Since the Ming Dynasty occupied the Strait of Malacca many years ago, the entire Nanyang has become the back garden of the Ming Navy, after several years of efforts, the South Seas have finally established colonies on several large islands in the South Seas, and the refugees generated by the Ming Dynasty due to famine or other reasons have been relocated here, making the Ming Dynasty's rule over the South Seas more and more stable, and the development of the various large islands is also getting deeper and deeper, coupled with the rich products of the South Seas, making the South Seas slowly become one of the richest areas of the Ming Dynasty.

With the stability of the South Sea, coupled with the development of local industry and commerce in the Ming Dynasty, the Ming caravan began to enter the Indian Ocean, coupled with the heroic battle of the Ming Navy, and finally defeated the Portuguese, so that the Ming controlled several important routes in the Indian Ocean, after these years of development, the northern and central parts of the Indian Ocean have been ruled by the Ming Dynasty, only the southern region is closer to Africa, and the Portuguese who retreated there.

However, compared to the rule of the Ming Dynasty in the Indian Ocean, there is still no inch of progress in the larger Pacific Ocean, in fact, it is not very accurate to say this, because whether it is the coastal or the South Ocean of the Ming Dynasty, it belongs to the Pacific Ocean in a broad sense, but in addition, most of the remaining Pacific Ocean is still a blank, although Zhou Zhong has long occupied the Edo Bay of the Japanese State, as the forward base for the Ming to develop the Pacific Ocean, but all these years have passed, Edo Bay still has not sent a ship into the Pacific Ocean.

In fact, it's not that Zhou Zhong doesn't want to develop the Pacific Ocean, but the Pacific Ocean is too big, as one of the largest oceans in the world, the Pacific Ocean occupies almost half of the world's ocean area, and there are not many inhabitable islands on such a vast sea. Most of them are concentrated near Australia in the southern hemisphere. There are no big islands in the northern hemisphere. This also made it very difficult for Daming to travel to the Americas through the Pacific Ocean.

For Australia located in the southern hemisphere, Zhou Zhong has no plans to develop for the time being, one is a long way, although it is very convenient to enter Australia through the South Seas, but now just a South Sea, the Ming Dynasty has not yet digested it, let alone distant Australia, but there are still some bold businessmen in order to pursue interests. From the South Seas, he discovered a route to Australia, and brought some Australian products from there, such as exotic animals such as kangaroos, and precious metals such as gold.

Of course, Zhou Zhong has not always had the intention of entering the Pacific Ocean over the years, he is just making some preliminary preparations, such as Edo Bay in the Japanese Kingdom, which is used as a forward base for opening up the Pacific Ocean, and over the years, the Ming Dynasty has sent a lot of people to set off from Edo Bay to find a current that flows through the sea outside the river, which is called the North Pacific Warm Current. Following this current, it is very easy and fast to reach the Americas.

After years of observation. Now the Ming Dynasty has been able to determine the location and direction of the North Pacific Warm Current, and even the officials of Edo Bay have written to the imperial court several times, hoping to arrange ships to enter this warm current as soon as possible, so as to reach the legendary Americas, according to the news that the Ming got from the Portuguese, the Americas are full of gold and silver, which has also attracted the attention of countless people, and it can be said that these people are waiting for the opening of this route.

It's a pity that Zhou has been busy reforming the internal shortcomings of the Ming Dynasty in recent years, and has to guide the development of the navy in the South and Indian Oceans, and has no time to take care of the Pacific Ocean, and he does not think that Spain will welcome them into the Americas, although Spain's power in the Americas has just started, but they have already occupied the most civilized Central America, if the Ming fleet arrives there, it is likely to conflict with the Spaniards, or even war.

It is precisely because of these reasons above, so that the Ming Dynasty's development plan for the Pacific Ocean has been delayed again and again, but after Zhengde pacified the northern Tatars, the entire Ming Dynasty basically has no external enemies, Tibet has long been attached, becoming the Ming Dynasty's Wusi Tibetan Division, before the Ming Dynasty's rule over Tibet was very weak, but with the increase of national strength, the Ming Dynasty's rule over Tibet has also been strengthened, as for the northern part of Tibet, it is not worth mentioning, Zhengde's next target is it, there is no external threat, Zhou Zhong finally set his sights on the Pacific Ocean.

In September of the twentieth year of Zhengde, a Ming fleet that had been prepared for a long time set off from Edo Bay, the size of this fleet was not very large, only five ships, but these five ships were specially made ocean-going ships, the performance was first-class, and the ships were also equipped with a large number of weapons, such armed forces are not to mention pirates, even if they encounter the regular Spanish navy, they can escape if they can't fight.

This fleet is mainly used to explore routes, otherwise the size of the fleet will increase several times, because many Ming people have listened to the news propagated by the Portuguese, thinking that the Americas are really full of gold and silver, so many people in China are full of yearning to explore the Americas.

Although Zhou Zhong knew that Portugal did not have any good intentions to promote this news, they wanted to shift the attention of the Ming Dynasty to the Americas, so that the Ming and the Spaniards would have a conflict, so as to reduce the pressure on themselves, and even allow them to regain control of the Indian Ocean, but Zhou Zhong did not explain the truth to the people in China, because he needed this belief to stimulate the Ming people's desire to explore the Americas, only in this way could they open up the shipping routes with the Americas faster, and even colonize the Americas directly. Snatching the resources of the New World, I believe that when the Pathfinder fleet returns, Daming will set off a wave of exploration of the New World.

When the fleet to explore the Americas set sail from Edo Bay, Zhou Chong, who was far away in Beijing, sat in his study, looking at the report sent by the Shanghai Naval Academy, which recorded the performance of Selim's youngest son Murad in the military academy, which had been in the military academy for nearly three years, and every three months, the military academy would record his performance and send it to Zhou Chong.

The Ottoman Empire is the only powerful empire that can be compared with the Ming Dynasty, although the two countries are jointly building the Suez Canal, but the relationship between countries has always been very fragile, and as the Ming Dynasty regained the grasslands, and Zhengde plans to march to the Western Regions, it is inevitable to clash with this huge empire in the future, in order to weaken this huge empire, Murad's dark chess is becoming more and more important, so Zhou Zhong needs to know Murad's performance in the Ming Dynasty, and make his own plan according to the performance of the other party.

Zhou Zhong looked at the report in his hand, and kept shaking his head while reading, I have to say that although the heir system of the Ottoman Empire is cruel, it can even be said that it is inhumane, but the heirs selected by this system are very good, Murad can become a substitute for Suleiman, in addition to his good luck, in addition to his talent, his talent is even more outstanding, his performance in the military academy can be described as a genius, every assessment is special, and among the cadets who entered the military academy in the same year, it is almost impossible to find a better cadet than him.

However, although Murad showed amazing ability in his studies, he was not without his shortcomings, such as the harsh education he received since he was a child, so that he could not socialize with people at all, and he did not have any friends at all in the military academy, but this is not surprising, after all, he was originally educated by a king, as a king, he does not need friends, or even any feelings, such as the current Sultan Selim of Osman, he is a monster who can even slaughter his son.

Thinking of Selim, and then looked at the report on Murad in his hand, Zhou Zhong couldn't help but think of his eldest son Zhu Zaiyuan, according to the holy decree of Zhengde before, Zaiyuan has been made the crown prince, although he is only twelve years old, but in order to become a qualified heir to the Ming throne, he has now begun to receive strict royal education, and even the cabinet has discussed the education of Zaiyuan for several days, after all, this is related to the inheritance of the Ming throne, and it is also related to the direction of the Ming Empire in the future, so they can't help but be cautious.

Zhou Chong didn't care about his son's royal education at first, but when he saw that his son had a heavy school to complete every day, not only to learn etiquette, but also to learn a large number of Confucian classics, it is said that the young prince was influenced by the doctrine of the sage from an early age, and could not become a king who only knew how to have fun like Zhengde in the future.

After Zhou Zhong saw this situation, he immediately used his status as a prisoner to suspend his son's studies, because he felt that there was a big problem with the royal education of the Ming Dynasty, he had no objection to learning etiquette, and even learning some Confucian classics was no problem, but his son was going to be an emperor in the future, not to take the Xiucai exam, he only needed to have a general understanding of Confucian doctrine, there was no need to memorize so many things every day, this is not something that a king has to learn.

So in this case, Zhou Chong personally formulated the education of his son, first of all, those royal etiquette must still be learned, but in addition, Zhu Zaiyuan does not need to recite those Confucian classics, but spends a lot of time every day to follow Zhou Chong to learn to deal with the government, and even whenever he has time, Zhou Chong will often take his son to the people for a walk, personally experience the sufferings of the people, understand the thoughts of the people, and know what they want most, only by knowing this, he can be a good emperor in the future.

In addition to learning to govern the country, Zhou Chong also used some disciplines as auxiliary learning subjects for his son, such as arithmetic, biology, physics, etc., most of these things were brought by Zhou Zhong from later generations, and now he needs to use these to cultivate his son's interest in learning, after all, in addition to being an emperor, Zaiyuan is also a person, but also a child, he needs to have something he is interested in, only in this way, he can form a complete personality, not like Zhengde, become a flawed emperor. (To be continued......)