my days with tyrants

On the same day Zhu Di set off, a whaling ship was sailing in the distant Eastern Pacific.

"Old Wu, it's been three months."

On the deck, the disheveled captain Han Zhong looked at the guide who was chewing on the can.

They are the military households of the Mito Senhu Station.

Of course, the coastal guard stations under the Fuso Capital Command and Envoy Department all have their own whaling fleets.

In fact, no military household in Fusang farmed their own land at this time. Although they all had their own fiefdoms. Depending on the land conditions, a military household could have as little as 50 acres or more than [-] acres. However, those who farmed were all He tribe tenants or simply serfs. During the harvest season every year, a prescribed amount of grain was sent to the city and handed over to them.As for these military households, those who are on duty are paid, and those who are not on duty are willing to hold on to the small amount of food to eat all day long, so they can live a peaceful life, but in fact they are engaged in industry and commerce, such as the coastal guard's fishery, aquatic product processing, and whaling. Of course, industry is also a popular choice.

This is the most profitable.

Although it is indeed hard and dangerous.

But according to the current Ming Dynasty culture, seeking wealth and wealth through risk is the mainstream.

Han Zhong and others took the pursuit of wealth and risk to the extreme, because they were tempted by Lao Wu, who had participated in the trip to the Americas, to go to the Americas to make a fortune privately. During the latter's trip to the Americas, he discovered that the natives had many gems in their hands. Especially emeralds, and because they don't know how to smelt iron, they can exchange a lot of gems with an ordinary knife.

If you can go back to America, you can use Ming Dynasty's cheap ironware, silk, sucrose, etc. in exchange for a large number of gems.

Then sell them to the mainland to make a fortune.

Isn’t this better than whaling?

Anyway, after a whaling ship like theirs goes to sea, it usually takes several months to sail. It often takes half a year or even almost a year for a whaling ship to return due to various reasons. This kind of job is to chase whales, especially sperm whales, and catch them. After that, it will be processed directly on the ship, and then the ship will return when it is full.

The time is not right at all.

In this case, why not come to America?
So they sailed for three months relying on an official chart, rich navigation experience, and Lao Wu as their guide.

Moreover, it was three months without any sight of land. There was not even an island along the way. They could only eat canned food and drink the stinky accumulated rainwater. Several people even died, but until now, there are still It's a seemingly endless blue.

"almost!"

Lao Wu could only answer like this.

In fact, he was a little panicked, because it took him two months of sailing with Zheng He to reach land.

Of course, what he didn't know was that because Zheng He had more accurate nautical charts and a full set of ocean currents, monsoons and other information, he first arrived in North America, and then went south along the coastline, and he was in the Ming army. There are nautical charts for every ship in it, and there is no information about ocean currents, so they never reached North America. They were pushed south by ocean currents hundreds of kilometers away from modern San Francisco.

Fortunately, he finally arrived.

"Port side, land!"

As soon as he finished speaking, the equally unkempt observer above his head howled like crazy.

Everyone on the deck jumped up, then threw themselves to the port side with eyes wide open. Han Zhong and Lao Wu rushed to the mast as if they were resurrected, and then quickly climbed to the top at an unprecedented speed, holding up their binoculars and looking a little further away. The faint green...

"Quick, turn the rudder!"

Han Zhong shouted with a trembling voice.

Their [-]-ton schooner quickly completed the turn.

Half an hour later, they approached the coast. Han Zhong, who did not care about measuring the water depth, immediately ordered the boat to be put down and then he and Lao Wu boarded the boat together. In order to prevent accidents, they even put on armors, one person with one person. He has a flintlock short musket, but he carries a long sword. After all, the stone-based weapons of the natives cannot break the defense of plate armor at all, and they also have no protection worthy of muskets. In this case, the plate armor plus the length of the sword The configuration is sufficient.The whaling ship anchored half a mile from the coast, and then prepared the only eight small cannons on the deck. They rowed to the shore under the protection of the artillery behind them. Soon the small boat docked, and the two The man took four sailors and watched the shore carefully.There was a village in front of them, but it was silent for some reason. There were even a few fishing canoes floating on the coast. In this weird silence, they continued to move forward.

"No, it smells like corpse!"

Han Zhong said suddenly.

He and Lao Wu looked at each other, holding the long knife with both hands.

The two sailors behind guarded the left and right with their spears.

The last two sailors held blunderbuss.

The six people moved forward cautiously, and soon a rotting corpse appeared in front of them.

Han Zhong picked it with a long knife.

"There are no wounds," he said.

Then they moved on.

As we approached the village, the strong smell of corpses was already suffocating us.

They speeded up, and then one corpse appeared in front of them. Han Zhong quickly picked up the corpse on the ground, but there were no wounds on the corpses...

"Quickly retreat, it's a plague!"

Lao Wu suddenly shouted in horror.

Everyone woke up instantly, including Han Zhong, who was so frightened that he turned around as fast as possible and ran towards the boat. Han Zhong suddenly remembered that he had even thrown away his long knife, and the six of them were chasing each other as if they were being chased by monsters. They got into the boat and immediately rowed away in fear. Soon they climbed back on the boat while the sailors on the boat looked at them in astonishment...

"Come on, get out of here!"

Han Zhong shouted.

Amid the chaotic bustle of the sailors, the ship weighed anchor and sailed away from the coast.

Fortunately, after sailing for half an hour, they found an uninhabited river mouth, and then they anchored again, then rowed the boat down to replenish fresh water, and found several kinds of fresh water that Old Wu had eaten on the shore. The sailors on the boat also caught some fish, and a group of people spent their first night in America on the boat.The next day they continued to set sail and found a second village not far away. This time they were careful and selected a sailor by drawing lots. The latter rowed ashore alone, but soon ran back in fear. This village was full of people. Only the bones remain.They had no choice but to continue heading south, and after two days they arrived at the first port where there were still living people. However, they did not dare to go there and just looked through the binoculars. But then Han Zhong suddenly discovered a problem.

They don't seem to be sick.

There are doctors on board their ships. In fact, all warships and merchant ships of the Ming Dynasty have doctors.

The doctor who was taught by Edo Wei Medicine told them as if he was very experienced that if it was an airborne plague, they would definitely be doomed. After all, Han Zhong and the others had entered the village. Since they are still fine now, then It can only prove that it is not airborne.

Since you are so afraid of a bird!

Of course, the key is that if you don’t dare to get off the ship, how can you make a fortune this time?

Are you going back empty-handed?

After sailing for more than three months, we have already arrived in America, just to make a fortune. Now we are here but we dare not get off the ship, so how can we make a fortune?
Besides, even if we go back, we still need to replenish food, otherwise we won’t have anything to eat on the way.

In the end, under the stimulation of the gem, Han Zhong gritted his teeth and gave up.

disembark.

Then he led his men to the dock.

"Burn it, set it on fire!"

he shouted as soon as he landed.

The sailors held torches, and under the numb gaze of the living natives, they poured the whale oil they carried on all the dead bodies they met and set them on fire. They also set fire to the houses with no living people. In short, they were burned. .And those natives who were still alive didn't even stop them. They were like walking zombies, watching them set fires everywhere.But then Lao Wu took the sailors and drove them aside. The doctor took his Huang Ming Medical Code and followed the standard epidemic prevention practices of the Ming Dynasty. The first step was to isolate them and drive aside those who looked healthy. Obviously Those who were already sick rushed aside.Then they took out a large pot for boiling whale oil from the ship, boiled the water, added concentrated salt, let it cool down, and drove the healthy ones in first to sterilize them, then burned all their clothes and the like. There was definitely no medicine, and I didn’t even know. What kind of plague is it? The doctor is just a barefoot doctor, and he can't be expected to know much about what kind of plague it is.

But fortunately there are willow trees nearby.

Then boil the water and drink it.

Anyway, whether it is useful or not is a dead horse.

In short, they were led by doctors here, and according to the Huang Ming Medical Code, they tried all kinds of methods on the living natives as if they were disregarding human life. The latter were already numb at this time and had no resistance at all. At their mercy, most of them were miraculously saved...

What the natives contracted was not smallpox.

In fact, it was impossible for Zheng He's fleet to carry smallpox patients, but the problem was that most of the germs on their bodies were ones that the Indians had never been exposed to, and any one of them could cause a plague of this level.And their treatment methods are also effective, so even if they are deceived, they can be deceived, not to mention that those who are still alive at this time have relatively strong resistance.After half a month of struggle, they actually restored the port to life, and the natives regarded them as gods. Although the two sides still couldn't understand each other in language, they could understand each other more or less. Those natives After understanding what they wanted, he immediately took them to the inland city.Until this time, Han Zhong and his men still had no one infected with the disease, and they were completely relieved. It was obvious that the plague would not harm them. In this case, of course they continued to the inland.

A few days later, they arrived in a city that was also in the plague. After the natives who led them told the city lord that they were gods and could cure the plague, they were immediately worshiped by the survivors in the city.

All that's left is to continue treating the disease.

It's still the same as before, even the doctor has some experience and is more efficient.

In order to thank them, the city lord ordered to collect all the gems he could and dedicated them to the gods who saved them.

Finally, a month later, when they left the city after eliminating the plague, they actually brought hundreds of kilograms of various gems with them...