1627 Rise of the South China Sea

Chapter 2021
In order to create a sufficiently credible background information for Jose's team, the Ministry of Security and the Military Intelligence Bureau also put a lot of effort into this. In addition to making up a story that the Spaniards could believe, they also had to In all kinds of details, the corpses and related items on board, every piece of evidence is a work carefully prepared by these two intelligence agencies.

Even if the Spaniards asked professionals to do the autopsy, they would basically not find any loopholes, because those corpses were really a few serious criminals who were executed before the departure of the Jose team, and the fatal injuries on their bodies were also similar to those of the criminals. Jose's escape from prison and anti-killing experience is exactly the same.This also means that Jose's narration does not contain any exaggeration and fabrication, and every detail, including the timing of the hands-on, can withstand scrutiny.

The goods carried on the ship, the personal belongings of the escorts, and the secret letters sealed with wax seals found in their luggage are all designed to make the whole story more authentic.The Spaniards who were exiled by Haihan rose up to resist, killed the guards and successfully hijacked the ship and fled. The big winner of this incident is undoubtedly the Spanish side.So whether it was the second lieutenant Joaquin who first discovered the ship, or the city defense commander Fernando who questioned Jose, all the information they received showed that the deeds of Jose and others were heroic. It can be said to be a shot in the arm for the passive colonial authorities.

Fernando was very satisfied with the humility shown by Jose in front of him. Although the young man in front of him didn't look amazing, he didn't seem to be in shock because of the murder and escaped. He still spoke in a very orderly manner, which shows that his psychological quality should not be bad .If young Hispanics in the colony can have such qualities, why should they be afraid of the pressure exerted by the Haihan people!
"You have done a good job! This is how our Spanish warriors should react when facing the enemy!" Fernando waved his fist excitedly: "Young man, your heroic deeds should be rewarded, and I will report this matter to the The governor will report, I believe he will be happy to hear such news!"

The Governor of the Philippines, Aragones, is undoubtedly a staunch fighter. Although he has been defeated repeatedly, his attitude towards Haihan has never softened. It is considered to be a rare positive news recently. Fernando is sure that this incident will definitely make Aragones very excited, and these brave young people should be rewarded.

Fernando ordered Joaquin to settle the people on the ship first, and he returned to the city with the secret letter found on the ship first, and went to the Governor's Palace to report the good news to Aragones.

Sure enough, after listening to Fernando's detailed description, Aragones also thought this was a rather inspiring special case.

"We should immediately invite these warriors to the city, hold a grand reception banquet for them, and commend their heroic deeds. At the same time, we should also use this opportunity to warn those weak capitulators that only by bravely resisting can we defeat the evil forces. Haihan people!" Aragones' few short words have already set the tone for the follow-up of the whole matter.

For Aragones, he needs some inspiring examples of battles to guide the direction of public opinion in the colonies. Otherwise, if the civil officials who advocate peace talks continue to make noise, the resistance to the reconstruction of the local armed forces will only increase.Of course, it is not accurate to classify this incident as a case of war. After all, Jose and others are not soldiers, but ordinary people in Manila who failed to escape in time, and the whole incident is not a military conflict, but just a personal escape. Behavior.But Aragones believes that as long as it is done properly, this matter can completely change the direction of the wind.

As soon as he said it, Fernando immediately sent an order to bring Jose and others to Cebu City.However, this kind of treatment was only provided to the three Spaniards on board. As for the other Filipino native crew members, neither Aragones nor Fernando planned to give them any extra rewards.After all, the colonial authorities have always regarded the local aborigines as tool people, and they are still the kind with limited ability. Even if they are given better treatment, they will not be able to play a greater role, so they simply save these unnecessary Spending, let them do what they should do.

After arranging this matter, the next step is the secret letter found on the ship.Judging from the letterhead and signature on the envelope, this is an official letter between the top officials of Manila and Sing Tao, and there is a wax seal on the envelope, which is very likely to contain some important secrets.

Aragones still had a trusted Han Chinese staff member, so he immediately summoned a Han man named Cheng Mu to interpret the contents of the letter for him.

Cheng Mu took the letter, first carefully scraped off the sealant, then opened the envelope and took out a few neatly folded sheets of letter paper.Although Aragones didn't know men, he could tell from the side that the letter was written with a hard pen with a very fine tip, not the kind of brush that Han people are used to.And this way of writing, as far as he knows, is the special habit of high-ranking officials in Haihan, because this kind of writing tool called "pen" in Haihan is quite expensive, and generally only high-class dignitaries can afford it , which further confirmed the authenticity of this letter from the side.

After Cheng Mu unfolded the letter paper, he said to Aragones: "The texture of this paper is very good, and there is also a grid printed on it to facilitate writing neatly, such paper has never been seen on the market before. "

In fact, Haihan didn't just pay attention to details such as writing tools and paper, even the content of this letter, Qiu Yuan was specially asked to copy it by himself, and it was an authentic handwriting of his own.The purpose of doing this is to completely avoid possible loopholes in the details. Even if the Spaniards can get Qiu Yuan's previous handwriting for comparison and identification, the conclusions they can get will definitely not be false.

The intelligence agency invested so much money to convince the Spaniards that the information they received was true.The story of the Jose team is to let the Spaniards confirm that this secret letter is indeed an official official letter from Haihan, and the content of this letter will in turn make the identity background of the Jose team more credible.

Cheng Mu first read the content of the letter roughly, and then slowly explained it word by word to Aragones and Fernando.

The letter began with Qiu Yuan's greetings and daily greetings to Roger, and then told the other party the contents of the materials shipped to Xingdao this time, and also mentioned the three Spaniards who were exiled to the local area on this ship.The reason why these three people were sent to Xingdao for exile was because there was a need for someone who knew how to raise horses to be in charge of raising military horses. Although Jose and others were exiled for the crime of poisoning the military horses in Manila, Qiu Yuan I don't think these three people have reached the point of being hopeless, and I hope that after changing the environment, they will repent, realize the mistakes they have made, and start a new life in Xingdao.

Of course, the most important reason is that these three people have many years of experience in raising horses, which may temporarily alleviate the local demand for professional grooms, but if the three people still do not want to repent when they arrive in the local area, Qiu Yuan's suggestion is to decisively give them the death penalty as punishment.

"They obviously underestimated the courage and determination of the Spaniards. These young men will not serve the evil Haihan people!" Hearing this, Fernando couldn't help mocking the wrong judgment of the senior Haihan officials, and at the same time, he was more convinced of Jose and the others. Means of resistance for people on board are necessary.If they didn't find a way to escape, they might be pulled out and shot within two days after they were sent to the local area.

Aragones felt that this high-ranking Haihan official was too benevolent, and the crime of poisoning a military horse could still be forgiven. If it was a switch of camps, he would definitely not forgive the criminal, and had already ordered him to be sent to the hospital. Go to the gallows.Of course, the actions of Jose and others are serious crimes for Haihan, but they are brave acts of resistance for Spain.Now they killed several Haihan people on the boat again, if they were caught by Haihan people again next time, they might not have the possibility of being forgiven.

However, this paragraph of content once again provided a guarantee of trust for the people on this ship. The self-reports of Jose and others can all correspond to the content of this secret letter. From the perspective of Aragones and Fernando, it is just It means they didn't lie.

But these contents are not the real focus of the letter. What Cheng Mu translated next made the expressions of the two senior Spanish officials become serious.

Qiu Yuan mentioned in the letter that unidentified armed men have recently appeared in many places in the north, equipped with relatively advanced muskets, causing considerable trouble for Haihan.He reminded Roger to be careful of similar situations in the local area, especially small groups of troops patrolling outside must beware of sneak attacks.

"Our measures have already worked?" Aragones was refreshed: "Unexpectedly, it really works!"

Fernando, as one of the few high-ranking generals in the current colonial authorities, is naturally aware of the inside story, and immediately echoed: "It seems that the multi-point flowering strategy formulated for Haihan was correct. If the place is set on fire, they won't be able to take care of it!"

Compared with Haihan's information transmission speed, the Spaniards' information from the outside world is undoubtedly lagging behind. They only have a rough idea of ​​the action plan, but the speed of getting information feedback is extremely slow.At this time, more than ten days have passed since Gong Shiqi and Ji Yuanqing's actions in Yangzhou City, but it is still far away before the local news reaches Cebu.

Haihan's strategy is to temporarily paralyze the Spanish colonial authorities through the content of this letter, making them think that their overseas military aid to many parties has achieved results. After they relax their vigilance, they may further increase their efforts. For Haihan, the strength of military exports to these areas will have more opportunities to catch the tail of its partners.

Of course, the most likely place to find clues is actually Cebu.What the Haihan intelligence department can confirm is that no matter who is cooperating with the Spaniards, they will definitely send personnel in Cebu to communicate in a timely manner.Whether they can be dug out from Cebu depends to a certain extent on the performance of Jose and others.

Jose was actually still in a very tense state at this time. He didn't know whether there were any loopholes in his performance after arriving at the Cebu port. Had to line up for the gallows.

Regarding the content of the secret letter, the boss did not tell him, which is one of the reasons for his uneasiness.Before he left Manila, he tentatively asked Fang Peng, but Fang Peng only said that the letter was their life-saving talisman. If he knew the content, it might affect his performance, so the content needed to be kept secret from them.

Fang Peng made such an arrangement mainly because he was worried that the content of the secret letter would cause Jose to inadvertently mention some information that should not have been revealed by him when he described his experience, such as their being exempted from the death penalty and exiled to The real reason for Star Island and more.Since the person performing the task is a newcomer like Jose, a little bit of detail error may lead to the failure of the entire operation. Fang Peng and Ran Tianlu are worried about it, and they can only minimize the links that may cause problems.

Jose only knows what he has to know so that he won't be swayed by state of mind, emotion and experience to say the wrong thing.Such an arrangement is indeed very wise, because Jose was indeed very nervous when talking to Spanish officials, but fortunately, the plan arranged by the intelligence agency is almost seamless. As a spy sent by Haihan.

According to Fernando's order, Jose and others were temporarily placed in a small hotel by the port.Due to the war, Cebu's trade scale has also been greatly reduced, and there are not many foreign merchant ships in the port, so the business of this small hotel is also extremely deserted. When Jose and others checked in, there were not many guests in the entire hotel.But that's good, they can take this opportunity to discuss how to proceed with the next plan.

According to the estimates of the intelligence agency, if the first step can deceive the Spaniards and make them believe in the experience of Jose and others, then there will be two possibilities in the next step. One is to use the deeds of Jose and others to hype and agitate the local Anti-haihan sentiment, so that Jose may immediately become a guest of honor in the upper class of society.Another possibility is to be treated coldly, treating them only as immigrants fleeing from Manila, allowing them to settle in the local area, but not giving them any special treatment.

Around these two possibilities, intelligence agencies have also prepared corresponding action plans.But no matter what happens in the end, it will be a big test for the fledgling Jose and others.

(End of this chapter)