"Haihan people! It's these troubled Haihan people again!" Hans couldn't help frowning after hearing Van Longen's explanation: "Is there any definite evidence?"

"The guns they used were significantly superior to the Portuguese in terms of performance, with long ranges and accuracy, and they were so fast to reload their ammunition that the Portuguese did not seem to have heard of such weapons. ... ≦," Van Longen explains.

Hans shook his head and said: "Mr. Van Longen, your news is a little delayed, we have recently received news that the Portuguese colony in Haojingao, Guangdong has begun to replace new artillery, and it is said that these cannons were bought from the Haihan people on Qiongzhou Island. These money-eyed heretics sold not only weapons to the Ming Dynasty, but also to our opponents. I wouldn't be surprised if the pirates you encountered were weapons bought from the Haihans. ”

"Then why don't we come into contact with the Haihans? In the eyes of the merchants, there should be no difference between the Portuguese silver and ours. Van Longen asked, puzzled.

"It's not like I haven't tried this before, but the results have made me even more worried. Hans's gloomy face showed that he was not joking: "I have contacted Haihan's office in Zhangzhou with intermediaries, but they don't seem to be too interested in doing business with us. Of course, this is probably the result of the damned Portuguese, and there are credible sources that the Portuguese had secretly signed a cooperation agreement with the Haihan two years earlier, and the content of the cooperation agreement was likely to be exclusive. ”

"Two years ago, wasn't that the end of the civil war in Annam?" Van Longen raised his eyebrows: "These Portuguese changed their stance quickly enough, and when they saw the southern regime in Annam fall, they immediately jumped into the camp of their opponents." But why did the Haihan choose to cooperate with the Portuguese? They probably didn't know that the country's national power was already declining, both in the West and in the Far East. ”

"Maybe that's why they chose to work with the Portuguese. Hans's view is the opposite of Van Longen's: "The Portuguese have limited power in the Far East, and after being expelled from Annam, they really have only a foothold in Northeast Asia." For such a down-and-out person, they had very little room to bargain with the Haihan, who were said to be very shrewd in business, and they probably saw the disadvantaged situation of the Portuguese. Now the Portuguese not only kept Ho Jing Ao, but also gained the right to trade to Qiongzhou Island. It is also said that Annam had re-signed an agreement with Portugal to allow Portuguese merchant ships to trade in the ports of Annam, which were of course under the control of the Han Chinese. ”

"Mr. Hans, do you think that the Haihan will be our opponents in the near future?" asked Van Longen.

Hans said solemnly: "Not in the future, but now." After Zheng Zhilong lost Nanri Island, we also lost a major channel for trading with Ming merchants. The Haihan mission sent to Fujian this time was received by Xu Xinsu with a high standard, and after they joined forces, they could completely monopolize the maritime trade from Fujian to Guangdong, which was by no means good news for us. And I don't think they'll stop there, it's almost inevitable that the Haihan will continue to expand northward along the Ming coastline, whether it's the Ryukyus or Japan and Korea further north, sooner or later they will become their targets, and then the competition with us will become open, and conflict will be inevitable. ”

"Then we should try to stop them!" After Fan Longgen said this, he felt that he was a little speechless, the eighteen Zhi, who were known as the first force on the sea on the southeast coast of the Ming Dynasty, couldn't even deal with an expeditionary fleet sent by the Haihan to Fujian, so what did the Dutch do to fight with the Haihan?

Hans also shook his head with interest and said: "It's not so easy, Haihan's expansion speed in Daming is far faster than ours, if the company can't invest more resources in Dayuan Island in the next few years, then we can only sit back and wait for Haihan to squeeze us out of the game little by little." ”

Hans's vision was undoubtedly relatively accurate, and although this attack on Nanri Island was the first time that Haihan had openly attacked the waters of Fujian, Hans had already realized the sense of oppression brought about by this change. The reluctance of the Haihan to develop trade relations with the Netherlands shows that they completely regarded the Netherlands as a competitor, and perhaps even an imaginary enemy. However, the armed forces deployed by the East India Company on Dayuan Island were very limited, and they were not enough to support their expedition to Qiongzhou Island to crusade against the ignorant Haihan. What's more, even if he could go, Hans was not sure that he would be able to take the port of Sanya, which was said to be guarded by hundreds of shore defense guns and dozens of large warships.

So, despite knowing that everything he was doing was undermining Dutch influence in the Far East, Hans had no more to do to change that. He had already mentioned this in his report to the company's board of directors, but the East India Company's main focus was now on the development of Southeast Asia, and he did not have time to estimate the situation in Northeast Asia for the time being. After all, there are plenty of tropical islands in the waters east of Java waiting for navigators to discover their treasures, and the distant port of Dayuan may seem to Batavia officials to be just a supply port on the way to Northeast Asia.

The bad news from Van Longen made the attention from Batavia that Hans expected even more distant, because even if the company's headquarters wanted to ensure the stability of the Northeast Asian routes, it would have to deal with the wild forces that had suddenly emerged from the Natuna Islands, after all, it had already begun to intercept the East India Company's sailing ships, and the shape of the Taiwanese side was far from deteriorating to the point where there would be a war in the near future.

While the two were talking about the change of form, the servant came to Hans to report that someone had asked to see him.

"This is Zheng Zhilong's messenger. Hans handed the greeting note to Van Longen, but Fan Longen didn't recognize any of the square characters on it.

"This man has been here for five days in a row, and his purpose is to convince me to sell a batch of arms to Eighteen Shiba, and if possible, he also hopes that I can send troops to help them retake Nanri Island. Hans gave a succinct account of the situation.

"How is this possible!" Fan Longen looked very unimpressed by the Zheng family's envoy's construction.

Since the defeat of the Dutch in Penghu in 1624, the East India Company has ordered to prohibit the Dayuan side from taking any military action against the Ming officials, so as not to cause unnecessary troubles - although the Ming naval division may not be able to capture the port of Dayuan, if the local trade is interrupted because of the war, it will also be a disguised loss for the East India Company. And Eighteen Zhi is a lawless pirate in the eyes of the Ming official, and the Netherlands sells weapons, if they help, it is no different from directly sending troops to invade the Ming Dynasty, Hans doesn't even need to ask for instructions, he knows that Batavia will definitely not allow this situation to happen.

"But this envoy knows Haihan very well, would you be interested in hearing about Haihan?" Hans asked Van Longen.

"Haihan people? I'd be interested in learning about that. Van Longen's previous knowledge of Haihan was only a few rumors, and when it came to him, he had often turned his hand a few times, and there was a big discrepancy from the original facts, but he really wanted to hear from those who witnessed it about the specific situation of this emerging force in the Far East.

After Hans gave the order, a man dressed in the costume of a Confucian scholar of the Ming Dynasty came to the reception room, followed by a young man, with black hair and yellow skin, but with deep eyes and a high nose, who looked like a mixed race of Eastern and Western blood.

The man clenched his fists and spoke, and the half-race young man behind him translated what he had said into Dutch, which turned out to be the interpreter he had brought.

"The villain Zheng Xinzhi has met Lord Hans!"

"Mr. Zheng, if you still want to persuade me to provide military assistance to Eighteen Zhi today, then I advise you to save your saliva. Hans did not save any face for the other party's politeness, and as soon as he opened his mouth, he made his attitude straight to the point: "But if you would like to talk to us a little about other topics, then I and this Mr. van Longen, who has just arrived in Dayuangang, would be happy to talk to you." ”

After Zheng Xinzhi listened to the translation, he looked up at Fan Longgen, and then made another deep thought: "Since Lord Hans has spoken, the villain has everything to follow, I don't know what topic the two adults want to talk about?"

"Tell us about the Haihan people, and tell us what kind of people you know about the Haihan people. Hans gestured to the chair below and motioned for him to sit down and speak slowly.

"Haihan people, that's a long story, they're not a simple bunch of guys......" After Zheng Xinzhi sat down, he began to tell what he knew without hurry.

The envoy sent by Zheng Zhilong, named Zheng Xinzhi, was actually the mastermind of the case of Zhangzhou's assassination of the Haihan delegation two months ago. He fled by boat immediately after the Zhangzhou incident that day, and narrowly escaped with his life. Although this assassination plan failed at the last minute and did not succeed, Zheng Xinzhi was rewarded by Zheng Zhilong after returning to Magong Port in Penghu, believing that his actions had formed a deterrent to Haihan and had the effect of warning the other party.

However, Zheng Zhilong actually only considered the morale problem, so he could only swallow the broken tooth into his stomach, because within a few days after the incident, the eighteen Zhizhi secret piles and clerks in Zhangquan and Quanzhou were arrested by the government one after another, and many smuggling trade channels were destroyed because of this, and the direct economic losses and personnel losses were very large. Fujian maritime merchants, who had not completely broken with Shibazhi, also changed their attitude because of this incident and began to break off various trade and cooperative relations with Shibazhi - for them, Haihan, the big customer, must have a much heavier weight.

However, a few days later, the combined forces of the Haihan fleet and the Fujian Navy Division set out from Zhangzhou and destroyed the stronghold of Shibazhi on Nanri Island in one fell swoop, and Zheng Zhilong could no longer pretend to be calm. As soon as Zheng Zhihu, who escaped from Nanri Island, returned to Penghu, he asked Zheng Zhilong to kill Zheng Xinzhi, a "traitor", to sacrifice his dead brother, because if he hadn't temporarily arranged such a failed assassination operation in Zhangzhou, it would not have aroused the anger of the Haihan people, so that they chose Nanri Island, the closest to Zhangzhou, as the object of revenge - more than 1,000 men deployed by Shibazhi locally, more than 20 boats, and finally fled back to Penghu to talk about dozens of people, two small sampans, and the ending can only be described as miserable.

Zheng Zhihu has nowhere to vent his anger, and he can only take Zheng Xinzhi, the person who provoked the incident, out of anger. If it weren't for Zheng Zhilong, Zheng Xinzhi would probably have been dragged out and beheaded on the day Zheng Zhihu stepped on the land of Penghu.

After the matter reached this point, Zheng Zhilong could no longer maintain his staff Zheng Xinzhi, just as his gang was clamoring to fight back to Nanri Island to take revenge, Zheng Zhilong gave Zheng Xinzhi another errand and asked him to go to Dayuangang to ask the Dutch for help. After all, if there is no large number of artillery, it is not easy to capture a relatively strong defensive stronghold like Nanri Village, and now the only one who can provide heavy weapons to Shibazhi is the Dutch.

And Zheng Xinzhi didn't get any good eyes after coming to Dayuangang, and visited Hans several times, either because he was shirked and had no time to meet, or Hans directly diverted the topic before he could say a few words. After five times, Zheng Xinzhi was actually a little tired, but he also knew that if this matter was not handled well, he would definitely not be able to explain to Zheng Zhilong when he went back, and then those vulgar people who couldn't get used to themselves would have more reason to clamor for their own crimes. So even though he had to hit some nails every time he came to visit Hans, Zheng Xinzhi still insisted on visiting here every two days, and if he couldn't convince Hans, then he didn't plan to go back.

Zheng Xinzhi didn't know what the origin of this Mr. Van Longen was, but it was clear that he was not an idle person, and looking at his dusty appearance and sun-soaked complexion, Zheng Xinzhi speculated that he should be a Dutch official from Batavia. If it can make the Dutch high-ranking officials feel bad and hostile to the Haihan people, then Zheng Xinzhi is very happy to do it.

Zheng Xinzhi thought for a while before he spoke: "There are many theories among the people about the origin of the Haihan people, but they are not actually descendants of the Han people, they just look similar, and they use this identity to confuse the people of the Ming Dynasty and seek personal gains." These people are valuing profit over righteousness, capricious, and doing unrighteous things in the name of commerce and trade, and they are shameless people......"

Van Longen interrupted him impatiently after listening to a few words of translation: "Please say something practical, I don't want to listen to your judgment on their morality. What I want to know is what Haihan people can do, what they want to do, what they are good at, and what they are afraid of. ”