princely countries, a Lombard principality's land power, far more than Venice.

In the north, they faced the aggressiveness of the Holy Roman Empire. Although this vast empire is now only a loose alliance, and the Holy Roman Emperor has no restraint on the principalities and princes, they are still an alliance.

But Venice's affluence was the original sin, and although they had an advantage over any of the previous dukes, they could not face the entire alliance.

When the Ming first arrived in Ceuta, they had already been discovered by the Venetian merchant fleet, and this huge fleet terrified the Venetians.

They were afraid that the arrival of the Ming fleet would change the situation in the entire Mediterranean Sea and make their maritime superiority come to naught.

However, after their merchant ships tentatively made contact with the Marin, they came into contact with the Ming fleet, only to learn that the Ming came from the far east, and the purpose of coming here was not for war, but for trade.

This attitude is also in the best interests of the Venetians, so they want to monopolize the cargo of the Ming fleet in the first place.

But when their people saw the boatloads of spices, the shiploads of fine porcelain and silk, they knew that they could not eat these goods by their own strength.

Although now the price of the Ming is much lower than that of the Ottomans, they cannot afford it.

But it is definitely in the interest of the Venetians to establish a closer relationship with the Ming Dynasty.

For this reason, when Wang Jinghong led the fleet to Venice, he was warmly welcomed by the Venetians.

At first, the Venetians were reluctant to contact too many trade partners of the Ming Dynasty, but the Ming had too many goods for them to eat, so they had to retreat to the next best thing and wanted to get the most preferential treatment.

That is, on the basis of other people's trade, we should give them more preferential treatment. Zhu Zhanji directly agreed to them at this point, after all, the countries that can come up with more gold and silver in Europe now are them.

However, how much discount can be given depends on their trade volume, in short, the more they trade with Daming, the greater the discount.

They can even be given a discount of up to 10 percent, and they can be allowed to use the eastern part of Crete to pay for the goods.

Wang Jinghong stayed in Venice for nearly ten days before he figured out that this small country did not have an emperor and a king, and although there were governors and consuls, they were not higher than other co-consuls.

This made Wang Jinghong extremely surprised, in his opinion, a country does not have a leader, which is completely inconsistent with reality.

However, the consuls here used meetings and consultations, elections, to jointly lead this small country, and it has developed quite well, and for five hundred years, it has been the richest region here.

Originally, Wang Jinghong was still very interested in this kind of political system, but when he set his sights on a higher position, he found that this system was restrictive and dangerous.

Venice's wealth was based on its mastery of trade routes and the most powerful fleet, as well as on their commercial exploitation of the surrounding countries.

The alliance formed by this group of merchants thought that the internal strife of the surrounding countries had given them a chance to develop, and they were still very small.

If Da Ming wants to do this, tens of millions of mouths to eat, and he can't be satisfied at all.

Moreover, he also met various merchants in Venice, in order to cooperate with the Ming Dynasty, on the surface, he advanced and retreated with others, but secretly wanted to establish various things with him, to the detriment of others and his own interests.

After all, it's still a group of uninformed businessmen!

After a cursory understanding of Venice's economic strength, Wang Jinghong did not have much interest in this small commercial country and decided to go to Lombardy.

It was an important country designated by His Royal Highness Taisun, and although they were not close to the sea, they had fertile land and a large population, and they were also one of the main objects of this trade.

When Wang Jinghong promised that no matter who the Ming traded with, the price would definitely be ten percent higher than that of Venice, the Venetians were still reluctant to let Wang Jinghong go to Lombardy through Venice.

However, when the Venetians on Crete sent a fleet of forty ships of the Ming Dynasty, defeated the Ottoman fleet of more than 200 ships, and sank more than fifty ships, the Venetians retreated.

Although they were the hegemons of the Mediterranean, they were still at a disadvantage in the face of the Ottomans.

This is because Venice is inferior to the Ottomans in terms of national strength and population. However, such a huge opponent was vulnerable in front of the Ming fleet, which frightened the Venetians.

Compared with the Ming fleet, which encountered various problems in various European countries, the missions to North Africa and Jerusalem were warmly welcomed.

Whether it was the Hafsi dynasty in eastern Marin or the Mamluk dynasty, which now occupies North Africa and West Asia, they gave the most warm welcome to the Ming missions.

This is not only because the Ming fleet brought the goods they wanted, but also because most of the envoys of the Ming Dynasty were Hui people, big cannibals.

The leader who went to the Mamluk dynasty was Ma Huan, the general manager of the fleet, who followed Zheng He to the Western Ocean many times, knew a lot about the countries in the Western Regions, and also wrote two books, which were published with the support of Zhu Zhanji.

He is one of the few talents who can see the world with an open eye, and he can also have a good grasp of trade with other countries.

Traveling eastward, he was always able to mingle with the locals and establish friendly relations with the locals, regardless of the tribe he was in.

When he arrived in Alexandria, he got the news that the Mamluk king Faraj had even sent a delegation to Alexandria to welcome Ma Huan and his party.

From Alexandria to Cairo, Ma Huan was hospied by the Mamluks. Sailing along the ancient canal of the Nile, Faraj sent more than 5,000 slaves to serve as the slender men of the Ming fleet, all the way to Cairo without delay

This kind of treatment made Ma Huan even feel a little weak-hearted, thinking that he was a five-grade sect and couldn't afford such courtesy.

Originally, he was only a nine-grade generalist, but because he was reused by Zhu Zhanji, he was promoted several levels in a row and became a seventh-grade experience.

This time he went to the West, because he served as the general manager, in addition to being responsible for managing the general affairs, he also assumed the responsibility of managing Confucian scholars and arranging them to educate foreigners, so he hung up the post of a five-grade teaching.

Now that he is being treated so highly by the king of the Mamluk dynasty, of course, he is a little uneasy in his heart.

However, when he met Faraj in Cairo and was asked about the Battle of Kurumus by him, Ma Huan understood why he attached so much importance to the Ming fleet.

Faraj was also a bitter king, and the Mamluks of the thirteenth century were able to resist the Mongol army and subdue the lost territory.

But a hundred years later, the Mamluk dynasty was already in shambles and crumbling.

From the end of the 14th century onwards, the vast majority of the Mamluk kings were either cowardly and incompetent, or arrogant and extravagant, and the powerful ministers and generals competed for power and profit, and the country fell into division and turmoil.

As soon as Faraj ascended the throne, the kingdom of Timur struck. The power of the Mamluks was much less than before, and all of Syria, including Jerusalem, was sacked by Timur, and Damascus was reduced to ruins.

For Faraj, the state of Timur was their greatest threat. Now I heard the news from the merchants who had gone to the East that a large fleet of the Timurid people had been defeated by a nation called the Ming and burned to the ground before they had time to escape.

The overwhelming state of Timur, which he saw, had now taken most of their fleet into the city, much to Faraghi's disbelief.

He had been looking forward to the appearance of the Ming fleet ever since, and in his mind, this Ming should be a country to the east of the Timurid state, and they had the conditions for an alliance.

But then the Ming fleet seemed to disappear, and more than half a year later, it would come from the west.

The Mamluks had no interest in the sea, and he did not want to know if the Ming had mastered the charts, he only wanted to ally with the Ming to help him deal with the aggressive Ottomans and Timurs in the north.

Knowing his new style, Ma Huan was full of confidence in this mission.

The Mamluks were not poor Europe, the country was arguably one of the richest on the Mediterranean coast, and in economic terms, it surpassed the Ottoman Empire.

In addition to gold, silver, and wool, they also have advanced handicrafts, and the manufacturing technology of bronze, glass, paper, and carpets is leading the world.

Especially paper, after Zhu Zhanji invented the pencil, the demand for hard paper in the Ming Dynasty rose sharply, but in addition to the expensive fine paper, most of the papermaking technology in the Ming Dynasty was for the service of the brush, so the manufacturing technology of ordinary hard paper was not as good as that of the Mamluk Dynasty.

Zhu Zhanji once ordered that paper and craftsmen were the priority goods exchanged by the Ming Dynasty, and if they could recruit craftsmen who could produce hard paper, they would take credit.

Ma Huan is not an uninformed person, and he is also fortunate to see Zhu Zhanji's globe and world map.

He is a Hui, but he is also a Ming man. He knows that his advantage is that he is proficient in Arabic and Turkic, so the opportunity for his development is naturally where his advantage can be used the most.

When he saw the map of Western Asia, he noticed the strait north of the holy city.

Today's Ming Dynasty needs to sail tens of thousands of miles to reach the Western Ocean, but if an opening can be opened here, the Ming fleet can save half a year's voyage.

For more than half a year, he has been secretly planning this matter, and this time he came to Mamluk on his own initiative.

His aim was to convince the Mamluk king to dig a canal out of the strait, which was less than a hundred miles long.

If this is done, he Ma Huan will definitely make a great achievement.