The bow of the "Toyo" crashed into the turquoise sea, leaving a straight track. The gunners on the upper deck were conducting gun drills on both sides, and with the command of the deck gunner, the gunners nervously carried out various tactical movements, repeatedly reloading and firing the training shells and training kits.

Wu Yiyong and Chen Tianli stood on the raised stern of the boat, observing their training with interest. Beside the two of them, there were also several midship-a.g. naval officers practicing the use of a rectangular instrument.

In those days, there was no GPS to locate ships at sea. Therefore, we can only use relatively rudimentary tools to find accurate directions at sea.

The nautical positioning tool is the four major pieces of the nautical astrolabe, compass, rectangular instrument and star plate. With the exception of the compass, the other three tools use the height of the stars (the sun) and the horizontal plane to calculate dimensions. That is, the so-called "dimensional navigation" tool, coupled with the compass, the sea ship can sail the vast ocean without land as a reference.

In addition to the young officer who was looking at the sun with a rectangular counter, at the back of the stern there was a sailor who threw a kind of rope into the sea with a winch that knotted every other distance. A rope of unknown length was tied to an empty barrel that had been thrown into the sea - a way to measure the speed of the ship. At the same time, a sailor is looking at a glass hourglass, so that he can know how many "knots" of rope will be released over a period of time. Do you know what the speed is?

Knowing the speed and course, you can roughly estimate the position of the Toyo.

At present, the "Toyo" is sailing on the sea near the Tsushima Strait, and the surrounding waves are undulating, and the blue is boundless, and it is extremely magnificent.

Zheng Yixin, the captain of the "Dongyang", a naval colonel in his early thirties, strode up to Chen Tianli and Wu Yiyong, raised his hand and saluted, and then reported: "It is now a full sail with a tailwind, and the speed is close to 10 knots!" At this rate, it will take another two and a half hours to reach the port of Hirado. ”

"How long does it take?" Wu Yiyong asked.

"Five hours." Zheng Yixin replied.

"Hehe, it's coming!" Wu Yiyong shook his head, "I really didn't expect it...... How much distance? 400 miles? ”

"More than 400 miles."

"Less than half a day." Wu Yiyong took a breath of salty air, "This is too fast, isn't it?" ”

"Because it's a tailwind," Chen Tianli said with a smile, "but the 'Toyo' is indeed fast!" It is a soft sailing ship with a much larger area of sails than a hard sailing boat. However, as soon as the wind changed, it could not be run, and it was not as fast as a hard sailboat. ”

Wu Yiyong said: "It's still fast enough...... You can run dozens of miles in an hour! If you march by land, you won't be able to go that far in a day! ”

"Not only is it fast, but it also has a strong capacity!" Zheng Yixin said with some pride, "There are as many as 60 cannons of 18 and 24 catties on the Toyo alone!" There were up to 300 officers and sailors on board! It can also carry up to the same number of Army Armor. The cargo hold on the ship can also carry 3,000 stone of various cargo.

Without guns, ammunition and gunners, the Toyo could transport more cargo and personnel. ”

Wu Yiyong nodded, "How many warships like the Toyo are under construction now?" When will it be ready for use? ”

"At present, there are only two," Chen Tianli replied, "and the Toyo is still in the sea trial stage, and has not officially entered service."

However, the Navy also has a large number of 'Truth'-class schooners. And even more transports based on the hulls of the 'Truth' class! There are not only military types, but also civilian ones. These schooners will not be too slow to run off the coast of Japan, and as long as they are fully mobilized, they can transport the personnel and equipment of 2 infantry divisions at once! ”

"Are there really that many?" Wu Yiyong asked, "Transporting two divisions at once?" Where is it shipped from? ”

"It can be transported from Lushun to Hirado," Chen Tianli said, "and if the wind is right, it will be there in two days." ”

"How's Hirado doing?" Wu Yiyong asked again, "Can you station soldiers?" ”

Chen Tianli smiled: "Hirado is almost here, let's see myself"

……

Japan, outside the port of Hirado.

This port city is located about the westernmost point of the Japanese archipelago facing China. Before it was forcibly leased to the Great Zhou Republic, it was just a deserted island, and two small sheltered bays in the northern part of the island formed two natural anchorages. Along the hills of the island, low wooden buildings are densely arranged. It's not Japanese-Chinese, it's just a small board house. In the port area, it is a bit of an emerging industrial and commercial city like Tianjin and Lushun. Tall Zhou-style buildings can be seen everywhere. The docks of the port are also lined with cranes that are stepped on by humans – they look a bit like waterwheels. Short Japanese laborers wearing shorts on a cold day with a white cloth belt tied around their heads are shuttling back and forth carrying large and small goods.

On the port wharf, there are warehouses everywhere, and the merchant ships of the Zhou State are moored everywhere on the sea. There are all kinds of things. There are old types of Cantonese and Fukubune, as well as new types of 'Truth', and some are improved models of the Truth type, with soft sails.

All the ships were hung with the Wanfu flag of the Zhou State, and the flags of the ships fell in the Great Zhou Republic.

As for the merchant ships of other countries, they were not allowed to enter the Japanese treaty ports of Hirado, Hakata, Namba, and Sado Island for trade.

According to a series of treaties signed between the Republic of Great Zhou and Japan, the Republic of Great Zhou exclusively enjoyed the right of "free trade" in several treaty ports of Japan.

In other words, only Japan can only have "free trade" with Dazhou, and cannot trade with other countries......

The two bays that make up the port of Hirado share an entrance that is less than two miles wide and is flanked on both sides by hills. There were two fortifications on each hillside to blockade the harbor.

The fort is not a fortress structure, but a traditional rammed-earth wall, but the side facing the sea has a slope to avoid bullets. The cannons were erected on the high part of the city wall, and they were 18 pounds of cannons, and there were 12 cannons in each of the two fortresses.

Inside the port, it is divided into two bays, north and south, of which the outer north bay is the commercial port, and the inner south bay is the military port.

The Toyo, which was huge in size and had a shell painted black, slowly sailed into the military port in Hirado South Bay, brought by a pilot ship from the harbor.

The military port is very tight, the entrance to the South Bay is very narrow, only a few dozen zhang wide, there are naval clippers patrolling, prohibiting unauthorized merchant ships from entering.

It was also very cold on the docks of the military port, with no Japanese laborers in sight and no ships docked.

Near the wharf, there is a rammed earth castle, the castle is not small, square, and the Wanfu flag flutters on the city wall, which should be an important stronghold of the Great Zhou Republic in Hirado.

Wu Yiyong carefully observed the surrounding terrain, some narrow, but there were no particularly dangerous mountains, they were all low hills, and a military camp could be built by clearing the trees.

The size of the entire island seems to be quite large, enough for an army of tens of thousands of people.

The only thing that isn't certain is how much fresh water is on the island?

If there are no problems, this Hirado Island should be able to serve as the base camp of the Japanese Dispatch Army!

When he was thinking about setting up a base camp for the Japanese in Hirado, the "Toyo" with the Wanfu flag fluttering had slowly approached the dock.

There were already some people waiting on the pier. They all wore neat narrow-sleeved robes and flat scarves on their heads. Needless to say, it was known to be an official of the Hirado garrison and the governor's palace. Laughing and groaning, he waited for the battleship to come to the dock.

Standing with them were a few guys in tall hats. At this time, it was already clear from the deck that it should be some Japanese officials, looking at the huge Great Zhou warship, all with their mouths wide open, dumbfounded.

These Japanese officials were all Dazaifu's trade officials in Hirado, and one of the leaders was named Yumune Nengyan, who was a retainer of the regent Seki Shirafuwara Tadamichi. He was in charge of several Fujiwara family farms in Hyugakuni.

Because Sakyo Doctor Fujiwara Ietaka served as Dazai Shoji, he followed Hizen to serve and was assigned to Hirado Island as the head of trade. Actually in charge of foreign affairs with the Great Zhou.

In recent years, the high-ranking officials from the Japanese national government are all in the style of a waste wood otaku, even if they are sent to the local government to be officials, they don't care about anything serious, that is, pickling girls, songs, and tea parties. It's almost the same as the light source-kun in "The Tale of Genji", which is far worse than a group of imperial examination doctors in the Great Song Dynasty - there is no most waste, only more waste.

However, these wastewood ministers have some lackeys who can help oppress the good. This is called a samurai!

Most of the lackeys have to eat according to their skills! The Japanese imperial court specializes in raising waste firewood, but waste firewood will not use its own money to raise other waste firewood, and has to raise some useful lackeys.

The Japanese nation is sustained by this group of lackeys! Because the master is too wasteful, the lackeys gradually began to grow bigger, unwilling to be dogs, and began to want to develop upward.

The samurai, the main body of the class, came from this.

Of course, the samurai were not all changed from the lackeys of the public family. There were also some high-ranking samurai who developed from the lackeys of Emperor Shirakawa. Emperor Shirakawa's lackeys are called northern samurai, but they are actually some noble-born military attachés, who can also be regarded as ministers, but they are not so wasteful and can fight and kill.

However, the proportion of famous samurai from the Genji, Taira, Fujiwara, and Tachibana clans is not high in the samurai class, and most of the samurai are local tyrants.

By Chinese standards, it is the landlord class.

And the origin of Weizong Nengyan is not up or down Weizong, and the Qin clan (whose ancestors are Chinese or Korean) from the people of Walai is not too cold. However, Weizong can say that he is not a descendant, but a worthless concubine, who cannot serve as an official position in the imperial court, and can only be born of the Fujiwara clan.

Noyan was very satisfied with this future until he became the head of the Dazaifu trade department in Hirado.

Because in Hirato, which was occupied by Chinese, Yumune learned that on the other side of the sea, a samurai from humble backgrounds could also rise to prominence with his skills and exploits......