Batavia, the largest port trading city in Southeast Asia, was also the capital of the Dutch East Indies. By 1896, the population had grown to 100,000, of which half were of Chinese descent.

On February 10, Wang Chenhao and his fleet arrived in Batavia. The fleet was replenished with food and fresh water in the harbor, while Wang Chenhao sent someone to hand over the customs clearance documents and make an appointment to meet with Anthony van Kate, the Dutch governor of the East Indies.

The Dutch East Indies relied on trade with the Qing Empire to sustain their development, so Governor Kate received Wang Chenhao and his party with the highest courtesy and arranged a welcome luncheon.

Batavia has a large auction house, and Wang Chenhao, under the recommendation of Governor Kate, met the bank's chief director, Danish Ligen.

Ligan learned that Wang Chenhao had a large number of antiques to sell, and immediately expressed his willingness to cooperate with Wang Chenhao. After the two discussed, Wang Chenhao decided to take out 20,000 pieces of antique artifacts and put them for sale in the auction house. Since all the antiques have been appraised by Qiao Yuying and others, Wang Chenhao handed over the reserve price to Ligen, and then Ligen was responsible for contacting the celebrities and wealthy businessmen in Batavia City to participate in the auction, and as a reward, Ligen would take 20% of the handling fee.

Normally, the auction house will generally take 30% of the handling fee, because the number of antique artifacts provided by Wang Chenhao is huge, and Li Gen sees that the auction house is profitable, so he agrees to take 20% of the handling fee.

Although the 20% handling fee is still distressing, for Wang Chenhao's reserve price, the final transaction price is generally higher than the original appraisal reserve price. This is also the result of the auction house's own market operation and vigorous publicity, the original reserve price of Wang Chenhao's batch of 20,000 antiques was only 3.88 million guilders (1.55 million pounds), After the exaggerated publicity of the auction house, the final bidding total reached 5.875 million guilders (2.35 million pounds), minus the handling fee of 1.18 million guilders (470,000 pounds), Wang Chenhao actually received 4.7 million guilders (1.88 million pounds), which is 830,000 guilders (330,000 pounds) more than the basic price, which is really a surprise.

Considering that the international silver price is falling sharply every day, Wang Chenhao will never cash out silver. Although the guilder is also an international hard currency, Wang Chenhao still likes to exchange it for pounds sterling to preserve its value. Fortunately, Batavia is very developed, with nearly 100 banks in the city, and the pound reserves are enough to support Wang Chenhao's large-scale cash-out. In the end, the 4.7 million guilders were successfully converted into 1.88 million pounds.

Wang Chenhao's Maria was now loaded with nearly £4 million in cash, gold and silver, as well as antique vessels made of gold and silver. In consideration of security concerns, Wang Chenhao purchased 12 large safes at a German bank in Batavia for cash and hard currency such as gold and silver. Cast from Krupp stainless steel, up to 80 mm thick, the safe is explosion-proof and waterproof, and features the most advanced mechanical dial combination lock available. This combination lock uses 5 English code dials, each with 26 English letters, making the code extremely difficult to crack. Wang Chenhao spent 50,000 pounds to buy these twelve large safes, which can be said to be worth the money.

In Batavia, Wang Chenhao befriended a local Chinese Chinese leader at the auction house, his name is Liu Lanfang. In this auction, Wang Chenhao's antiques were sold in large quantities, and this Liu Lanfang made a lot of efforts, and he gathered local wealthy overseas Chinese to purchase a large number of antique artifacts. The reason is that Wang Chenhao is in the name of a charity auction, and these overseas Chinese hope to be protected by the imperial court and also hope to do something for the motherland, so their positive surname is very high, which makes Wang Chenhao very embarrassed.

However, Wang Chenhao has always planned how to use this money to strengthen his own country, so strictly speaking, it is not a deception. Of course, Wang Chenhao's original intention in formulating this plan was to deceive foreigners into paying more money, and Liu Lanfang and other Chinese people were involved, and Wang Chenhao did not expect it.

Liu Lanfang got acquainted with Wang Chenhao because of this, and during the conversation between the two, Wang Chenhao found that this person spoke well, and on the surface he seemed to be a businessman, but he had a noble temperament in his bones. In particular, Liu Lanfang has a lot of information about Wang Chenhao, from Wang Chenhao's heroic performance in the First Sino-Japanese War, to the formation and training of the Zhili New Army, to the Yongping Autumn Festival, including the establishment of foreign affairs and other measures, he can be said to be as clear as a number of treasures, and he should have specifically probed Wang Chenhao's details.

Wang Chenhao didn't feel that Liu Lanfang had any hostility towards him, he felt that this was just an overseas Chinese's concern for the country, and everything Wang Chenhao did was an earth-shattering event, and it was difficult not to be noticed.

During the conversation, Liu Lanfang knew that Wang Chenhao still had a large number of antique artifacts ready to be auctioned in Europe and the United States, so he gave Wang Chenhao a suggestion, and he suggested that Wang Chenhao send people to the big cities of the countries along the route in advance to contact local buyers, so that when Wang Chenhao's fleet passed by, the goods could be sold smoothly. Wang Chenhao thinks this is a good idea, because his schedule is very tight, and if he sends someone to contact him in advance, it will undoubtedly save a lot of time.

Wang Chenhao then sent someone to set off early on a fast boat to British Singapore to contact buyers, and at the same time sent telegrams to the embassies and consulates of the countries passing along the line, informing them to help contact buyers. Due to Wang Chenhao's special status and the first-class minister, the local legations and consulates of the Qing Empire in countries along the route followed suit, and actively contacted the local nobles and wealthy businessmen to greet them in advance. In order to further facilitate sales, Wang Chenhao specially ordered someone to send a list of antiques and the unit price to them in advance, so that when Wang Chenhao's fleet arrived at the coastal docks, they could directly trade with buyers.

Liu Lanfang's suggestion to Wang Chenhao won Wang Chenhao's favor for him, and Wang Chenhao invited him, hoping that Liu Lanfang would have the opportunity to go to Tianjin and be hospitalized. Liu Lanfang thanked again and again, saying that she would definitely visit Tianjin if she had the opportunity.

After a short stay in Batavia for two days and one night, Wang Chenhao happily continued to embark on a journey around the world with a bowl full of gold and silver.

On February 13, Wang Chenhao and his fleet arrived in Singapore to replenish fresh water and food, and on the Singapore dock, a large group of local aristocrats and wealthy merchants waiting to admire and buy Tang and Song antiques had been waiting for a long time, and there were even a large number of spectators. Wang Chenhao then ordered people to set up exhibition stands on the decks of each ship, classify all kinds of antique artifacts, select the representative surnames to arrange separate exhibitions, and set up auction points on the deck for public auction. In this way, Wang Chenhao no longer needs a local auction house, and without this link, Wang Chenhao's profit has increased by more than two percent.

Singapore is far less prosperous than Manila and Batavia, and there are not many nobles and wealthy merchants. On the same day, Wang Chenhao made a total profit of 420,000 pounds in the auction of antiques in Singapore.

In the following 20 days, Wang Chenhao's fleet marched along the Indian Ocean, passing through dozens of large seaport cities around the Indian Ocean, such as Phuket, Merguie, Yangon, Chittagong, Kolkata, Chennai, Mumbai, Muscat, Djibouti, and Port Sudan, selling more than 40,000 pieces of antique artifacts and making a total profit of more than 6 million pounds. Bombay and Kolkata were the most profitable, with sales profits of £3.4 million, most of which were purchased by a dozen senior board members of the British East India Company. They had a lot of dealings with the Qing Empire, and knew that the officialdom of the Qing Empire preferred to send antiques for bribes, so they bought a large number of antiques from the Tang and Song dynasties at a high price, so as to further bribe the officials of the Qing Empire and facilitate the economic aggression of the East India Company.