In the meeting hall of Dinghaiwei, a banquet is being held, in which Zhou Zhong sits on the first place, and the head on the left is the gray-haired Shenying, he did not come alone this time, but brought three thousand carefully selected Beijing camps, and at Zhou Chong's request, one thousand of these three thousand people are musketeers from the Shenji battalion, and the remaining two thousand people are also selected from the Beijing camp elite soldiers, and they have also had the experience of cooperating with the Shenji battalion before, so it can be said that they are the elite of the Beijing camp.

On the right side of Zhou Chong, there is a young eunuch, and this little eunuch is also Zhou Chong's acquaintance Wang Gui, when he and Gu Dayong met for the first time, he just met that Zhang Zhong came to Zhou to Zhou important Bai sisters, and was ruthlessly cleaned up by Gu Dayong, and then Zhang Zhong was dismissed, it was this Wang Gui who ran to Zhou Chong to report the letter, and Zhou Chong gave him a thousand taels of silver when he left, but as long as there was something in the palace, Wang Gui would take the initiative to go to Zhou Chong to tell him, and by the way, exchange some pocket money, So Zhou Zhong and Wang Gui are also old acquaintances.

Shen Ying and Wang Gui were both sent to assist Zhou Chong this time, of which Shen Ying was appointed deputy commander-in-chief, as Zhou Chong's assistant, Wang Gui was the supervisor of the army this time, plus Zhou Chong, the commander of the military affairs officer, just formed a fixed model of the Ming Dynasty's expatriate army, in which Zhou Chong was in charge of the overall situation, Shen Ying commanded the army, and provided professional military advice to the commander, and Wang Gui, the supervising army, played the role of supervision, in case the generals led the troops to make chaos.

It can be said that this mode of leading troops has a clear division of labor, and civilian officials, military generals, and eunuchs perform their own duties, and no one can be in charge of the army alone, which greatly reduces the possibility of the army getting out of control. However, the disadvantages are also obvious. That is, the three parties contain each other. The power of the military generals was also compressed to the limit, and it was easy for the layman to command the insider, and even the strength of the army could not be exerted at all, which was also a major drawback in the military of the Ming Dynasty, and there was no way to solve it until the end of the Ming Dynasty.

"Princess, Shen Lao General, we used to be acquaintances in Beijing, and now we are gathering in Ningbo, which is thousands of miles away from the capital. It's also a kind of fate, come on~, let's have this drink! I saw Zhou Zhong raise his wine glass and toast to the two at this time.

"What Lord Zhou said is right, our family didn't expect His Majesty to send me to supervise the army, but this is the first time for our family to go out of the palace to do business, and I hope that Lord Zhou and the general soldier of God will give me more guidance in the future!" At this time, I saw Wang Gui also raise his wine glass and smiled. Speaking of which, he also has a good relationship with Zhou Chong, otherwise there are so many eunuchs in the palace, where would he talk about him as a little eunuch.

"Hahaha~, Lord Admiral and the prince are too polite, and God is a rough man. I won't say anything polite, if the two of you have any use for Shenying. God will definitely do his best! Shen Ying was also very excited at this time, especially for Zhou Chong, his heart was full of gratitude, it was because of Zhou Chong's words that he was able to make military achievements in the suppression of rebellion in Bazhou, so as to keep his title of Earl of Jingyang, this time there is a chance to lead troops to fight at sea, if it is successful, I am afraid that the reward of the court in the future is indispensable.

After the three of them finished speaking, they drank all the wine in the cup together, and Qu Lie and the others who sat with him also drank a cup, and then Zhou Chong asked Wang Gui with concern whether their journey was smooth, etc., and the other party also answered one by one, and Shen Ying was also very concerned about the situation in Dinghaiwei, but for these problems, Zhou Chong asked Qu Lie to report to Shen Ying, after all, they are all military generals, and they will cooperate with each other in the future, and it would be better to have more exchanges now.

After the reception banquet, Zhou Zhong arranged for Wang Gui and Shen Ying to stay, and the next few days was to take them to visit Dinghaiwei, and arranged for Shen Ying to bring 3,000 Beijing battalions to participate in the training of the sailors, at least they should be able to go to sea without seasickness, and even like the sailors and soldiers, they can fight on the undulating deck, of course, this is not something that can be done in a day or two, so Zhou Chong is not in a hurry, and according to their plans, the main combat method when assisting Malacca is land warfare.

On the third day of their arrival, the sailors of Guangzhou also rushed over, speaking of which the sailors of Guangzhou are stronger than the sailors of Ningbo, there is only one guard in Ningbo to maintain a complete system, but there are two complete guards in Guangzhou, namely Guanghaiwei and Nanhaiwei, but because the tributary team in Guangzhou is constantly coming and going, and people are usually needed to guard it, so only one Guanghaiwei came to the two guards, and Zhou Zhong has long known this.

Guanghaiwei's Wei commander surnamed Chang Mingxiao, it is said that the ancestor is the founder of the Ming Dynasty Chang Yuchun, but unfortunately Chang Yuchun died early, and the Chang family stood on the wrong team in the battle of Jingjing, and the title was not passed down, and the descendants only got some martial arts positions in the guard, this Chang Xiao is the descendant of Chang Yuchun's third son, Chang Sen.

It is said that Chang Yuchun is tall and has long arms and infinite strength, and the advantages of this family are very good, and Chang Xiao has been reflected. When Zhou Zhong saw this regular commander, he was also startled at first, only to see that the other party was in his thirties, with a full beard, definitely more than two meters tall, and his two arms were as thick as ordinary people's thighs.

"Subordinate Chang Xiao has seen Lord Admiral!" On the wharf of Ningbo Port, Zhou Zhong took Shen Ying and others to greet the Guanghai Guardian Sailor from Guangzhou, among which Chang Xiao was the first to get off the ship and salute Zhou Chong, although he was tall and rude, but his words and deeds were extremely polite, which formed a strong contrast with his appearance.

"The permanent commander doesn't need to be polite, this admiral has been waiting for a long time, and today he finally waited for the permanent commander to arrive!" When Zhou Zhong saw Chang Xiao, he didn't show the slightest happy expression, but said in a somewhat unyin and yang manner.

In fact, Zhou Chong is not to blame, the military order to summon Guanghaiwei to Ningbo to rendezvous has already been issued, Guangzhou is not too far from Ningbo, and Chang Xiao and they may be faster by sea, so Chang Xiao and these people should have arrived a few days ago, but now they have waited until Shenying and Wang Gui and their people from the capital have arrived, and Chang Xiao arrived with the sailor, which made Zhou Chong not angry?

Hearing the tone of Zhou Chong's words, Chang Xiao was not a stupid person, and immediately understood that the Admiral was blaming himself for coming late, and then saw him salute again: "Your Excellency, my subordinates should have arrived in Ningbo six days ago, but when our fleet passed through Penghu, we found that there were pirates entrenched there to rob the passing ships, and many fleets had been killed, so it took a few days for the subordinates to exterminate the pirates, and now the pirates' heads are on the ship, please check the Admiral!" ”

Chang Xiao waved his hand after speaking, and immediately there were Guanghaiwei's soldiers dragging things down from the deck, and after a while, I saw them dragging down several large fishing nets from the boat, which were filled with some hideous human heads, because it was winter now, and the temperature was relatively low, so the human heads were not rotten, and there was no big smell.

Looking at the heads piled up in the fishing nets, there were one or two hundred people, this was already a group of pirates, but Zhou Chong still looked at Chang Xiao with some suspicion: "Commander Chang, it's not that Admiral Ben is too careful, although there are indeed many pirates in the South China Sea, but do you have any evidence to prove that these people are pirates and not ordinary people?" ”

Zhou Chong's suspicion is not superfluous, this kind of thing is not uncommon in the army of the Ming Dynasty, and it is even easier for the sailor to do this kind of thing, for example, although the Ming Dynasty imposed a sea ban, some people really can't survive in the Ming Dynasty, so they took the most risk to go to sea, a small number of these people like Zhou Chong, became a member of the smuggling team, and most of the others chose to settle overseas, such as Penghu and Ryukyu and other islands where many ordinary people live.

Of course, the composition of the people who settled overseas is also very complicated, and even some of them are usually people, and when they can't survive, they will go to sea to become pirates, and some smuggling fleets will occasionally make a cameo appearance as pirates, so in this era, the definition of piracy is very vague. Like Chang Xiao, he himself said that he had exterminated a group of pirates, but who dared to guarantee that these heads would be pirates? Maybe they just killed a bunch of ordinary people who had settled overseas to pose as pirates.

Seeing that Zhou Zhong suspected that he had killed good and risky merits, Chang Xiao, who was originally very polite, looked a little angry, only to see him blushing and arguing: "My lord, how can my subordinates, who are the eleventh generation great-grandsons of the King of Kaiping, smear the faces of their ancestors because of a little military merit, these heads are indeed pirates, and the pirate den that was destroyed by us is still there, and adults can send someone to investigate at any time!" ”

King Kaiping is also Chang Yuchun after his death, I didn't expect Chang Xiao to be a person who attaches great importance to the honor of his ancestors, but it's a pity that Zhou Chong comes from later generations, and he doesn't attach great importance to the so-called honor, what he values is evidence, so he saw Zhou Chong sigh and said: "Commander Chang, this admiral is not trying to embarrass you, but this matter is related to the military merits of the sailor, and Penghu is far away from here, so it is really difficult to explore, so I don't know if you have any other evidence to prove the identity of these pirates?" ”

If it was another general, he might not care much about his subordinates' killing and risking merit, but Zhou Chong from later generations was very disgusted with this kind of thing, so if these heads were really pirates, then Zhou Chong would not only not blame Chang Xiao for coming a few days late, but would also reward him greatly.

But if these heads are ordinary people killed by Chang Xiao, then don't blame Zhou Zhongzhong for being ruthless, last time he let go of Cheng Quan, the commander, because of some things, but this time no matter what the reason is, Zhou Zhong will not let go of a butcher who kills good and risky merits! (To be continued......)