Dragon Sea Empire

At the end of 1603 (the 31st year of Wanli), the main areas of China's foreign trade in the Ming Dynasty: Zhangzhou, Quanzhou, towns and villages everywhere, the scene of fathers and villagers crying for their relatives who died in Luzon can be seen everywhere: every Thousands of old people, widows, and orphans in villages and families, wearing mourning clothes, crying, burning incense in front of the altar, and throwing paper money into the air...

Anhai and other places in Jinjiang "went to the house, cried and heard about each other, and I don't know how many women are called widows."

About [-] Chinese and overseas Chinese will never return home.

After Zeng Yue left the Badalan Coast, the sense of relaxation that he could go home suddenly aggravated the pain and fatigue all over his body.Originally, his leg injury was not healed, and he was soaked in mud and water during the long journey, and the wound was infected.On a ship that is so crowded that it is almost impossible to move, the air is polluted and the sanitation conditions are extremely poor.During the more than ten days of floating on the sea, at least fifty or sixty people on the three ships died of illness, and their bodies were thrown into the sea.

Although Yin Feng was injured all over his body, his physical condition was much better, and he recovered after sleeping on the boat for a few days.After returning to Taiwan, Zeng Yue had a high fever and was completely in a coma. Yin Feng had to send a boat back to Quanzhou on the same day.

On the second day after Yin Feng arrived in Taiwan, he called together all the rich businessmen, traders, craftsmen who escaped from Luzon, as well as sailors and buddies from various families, and announced his plan: everyone can voluntarily invest, or The main purpose of joining and participating is to unite all possible forces, make money first, and then expand the force to fight back to Luzon.

Yin Feng called the organization he wanted to set up: China United Company.

He borrowed the organizational structure of the Dutch East India Company established in 1602: the world's earliest joint stock company model.

On this earth, all people are unwilling to invest their own money in projects that do not see benefits, but all people have the idea of ​​sitting back and enjoying the benefits.Although the form of shareholding cooperation is a bit ahead of China, Yin Feng decided to set up the company's main base in Taiwan, away from the domestic business environment, and mainly for overseas trade; All the major wealthy businessmen in the area will join in, so that it will be easier to form a business group-like organization.

Like Zheng Zhilong in another time and space, it's not that Yin Feng has never thought about integrating all forces by force.But that would take too long, because Yin Feng didn't have a cheap father-in-law who would pass on all his family property to him as generously as Yan Siqi; Li Dan was still in the dungeon in Manila at this time, and his strength was also very weak, so it was impossible for him to pass on his own power. transferred to his name.

Even in history, Zheng Zhilong had to spend many years fighting between the Western colonists and the government after gaining the strength of the two super-rich merchants and the government. He gave up the interests of Taiwan, and many brothers were killed or injured in order to integrate the entire business of Fujian. Benefit.

Yin Feng did not have this condition, nor could he afford the time. The Dutch were about to enter the southeast coast.However, there are always various difficulties in the generation and promotion of new things, and the merchants who invested in the initial stage were less than one-fifth of the people present.Chinese people like to do business alone, which was very famous in the Ming Dynasty.The historical materials of the Spaniards, Portuguese, and Dutch often record the deeds of Chinese merchants competing with each other to lower prices, and as a result, these Western colonists were cheaper.

After Yin Feng left Luzon, he considered this plan maturely.He just wants to reverse the state of disunity among Chinese businessmen.He didn't give up at all, and revised the company's articles of association overnight, promising to return three times the share capital within two years, and promised to fight back to Manila within three to five years to avenge his revenge.He remembered that when the Dutch East India Company was established, it also promised to return three times the share capital.It's a pity that the information copied from the laptop is at home in Quanzhou, and he has no place to refer to it for a while.

At the end of the year, the China United Company raised nearly 200 million taels of funds, and 5000 taels counted as one share.It included all of Yin Feng's family wealth of 40 taels - he put all his own boats into it.Li Dan's family, represented by Li Lihua, added 40 taels of silver.The rest of the funds were all invested by wealthy businessmen who were rescued from Luzon Island by Yin Feng, and the start-up capital of China United Company was quite a lot.However, there are thousands of things to do, and no one except Yin Feng knows how to unfold them.As a result, Yin Feng was so busy that his feet never touched the ground. Basically, Yin Feng never returned to his home before the Chinese New Year.

Until a few days before the Chinese New Year, a fishing boat brought the servants of the Zeng family.Yin Feng had just seen Coutere off at the beach; the colonel was going to Malacca and Siam to recruit more Portuguese mercenaries for him.

The servant of the Zeng family was brought to the seaside by Chen Zhongji, and he cried and knelt in front of Yin Feng: "My lord, the young master has passed away!"

Yin Feng's brain thumped, his eyes went dark; he went to Manila for Zeng Yue brothers, and Zeng Yue had already returned home, how could this be...

The news that almost made him faint disrupted his work plan, so he had to drop everything at hand and rush back to Quanzhou.Speaking of which, since returning to China, his own wives and concubines have not had time to go back and take a look.

……

In January 1604, the Zeng family held a big funeral in the north of Quanzhou City. The third son of the Zeng family, the owner of the good shop, died, Zeng Yue, who was also the shopkeeper of the good shop.On that day, almost all the merchants in Quanzhou City and a large number of ordinary people went to the north of the city; the merchants from Zhangzhou and other places, as well as the survivors of the Manila massacre from all over the place, all gathered here, not only because the young man suffered from a wound And the one who died was also for the hero in the eyes of the people, the savior of the Luzon survivors—the son-in-law of the Zeng family, Yin Feng.Everyone witnessed the scene of Yin Feng kneeling in front of Zeng Yue's spiritual throne.

Crowds of people went to Zeng's house to worship, reaching as many as [-] people in one day, almost breaking through the threshold of Zeng's house.This grand occasion even attracted the attention of the government.

In March 1604, in the second month of the lunar calendar in the 3nd year of Wanli, tens of thousands of people in Zhangzhou and Quanzhou jointly appealed to the Governor's Yamen in Fujian, demanding justice for the 32 merchants who died in Luzon.After the post was submitted to Chen, there was no news from the government for a long time.

Not long after, the whole of Fujian was shaken, and many businessmen were worried; they couldn't go to Luzon for trade, how would they do business this year?

During the same period, there were posters recruiting various kinds of manpower in the ports of Zhangzhou and Quanzhou, signed "China United Company".Almost everyone is recruited: farmers, pig farmers, fishermen and sailors, various craftsmen, teachers, bookkeepers, and even bodyguards.

Originally, now is the best season for trading ships to Manila, but most of the ships departing from the port are heading towards Siam in Southeast Asia.Legend has it that a pirate known as the Jinghai Gang posted a post on some merchant ships. The content was: In order to retaliate against the massacre of the Tang people by the Ganla people in Manila, an indefinite and comprehensive trade ban on Luzon Island will be implemented from January this year. transport.

"Trade embargo? What do you mean?"

The person who asked this question was a brown-haired and blue-eyed foreign priest wearing a Confucian robe, a scarf on his head, and a cross on his chest.He was chatting with several Hangzhou businessmen on a merchant ship named "Haolai", and the owner of the ship was the Zeng family's Haohao brand.This 400-meter brig is carrying a large amount of raw silk to Quanzhou.The foreign priest was the assistant of the Italian missionary Matteo Ricci and the Portuguese Jesuit apprentice monk Baradas.

The elder brother of the young trainee Baradas was a captain of the Portuguese army, and unfortunately died in the sea in the big storm that Yin Feng traveled through time and space.Yin Feng picked up Baradas's pistol, magnifying glass, Bible and other relics, and accidentally rescued the black slave Magaro of Baradas.When Yin Feng went to Nanjing three years ago, he visited the residence of Matteo Ricci. Unfortunately, Matteo Ricci had already gone north to Beijing, and Guo Jujing, an Italian missionary who presided over the teaching affairs in Nanjing, went to Nanchang.

Yin Feng left a letter and entrusted the Chinese believers of Baradas to pass it on, informing his brother of the bad news, explaining his intention to keep Magaro, and his willingness to return his brother's relics in person.

Matteo Ricci was received by Emperor Wanli in Beijing by ringing the bell, and his missionary career finally picked up.One day, he found a book "East and West Travels" written by a Chinese in a bookstore in Beijing.This book narrates the concept of the earth, starting from the Americas, from west to east to Asia, and describes the features and country profile of each continent.According to Matteo Ricci's Chinese cultural accomplishment, he can see that the author's literary talent is very average, he mostly uses vernacular writing, and describes the situation in various places, focusing on things that can make money such as gold and silver minerals, special crops, etc. It should be written by a businessman. The author is Yin Feng. .

What surprised Matteo Ricci the most was that the author had a complete concept of the earth, a very accurate understanding of European geography, and a very clear concept of the Near East, Central Asia, and the Far East; this is a typical European concept of political geography, although later generations became It became the mainstream of the concept of world political geography, but it was only circulated in Europe at this time.Therefore, Matteo Ricci was very puzzled: How did this Chinese author have such a concept?Has he been to Europe?

Matteo Ricci has been in China for decades, and he has never seen or heard of a Chinese who has such a clear and organized concept of the earth and the whole world.In order for Ming Dynasty people to accept the concept of the world map, Matteo Ricci had to enlarge China and place it in the center of the map, so some Chinese still did not believe him.

Just in time, his trainee monk Baradas received Yin Feng's letter and came to ask him what to do.Matteo Ricci is very interested in Yin Feng, if he hadn't just gained a firm foothold in Beijing, he would definitely go to talk to Yin Feng in person.

Baradas thus shouldered the task of making friends with Yin Feng, left Beijing, and went south to Fujian with an auxiliary monk You Wenhui borrowed from China.

They passed through Nanjing, and Guo Jujing, an Italian missionary who happened to be in charge of Nanjing’s educational affairs, was called by Father Fan Li’an, the superintendent of the Chinese Diocese of the Society of Jesus, to report his work in Macau, so they went with him. Merchant ships sailed from Ningbo, Zhejiang to Quanzhou.

Of course, Hou Baradas didn't know at this time that this merchant ship had a close relationship with Yin Feng.

The Portuguese Baradas himself took the Chinese name Bao Daren. As a junior trainee monk who had just entered the Jesuit order, he was very humble. In addition, there was also a Jesuit monk from China, You Wenhui, and Guo Jujing, the highest rank. They have been familiar with China for a long time, so it didn't take long for the missionaries to get acquainted with the merchants on the ship.

These businessmen are Zhang Yuyu, the head of the Hangzhou Silk Guild, Yang Caipu, a Fujian businessman doing business in Hangzhou, and others, and the big businessmen Yin Feng met in Hangzhou when he debuted for the first time.

They were talking about the recent rumors of the Manila massacre, and also about the total trade embargo on Luzon that was circulating all over the coast of Fujian.Baradas believed that this kind of genocide could be committed by the Spaniards, and they had done a lot in America.However, as a citizen of Portugal, a country founded on maritime trade, he is very sensitive to words like "trade embargo".He hurriedly asked, "Is this trade embargo enforced by the government?"