1627 Rise of the South China Sea

Chapter 3977

The several members of the Li family currently working under the Special Forces Division were all personally selected and recommended by Li Yuande. Most of these people are illegitimate children from various branches of the family. Although they are well-off, they are not in a position to inherit the family business. If they are unwilling to spend their lives as caged birds, only receiving a monthly salary from the family, then they have no choice but to go out and work hard to earn their own fortune.

Li Yuande selected people who were kind-hearted and hardworking. Even though the living conditions in their current location were harsh and far inferior to those in Guangzhou, these people still settled down and diligently handled various complicated local affairs for the special operations division.

Judging from their performance, these members of the Li family have basically passed the assessment and are just waiting for a suitable opportunity to officially take up local official positions.

This is a win-win situation for both the special operations division and the Li family, so both sides are happy to see it happen, and the appointment of these people had been agreed upon long ago.

The arrival of a large number of salt merchants' sons finally provided enough manpower to set up the local government structure. With the Li family members, who were already familiar with the local situation, in charge of managing related affairs, and the salt merchants' sons assisting, the special operations division felt relatively more at ease.

If Li Yuande also wanted to seek an official position here, there would be no obstacles whatsoever. As long as he asked, he would immediately receive the appointment letter.

However, he had been by Qian Tiandun's side for several years. Although he did not hold a real position, he had long since had enough of being an official and had been involved in almost all matters related to the Special Forces Division, including commerce, civil affairs, and infrastructure.

All the officers under Qian Tiandun, including special figures like Qian Shaobao and Gao Qiaonan, always treated Li Yuande with courtesy and did their best to cooperate, which far exceeded the treatment a businessman should receive.

Aside from not leading troops into battle, Li Yuande now possesses resources and power comparable to a high-ranking local official. Therefore, he doesn't have much of an obsession with becoming an official. Instead, he feels more comfortable retaining his identity as a businessman, and traveling around doing business in various places allows him to avoid the taboos of officialdom.

However, now that these sons of salt merchants have arrived, Li Yuande has to put on the airs of a senior official and tell them about some taboos in handling local affairs, lest these newcomers lose their newly acquired positions for making mistakes before they've even settled in.

Chen Pingliao, not wanting to interfere in personnel arrangements within the Special Operations Division's jurisdiction, voluntarily avoided the issue and went to find Sun Zhen.

Along the way, Sun Zhen drank and chatted with those Annamese officers every day, so he must have obtained a lot of valuable information. Chen Pingliao also wanted to see if he had already compiled the information.

Sun Zhen had already disembarked, but instead of moving into the military camp on the island, he had his men set up tents near the dock and stay there.

Chen Pingliao entered the military tent and saw that Sun Zhen was the only one inside, writing furiously at his desk. He smiled and teased, "Is the drinking party finally over?"

Sun Zhen looked up and replied, "These bastards! They originally agreed to stop once they crossed the Strait of Malacca, but they changed their minds after we docked. They said they wouldn't leave until they finished the wine they brought from Sanya, and they ended up drinking until the wee hours last night, almost ruining my business!"

Although Sun Zhen's tone was extremely impolite, there was a hint of a smile on his face, indicating that he had not suffered any loss at the dinner table, and that most of his drinking buddies were still unaware of what was happening.

Chen Pingliao cupped his hands and said, "Lord Sun, you have a truly impressive capacity for alcohol! I admire you!" Sun Zhen ignored Chen Pingliao's teasing and simply raised his arm to beckon him to sit down next to him.

Just as Chen Pingliao had predicted, Sun Zhen hadn't been living a life of debauchery these past few days; instead, he had been gathering relevant military intelligence over drinks.

As the saying goes, people speak the truth when they're drunk, and the Annamese officers who boarded the ship did indeed share a lot of their experiences and observations here. However, when it came to matters involving the special operations division's internal secrets, even if Sun Zhen was a former colleague, he couldn't get a single word out of them.

The intelligence information mentioned by the Annamese officer was not a military secret. If he waited until he met Qian Tiandun at Fubo Port before making a request, he would most likely be able to get it. However, if he was slow to act, he would be slow to act. By then, it would be too late to make corresponding adjustments to the troops from the Northern Region. Sun Zhen hoped to keep the initiative in his own hands.

Sun Zhen was currently writing down fragments of information he had gathered over the past few days. He had already categorized and organized them, and was just waiting to add the last few strokes.

After Chen Pingliao sat down, Sun Zhen pushed the information she had written in front of him and began to explain it in detail.

Although Sun Zhen was a rough and unrefined military general, his handwriting was neat and orderly, showing that he had put in a lot of effort in the army. If Chen Pingliao hadn't seen him write with his own eyes, he probably would have thought that it was written by one of his staff officers.

"Young Master Chen, please take a look. I have divided the information I have gathered into three categories: local customs and traditions, power distribution, and potential adversaries."

"Regarding local customs and traditions, we already know quite a bit. The questions I asked those Annamese officers were mainly to fill in the gaps, such as the situation inside Nahihu. The information I had read before was only a few paragraphs, which were not of much reference value."

"Fortunately, two of the officers we met this time were in charge of training the Hih-hu army. They had dealt with those Arabs for more than two years and were very familiar with their situation. They even mentioned a lot of information that we hadn't encountered before."

Sun Zhen took this matter very seriously, not only because he was the commander of the Northern Region's troop deployment, but also because another mission of his trip was to set an example for Chen Pingliao, so that the young master would gradually become familiar with the qualities a commander should have, and how to formulate various military plans in an unfamiliar environment.

Although Chen Pingliao had studied theory for several years at the military academy, he had few opportunities to actually lead troops in combat after returning to the northern region, let alone improve his command skills. Chen Yixin assigned him to the special operations division to give him more opportunities to experience real combat.

Sun Zhen was also a partner carefully chosen by Chen Yixin, and his qualifications and abilities are beyond doubt. As for how much Chen Pingliao can learn from Sun Zhen, it ultimately depends on his own understanding.

The two continued their study until lunchtime, when Sun Zhen stopped explaining and said to Chen Pingliao, "These materials are only for reference, because the sources of this information may not be 100% accurate, so ultimately we must rely on seeing for ourselves. Take a good look around the island these next two days and see if there are any discrepancies between this information and the data we have."

The number of immigrants brought from China was not large, but after arriving in Phuket, they all requested to settle there and were unwilling to leave.

The reason is actually quite simple. After several years of development, several thousand immigrants have settled here, and the supporting facilities are relatively complete. If you go thousands of miles further west, the development there started much later, and the living conditions may not be as good as those in Phuket.