Dominate the Country

In mid-August, Huang Dingyou, wearing a Dongpo hat on his head, followed the flow of people and came to Pancheng. This is the southernmost city in the area that Chen Han can now control.

Belitung Island is Pancheng, the most prosperous city on this not-so-big island. Not long after the Nanyang Navy explorers signed an agreement with the Sultan of Palembang, they discovered rich tin deposits here. Mineral resources, and then this unknown island quickly gathered many miners.

Pancheng is the name given to this city by the Nanyang Navy. The intention is to establish a firm foothold here. The geographical location is considered to be the dividing line between the South China Sea and the Java Sea.

There were originally more than 10,000 indigenous people on the island. Except for those who were sent to Palembang, most of the remaining people became slave labor in tin mines.

Pancheng is located on the west coast of the island, facing Bangka Island. The beach has sandy beaches and swamps, interspersed with rocks and coral reefs.

Huang Dingyou carried his luggage down to the shore. Unlike many passengers who had relatives and friends coming to greet him, he was alone. After asking the port guard, Huang Dingyou carried his luggage to a hotel not far away.

Pancheng is one of the areas with the highest concentration of Chinese in Nanyang. The total number of people exceeds 20,000, of whom 50% to 60% are from China alone. There are fifteen mining areas of various sizes scattered around, two-thirds of which are dominated by private capital. There are more than 20 mining companies, and there are also more than a dozen Chinese and foreign trading companies. This is not prosperity in the ordinary sense. As long as the mining companies have a foothold in Pancheng, they are great tools for attracting gold.

As one of the traditional Chinese hardware, tin metal still plays an important role in machinery manufacturing. Bronze, its combination with copper, is still used to make wear-resistant parts and corrosion-resistant parts. equipment. Bronze is a comprehensive type, with many formulas in different proportions. Different percentages have different properties and properties of bronze.

For example, tin brass, brass with tin added to the copper-zinc alloy, is corrosion-resistant in both fresh water and sea water, and is generally called naval copper.

In printing factories, the lead type used is an alloy of tin.

Tin sulfide, a compound of tin and sulfur, has a color similar to gold and is often used as a golden pigment.

Tin dioxide, a compound of tin and oxygen, is a water-insoluble white powder that can be used to make enamel, white glaze and opalescent glass. Of course, tinware, tinfoil, etc. are also indispensable.

Tin is a metal that is shiny, non-toxic, difficult to oxidize and discolor, and has good sterilization, purification, and preservation effects. The water plants currently being installed and renovated in major cities in China also use a lot of these things.

As long as you find the right mine, this is definitely a good business. And it’s not just China’s domestic needs, foreigners also need them, whether in the military field or in daily life.

Huang Dingyou decided to take a closer look at this emerging Tin City. As a center where China, indigenous people, and foreigners collided, the society here must be very different from that of Zengmu Island. Although he lost his job at Nanjing Daily, it does not mean that the manuscripts he wrote will have no place to be published. Freelance journalists were born in China at the same time as war reporters. They come from the military, some are officers, and some are soldiers. The articles they write are sent back to China by war reporters, and then freelance writers emerge. Because those officers and soldiers cannot guarantee that the manuscript will be completed on time and in quantity, they have absolute freedom.

Huang Dingyou sat in a corner of the hotel lobby with a glass of rum, observing this popular place.

There are Chinese, natives, and foreigners. Some of them sit at their own tables, and some gather together to play cards. Such a scene would never be seen on Zengmu Island. There are a lot of Chinese people here, and there are also a lot of foreigners, and the indigenous people are the least.

After all, this is a hotel, and the people who appear here are "loners" like Huang Dingyou. It is understandable that the Chinese do not have a big advantage.

There are quiet and elegant teahouses in Pancheng, and there are no fragrant restaurants, but the hotel where Huang Dingyou lives is just an ordinary mid-range hotel. There are many bare-chested foreigners and black-haired, brown-skinned, swarthy natives. Everyone was noisy speaking in babbling Yiyu or half-baked Chinese.

Tinware is also a traditional European utensil, and tin materials also have a huge demand market in Europe.

In the time and space before Chen Ming, it was not until the mid-19th century that tin mines appeared one after another in Nanyang. When did Belitung Island develop? Kuala Lumpur was created from scratch by the Chinese. established. But at that time, not only did the Chinese fight for their legitimate interests when facing foreigners, they were also at a disadvantage when facing the indigenous people. The fruits that have been cultivated so hard are helplessly watched by outsiders picking them away effortlessly.

But it’s different now. Today’s China and the Chinese are definitely predators in Southeast Asia. Neither Spain nor the Netherlands is willing to start a dispute with China at this time, because the boss and the second boss of Europe, John Bull and Gallic Rooster, are likely to break out into a "Last Seven Years' War" because of the war in the British North American colonies. Spain and the Netherlands were also focused on Europe.

They will not provoke China at this time. The Europeans cannot unite their power in the East, and they cannot challenge the Chinese authority and monopoly trade power at all. So they watched helplessly as China made a fortune in Belitung Island and then unearthed a richer and larger western mine in Jizhou [Kuala Lumpur].

As for the Sultan of Selangor, are their opinions considered opinions? Are their opinions important?

He is just one of the many Sultans of Malay, and how many people are there in the whole of Malay now? It is not more than 30 million in later generations, but a small country with less than 4 million people, and the Sultan of Selangor is just one of many forces. A "group" of hundreds of thousands of people, facing China's tyrannical attitude, they can only endure.

Besides, these Nanyang monkeys are lazy by nature, and they are more lazy than working hard. The rich tin resources in Jizhou have not been known for a day or two. Europeans and even China have a lot of demand for tin mines, and the Malays are not unaware of it. Why did these Nanyang monkeys jump out to pick fruits after the Chinese came to develop this industry in history? It's their personality.

China pays the Sultan of Selangor 200,000 yuan a year, which has made them secretly happy. Otherwise, that piece of land is in their own hands, and the Sultan of Selangor can't get a penny.

Although the same area is in the hands of the Chinese, the benefits generated in one year are dozens of times more than the 200,000 yuan.

Now China's Nanyang Navy occasionally goes around Nanyang. The exploration ships belonging to the Overseas Exploration Bureau No. 3 drill around the islands of the entire Nanyang all day long. The Spaniards and the Dutch have become deaf and blind. No one else dares to squeak in this territory of Nanyang.

In just a few years, the status of the Chinese in Nanyang has become no less than that of the Spaniards and the Dutch, and they have completely occupied the heads of the native monkeys. This is the change in strength.

Europeans now know that the Chinese army has a weapon called Fire Dragon Bomb, which is powerful, accurate, and easy to launch. It is a killer weapon in naval warfare. The previous battle between the West-Dutch coalition and the Chinese Nanyang Navy on the Sulu issue was a tragic failure because of this weapon. European countries have conducted research on this, and the British even compared it with Indian rockets, but the final result was very disappointing. Although Indian rockets are a new thing for Europe, they are far inferior to Chinese fire dragon bombs in terms of power and accuracy.

Without clarifying this issue, Spain and the Netherlands are unwilling to take the initiative to provoke a war with China.

The most obvious manifestation of this is that in the past two years, whether in Manila or Batavia, those Chinese who did not withdraw from monotheism at the first time have now chosen to withdraw from the religion, but they have to pay the price for taking the wrong path. Now it is not so easy for them to get that nationality certificate again.

More and more Chinese have returned to Manila and Batavia, Palembang, Semarang, and Surabaya. Taoist and Buddhist temples, and the Mazu temples that are most trusted by residents of the southeast coast, have sprung up all over Nanyang, one after another!

Of course, foreigners are not happy to see the rise of Eastern religious beliefs in their territory, but with the backing of national power, the Nanyang Chinese have changed their cowardice and tolerance and timidity, and their style has become bold and unrestrained.

Behind this kind of "betrayal" of faith and the establishment of Taoist temples and Buddhist temples are the big families among the Chinese. They are the undisputed upper class among the Chinese in Southeast Asia. This directly proves the change in the power structure in Southeast Asia.

In Southeast Asia, such scenes can only appear after the status of the Chinese has really increased. Otherwise, a considerable number of the Chinese in Southeast Asia, especially the upper-class Chinese families and wealthy people, would show that they want to kneel down and lick the monotheism and God.

This is a spiritual evolution from obedience to assimilation and then to resistance. The Chinese in Southeast Asia were scared of being fleeced by the Spaniards and the Dutch, and they were scared from the bottom of their hearts. They strive to show the side that is most recognized by the Spaniards and the Dutch, so as to protect the safety of their family's lives and the greatest interests.

Because the guns and knives are not in the hands of the Chinese in Southeast Asia, in order to survive, life is like this.

Many people believe in God, not because they truly believe in Christ from the bottom of their hearts, but a disguise. Every New Year, when offering sacrifices to their ancestors, you will not see them being less respectful to their ancestors, and the foreigners are not unaware of this scene. Of course, many people were assimilated after pretending, and there were also some dogs who really degenerate!

And now the Chinese have changed beyond recognition.

The contempt and arrogance in those eyes, in the past, only white people would look at yellow monkeys, when will it be the turn of these low-level ethnic groups to look at the noble white people like this?

The Chinese who returned to Manila and Batavia had sporadic conflicts with the local Spaniards and Dutch, and even saw blood in some things. The Chinese's unyielding attitude and the tough attitude of the Chinese Nanyang Navy behind them made the Manila and Batavia authorities adjust their attitudes at the first time. Because at that time, the sound of Lexington's gunfire had spread from Europe to Asia!

Huang Dingyou certainly had a certain understanding of the situation in Nanyang, but he didn't know many things. There were many things in Pancheng in front of him that had extraordinary significance to him.

Just when Huang Dingyou arrived in Pancheng, at the Sanduao Port in Fujian, a neatly arranged team was boarding two large ships docked at the dock. Zheng Ji, wearing a general's military uniform with his discipline buttons buttoned tightly, swept his eyes like a knife across the face of every soldier who boarded the ship.

These are the soldiers he selected. Now he will take them to Taiwan for a ten-day training. Then the fleet carrying immigrants will arrive in Taiwan, and he can set off south with the fleet.

Outside the Sanduoao Port, outside the cordon, thousands of people gathered to see off the five hundred people.

Many of these people were in tears, looking at the people on the ship with reluctance, but no one would say that they would stay. These soldiers who boarded the ship were all for them, for the "future".

Whether they were bannermen with a long "labor reform period" or ordinary prisoners of war, it was worth it to escape from here, even if they could live easily for a month. And their lives were exchanged for the new life of the whole family, which was a good deal.

There was a sobbing sound in the crowd of people who saw them off, and many of the soldiers who boarded the ship had red eyes and tears, and many of them knelt on the deck and kowtowed to the bottom of the ship. This trip may be a farewell forever, a farewell forever...

Zheng Ji looked at the scene in front of him with satisfaction. It's good to have feelings. With feelings, there will be concerns. With concerns, there will be handles, and then you will be more obedient.

"It's been two years, and I can finally use my skills!"

Zhang Gou, also known as Zhang Gou, put his hands on his waist and sighed towards the Sandu'ao Port. At the beginning, he was also a brigade commander, but Zheng Ji was stripped of his military power and hung up, and Zhang Gou ended up like this. But he is much worse than Zheng Ji. Zheng Ji is also Tong'an Bo, what is he, Zhang Gou?

The so-called reserve general, that's shit.

Zheng Ji was hung up for two years, and Zhang Gou was buried for two years. When the sudden good luck fell on them, Zhang Gou's biggest wish was to leave Nanjing as soon as possible and return to his hometown. Then he would run the Zhang family into a local prominent family, and that would be enough. But now he has a bigger ambition!

Colonization!

Nanmingzhou is what the foreigners call a "colony". It is just the first step for the court. In the future, the entire Nanyang will be wrapped up by the court, and he will also become the governor of the colony.

Just like before, Zhang Gou is really unwilling to live a muddle-headed life. The stirring of the storm at the beginning has enlarged his heart. Once the heart is enlarged, it is difficult to shrink it.

After joining the new dynasty, Chen Ming used thundering means to directly lock a lock on their hearts, and now Chen Ming has opened this lock again. Zhang Gou is different from Zhang Gou two years ago. He once again tasted the taste of power and the feeling of pretending to be a grandson. So when this lock is opened, he will pursue power even more. But this power is the power under the control of the powerful...

In a well-decorated cabin on the ship, two newspapers were placed on a table firmly fixed to the board by nails, "Hongchang Textile Company's Stock Price Fell by 30%", "Yuan Mei Was Ashamed to See People, Resigned from Office", and a box of cigarettes was placed on the dense lead type. On the iron cigarette box, there was a phoenix spreading its wings and soaring...