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Cixi also left overnight, not to return to Guangzhou, but to take a warship to the port of Malacca. At present, it has become the headquarters of several forces in the Southern Song Dynasty maritime merchants, don't look at the maritime merchants who say they will go, and they will disappear in an instant when they put their homes on the ship, but they still miss their hometown very much. They leave just to live a better life when they come back, and if they don't achieve this goal, they will never look back.

Compared with the urgency on the side of the maritime merchants and the Jinhe Empire, the Southern Song Dynasty court did not seem to care too much about this large-scale strike. Thinking about it, looking through the history books, I am afraid that I will not find an uprising dominated by merchants. Since ancient times, people have believed that businessmen value profit over righteousness, and rebellion is a very bloody thing, and businessmen who can calculate oil with a copper plate will not do it, because the risk is too great.

The imperial court did not even send special officials to check on the specific situation, but only strictly ordered the magistrates in Guangzhou and Quanzhou to strictly control them. And the Great Song Dynasty royal fleet also went south to Quanzhou as scheduled, and this time it was not more than a dozen sea ships, but thirty whole ships.

Since last year, when he saw the huge benefits of ocean trade and touched the jewels and copper coins in a ship's cabin, the eyes of all the forces in the fleet have turned red. They can't wait to run three times a year to have fun, since they can't run more, then double the number of ships at a time, so let's earn enough at one time! To increase the number of sea ships at one time, it must be a sea ship that can run long voyages, which is also quite difficult for the Southern Song Dynasty court. Still, they managed to put it together, if they could use it to defend themselves against the Mongols. It is estimated that Hong Tao can drive the boat to the Americas. What the hell are you talking about?

"Brother Shi. This time, I was able to raise so many big ships to go with it, all thanks to the strong support of your master, and my master has written to tell my little brother that the money obtained from this trip to the South Seas will be used by your master first. If we can buy a few big ships from the sailors, we will definitely make those maritime merchants respect us next year. "The composition of this royal fleet is very complicated, similar to Hong Tao's guess, there is only one royal ship that really belongs to the official family. Most of the rest were occupied by some big families in the imperial court, especially the two families with the most numerous, one surnamed Shi and the other surnamed Zhao.

At this time, the two middle-aged people sitting on the stern of the ship drinking tea were the stewards of the Shi family and the Zhao family, and the white fat man sitting at the bottom was called Zhao An. He was originally Zhao Fan's family member and has been helping Zhao Fan take care of the family business. After Zhao Fan's death, he became Zhao Kui's confidant again, and was sent to this fleet by Zhao Kui to represent the interests of the Zhao family. And the long-bearded thin man who sat on the hand was surnamed Shi, called Shi Hong, and was the nephew of Shi Songzhi, an important minister in the court, a bachelor of the Huawen Pavilion, and the right prime minister. Same as Zhao An. His role is also to represent the historian in the fleet.

Who is this Shi Songzhi? As we mentioned earlier, he served as the envoy of the Jinghu system when Duanping entered Luo and recovered Sanjing. He is also a feudal official. And his uncle is even more famous, it is Shi Miyuan, the powerful prime minister of the Southern Song Dynasty. If you don't say that the gene thing is amazing, his uncle is a staunch lord and faction, and in his life, he is even more determined than his uncle.

In order to prevent the army going north from winning the battle, he, as a member of the Southern Song Dynasty official, actually cut off the food and grass of the troops in front without hesitation, the reason was that Emperor Lizong did not listen to his advice and negotiate peace with the Mongol Empire, and at the same time, he did not want to watch Zheng Qingzhi succeed in the issue of Duanping and entering Luo, so it would be difficult for him to bring Zheng Qingzhi down. To say that the court of the Southern Song Dynasty is full of such goods, if you don't lose the battle, you will see the ghost, and you can't take care of anything for your own selfish interests, Zhao Fan is nothing compared to him.

However, Zhao Fan is not wronged, he does not have Shi Songzhi's hard foundation, and many ministers in the court are Shi Miyuan's old friends, and it is not surprising that Shi Songzhi's eyebrows come and go. Even if he cut off the supply of food and grass to the front-line soldiers, which partly caused the failure of the Duanping operation to enter Luo, Emperor Lizong still did not dare to bring him to justice, and even promoted him to become the right prime minister, and specially put him next to Zheng Qingzhi to make trouble. 、

So, what kind of emperor there is, what kind of minister there is. You can't just blame these ministers for being too selfish, your emperor thinks about how to mix sand and play checks and balances in the ministers all day long, and regards his throne as more important than the interests of the country. If you follow the example, it is reasonable for the ministers under your command to protect their families and betray the country, which is called the upper beam is not correct and the lower beam is crooked, and it is in the same line.

Zheng Qingzhi led the Southern Song Dynasty Navy Division to defeat the Mongol Navy Division, no matter what role the royal fleet played in it, anyway, this credit went to Zheng Qingzhi, and others couldn't grab it if they wanted to. Emperor Lizong couldn't sit still at this time, it was said that it was a good thing to win the battle, but letting Zheng Qing win such an honor reminded him of Shi Miyuan before, for fear of turning himself into a rubber stamp again.

What to do? In order to balance Zheng Qingzhi, Emperor Lizong began to lean towards Shi Songzhi's side. The burden of rebuilding the Southern Song Dynasty Navy Division was handed over to the right prime minister, and at the same time, he also listened to Shi Songzhi's suggestion to form a fleet in the name of the royal family and occupy a place on the Nanyang route. According to Shi Songzhi, it is necessary to fill the national treasury to facilitate the country's military construction.

It's nice to say, but it's not like that. The Southern Song Dynasty was a unique dynasty in that it had a very relaxed attitude towards business, and the status of merchants was no longer suppressed, and many high-ranking officials in the imperial court were from merchant families, so it is not surprising that the officials' families were doing business. The reason why Shi Songzhi wanted to get this fleet was not to raise military funds for the Southern Song Dynasty sailors at all, but to take this opportunity to establish his own small circle in the imperial court, and then confront Zheng Qingzhi.

A small circle, to put it bluntly, is a community of interests, is there anything more beneficial and common than investing and trading together? So Shi Songzhi was the first to pull Zhao Kui, the younger brother of Zhao Fan, the original commander of the Southern Song Dynasty Naval Division, plus some other officials who had a common language and common pursuits, and got this fleet out.

The first time it went to the South Seas, thanks to the connivance of the maritime merchants, this fleet made a great profit. This not only attracted some officials in the DPRK and China, whose position was not very firm, to come and surrender, but also dealt a severe blow to the main battle faction led by Zheng Qingzhi, and made Emperor Lizong Longyan happy.

Such a good thing of killing three birds with one stone, how could Shi Songzhi not use it? Since Xia Nanyang is so fame and fortune, why not make the scale bigger? As for whether it will affect the income of maritime merchants and the country's taxes, who cares about it. We're officials! Is it on behalf of the imperial court, a group of small businessmen, who also dare to oppose the imperial court? This is not scientific! Since ancient times, in this land of China, the people did not fight with the officials, and this people did not include merchants before, and now they are barely counted.

As the commander of the Southern Song Dynasty Navy Division, and with the support of Emperor Lizong, Shi Songzhi did not worry about the problem of sea ships at all. It just so happens that the Southern Song Dynasty Navy Division is refitting new warships, and the old ships in the past will be dealt with by the shareholders of their merchant fleet, as for whether it will affect the combat effectiveness of the Navy Division, who will consider the annoying problem. The Mongolian sailors will not be able to come for a while anyway, and the Jinhe Empire is an ally of the Great Song Dynasty, what are the allies doing? Isn't it just for pitting?

"The prime minister said before he came, let's not mess with the people of the Strait Company first. A few days ago, the Jinhe Empire came up with a sharp weapon called a musket, and with only 300 soldiers, it completely annihilated thousands of soldiers of Wang Shixian's father and son. The imperial court has basically decided that it is necessary to purchase a batch of muskets, and then the generals of the Jinhe Empire will be responsible for training, and it is necessary to train a combatable division for the imperial court within a year, and it has not yet been decided whether it will go on a northern expedition. This matter was controlled by Zheng Xiang and his gang again, and if they wanted to fight against them, this fleet must control the sea trade, which was the majority of the imperial court's taxes. Only if our side is strong, can the prime minister's side gather more people of insight and suppress the arrogance of the main battle faction in the court. ”

If this Shi Hong's words were heard by Hong Tao, he would have to vomit blood. The matter of the musketeers has not yet been finalized between the two countries, and even he himself does not know what the Southern Song Dynasty court thinks in the end, and such a relative of the prime minister's family has already said the truth. No wonder Cixi is sure that in a few months she will be able to bring people into the camp of the Southern Song Dynasty Navy to sketch the graphics of the new warship, it seems that this is really not bragging, the Southern Song Dynasty court is a big colander.

"But this group of Diao people really went on strike, in case they went to join forces with the merchants of Nanyang Port to strike together, wouldn't we have no goods to buy and sell, so how would it be good?" Zhao An is not as well-informed as Shi Hong, and he doesn't care too much about the situation in the court, he is more concerned about whether the goods loaded on the ship can be sold at a high price, and whether he can purchase enough goods when he comes back.

"Hey...... We are the royal merchant ships of the Great Song Dynasty, who dares to embarrass us? As for those Qiu Ba in the port of Malacca, they are just lackeys of the Golden River Empire. This time, we will not go to the port of Malacca to unload the cargo, and go directly to the port of Kalamba. Although the distance is long, the goods are more abundant and the profits are higher. Those people can't even convince the merchants of Port Calamba to strike the market, right? Shi Hong obviously came prepared, and he didn't care about Zhao An's worries.

"I've heard about the maritime merchants in Mingzhou in the port of Kalamba, and as Brother Shi said, there are more goods there and the price is more reasonable. However, the port of Kalamba is far away, we don't have ships at sea to guide the way, and we don't have the territorial waters that are familiar with the route, I'm afraid we won't be able to get there......" Zhao An actually used to be a maritime merchant, and he was dumping goods between Mingzhou and Japan, and he knew much more about things at sea than a land businessman like Shi Hong. Hearing Shi Hong's decision, a layer of worry immediately appeared on his face, but he hid it well, and instantly changed his smile back.

[It's about to be 515, I hope to continue to hit the 515 red envelope list, and the red envelope rain will be able to give back to readers and promotional works on May 15. A piece is also love, and it must be better! (To be continued.) )