Zhen Qian stretched out his hand and patted Zhen Jiu's shoulder, but did not agree to Zhen Jiu's request, but his eyes fell on Zhen Seventy-two's face on the side.

Seeing Zhen Qian looking at him, Zhen Seventy-two shook slightly, and stepped forward and said, "Master, I am also willing to go to the Americas to find the legendary high-yield crops!" ”

"Twenty thousand miles to the Americas, the sea route is even more difficult and dangerous, the hardships are ten times more difficult than imagined, it is impossible for people with great will to complete, but the risks and benefits are equally huge, if you think about it clearly, I will tilt all my resources to you, and do my best to ensure the smooth sailing of your voyage!"

"I've thought it through!" Zhen Seventy-two straightened his waist and said in an extremely firm tone: "The eldest husband will cook without eating in the world, and I will not give up such an opportunity!" ”

Zhen Jiu on the side was a little dissatisfied and said, "Master, why don't you choose me!" ”

"Zhen Seventy-two, why didn't I choose Zhen Jiu, but chose you", Zhen Qian asked rhetorically.

Zhen Seventy-two thought for a moment and said, "Because I have more perseverance than Zhen Jiu to complete this voyage?" ”

"That's a good point!" Zhen Qian looked at Zhen Jiu and said: "You are more experienced than Zhen Seventy-two in navigation, and you are also talented in command and dispatch, but you are a little less ruthless than Zhen Seventy-two, being ruthless to others is nothing, being ruthless to yourself is really ruthless." At the beginning, in order to avoid the pursuit of the enemy, Zhen Seventy-two hid in the reeds alone and spent three months alone, such willpower is not something that everyone has, and this voyage of 20,000 miles to the other side of the ocean also requires extremely strong willpower, even when everyone is desperate, he can stick to his faith and not give up, which is particularly important in sea navigation, now understand? ”

In fact, Zhen Qian has another candidate, that is, Zhen Thirty-one, who has not come back since he went south to the Ryukyu Islands, this person is similar to Zhen Seventy-two, has the nickname of the King of Hades, does things decisively, vows not to give up until the goal is achieved, and even a little ruthless, it is precisely because of this that Zhen Qian did not choose Zhen Thirty-one for the first time.

Zhen Jiu's mouth was puffing up, but he was very convinced Zhen Seventy-two in his heart, thinking about what it was like to not see land for a year at sea, the feeling of powerlessness that called the sky and the earth should not be able to bear it.

Zhen Qian asked people to bring tea, and said to Zhen Seventy-two: "I am going to let you set off before October, at this time there are the least storms at sea, and the wind and waves are not big, and now there are still three months before departure, during this time, you first go with me to Hyuga Country to help Shaoji Dongshang block the coastline of Osumi Country and prevent the Osumi Kingdom from being defeated and escaping ......." ”

"After that, when you come back, you will start to choose sailors to accompany you, and I will give you two thousand-stone flying ships, a total of eight hundred people, and bring goods such as silk, porcelain, and refined salt, and weapons and equipment as you choose, and take all twelve artillery pieces away, and install two eight-ox crossbows and sixteen launchers on each ship, and bring oil bombs and thunderbolt bombs, and ten war horses, which will be used in the Americas, and what requirements can you think of?"

Zhen Qian made a bloody investment this time, and the three thousand-stone flying ships were taken out two at once, and all the twelve artillery pieces were taken away, if it weren't for the fact that there were not too many eight-bull crossbows on the ship, Zhen Qian would have brought more, not to mention the fire oil bombs and thunderbolt bombs, this kind of weapons and equipment can walk sideways along the coast of Liaodong, and the people next to him smacked their tongues and inhaled the cold air.

After promising the greatest support to Zhen Seventy-two, Zhen Qian said to Ke Ming: "The last time we talked about transforming a hard sail into a soft sail, we will immediately experiment on a thousand-stone flyship, and hand it over to Zhen Seventy-two for adaptive training in the shortest possible time, so that the sailing speed of our ship can be doubled, and the sailing time of one year will be shortened to half a year, if everything goes well, Zhen Seventy-two will hopefully return to Datang after a year and a half!" ”

The biggest difficulty in sailing to the Americas is time, if you can make a clipper now, the time from Datang to the Americas can be shortened to one month, but unfortunately this type of ship is impossible to manufacture for more than ten years, and the speed may not be as fast as that of later generations, but it is still possible to reach the Americas in two months.

This is a bold attempt by Zhen Qian, and he has no bottom in his heart to grasp the success at all, but fortunately, he did not put all his hopes on this voyage, and in the short term, it will be more secure and realistic to pass through the Ryukyu Islands.

However, there are risks in everything, there are also many uncertainties in the Ryukyu Islands, it is not all smooth sailing in transporting people from the Tang Dynasty, the Tang people come to live on unfamiliar islands, first of all, it is not that they are not adapted, but they are afraid and uneasy to stay away from the Tang Dynasty, if it is not for their livelihood, Zhen Qian does not know that he can transport many people from the Tang Dynasty to the island.

Wang Lun half-jokingly said: "Zhen Seventy-two, this time Zhen Lang has invested in you, and half of his worth is entrusted to you, if you can't bring back the things that Zhen Lang said, I'm afraid you won't even be able to raise your head in the future!" ”

"Don't put too much pressure on Zhen Seventy-two!" Zhen Qian didn't want to put too much pressure on Zhen Seventy-two, his nerves would be broken if he was too tight, "There are a few things that must be clear about this voyage, the first is to ensure your own safety, in addition to a long time at sea, you are worried about storms, but it is unlikely that there will be storms at sea in winter, but you must also be careful." ”

"Second, when you meet the local natives on the American continent, you should also be careful, some of those natives are more friendly, but many natives still retain the custom of headhunting, they will not attack because of your friendliness, you don't underestimate those natives, those natives are very powerful, their advantage is a large number of people and geographical advantages, your advantage is a warship, don't fight with them."

"The third is the high-yield crops I said, don't be too demanding, potatoes, corn and sweet potatoes are very common in the Americas, you can quietly collect them in the process of trading, as for the other crops I said, it doesn't matter if you have one of the three kinds of potatoes, corn and sweet potatoes, you can complete the mission of this voyage!"

"Fourth, this voyage is to accumulate experience, and there will be many such voyages in the future, so after you arrive in the Americas, try to deal with the local natives to lay the foundation for our next voyage, if there is no need, don't go on a killing spree!"

“……”

Zhen Seventy-two listened to it and had a very strange illusion, as if Zhen Qian had been to the Americas before, not only knew what high-yield crops were in the Americas, but also knew the customs of the indigenous people, this feeling was not only his own, when he went from the Bohai Sea to the Wufeng Islands, many people were saying that Zhen Qian must have been to the Wa Kingdom and the Wufeng Islands before, otherwise he would not be so familiar with this place.

(End of chapter)