"I... don't have any." Emperor Chongzhen came back to his senses and saw Empress Zhou's caring expression. His heart warmed slightly, but more fatigue surged in his heart. The fighting spirit he had before seemed to be drained away in an instant. Emperor Chongzhen felt that he wanted to rest, wanted to no longer care about anything, and wanted to put down the heavy burden on his back. This heavy burden of being the head of the Ming Dynasty was about to crush him, Chongzhen.
Emperor Chongzhen held Empress Zhou's hand. He couldn't remember how long it had been since he held his woman's hand. It was so long that he seemed to have almost forgotten her existence. Wang Chengen lowered his head and wiped his tears. He found that he always felt like crying in recent times. The desolation after the prosperity, the sadness of facing the destruction of the country and the demise of the family made Wang Chengen feel like he was getting old. He no longer had the decisiveness to kill for power.
The Princess of Changping, who had come with Emperor Chongzhen, did not know why Wang Chengen, who was standing beside her, was crying. At the age of twelve, she did not understand Wang Chengen's mood after the prosperity of watching buildings rise and fall. Although she was smart at the age of twelve, she did not understand the sorrow of the country's destruction and the family's demise that was about to come. At the age of twelve, she still held the bottle of perfume in her hand, looking at the people around her with pure and beautiful eyes, watching this era of dynasty change.
A few days later, an envoy group from the capital boarded the Tang family caravan and set off for the Daming City in Southeast Asia. The leader of this envoy group was the Duke of Changping. The ministers in the capital did not know why Emperor Chongzhen would send a duke as an ambassador to an overseas foreign gang. In the eyes of those ministers, all other places outside the territory of the Daming Dynasty were foreign countries. This cognition made Emperor Chongzhen feel more and more that these ministers were traitors. Emperor Chongzhen had actually read some content in the "Call to Arms" newspaper. He felt that what the King of Tang said was very right. As long as the Han people occupied a place, it belonged to the Han people. As long as the Han people liked a place, it also belonged to the Han people.
These words sounded very domineering, but Emperor Chongzhen appreciated them. The reason why he sent his daughter to lead a team to visit Nanyang was because Tang Tong said in the letter that Your Majesty is not a king who lost his country, but your ministers are the ministers who lost his country. These words were not polite, but they hit the mark in Emperor Chongzhen's heart. Emperor Chongzhen believed in such a person and would never make things difficult for the people he sent to visit, let alone detain his daughter, Princess Changping.
Although it is now clear that both sides are on opposite sides, Emperor Chongzhen does not have much hatred for Tang Tong because Tang Tong has not openly occupied the territory of the Ming Dynasty. What Emperor Chongzhen wants now is to temporarily sign a peace agreement with this Prince Tang so that he can concentrate his forces to deal with the rebels in the Ming Dynasty. At this time, Emperor Chongzhen has not given up his efforts and is still hoping to save the Ming Dynasty from destruction.
This was the first time for Princess Changping to leave the capital and go to sea. The endless sea made her excited for a while at the beginning. However, her health was not very good, and the bumpy sea made her uncomfortable. In order to take care of her, the Tang family's merchant ship had to sail slowly along the coastline of the mainland, and only traveled a short distance every day, and then went to the shore to let Princess Changping rest.
This time, there were many people coming out with the Duke of Changping. The Duke of Changping was only the one in the open. In secret, there were also the Crown Prince Zhu Cijiong and several ministers who assisted the Crown Prince. Their goal was to reach Jinling, the secondary capital of the Ming Dynasty. For the Crown Prince and his party, the Tang family caravan
The situation was known through Tang Tong's intelligence organization, but Tang Tong had no intention of questioning it, so the people in the Tang family caravan did not say anything about the prince and his companions, allowing them to blend in with the crowd of envoys.
This was the first time for the Crown Prince to leave the capital and also his first time to go out to sea. He was very surprised by what he saw along the way. This time, it was the Zhou family who protected the Crown Prince and his group. This time, it was also the Zhou family who contacted the Tang family caravan. Although Zhou Kui, the uncle of Queen Zhou, was an extremely greedy person, he also knew that he could not let the Ming Dynasty fall easily. Zhou Kui did not have a second daughter to be the queen. If the Ming Dynasty fell, his Zhou family would no longer be royal relatives. What's more, the Crown Prince was born to Queen Zhou, and was Zhou Kui's grandson. For the better future of the Zhou family, his family had to do something.
The days at sea were very fresh when they first arrived, but they became boring after a while. Fortunately, for the prince and his companions, they did not need to go far on the sea this time. After arriving in Jiangsu, they passed through the rebel-controlled area. Under the protection of a team of guards, the prince and his companions quietly left the Tang family caravan ship after docking. The Zhou family thought their cover was perfect, but they did not know that the people in the Tang family caravan had known about it for a long time, and only let the prince and his companions go because there was no order from Tang Tong. However, the intelligence personnel under Tang Tong were also secretly following the prince and his companions, waiting for Tang Tong's new order.
After a period of time, Princess Changping also got used to the turbulence on the sea. However, due to her weak health, the group stayed in Hangzhou for a long time. After she felt better, they continued to head south. At this time, Tang Tong could no longer wait for the group in Daming City in Nanyang, so he took his army to fight the Spaniards.
Due to the huge investment of manpower and material resources, the construction of the Suez Canal progressed smoothly, but it also attracted the attention of Westerners. In the early days, there were many Western spies gathering intelligence in the Suez Canal area. Later, those Westerners constantly instigated the local indigenous people to attack Tang Tong and his team. Although relying on Tang Tong's relationship, the number of Ming Dynasty merchants and the colonial team was very large, their combat effectiveness was not very high. In the early days, relying on their large numbers, they caused the indigenous people to suffer a lot. But later, after those indigenous people got the support of Westerners, they took advantage of their familiarity with the terrain here and the vast desert area here, and from time to time they launched sneak attacks on the unfinished Suez Canal City, and ran into the desert after each sneak attack.
Due to Tang Tong's rapid rise, the interests in Southeast Asia, India and Africa almost fell into Tang Tong's hands. This made those Westerners regard Tang Tong as their biggest rival. After ending the decades-long war in Europe, these Western countries needed to recuperate on the one hand, and on the other hand, they also needed a large number of colonies to enhance their national strength. However, Tang Tong occupied so many colonies, like a big tiger standing in the way, blocking the development path of those Westerners. There are no eternal friends in the world, only eternal interests. The Spaniards who had lived in peace with Tang Tong and his men finally united with other Westerners to suppress Tang Tong's power.
In the Nanyang area, there was still a force like the Spanish. As Tang Tong's power grew stronger, the Spanish knew that sooner or later they would not be able to keep their Spanish colony in Nanyang, so they wanted to strike first. Therefore, the Spanish united with the Dutch, Portuguese, and British to form an alliance army. The vanguard force had ten warships and more than 10,000 personnel, but a war to sneak attack on Daming City turned into an encounter with Tang Tong's navy.
Although Tang Tongshou encountered the Spaniards with only a patrol team of three ships, this team of only three ships managed to delay the Spaniards and waited for the arrival of more than 20 other patrol teams, and then fought a fierce battle in the Strait of Malacca. Although both sides suffered heavy losses, the Spaniards' losses were strong teams, while Tang Tongs losses were only local complete troops. The equipment of these complete troops was worse than that of the combat army. The loss of these equipment was nothing to Tang Tong. The only thing was that the casualties were too many, which was a huge sum of money for the pensions of Tang Tongs' army.
The shameless attack by the Spaniards angered Tang, who immediately took Zheng Chenggong and Li Dingguo to the Spanish-occupied colonies, determined to take this opportunity to drive the Spaniards out of Southeast Asia. Originally, with Tang's current status, he did not need to lead the army personally, but Tang's hands were too long and he occupied too many places. Part of the army could not move easily in India, part of the army was still fighting bandits in Southeast Asia, and some troops were stationed in Japan, Korea, and Mongolia. Tang had to deal with such a large situation, which made it impossible for Tang to do anything to the Ming Dynasty in a short period of time.
Tang Tong originally wanted to live in peace with the Spanish for a while, but they were eager to go to war with him. Tang Tong had no choice but to lead his army to wipe out the Spaniards in the South Seas. This time, Tang Tong mobilized 30,000 troops and more than 100 warships. However, the number of coalition forces of Spain and other countries also increased to 20,000, which was almost all the troops of these countries in the Indian Ocean. It was a desperate move.
Although Li Dingguo and Zheng Chenggong were already Tang Tong's capable generals, they were too young and lacked experience in the army. Therefore, Tang Tong had to stay in the army during this war. Firstly, to stabilize the morale of the army, and secondly, with Tang Tong in the army, when Li Dingguo and others gave orders, the other generals would not dare to disobey.
The Spanish and other countries' armies knew that Tang Tong's warships were superior to theirs, so they did not plan to compete with Tang Tong at sea. Instead, they built a land front along the Strait of Malacca, intending to have a big battle with Tang Tong on land. At this time, they did not know that Tang Tong had a large number of land artillery.
After crossing the Strait of Malacca, Tang Tong's fleet used their shipboard artillery to plow through the Spanish military fortifications on the shore. The powerful firepower made the Spanish regret their actions. The shells seemed to be free, turning the entire land where Tang Tong and his men were about to land upside down, and the Spanish military fortifications that had been painstakingly built were wiped out in a matter of days. (To be continued. To learn more about the next chapter, please log in for more chapters. Support the author! Support!)
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