Cutting over the end of the Ming Dynasty: a dog-leg knife at the beginning

Chapter 527 The Merchant of Venice

"Miss Catherine, I don't know what rare goods you brought with you when you traveled thousands of miles to China?"

Probably because he accepted a precious gemstone from others, when he sailed to Yantai Port, Yang Menglong became more enthusiastic towards that strange foreign girl with silky black long hair, with a sincere smile and asked It's very courteous to ask that.

Catherine's gaze has been on the Decepticon's naval guns. It seems that this foreign girl is not a fuel-efficient lamp. She can't wait to pounce on the two 120mm naval guns and dismantle them to see what is inside. What a mystery, why the speed of fire is so fast, the range is so scary, and the power is so insane.However, she is from aristocratic background after all, and Yang Menglong's status is unusual, so she still maintained a charming smile and said: "When I returned to the Governor, I brought a large amount of ivory, gold, silver and precious stones purchased from Black Africa. I don't think China will reject these shipments."

Yang Menglong's saliva flowed out: "These four ships are all loaded with gold, silver and ivory?"

Catherine laughed: "How can it be? The Bloodthirsty Mary is loaded with gold and silver, and the other three... I heard that sulfur and saltpeter are very popular here, so those three ships are filled with high-quality sulfur and saltpeter. "

Yang Menglong gave a big thumbs up: "You are so smart, you know what is the most popular on our side even thousands of miles away!"

Catherine said: "To tell you the truth, Governor, although we came to the East for the first time, the missionaries we funded began to preach in China decades ago. Through their letters, we still know a lot about the East." I heard that the governor has some novel products that are extremely valuable, and I was very curious, so I decided to take a trip myself."

Yang Menglong smacked his lips and asked, "What do you like? Tea? Cane sugar? Silk? Porcelain?"

Catherine said: "No, no, no, these things are precious, but they are not of much help to our city-state. What we need most is something that can make our city-state indestructible - yes, that kind of thing Concrete of that grand open wharf!"

Yang Menglong was stunned for a moment, and said in his heart: "Damn, so I came to buy cement!"

As Catherine said, although the Venetian merchants seldom came to China, they still had a good understanding of the situation in the Ming Dynasty through the missionaries funded by them.As early as a year ago, a missionary from Italy secretly sent a bag of cement back to Venice together with some goods he bought, and in the letter he exaggerated the usefulness of this gray powder, claiming that it can Build impenetrable fortifications and immortal avenues.The Venetian was skeptical, and according to the method in the letter, he mixed the bag of cement and fine sand in proportion, then added water to make a slurry, and used it to build a wall.After the cement completely dried up, everyone was shocked: this damn thing can't be hit with a hammer!The Venetian is happy, if the wall is made thicker, or simply pour a large amount of cement slurry between the two walls to form a half-meter-thick or even one-meter-thick cement wall, wouldn’t it be impossible for any artillery to hit it? up?At that time, the fierce battle between the Venetian city-state Republic and the Ottoman Empire was in full swing. They lost one after another, and the overseas colonial strongholds fell one after another. The Venetians needed something to help them strengthen their towns and block the guns of the Turks. Yes, the appearance of cement made everyone's eyes bright, as if they saw hope.After a heated debate, the parliament finally decided to grit its teeth and squeeze out a sum of money from the financial crisis, allowing Catherine, a business-minded female lord who had made a name for herself at a young age, to go to Asia. If you come here, you must buy a few ships of cement and go back.

At the beginning, Catherine was quite disapproving of her errand, thinking that this trip to the East was a waste of time. What the Venetian city-state Republic lacked most were soldiers and funds. Without soldiers and funds, no matter how strong the fortification was, it was useless ...Besides, the female lord did not believe the nonsense that a handful of gray powder would become harder than stone after adding water.But after witnessing the Transformers fleet sinking all the more than 30 ships of the Japanese pirate fleet, she changed her mind.For the first time, she realized that there is such a powerful navy in the far east, and this trip will definitely bring unexpected gains!
For example, this kind of gun is so long that it can sink an enemy ship with one shot...

The shrewd Miss Dandolo's beautiful blue eyes moved away from the naval gun and turned to Yang Menglong... Well, it was just like what the lovely missionary said in the letter, a round baby face, although it was already He is a general with [-] tigers and soldiers, but he still has a strong childishness in his character. The most important thing is that he does things regardless of the consequences and fights without risking his life. It is too easy to deal with this kind of brat. Visually, there are at most two. You can take him down in a matter of weeks and let him willingly give you everything you want in your arms!
It's a good thing Yang Menglong doesn't know what this foreign girl is thinking, otherwise he will be pissed off: at most two weeks can take me down?I said girl, are you too narcissistic?I admit that you are good-looking, you need a face and a figure, but you can take me down in two weeks, do you think it is possible?
——At least three weeks!

The Venetian captains who came with Catherine were also full of interest in the Decepticon. Asking this and that, every detail can arouse their strong interest.However, their Chinese is not good enough, and they have no way to communicate with the sailors of the Denglai Navy, basically speaking with chickens and ducks.

It is always beneficial to learn another foreign language, especially Chinese...

In the chicken and duck story, the fleet has returned to Yantai Port.Just like Tianjin, the Yantai Wharf was crowded with people, from the gentry and officials to the salt workers and farmers, and everyone who could come came. Seeing the majestic fleet entering the port, there was a deafening cheer on the wharf. The tsunami-like cheers made everyone The Venetians from far away Europe were stunned, and Catherine exclaimed: "There are too many people! There are too many people! My God, the people on this pier are almost more than the total population of our entire city-state republic!"

Yang Menglong said triumphantly: "Do you know what the sky is like? Hmph!" Shaking his head and tail, he led a group of generals to the pier.Seeing him, the residents of Denglei almost went crazy, and shouted with an almost crazy expression: "Champion! Champion!" Hundreds of gentry pounced on like hungry tigers, this one grabbed the collar and the other the sleeve, that enthusiasm, It was almost murder—almost tore Yang Menglong into eight pieces.The affectionate and caring greetings were overwhelming, and Yang Menglong only felt that he was surrounded by six or seven thousand bees, buzzing everywhere, and even Gu couldn't take care of them... Alas, they were so enthusiastic.

It took Zhang Tong a lot of effort to squeeze in front of Yang Menglong, cupped his hands, and said, "I will see the champion!"

Yang Menglong rolled his eyes and said: "Come on, don't do this with me! I said, Lao Zhang, why are you putting on such a big scene? You don't mind the trouble, but I'm afraid of being squeezed in by these crazy groupies." And the sea!"

Zhang Tong said: "What the Marquis doesn't know is that these people were not organized by the lower officials, but came spontaneously to welcome the victorious army!"

Yang Menglong didn't believe it: "You really didn't organize it?"

Zhang Tong said: "Really not!"

Yang Menglong wiped off his sweat and murmured, "Old people, it's not a good thing to be too fanatical..."

The common people are of course fanatical. Most of them moved from other places. They belong to the hard-working family who are still at the self-made stage. They are simple and kind. They are very grateful to Yang Menglong who gave them food and planted land. Golden blood flowed into rivers, 200 corpses lay dead, and among the soldiers of the Ming army who defeated Jiannu, many of them were his children and friends. Could they be unhappy?Can they not be proud?The most wonderful thing is that Yang Menglong was also made a Marquis!This is a grand event that hasn't happened in the past [-] years, and the people under Yang Menglong's rule are naturally ecstatic.Ordinary people, of course, hope that those officials who are capable and kind to the people will be promoted step by step and become stronger, so as to provide better protection for themselves and seek more benefits.The ecstatic people came to welcome the triumphant army. They even cut down cedar branches and built a triumphal arch with a height of more than ten meters on the road leading to the center of Dengzhou City from the wharf. Line up, pass under the Arc de Triomphe, and receive warm cheers and applause from the people. At this moment, everyone's hearts are filled with pride.

The carnival crowd brushed aside the Venetian merchants, but they didn't care.Catherine admired the layout of the pier first, and felt that it was very grand. The throughput of this port must be very scary. Just rushing to this pier, this city will surely become a big city as rich as Venice.She stomped the ground hard, feeling as if she was stepping on an extremely hard rock——the entire pier ground was covered with concrete shells, and at most it was just a small crater.Nedland was the most exaggerated. He simply lay down on the ground and repeatedly tapped the ground with a short knife, almost licking the taste.

"It's as solid as a rock!" Netherland said, "This ground is harder than rocks. Those priests didn't talk too much. This kind of concrete really exists!"

Catherine looked at the road leading from the pier to the city, and said with emotion: "It doesn't just exist, people have already used it to pave a wide and long road!"

Captain Fernan muttered: "The thinking of the Chinese is really weird. Such a useful thing is not used to build fortresses, but to build roads. I can't understand their thinking!"

Catherine glanced at the captain, and pointed at the warship moored in the naval port: "With such a powerful fleet, do they need to build the fortress? It's their enemies who want to build it, right?"

Fernan looked in the direction of Catherine's finger, just in time to see the black muzzle of Optimus Prime's bow cannon facing him.The horror scene of Japanese warships being shot into fireballs one by one by this monster came to mind again, and he shivered involuntarily.

With such a powerful fleet, and the surrounding countries are so weak, China certainly does not need to use cement to build fortresses!
(End of this chapter)