The Han culture is spreading strongly in Southeast Asia

Chapter 82 River Fairy
The salty and humid breeze from the South China Sea blows briskly across this port city in the Mekong Delta.

In this September in Southeast Asia dominated by heat waves, a cool breeze, even if it has a slightly unpleasant smell, is precious.

The children on the street raised their hands high, trying their best to expand the area exposed to the wind and enjoy this rare coolness.

Hexian is backed by Pingshan Mountain and faces the sea, and is known for its beautiful scenery.

The city is nestled against the fairly tall Pingshan Mountain in the north, and the entire city can be overlooked from the mountainside. The slope from the foot of the mountain to the mountainside is steep, and there are many strange rocks around. In addition, the roads are narrow, making it easy to defend but difficult to attack.

After two generations of management, the Mo family built Wuding City, a fortress on the mountainside that symbolized their ruling power.

Wuding City is located in layers, with a radius of more than four miles.

The brick-and-earth mixed city wall could accommodate more than five people side by side. It was equipped with ten 24-pound naval guns bought from the Fulangsa people (France), and the defense was very tight.

In addition to the fortress of Wuding City, Hexian also has a town surrounded by wooden fences, surrounded by large tracts of fertile farmland.

Before the arrival of the Chinese, the Mekong Delta was far less prosperous than it is today.

Due to the lack of human activities, it is covered with swamps, and the large and small pools are filled with crocodiles and pythons. As for the giant gadflies and swarms of mosquitoes and poisonous snakes, they are so rare that they are not worth mentioning.

The productivity of the Chenla people who were born here is extremely low, and they have completely lost the passion and positivity of the Khmer Empire period.

It was like a beautiful dream. When they woke up, the Zhenla people returned to the same life as their ancestors two thousand years ago.

When they are hungry, they pick fruits from the trees. When they are thirsty, they drink water from the river. Planting depends entirely on their mood and fate. Taking the initiative to catch fish is considered hard work. Killing a crocodile is a great achievement, and the whole tribe will have a feast in the evening.

With such productivity and temperament, it is naturally impossible to control the Mekong Delta, which is prone to floods and swamps.

The approach of high emotional intelligence is called maintaining the ecology, while the approach of low emotional intelligence is called laziness.

This situation did not begin to change until the Chinese moved south on a large scale.

The Chinese, mainly from Fujian, Guangdong, Guangxi and Hainan, built dams and dikes, leveled the land, dug canals and drained swamps in the Mekong River basin.

They reclaimed vast tracts of wasteland and confined the Mekong River and its tributaries, which had been running rampant for tens of thousands of years, to a fixed river channel.

It can be said that without the Chinese people going to Southeast Asia, there would be no prosperous Mekong Delta in later generations.

The town of Ha Tien is divided into two areas: the town and the port.

Today, it seemed that all the river immortals had flocked to the port.

Nguyen Dynasty of Quang Nam appointed him General of Ha Tien Town, secretly regarded himself as General of Leizhou Town of Ming Dynasty, called himself the King of Cambodia to Europeans, but was called the King of the Port State by Europeans. He stood in the center of the crowd with his eldest son Nguyen Zihuang and his three sons.

On his left, there were several men wearing red Ming Dynasty official robes, who looked very conspicuous. The leader was chatting with Ou Tianci.

People who are familiar with the political landscape of Ha Tien could not help but be amazed. After so many years, this was the first time that Chen Dasheng, the head of the Chen family of Gia Dinh, came to Ha Tien.

In recent years, the unification of the Zhou and Chen families has become increasingly unrealistic, and the Guangnan Kingdom has gained strength in Jiading, which has suppressed the Chen family.

Although the Chen family still has contacts with Hexian, the leaders of the Chen family rarely come to Hexian, let alone the head of the family, Chen Dasheng, who comes in person.

"Here it comes, here it comes, the fleet is back!" Suddenly, the small boat sent out for transportation from Hexian Port came back at lightning speed.

The pilot on the small boat was still waving a red flag to inform the shore, and the crowd gathered at the port immediately became excited.

Not long after, large ships slowly sailed into the Hexian Port amidst jubilation.

There were two loud bangs, and the Treasure gently tilted its ship in the distance, and then four six-pound cannons made huge roars one after another.

This was a salute from an unloaded gun.

Immediately afterwards, more than a dozen large Chinese and foreign ships in the Ha Tien port also organized their crews to line up in formal attire and then fired guns into the sky to express their welcome.

Li Xianwen, wearing a brocade robe and a wingless black gauze hat, was the first to get off the treasure ship.

Behind him, thirty elite soldiers of the Hexian army, thirty red-coat and silver-sword soldiers of the Chen family, and one hundred French and Prussian mercenaries filed down.

The elite soldiers of Haxian were dressed in cyan uniforms and armed with 1750 Irish harp flintlock rifles.

The Chen family's red-coat and silver-sword soldiers wore bright red uniforms with exposed arms, red military caps on their heads, and held rattan shields and silver swords in their hands.

One hundred European mercenaries were collectively dressed in white trousers, white shirts, and tricorn hats. They all held flintlock rifles with bayonets and pulled four three-pound Austrian field guns.

Well, it looks a bit out of place, but there is no way. The current military uniforms of the British and French armies are not cheap, and it is too hot in Southeast Asia and India, so it is basically impossible to wear their European military uniforms. Therefore, the group of European mercenaries recruited by Mo Zibu did not have a unified military uniform at all.

Even this awkward outfit of white shirt, white pants and a three-legged hat was "bought" by Mo Zibu from a Dutch tailor in Ceylon. It took a lot of effort.

But only Mo Zibu thought that the outfit was awkward. Except for him, no one else, including Lieutenant Colonel Bruno, Captain Jacques, Captain Frederick and Li Xianwen, thought it was awkward and they thought it looked good.

Of course, Ou Tianci and others also thought it was good.

Li Xianwen was so excited that his breathing became rapid. Following Mo Zibu's instructions, he quickly stepped forward and saluted Zou Tianci with his fists clasped.

"Sir, the Kunlun Mountain Fleet has returned from a nine-month expedition, conquering three cities, capturing two kings, and seizing twenty cannons and five hundred muskets.

Thirteen merchant ships, all crew members returned safely, earning a total of over fifty thousand taels of silver."

"Wow!" The crowd exclaimed.

Although there were thirteen ships that went out to sea with the fleet, seven of them were loaded with rice, which was not very valuable. Five of these seven ships returned to Ha Tien after completing the transactions in Songkhla and Batavia.

The remaining two ships also went to India basically empty, and were actually used as troop transport ships.

In other words, Mo Zibu earned more than 50,000 taels with just six ships, and on average each ship had a net profit of at least 9,000 taels.

Well, actually, it was more than that, because the cargo on one ship was sold to the British East India Company by Mo Zibu at a fair price. In other words, the net profit of one ship was more than 12,000 taels.

This is a very, very amazing statistic. For such a short voyage, the profit is equivalent to 70% of the profit of sailing to Europe.

Ou Tianci was also very happy, but this was not what he cared about most.

After the great development in recent years, Ha Tien is not short of money. Ou Tianci knows very well that in this chaotic Nanyang, no matter how much money you have, it will be useless without strength.

Li Xianwen also knew what Ou Tianci was waiting for. After Ou Tianci waved his hand to signal the crowd at the port to quiet down, Li Xianwen bowed again and asked:
"The warriors of Kunlun Mountain Hall, grateful for the kindness of the General, have been commissioned by the Dragon Head and would like to perform a drill to express our gratitude!"

"Okay!" Ou Tianci, who had communicated with him long ago, waved his hand and seemed a little excited.

Li Xianwen received the order and ordered the drummers and musicians to play music, and then held the order flags and presented them to the four team leaders.

The four teams immediately rushed to the team with flags, and then the 160 elite soldiers began to drill under the command of the flags.

The specific content is actually not complicated.

One is a street search battle with sword and shield soldiers in front and musketeers in the back.

Second, the soldiers quickly formed three rows of horizontal lines at the command, with artillery in the middle, and attacked forward in a formation coordinated by infantry and artillery.

The third one formed a hollow square formation, with the sword and shield soldiers changing into long spears and forming a formation with some flintlock soldiers with bayonets.

The remaining musketeers demonstrated three rounds of attack, and the artillerymen were in the hollow square formation. The musketeers and artillerymen cooperated with each other to bombard the enemy cavalry.

To be honest, this level is not too high, at least there is a big gap between it and the elite troops of the European powers, and it is also inferior to the nine-to-ten consecutive troops of the Eight Banners elite of the Qing Dynasty and the Green Camp elite troops.

But in Southeast Asia, it should be stronger than the armies of Siam and the Northern Zheng and Southern Nguyen armies, and should be able to fight back and forth with the elite troops of the Burmese army, the current overlord of Southeast Asia.

However, the soldiers under Mo Zibu's command were much better at drills than they were at actual skill.

why?

I can't say anything about Mo Zibu's other military knowledge, but he is definitely familiar with training formations.

Although he has never been a soldier, the military training he attended in junior high school, high school and university were all of high standards and were definitely not just for the sake of getting by. The military training in high school and university also included live-fire shooting events.

In addition, students of later generations, from elementary school to university, basically spent their time in queue training and discipline training.

It is no exaggeration to say that if high school students from later generations traveled back to ancient times, they would be far ahead of their contemporaries in terms of discipline and queues.

Therefore, it is difficult to say anything else, but under the personal supervision of Mo Zibu, the formation training of Kunlun Mountain Hall is definitely the best among all the armies at that time.

Even in Europe at that time, the methods of queue training were not yet mature, and the major powers were still groping for it.

This can be considered a great advantage for a time traveler.

At least everyone on the dock was deeply shocked.

They watched as the soldiers of Kunlun Mountain Hall, under the command of flags, drums, music and slogans, more than a hundred people acted as one, performing various tactical moves, and shouting and killing, shaking the roof tiles.

After the performance, they all saluted Ou Tianci with a European military salute and shouted "Victory" three times.

Ou Tianci was so shocked that he didn't know how to respond and was in a panic for a long time.

After the exercise, thousands of people in the port suddenly fell silent. After a while, thunderous cheers rang out.

Well, after all, you are from a small place and don’t have much knowledge.

It can also be said that the people of Hexian, whose country was destroyed, have not seen any regular army since they left the mainland for more than a hundred years.

Ou Tianci's face flushed with excitement. He walked back and forth quickly, looking at the more than one hundred soldiers brought back by Li Xianwen as if he had seen his life.

"They obey orders with impunity, and their troops are under their command. They are an elite force unlike anything we have ever seen!" Ou Tianci pointed to the distance and said to Chen Dasheng beside him:

"Brother, please look. The soldiers of our two families were originally ordinary, but after several months of training by Ah Wu, they have become fierce tigers from the south. I'm afraid they are no less powerful than the elite soldiers of the Ming Dynasty when my father-in-law was alive!"

Chen Dasheng grabbed Ou Tianci's hand, and suddenly realized what Ou Tianci meant by insisting on him coming.

Since the passing of heroic founders like Ou Jiu and Chen Shangchuan, there have been few commendable figures among the descendants of the two Ou families in terms of military affairs.

Even his brother Chen Dading could only be described as the son of a tiger father and a dog, with only mediocre talent.

It’s as if the luck and talents of the descendants have been used up by their ancestors.

In this southern part of the world, the consequences of a lack of military fortune are extremely serious.

It can be said that the Chen family had the first-mover advantage, but after Chen Shangchuan's death, they were quickly squeezed out by the Ruan family and almost unable to survive, because no one could train an elite army for the Chen family to defend themselves.

The same goes for the Nguyen family. The commercial tax in Ha Tien is almost equal to the income of the Nguyen family in Quang Nam, and the annual surplus is even much higher than that of the Quang Nam Kingdom.

However, such abundant financial resources did not translate into advantages for Ha Tien.

Although Ou Tianci had a lot of money, he was always suppressed militarily by Guangnan's 8,000 regular soldiers in Jiading. This was also because the Ou family did not have a general who could train and lead troops.

But now, the sudden appearance of Mo Zibu finally gave them hope. With the guarantee of military force, the stagnant integration of Mo and Chen seemed to be able to move forward again.

Chen Dasheng excitedly grabbed Mo Tianci's hand and said, "Brother-in-law, the future of our two families, and of the Tiannan Mingxiang people, will be in Ah Wu's hands."

Hearing what Chen Dasheng said, everyone around him, whether from the Ou family or the Chen family, showed expressions of joy or surprise.

Only one person, Ou Tianci's eldest son Ou Zihuang, had a pale face and a look of shock and doubt in his eyes.

(End of this chapter)