In a blink of an eye, it was the eighth day of the Lunar New Year, and the departure day of the westbound fleet that had been in Guangzhou for nearly a month.

The crew members gathered again as early as two days ago, and with Li Zhi's silver payment, these people seemed to have a comfortable year, their faces were red and full of energy.

Other follow-up officials of the imperial court have also been in place one after another, and the officials of the two prefectures in Guangzhou City have all been dispatched.

All the families also rushed to see each other, and on the wharf of Guangzhou Port, there were crowds of people.

The old ancestor, Grandma Li, and the old Ming king, and the children are all staying in the secret territory of the dynasty, and they will not show up until they return to the Tang Dynasty.

Even if Qingqi and the other four ladies will not show up after arriving in the Western Regions, this is all arranged in advance, how can Afei Fa be a dignified eldest princess, how can she be known by the public, after marrying the Tang Dynasty, she can only be listed as a companion.

In order to take care of the face of the empire, there have been negotiations between the two countries, otherwise it will be really difficult to arrange it at that time.

It is said that dozens of carts of gifts were brought to the guests of the Western Regions by people from all walks of life, but Li Zhi did not see them yesterday, and it was not until the fleet officially set sail that Mahdi led him to the warehouse to see it.

Most of the personnel on both sides were recorded on the Shengjing Zero, and the two ships were nominally full of cargo in their holds.

On this trip, there were more people from King Ming and his entourage, as well as Bastion and several of his entourage, as well as Xin Jingshan, Si Xiangwen, and Xing Yichun.

According to Xin Jingshan's explanation, it was the idea of the Fengyi League, and the first reason was to investigate the situation of overseas cultivation forces, and by the way, to bear some protection for Li Yiyi and his party.

According to Li Zhi's opinion, he was unwilling to bring the three of them, so it would be very inconvenient to enter the Chaoyuan Secret Realm.

But the Fengyi League sent out a lot of gifts, of course, in the name of various sects in the cultivation world, which made it difficult for Li Zhi to refuse.

In his opinion, taking the opportunity of this close contact to get closer to Li Zhi is the real purpose, as for the investigation, there are some reasons in that regard, and it is not harmful to know more about similar people overseas.

Although he already had sailing experience along the way, three days later, when he really came to the open sea, a group of people, including Li Zhi, knew how difficult it would be to be a qualified captain.

The first is orientation discrimination, the Tang Dynasty did not even invent the earliest nautical tool, the compass, let alone the compass.

At that time, seafarers always kept a relatively close distance from the shore at sea, and judged whether the course was correct by the land features they could see.

Usually they sail during the day and anchor in harbor or anchor at night.

No shipowner dared to venture out into the sea, where no land could be seen, for they thought that a shipwreck on reefs and shoals was less dangerous than sinking in the sea.

There are three reasons why I dare not sail directly across the ocean: first, I am afraid of losing my way; the second is the fear of storms in the ocean; The third is the fear of being attacked by pirates, but in the final analysis, it is the first reason.

Later, navigation technology improved, and although there were still second and third reasons, ships dared to sail across the ocean.

Therefore, in ocean voyages, determining the orientation of the ship is the first priority.

At this time, the navigator judged the latitude by observing the height of the sun during the day and the position of the North Star at night.

Relying on the positioning of celestial bodies, navigators used a very simple instrument to measure the angle of celestial bodies, which the Westerners called "Jacob's rod", and is currently the only tool for identifying the direction shared by Li Zhi's three ships.

What is a "Jacob's rod"? In fact, the observer uses two rods to connect at the top, the bottom one is parallel to the horizon, and the top one is aimed at the star or the sun, and the energy is declined.

The declination difference is then used to calculate latitude and range, a technique known as "latitude navigation", which is relatively successful in measuring latitude, but very difficult to determine longitude.

Despite this, the method of "latitude navigation" is still very common in Western Europe, placing oneself on the same latitude line as the destination, and then staying on this line to reach the destination.

Rahman, Sada, and other veteran pirate trainees have mastered this method of measuring latitude, but this is not completely scientific, and even in later modern times, the error of using astronomical positioning is still about 1-2 nautical miles.

On weekdays, Bastien likes to be on the deck outside the cockpit, talking endlessly with Rahman and others, according to him, he was like a navigator when he was a child, but unfortunately he was ruthlessly strangled by his family.

But his adventurous hobby remained obsessive, and he had the experience of wandering around the world as an adult.

He was no stranger to such ocean journeys, spending at least twenty percent of the year on various fleets.

According to him, most of the current European merchant ships sail along the coast of the coast, preferring to make a roundabout voyage along the Mediterranean coasts of Spain, France and Italy rather than sail directly east after passing through the Strait of Gibraltar.

This is also the main reason why there are many ships from the East and the Western Regions in Datang, and few ships from Europe.

Bastião did not shy away from pointing out that piracy in Europe is far more rampant than piracy in other regions.

Li Zhi was not surprised by this, because there are many records about this in the annals of later generations, but Bastion's next remarks attracted Li Zhi's special attention.

Inbastion inadvertently remarks that European pirates not only grow in size, but also employ more outlaws to carve out territory deeper into the sea.

Sometimes, when they are understaffed, they will buy or subjugate local pirate forces in a certain area of the sea, so that they can strengthen and establish themselves in the original sea.

He could even open his mouth to name the pirate leaders who were often present in a particular sea, either relayed by the crew of the ships he was on or from the royal nautical diaries of the Eastern Roman Empire.

The latter, in particular, has many sources from the Empire's envoys to the country.

Because pirates also need to sail by land in the coastal seas, large pirate forces often go ashore to plunder, so the more small islands or even small countries on land, the more they understand the pirate forces in the coastal waters.

These rumors are not secret, but Rahman does not know the details, and they have long been out of their original life for several years or even more than ten years.

Li Zhizhi moved, but he didn't ask a question, but his eyes gestured to Rahman and Sada.

The two of them understood, and because of their apparent curiosity, they asked about some specific rumors.

Li Zhi made an excuse to leave, not because he didn't trust Bastion, but because he didn't want to involve him.

In fact, Bastião has traveled more countries, and he has experience, but his personality is not complicated, and he is willing to make friends, and he can tell himself about this today, not necessarily to others not to tell others some experiences from the East.

Just like the current war between the Arab Empire and the Eastern Roman Empire, he has no hatred for the people of the Western Regions, and in his inner world, when he goes out, he should sincerely help each other.

Li Zhi did not stay away, but came to the sail windmill on the first deck, and this time he was followed by two craftsmen from the Beijia Carpentry Factory.

This time, Hisham ordered dozens of sets of windmills in the carpentry yard, and this time only two sets were rushed out, and the master craftsmen were the installation and training personnel who went with the finished products.

For three days in a row, Hisham had been under the windmill for a while, in order to keep up with the practicality of this new sail.

Once proven along the way, the sail windmill he introduced was a great achievement, no less than the introduction of Nasir's rice paper process.

Among the crew members who were arranged by Rahman to work next to the windmill, there were also many Datang crew members, who were hired in advance in Hangzhou and nearby areas on the way to come.

The formation of ancient navigation can be traced back to the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period, during which maritime exploration, large-scale maritime transportation, overseas trade and frequent naval battles successively appeared as maritime powers—Qi, Wu and Yue.

Among them, the Yue country is now the area of Jiangsu and Zhejiang, and the Yue people have been good at navigation since ancient times, which is why they came, so the previous recruited crew will be set in Hangzhou.

These people have the custom of "breaking their hair and tattooing", which may be due to the fact that they are often in the water and have inconvenient long hair, so they cut it short and tattooed it to symbolize the son of the dragon, and ask for its safety in the sea, and naturally there is also a superstitious color.

Because they often dive and swim, they are more proficient in shipbuilding and navigation technology, and the local shipbuilding industry is also very developed, whether it is suitable for naval warfare, or civilian flat boats, light boats, boats, etc., the scope of recruitment of Shengjing Zero is not limited to whether they are good at swimming.

In order to pass the long life on the ocean in the future, Li Zhizao planned a shipbuilding plan on an ocean-going ship, which of course would only be a small boat.

The reason why it is built on ships is because they do not need to produce in batches, and the emphasis is on the development of ship types; Second, these people have the convenience of going south and north, and can see any ship type in the world that can be used for reference; The third is those who are willing to go to the boat to beg for a living, and their families must not be wealthy, and this move also gives them some opportunities to earn extra money.

At this time, there were several boatmen from Jiangsu and Zhejiang at the scene, and they were already somewhat familiar with Li Zhi, and they spoke a lot more casually.

In their eyes, Li Zhike is a master of shipbuilding, and sometimes they meet on the ship, and usually ask some questions about the type of ship.

It's the same today, after Li Zhi and Hisham communicated for a while, some crew members came forward to ask for advice.

Because Li Zhi had promised them in public that there were ready-made timber on board at any time, and that there would be a large amount of silver reward for the development of new ships, those who were familiar with shipbuilding were very interested.

With nothing to do, Li Zhi simply led a few people to a leeward place, spread out a few pieces of paper and began to paint.

In his previous life, he was not a shipbuilder, he only paid attention to ancient ships out of hobby, and he still had some research on the famous ship types, and other inconspicuous small ships were only left with a vague impression.