In the northwest corner of the West Garden, there is a single-storey Tang-style wooden building with an elevated teak floor. This is the place where Chongzhen built for himself to exercise and learn martial arts. Of course, Chongzhen didn't want to learn any martial arts master, but just learned some basic defense skills.

For an emperor who often fights on the battlefield, he doesn't want to entrust his safety to others. Of course, another function of this martial arts hall is to demonstrate to Chongzhen that martial artists from all over the world can jointly study and simplify military fighting techniques.

Right now, in front of Chongzhen, two young men armed with two wooden sticks, simulated short spears attacking a young Japanese samurai armed with a long-handled sword. Unlike ordinary samurai, this young samurai actually held a sword more than a meter long in one hand, and held the scabbard in the other.

Despite being one-on-two, the samurai maintained an attacking stance, drawing the attention of his opponents with the scabbard of his left hand, followed by a slam blow from his right-hand sword. His feet are constantly moving, never allowing his two opponents to stand side by side, to ensure that they are in a line-up order, keeping only one enemy in the fight.

The strength of the samurai's wrist and the precision of his judgment of the distance between battles caused the two young men in front of him to hold out for less than a minute, and they were defeated one after the other. Such an ending made the defeated Wu Zhen and Zhang Yuchuan's faces flushed, and Shi Dian, who was kneeling beside the emperor, also turned a little dark, and he was about to ask the emperor to personally fight, and when he met the Japanese samurai for a while, Chongzhen clapped his hands lightly and said: "Sure enough, it is Miyamoto Musashi, and he is indeed qualified to teach Chiyo's swordsmanship." ”

Seeing Miyamoto Musashi, who defeated Wu Zhen and Zhang Yuchuan but didn't shed a drop of sweat, Zhu Youzhen was really convinced at this time, this should be the sword saint he remembered who was touted by the Japanese in later generations, not just a person with the same name and surname.

After returning to the capital from Tianjin, he happened to hear that Toyotomi Chiyo had hired several Japanese samurai as adopted sonsmanship instructors, and one of them was called Miyamoto Musashi.

However, it is clear that the guards in the palace, including Shi Dian's apprentices, are not as skilled as Miyamoto Musashi. Seeing that Shi Dian, who was embarrassed and angry, wanted to play in person, Zhu Youzhen hurriedly stopped the game.

If this person is really Miyamoto Musashi, then in addition to the name of Sword Master, he has an even louder nickname: Killer. Whether it is the palace guards or Shi Dian's apprentices, after all, practicing martial arts on weekdays is just to strengthen the body, not to meet the enemy on the battlefield, and it is difficult to face ordinary people with swords.

But the Japanese are different, and it is not a sin for Japanese samurai to slash civilians, as long as you have a valid reason or a strong skill. Although Japan was unified in form, there was still an independent legal system among the feudal states, and the samurai who killed the people fled to other feudal states, and basically escaped punishment, unless the victim had the right and money to have his retainers and disciples hunt him down.

Miyamoto Musashi was known for his penchant for killing before he became famous, and the reason he slashed civilians was not because he was offended, but because he wanted to hone his skills in killing. His swordsmanship was constantly improved in killing, and it was only after he became famous that he was slightly restrained.

However, it is precisely because of this notoriety that Miyamoto Musashi is not treated well by the shogunate and some daimyos, making it difficult for him to step into the official career. I don't know how he got into Toyotomi Chiyo and came to Mingguo.

For such a swordsmanship master who used his human life, the palace guards who regarded martial arts as martial arts were naturally not opponents. Zhu Youzhen is also reluctant to use his old stone to fight against the young Miyamoto Musashi, he is just hunting and not really appreciating martial arts.

Hearing the emperor's praise, Miyamoto Musashi quickly knelt down, and he said bluntly: "Thank you Your Majesty for your praise, these young people's martial arts are also quite good, and their bayonet skills are also very exquisite, but they are all a little less murderous, otherwise it should be a villain who admits defeat." ”

For Miyamoto Musashi's well-behaved, Zhu Youzhen is still very satisfied. He then ordered the guards to take some silver dollars and a bronze medal, put them in front of Miyamoto Musashi, and said, "Your martial arts are outstanding, I want you to serve as a military swordsmanship instructor, are you willing?" ”

Miyamoto Musashi suppressed his excitement and pressed his forehead against the teak floor and replied, "The villain is willing." ”

As soon as Miyamoto Musashi walked out of the door, Shi Dian and several disciples who had failed in the battle with the other party came over to ask the emperor for their guilt. Zhu Youzhen smiled and comforted: "Shi Shifan doesn't have to be too anxious, victory and defeat are a common thing in soldiers, how can there be a failure once, you have to ask the guilt, is there anyone around me if I go on like this?"

However, there are still many lessons to be learned from this martial arts demonstration. First of all, it told us that it is impossible to build a car behind closed doors, whether it is chemistry, science and technology, martial arts or ordnance, only continuous exchanges with neighboring countries will make progress. I hope that Shi Shishi and all of you will stop holding the idea of keeping a hand, this is not good for the martial arts world..."

Returning from the martial arts hall, Zhu Youzhen, who was about to take a bath, suddenly stopped Wang Chengen and said: "Wang Banban, you go and talk to Feng Quan, let him transfer some silver taels from the customs, and prepare to hold an East Asian Games in Beijing next year, invite people from various countries to participate, and hold another Go tournament to promote friendly exchanges between China and East Asian countries." ”

Although Wang Chengen didn't know the emperor's intentions, he quickly agreed. In his opinion, these things ordered by the emperor were to make the capital lively, which was the interest that the emperor should have.

From 13 to 15 August, strong winds occurred again on Chongming Island and the sea, and the tidal wave caused by the strong winds once again broke the outer embankment of Chongming Island. This time, the tidal disaster in May was also harmful, and the low-lying areas of Chongming Island were completely submerged. However, due to the fact that the low-lying villages had obeyed the orders of the imperial court, tall mounds were built on the edge of the villages, and a sentry system was established on the island.

Therefore, by the time the outer embankment was breached, most of the villagers had already been woken up. Although the village was swept away by the tide, most of the villagers hid in the mound and waited for the boat sent by Song Yingsheng from the sea to save people. The tens of thousands of people on the island eventually lost only a tenth of their population.

Within a year, there were two major disasters in a row, and the number of people who died exceeded 5,000, such a tragedy finally made the people of Chongming Island wake up, and the imperial court did not want to build the stone pond around the island to make money from them, but it was indeed a project that cared about their own interests.

Previously, under the instigation of some local big households, the public opinion that refused to merge Chongming Island into Haishi suddenly disappeared. On the contrary, the people of Chongming have become staunch supporters of the merger of Chongming Island, Hai, Jiading and Songjiang counties into Haishi. Song Yingsheng was also praised by the people of the neighboring area for his proper response to the disaster.

The 1st Coast Guard Division was still a little reluctant when it sent troops to provide disaster relief in May, but after receiving commendations from the General Staff Headquarters and being awarded the title of Model Division, it was much more active when it was ordered to send troops to disaster relief in August.

The reason why they were reluctant to go to disaster relief was because they were outsiders and had no interests with the local people, so they couldn't take the risk to save irrelevant people. But now, after receiving so many honors, they finally recognize that fighting a war is an equally important task to help people resist disasters.

Moreover, it is much stronger to rescue the people in braving the enemy's arrow rain, and not only can you win the honor of the battlefield, but also get the gratitude of the people affected by the disaster. Unconsciously, the 1st Coast Guard Division, which had always been called the Yankees, gradually became familiar with the locals.

When Song Yingsheng gradually integrated local forces and merged Chongming, Jiading, Hai, and Songjiang into the Hai region, his brother Song Yingxing was in Jingdezhen, and the craftsmen of the official kiln fired large pieces of ceramic floor tiles and ceramic sanitary utensils, as well as more exquisite bone china. In the intervening years, Jingdezhen's annual porcelain production nearly doubled to 25 million pieces, one of which became fine porcelain.

The improvement of machinery and the use of coal fuel not only increased the production of porcelain in Jingdezhen, but also caused the price of coarse porcelain to fall by nearly one-third, and began to become a large amount of kitchen utensils that ordinary citizens could consume. The fine porcelain also began to be fixed in six or seven corners, and the quality ranged from 1 or 2 yuan to more than 100 yuan.

In short, before the successful firing of ceramic floor tiles and ceramic sanitary utensils, the annual sales volume of traditional porcelain alone has reached nearly 5 million yuan, and the tax revenue is 150,000 yuan. At the same time, Song Yingxing not only sorted out the classification of ceramic varieties in the ceramic firing technology and market, but also established the Institute of Ceramic Technology, breaking the original technical rules passed down from father to son, master and apprentice, which greatly promoted the further development of ceramic technology.

The classification of building and sanitary ceramics, industrial ceramics, arts and crafts ceramics and daily ceramics began to appear, which meant that more specialized porcelain workers appeared. Coupled with a variety of water-powered machines that replace human labor, the production capacity of each porcelain factory has been rapidly increased without much increase in the porcelain workers in Jingdezhen.

Song Yingxing did not have the idea of cherishing the broom for these sorted out porcelain technology and hydraulic machine production methods, and he thought that it should be promoted in other parts of the Ming Dynasty. Song Yingxing believes that the technical content of coarse porcelain is not high, and if it can be manufactured in the place where it is used, then the people in the vicinity can buy cheaper porcelain bowls.

If it can be manufactured in Fujian, which has convenient transportation, it is not only easy to transport to various places, but also many rivers in Fujian can also be used to manufacture porcelain with lower cost in Jingdezhen and so on.

Zhu Youzhen naturally did not refuse such an offer, and at his suggestion, Jingdezhen began to send craftsmen to teach porcelain-making techniques to various places and collect patent licensing fees. Fujian, Guangdong, Hai and Shandong began to prepare for the construction or expansion of porcelain factories.

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