Volume 2: Soaring! The Overlord of the Region Chapter 209: Yuheng Yaoguang Alliance (I)
"The rituals are in place, on an auspicious day of an auspicious month, I will announce your name, which means 'Yuan', which means 'righteous'..."
On January 5, 1613, in Edo Castle, Japan, Tokugawa Ieyasu personally held a coming-of-age ceremony for his ninth son, a time traveler named Takechiyo in his childhood. He named him "Tokugawa Yoshinao" and officially granted him a territory of 378,000 koku in Kazusa .
At this ceremony, in addition to the representatives of court nobles sent by the Japanese Emperor and various daimyos who attended in person, Yan Siqi, the president of the Ming Chamber of Commerce in Japan, was also invited to observe the ceremony.
Of course, the appearance of these people was natural. What surprised everyone a little was that Siam, a country in the far south, actually sent representatives to attend the meeting. Of course, these were envoys from the other side who came to request the signing of an official trade treaty. It just so happened that they came at this time.
After strictly following the Chinese Zhou Li, the whole process was completed, and half of the day had passed. After all, Tokugawa Ieyasu was already 69 years old this year, and he was obviously a little tired, so he went to rest early.
After respectfully serving Ieyasu into his room and waiting for him to fall asleep, Tokugawa Yoshinao touched his scalp, which was a little burning and painful after being shaved into a Mediterranean-style "Japanese" hairstyle, and gently stood up and walked to his room.
"Greetings, lord. Congratulations on your coming of age ceremony today! From today on, you are a true warrior."
"Haha, thank you." After a gentle reply, Tokugawa Yoshinao frowned and said, "Hyogosuke, please quickly arrange that new warship for me. In addition to the sailors, prepare thirty elite hatamoto. I will go to sea in half an hour."
"Ah? My Lord. It's already 5pm on a western clock. It will be dark soon. Are we going out to sea now?"
"I have an appointment that I have to keep. Don't worry, I won't go too far out to sea. Besides, with you by my side, what do I have to be afraid of?"
"Hi! I'll go down and make arrangements right away."
The so-called appointment that had to be attended was, of course, the Thai envoy, who was acting as a messenger under the pretext of establishing trade relations between the two countries, privately gave Tokugawa Yoshinao a letter written in English. The content of the letter was very simple: I will come on a certain day of a certain year. Will you come to see me?
Then, starting from last night, Tokugawa Yoshinao clearly sensed that Yuheng had arrived at the sea not far from Edo. However, because of the coming-of-age ceremony, he could not go out to sea rashly. He could only wait until now.
In short, after about two hours of struggling, although the sea surface had gradually become dark, thanks to the accurate positioning of the two travelers and the courage of the Thai Luoja Buddha, who pushed his ship not far from the shore, both sides soon saw each other's ships.
Looking at the fleet of no less than ten Spanish-style square ships on the opposite side, Tokugawa Yoshinao looked at his own galleon and trembled slightly in his heart.
However, the enemy soon dispelled his concerns. Ten warships stopped far away from their range, and then two small boats came over. When the enemy approached, a voice in Japanese came from the small boat: "An important person from our country requests to board the ship."
"Permission to board the ship."
Finally, the two completed this plane, the first meeting between travelers.
After the two time travelers shook hands and greeted each other with extremely modern etiquette, they naturally came to a relatively private room, then waved away all their subordinates and began a secret conversation.
"English?"
"Fine, But, My English Is Very Poor. So..."
"Hey, I know that your English isn't just bad, but your pronunciation is really unbearable. Whatever, we can't expose ourselves, and we can't use a translator. Can't everyone use English, sign language, comics, etc.?"
"Oh Ke, say Rui."
"Let me introduce myself first. I am Raja Buddha, the current King of Thailand. I studied agriculture before I traveled through time."
"Hajime no circus, my name is Tokugawa , and I was a cartoonist before I traveled through time."
"Well... well, I'm not the first choice anyway. Well, according to my intuition, you haven't taken office as general yet, right?"
"Not yet, to my shame."
"Uh, how long do you expect it to take?"
"According to historical records, the current general will die in June 1616, not long."
"Not long yet?! There are still three and a half years left! And now the time traveler from the Ming Dynasty has developed penicillin. Who knows, your general may live even longer."
"Why? Is penicillin also sold in your country?"
"How could there not be any? Fifty taels of silver per set! But I can't order a ban on imports, or else my generals will not agree, not to mention the princes and nobles in my country. Well, every year our country can make a lot of money by selling spices to those white people in Western Europe, but at least 20% of the net profit is taken away by penicillin."
"Hey, hey , hey~~same. Last year, our country spent 150,000 taels of silver just to buy penicillin."
"Almost the same. We have roughly the same number. But according to Philip from Spain, he spends no less than three million ounces of silver every year on penicillin."
"Ah? Oh~~ He bought it back to Europe to resell it? I see. Huh? Have you also contacted the European time travelers?"
"Of course. Otherwise, why would I take such a big risk to come here in person to find you? Who knows, Kaiyang in the west must have sensed that we are too close. So, let's talk quickly and disperse as soon as we are done. Otherwise, it would be bad if he sent a fleet to sink me at sea."
"Okay, since this meeting is so sudden, please speak first."
"Okay." The Japanese have a bad English accent, and the Thais' English is very brief. It is actually quite difficult to communicate in two dialects of English. In the end, the two travelers simply asked their men to bring paper and pen, and started writing or even drawing.
"Last October, the Spanish Manila Fleet suddenly sailed into the Gulf of Siam, which frightened me. Who knew that they said they were sent a personal letter to me by the order of their Prince of Asturias. In addition to the other party's request to establish a spice trade and sever trade relations with the Dutch, the letter also mentioned a problem. That is, in Asia, if the two of us do not unite first, once the Chinese traverser reaches the top, we will be defeated in an instant.
Although this is not a pleasant thing to say, after thinking about it for nearly two months, I still think that what he said is very right. Mr. Tokugawa, you and I both know that China has been the ruler of East Asia for thousands of years. Although it declined for a period of time from the 19th century to the first half of the 20th century, at least in the era we traveled through, China's complete revival was already very clear. "
"...Hi! You are right. Fortunately, according to historical records, the emperor of the Ming Dynasty will not die until 1620, so we still have some time."
"Then, you and I will form an alliance first, defeat Kaiyang, and then fight for the position of ruler of East Asia, okay?"
“As it should be!”
"Okay!" Luo Jifutu stretched out a hand, and Tokugawa Yoshinao also quickly stretched out his hand, and the two hands were tightly clasped together.
