Zhou Chong's first meeting with Alfonso was not very pleasant, the main other party was so arrogant and unreasonable even if he was a prisoner, but Zhou Zhong was even more arrogant than him, and directly gave two ways, the first is to directly hand them over to the Malacca people, as for how those angry Malacca people will deal with them, it is not Zhou Chong's business, the second is to cooperate with himself unconditionally, everything must obey Zhou Chong's arrangement, and there can be no reservations, For example, the first thing Zhou Zhong asked them to do was to ask Alfonso and their soldiers to teach the Ming to operate the captured Portuguese warships.

Thinking of the atrocities he committed against the Malacca, Alfonso, who had been arrogant before, chose the second path very wisely, after all, since he was captured, there have been Malacca people running to the prisoner of war camp every day to make trouble, if it were not for the Ming army to stop them, I am afraid that these unarmed captives would be torn to pieces by the angry Malaccans.

After Alfonso gave in, Zhou Zhong immediately asked Chang Xiao and Qu Lie to select a group of more clever soldiers from the sailors, and began to learn the operation of the warship from the Portuguese prisoners of war led by Alfonso, as well as the application of this kind of warship in naval warfare, after all, those Portuguese warships are soft-sailed Clark ships, and the operation of this kind of ship is very different from that of the Fu ship.

After dealing with the prisoners of war, there was a series of troubles, such as after Baman organized the Malacca people to clean up the battlefield, those maritime merchants who were hiding in the city immediately asked to leave the port, after all, they had been delayed in Malacca City for a long time, and many of them even died in the city, so the rest of the maritime merchants were naturally in a hurry to leave this place of right and wrong.

For these maritime merchants. Zhou Zhong can't be as shameless as the Portuguese. At least he won't confiscate the goods of the maritime merchants. And in the future, the port of Malacca will also need these past maritime merchants to pay taxes, if he confiscates the other party's goods for some property now, then who will dare to come to the port of Daming in the future? Therefore, after reassuring the merchants, Zhou Zhong asked them to count the surviving cargo ships in the port and return them to the maritime merchants, and also gave them a tax exemption list, which they could do in the port of Malacca once in the future.

After sending off the maritime merchants, Zhou Zhong immediately began to rebuild the port of Malacca, after the Portuguese had forced the Kingdom of Malacca to surrender. The port was bombarded with artillery, but fortunately the solid bullets were used in this era, and the damage to the port was not very great, so after a few days of repairs, the port of Malacca resumed operation again, but this time the management of the port has all been replaced by the people brought by Zhou Chong, and the tax collected has also entered Zhou Chong's pocket, to be precise, it should be in the inner treasury of the Yamen of the Governor of the Four Seas.

"Lord Admiral, what do you mean by this, the port is the port of our Kingdom of Malacca. But now all of them have been taken over by your Ming Dynasty, and the taxes collected have also been embezzled by you. What is the difference between you and the Portuguese? In the Ming military camp next to the port, Baman, the envoy who temporarily managed Malacca City, was yelling with an angry face.

The Malacca people were naturally very dissatisfied with the behavior of Zhou Chongque's occupying the dove's nest, and at the beginning, no one dared to say anything, but after getting along for a while, they found that the army in Daming was not as vicious as the Portuguese, which made the Malacca people slowly bolder. As the leader of Malacca, Baman also approached Zhou Chong several times to negotiate, but every time Zhou Chong diverted the topic, which made him very dissatisfied, and this time he finally couldn't help arguing with Zhou Chong.

Seeing that Baman was angry, Zhou Zhong smiled unmoved, and did not rush to answer, but poured himself a cup of tea and took a sip, and then said: "Ambassador Baman is not impatient, we and the Portuguese are naturally fundamentally different, first of all, they want to seize your port by force, and even kill all your people, but our Ming Dynasty came to aid you as the suzerain, so you must distinguish who is the enemy and who is the friend!" ”

Zhou Zhong paused when he said this, took a sip of tea and then said: "As for your port, we are only in charge, although this group of Portuguese was defeated by us, but who can guarantee that there will be no next batch, in case they send troops again, you have no strength to protect yourself at all, so it is safer to hand it over to us." However, since the garrison is to be managed, the army needs to eat, and military salaries must be paid in peacetime, so can't we let the Ming Dynasty pay for this money? Therefore, the tax revenue of the port will be taken over by us for the time being, and Ambassador Baman should be considerate of us! ”

What Zhou Chong said was reasonable and well-founded, and Baman didn't know how to refute it for a while, but he always felt that things were not as simple as Zhou Chong said, and after thinking about it, he asked again: "Since Lord Admiral said that he was in charge, then I don't know how long you will be in charge of Lu Dao, is it that after our Royal Highness the King comes back, you will withdraw your troops?" ”

"Withdrawal?" Zhou Zhong chuckled lightly when he heard this, looked up at Baman, and suddenly asked, "Ambassador Baman, I heard that your family came here from India, I don't know how much you know about the current situation in India?" ”

Hearing Zhou Zhong suddenly ask about the situation between his family and the Indian side, Baman was stunned at first, and he was a little unclear about Zhou Chong's intentions, but he still replied later: "Yes, our family did move from India, and it is already the fourth generation of my generation, and the connection between the family and the Indian side has long been broken, so I don't know a lot." ”

"Then it's no wonder." I saw that Zhou Chong smiled at this time, but after laughing, I saw that Zhou Chong's expression changed, "I'm afraid Ambassador Baman doesn't know the way yet, these Portuguese have already crossed Africa to India, and established a foothold there, the west coast of India has completely fallen into the hands of the Portuguese, and monopolized the trade there, it can be said that now the Portuguese have seized huge benefits from the west coast of India, and they will not give up there no matter what." ”

Speaking of this, Zhou Chong paused again, took a breath and then said: "The Portuguese have a great appetite, and now the interests of the west coast of India can no longer satisfy them, so these people have set their sights on Nanyang and other places, this time they attacked Malacca City, just to open up the passage from India to Nanyang, although this time it failed, do you think they will give up easily?" ”

"Hiss~" Hearing Zhou Chong's introduction to the situation in India, Baman also gasped, he didn't expect the Portuguese to expand so quickly, even his hometown already has the other party's stronghold, and the Portuguese also want to seize the South Seas, Malacca City is just located on the main road between India and the South Seas, naturally it is their first target to seize, this time Baman finally saw the situation that Malacca City is facing now, and his heart was heavy all of a sudden.

Seeing Baman's face changed greatly, Zhou Zhong smiled secretly in his heart, although the Portuguese have expanded to India, but in the case of the Suez Canal not being opened, Europe is too far away from India, so it is not easy for the Portuguese to transport troops to India, which leads to the fact that Portugal does not have many troops in India, and he has defeated nearly half of Portugal's troops this time, if they want to attack Malacca again, I am afraid it will take at least two years to prepare, So the situation in the city of Malacca is not at all as critical as he said.

"Lord Admiral, when do you think the Portuguese will attack Malacca again next?" I saw that Barman pondered for a while, and finally asked.

"This question is not answered by anyone except the high-level of Portugal, maybe tomorrow the Portuguese warships will come again, maybe the other party will wait patiently for two years, but with the ambition of the Portuguese, as well as Europe's thirst for Nanyang specialties and Ming goods, I believe that it is impossible for the Portuguese to give up invading the Nanyang!" Zhou Zhong deliberately said in a heavy tone. Malacca City is such an important position, now that it has fallen into his hands, it is naturally impossible to hand it over easily.

Hearing Zhou Chong's answer, Barman fell silent again, he had seen the strength of the Portuguese before, tens of thousands of soldiers in Malacca City were defeated by more than a thousand grape soldiers, and those tens of thousands of soldiers were already the most elite army in the kingdom, but now they were killed and wounded, if the Portuguese came again, then they could only close their eyes and wait for death.

Thinking of this, Baman couldn't help but sigh, knowing that it was a foregone conclusion that the Ming Dynasty would garrison troops in Malacca, but although the Ming Dynasty was the suzerainty of the Malacca Kingdom, it was impossible for their army to be stationed here in vain, so the tax from the port naturally became the reward for the garrison, otherwise why would people come all the way to Malacca?

However, although Baman figured this out, he then thought of the Malacca people in the city, especially the Malacca officials who had interests in the port before, they would definitely not be willing to give up the interests of the port, and it would be terrible if they clashed with the Ming army.

Zhou Zhong saw the change in the expression on Baman's face, and after a little thought, he understood what the other party was thinking, and then said with a solemn face: "Ambassador Baman, I know that you Malacca people have opinions about our takeover of the port, but my soldiers also need to eat to support their families, and at the same time, I also need a reason to persuade His Majesty the Emperor to garrison Malacca, so we have to benefit the port, as for those Malacca, then you need to convince them!" ”

Hearing that Zhou Chongdu had already said it so clearly, Baman's face was also full of bitterness, on the one hand, the huge interests of the port of Malacca, and on the other hand, the brutal massacre of the Portuguese, smart people naturally knew how to choose, but some people in the city were blinded by interests, and he was worried that these people would do something stupid! (To be continued......)