Late Ming sea owl

Chapter 1 Four Years of Apocalypse
In the early winter of the fourth year of Apocalypse, the wind blows in the north and the snow dances, the dew in the south of the Yangtze River is heavy and the frost is thick, and even the south of Wuling is full of cold forests and austere forests.

The Chief Envoy of Guangdong in the Ming Dynasty, on the coast of the southern border of the empire, a lonely Danjia boat was sailing in the depths of the Lingding Ocean.The small boat is more than eight feet wide and less than three feet long. It moves slowly eastward on the sea. The oars cut through the water. The sound of the oars is soothing and has a fixed rhythm, like an ancient and peaceful song.

"It is indeed the Little Ice Age. Even the Pearl River Estuary is so cold." Lin Hai was sitting on the Danjia boat. The northeast monsoon wind blowing in front of him was slightly chilly. He folded his hands and inserted them into the cuffs of his leather windbreaker, muttering to himself. One sentence.

Suddenly, his movements stopped for a moment, and he turned up the cuff of his left hand to take a look.Sure enough, the watch on his left wrist was still there, and it was still running.

Lin Hai quickly covered the cuffs again, and a light of excitement flashed in his eyes that were originally a little distracted.

From the appearance, on his left wrist is an ordinary light kinetic energy nautical watch, Casio brand, 200 meters waterproof.But in fact, the function of this watch is far from being comparable to ordinary watches. It is the new equipment that Lin Hai received from the organization last year - a special spy watch.

But these are not important now. What really excites Lin Hai is the most basic function of this watch-timekeeping.

Precise timekeeping meant precise measurement of longitude, an ability coveted by navigators in Europe today.Several countries in Western Europe offered huge rewards for this, and Galileo and later Newton devoted a lot of effort to this.

The two physics masters failed to solve the problem in the end. It was the clockmaker John Harrison who really received the bounty. At that time, more than half a century had passed since Newton's death. Perhaps this is why engineering students have more money than science students. clear evidence.

While Lin Hai was thinking wildly, his stomach suddenly growled.

"Are you hungry? There is dried fish on the boat, do you want to eat it?" A clear and hearty female voice sounded. Lin Hai looked up and saw the girl on the bow of the boat turning around. The sun shone into her eyes, causing her long eyelashes to twitch. There was a flutter.

The girl's facial features are quite delicate, but her skin is not very fair. It glows with a healthy malt-colored luster in the sunset.She was wearing a smooth and tight fish skin bodysuit, and her youthful and graceful figure was exquisite and convex. She looked heroic and energetic.

"I'm not hungry, thank you." Lin Hai declined her kindness. He drank a lot of sea water in the morning, and he was still a little nauseous at this time.

"Don't be polite..." Seeing that Lin Hai didn't answer, the girl just shook her head and smiled.In her opinion, Lin Hai must have been frightened after falling into the water, and he had not recovered yet.

In fact, Lin Hai experienced much more than just falling into the water.

He was an undercover agent in a smuggling gang and was tracking down clues about an important defector.Just when the mission was about to be completed, his identity was accidentally exposed. In the critical situation, he had to jump into the sea to escape. Unexpectedly, as soon as he entered the water, his limbs were weak and his mind was in chaos. When he woke up, he was on this boat.

The girl who fished Lin Hai up from the bottom of the sea was the girl on the bow of the boat. She was a native of Xin'an County, Guangzhou Prefecture. Her name was Shi Zhuniang, and her family had been engaged in pearl fishing for generations.This morning, when she was fishing for pearls in Lingding Ocean, she saw someone under the sea as soon as she got out of the water, so she rescued Lin Hai on the Danjia boat.

Lin Hai had also heard of the Dan people and knew that they were a kind of untouchables in ancient times. They had been discriminated against by society in all dynasties and were not allowed to live on land, so they could only live a life on boats.

In the era before he traveled, the Dan people had already given up their traditional life and settled on the shore.But at this moment, he still had a bit of luck. A Danjia boat couldn't mean anything. Maybe the time and space he was in was still the 21st century.

Of course, if he really traveled to the end of the Ming Dynasty, Lin Hai could face it calmly.Years of working as an agent have already given him strong nerves, and half a day is enough for him to complete his mental construction.

"You haven't eaten for a day. Are you really not hungry? My home is still far away."

Shi Zhuniang's voice came from the bow of the boat again. Lin Hai stood up and said with a smile, "I'm really not hungry. Do you want me to help you explore the reef?"

Shi Zhuniang glanced at Lin Hai's hands and saw that his fingers were well-proportioned and his nails were neatly trimmed. She smiled and shook her head.She picked up the penny in her hand, poked it into the cabin behind Lin Hai, and shouted: "Qizai, don't hold up the body anymore, get up and explore the reef."

"Sister, can't you let me stay here for a while?" The bamboo curtain hanging in front of the cabin moved, and a sleepy half-year-old boy came out.

Since he rarely has access to fresh vegetables, the young man named Qizai has thin yellow hair and dry skin. He wears an ill-fitting potato shirt that covers his body from his neck to his ankles. His exposed feet are somewhat edema.

"How long are you going to keep lying there? Look where the sun is?" Shi Zhuniang slapped Qizai on the buttocks with a bamboo pen.This boy is her brother's son. He has just turned eight this year. Because he was born on the night of Qixi Festival, his name is Shi Chongqi. Everyone calls him Qizai.

Qizai stretched out his hand to scratch his itchy skin, turned his head to face the sunset and blinked. After a while, he came to the bow of the boat and reluctantly took the pennant from Shizhuniang's hand.

"Cheer up. In addition to rocks, you also need to be careful of whirlpools." Shi Zhuniang said and pinched her nephew's face gently. She had a pile of mats made of grass at her feet. If she encountered a whirlpool, she would throw one away. Zhang can prevent the boat from being involved.

"It hurts, it hurts... Sister, stop it." Qizai shouted exaggeratedly, and his sleepiness had completely disappeared after shouting like this.

Shi Zhuniang saw that her nephew had cheered up, so she came to Lin Hai and said, "Brother Lin has come to his senses? What are your plans for the future?"

"Now that I have no money, I can't go to Zhejiang for the time being. By the way, this is not far from Haojing, right? I can write and do math. I can go to Haojing to find a job first, and then make plans for the future." Lin Hai replied calmly.

After being rescued, Shi Zhuniang asked him about his life experience.

At that time, Lin Hai said that he was a businessman in Thailand and Spain. His ancestors had gone to the West with the eunuch Sanbao, and later settled in Thailand. When it was passed down to his generation, there was only one person left. So he sold his property and wanted to return to his hometown, but unexpectedly encountered a shipwreck.

"Hao Jing..." Shi Zhuniang said thoughtfully, "Well, you stay at my house for two days first. Although I have never been to Hao Jing, there are some roundabout ways that may be able to help you."

"So, thank you so much, girl." Lin Hai said to Shi Zhuniang, "After I find a job, I will definitely repay today's life-saving grace."

"We'll talk about it then." Shi Zhuniang smiled upon hearing this, "You can just call me Zhuniang. We, the Dan family, are not that particular."

The two talked for a while. As the coastline got closer and closer, they encountered more and more Danjia boats on the road. They even encountered a three-masted wooden sailboat eight or nine feet long with a black hole on the bow. cannon.

Through the bow pillar of the ship, Lin Hai recognized that it was a Guangzhou ship rather than a Fu ship. Judging from the flag hanging on the ship, this ship should be a ship from the Guangdong Coastal Defense Road.

Everything in front of him told him that this is really the fourth year of the apocalypse, Lin Hai completely let go of the last sliver of luck, and began to seriously consider the next plan.

It's been four years since the apocalypse, so it should be very profitable to be a maritime merchant these years, right?
Lin Hai has been fond of history and military affairs since he was a child, especially stories about the Age of Discovery. He was the president of the Ship Model Association in middle school. It can be said that giant ships and cannons were the romance of his youth.

He clearly remembered that Zheng Zhilong started to rise in the fifth year of Tianqi. It seems that he later earned tens of millions of taels of silver per year. He was definitely the world's richest man in the seventeenth century.

If I remember correctly, Zheng Zhilong's uncle Huang Cheng should be a Haojing businessman.Zhu Niang said that she has connections in Hao Jing, but she doesn’t know if she can trust her?

(End of this chapter)