The world of film and television begins with the God of Medicine.

Chapter 1517 Resisting the Japanese Pirates

It's already July, which means autumn has arrived. In addition, we are currently in the Little Ice Age, and there is no heat island effect like in modern cities, so it is still quite cool at night.

At the house by the dock, all the windows were open, a cool breeze was blowing, and cicadas were chirping. Wang Yan, shirtless and wearing shorts, felt very comfortable.

However, this comfort did not last long before it was interrupted by the sound of someone rushing in through the door.

"Third Master! Third Master!" Qi Dazhu rushed in anxiously. He was slightly taken aback when he saw Wang Yan already sitting there. He then quickly said, "Japanese pirates are coming from the east. Their boats are moored in the river. They are sneaking towards the county town."

Wang Yan instructed, "Send someone to report to Minister Hu, have the brothers assemble, send a hundred men to guard their ships, and the rest of you come with me to fight the Japanese pirates from behind."

"Third Master, I'll go instead. You can stay behind and oversee things."

"Go and relay the order." Wang Yan gave him a light kick, then got up, put on his clothes, and found two local militiamen to put leather armor on him.

In their fight against the Japanese pirates, they mostly used paper armor, which did not rust or break, was inexpensive to manufacture, and was also much lighter. It was even more effective against firearm bullets.

Wang Yan's leather armor was a set that Zhu Qi had transferred to him from the local garrison, along with a long sword. They got it all to him without any paperwork; Zhu Qi was incredibly efficient and decisive, even taking the risks.

Soon, Wang Yan was dressed, put on his helmet, and walked out with his hand on his knife.

The sky is beautiful tonight. Although it's a crescent moon, the countless stars illuminate the earth with a soft glow, enough for even those with night blindness to barely see their surroundings.

For Wang Yan, it was even brighter. After all, his organs had been enhanced in all aspects, his eyes were more developed, and he could receive and process more information. This dim light was definitely different from bright light in his eyes, but he could still see everything clearly and distinctly.

Although the assembly took some time, the troops, thanks to their constant training, behaved in a measured manner and did not panic much because they were about to fight a deadly battle with the Japanese pirates.

Dealing with the Japanese pirates was no easy task, because they didn't fight positional battles or try to seize advantageous positions. They would infiltrate with the help of smuggling merchants, cause damage, loot, and then leave.

This puts the defending side in a difficult position. Chun'an County has to be guarded, as there is a river within its borders and the people live in different places. They don't know where the Japanese pirates will come from, making it virtually impossible to defend against them.

However, it's impractical to mobilize all the able-bodied men from the county's militia; what if that disrupts production? The entire Chun'an County has a population of over 40,000, but only about 10,000 are able-bodied adults. The county's agricultural work, housing construction, and other public works all depend on these men.

Therefore, Wang Yan did not mobilize many men to deal with the Japanese pirates. Only three thousand men were conscripted in total, divided into three groups. One thousand were stationed in the county seat, and the other two groups each had one thousand men. This was to maximize coverage across the entire county, responding to the pirates as quickly as possible and minimizing damage.

In the county town, there were 500 soldiers guarding the town and another 500 patrolling the surrounding area.

The people gathered here now are these five hundred men from outside the city.

“The Japanese pirates came and harmed our wives and daughters, killed our parents, destroyed our fields, and defiled our newly built red brick houses. They have harmed several generations of our people. The blood debt must be repaid in blood.”

Now the Japanese pirates are here again. We cannot tolerate them causing trouble on our land. We must kill them and capture them. There is still a lot of work to be done in the county. Once we capture them, we will treat them like livestock.

Tonight, I, your master, will personally lead the charge in the battle. Those who die or are wounded will be compensated by the government, ensuring my brothers have no worries. Those who survive will also receive their due rewards. As long as I live, these words stand.

Without further ado, now, follow me to kill the Japanese invaders!

"Kill the Japanese!"

"Kill the Japanese!"

"Kill the Japanese!"

"Are you stupid? Why are you shouting so loudly? What if you disturb the Japanese pirates and they escape? Let's go!"

Wang Yan waved his hand in dissatisfaction, stopping the hot-blooded young men. He then gave some simple instructions, ordered an attack from two directions, and led his team off.

As for more specific close-quarters combat techniques, those are used during daily training, and how well they can utilize them depends on themselves.

Soon, after running for only half an hour, Wang Yan and his group reached the rear of the Japanese pirates.

Without uttering a single word, Wang Yan silently drew his sword. After firing a volley of arrows, he led a group of men wielding long swords and spears and charged forward.

"Kill!"

Wang Yan didn't shout that; it was Qi Dazhu who did. He was running alongside Wang Yan, and when he saw Wang Yan looking at him, he even took a moment to scratch his head.

"Third Master, I just don't feel right if I don't shout it out."

"Take care of yourself, don't worry about me."

Wang Yan didn't say anything more. He covered the more than 100 meters in the blink of an eye, swung his knife first, and a head flew high into the air, blood gushing out...

"kill!"

The shouts of battle echoed far into the night, and for a moment, the surrounding area was filled with the sounds of roosters crowing and dogs barking.

Qi Dazhu and several of his brothers stayed close to Wang Yan, trying to protect the Third Master from injury or even death.

Although Hai Rui's continuous efforts to do practical things were seen by the people and earned them their genuine love and respect, it still couldn't shake the Third Master's prestige. If the Third Master were to die here, they themselves would have to be buried with him, otherwise they wouldn't be able to withstand the contempt of the people of Chun'an.

However, they were being far too simplistic, assuming that the Third Master had only practiced a few moves. After all, they could see him running around the county town and practicing boxing every morning, and for a period of time, he even trained with the local militia.

None of them had ever seen the Third Master in action before, so they never imagined that he would be so fierce in a real battle, with no one able to withstand a single blow from him, cutting straight through the Japanese pirates' ranks. He even managed to shield them from a few blows during the fight.

Such behavior shows absolutely no trace of the scholarly air of a virtuous scholar; he's practically a peerless warrior on the battlefield...

"Third Master!" Wang Yan nodded calmly, surveyed the battlefield, and said, "If we break through their defenses, these Japanese pirates will be basically defeated. You don't need to worry about me. Go help the brothers fight for a while, and chase after those who are fleeing. Go."

So Qi Dazhu and the others joined the battle and helped kill the Japanese pirates.

Wang Yan stood there, leaning on his sword, watching the two sides fight. Occasionally, someone would come at him, but he would easily take them down with a single slash.

The battle, which lasted no more than ten minutes, was over in which Wang Yan led his scattered troops against the Japanese pirates.

However, dealing with the various post-war matters did not continue until noon of the following day.

"Third Master, we killed a total of 178 people, captured 359 people alive, and more than 100 people escaped. We lost 49 people, 76 people were seriously injured, and countless others were slightly injured."

Tian Youlu finally gathered the information and reported it to Wang Yan and Hai Rui during lunchtime.

Hai Rui asked, "How is the compensation calculated?"

"Fifty taels of silver for each dead person, ten mu of land exempt from tax for ten years, and all debts incurred for building houses and converting rice paddies to mulberry fields will be waived. Twenty taels of silver for each seriously wounded person, five mu of land exempt from tax for ten years, and all debts incurred will also be waived. In addition, all participants in the war will receive five taels of silver each. We can still make these decisions, what does Your Excellency think?"

Wang Yan spoke fluently and generously, and the compensation he provided was quite good; the death of one in battle truly made life better for the family.

"They were all able-bodied men who fought to the death for Chun'an; we can give them whatever we want. But the yamen has no money right now, and we've exempted the entire county from land taxes for three years. How can we come up with any compensation? You're the registrar; don't you know about this? We can't expect any rewards from above either; even Minister Hu's army is struggling to pay its military expenses..."

"Of course I know." Wang Yan took a sip of rice wine and ate some fish. "Didn't the Weaving Bureau promise to buy raw silk from our county at market price?"

"That's the people's money!" Hai Rui exclaimed, his eyes wide.

"Don't worry, why would I touch the people's money? Your Honor, have you forgotten what I told you about the circulation of money? If the people have money in their hands, they will definitely spend it."

Wang Yanxiang ate his food with relish, muttering, "After making money, I'll buy some cloth to make clothes, some oil to replenish my body, some candy to sweeten the children's mouths, some medicine to treat my chronic illnesses at the pharmacy, and soon it will be winter, so I'll need to make some cotton clothes to keep warm. The children in the family will be going to school, so I'll need to buy some writing materials. All these things will cost money."

The wealthy families in our county have all been dealt with, and commerce has declined. Our county government has taken over and is barely managing to keep things running. Now that the people have money in their hands, those shops will be easier to sell. Selling the shops is one source of income, and collecting taxes from the goods sold in those shops will be another. Making up for the pensions of these local militia members won't be a problem, will it?
I'll first rent a shop, specializing in selling meat. I'll owe the money to them initially, and pay them back when I have the funds.

Hai Rui glared at him: "You still owe the government for your daily meals."

"It's a small matter. You've seen my white glass before. It's more profitable than cement. How could it possibly affect my food and drink? Speaking of which, His Majesty should receive the glass around the time we send our victory report."

Wang Yan waved his hand and then said, "Second Master, everything is settled. Quickly write a battle report and send it to all levels of government to report the victory. Also, send someone to Hangzhou to spread the word that the people of Chun'an have money and that the shops in the city are going to be sold, to attract them to come and take over."

"Alright." Tian Youlu didn't complain at all. He took a big bite of meat, resignedly got up and left the table to write the victory report and arrange for people to spread the advertisements.

Hai Rui took a sip of wine and asked, "You'll do these things?"

“You’re the boss, of course you should come. I don’t have the time. I learned about their hiding places from the prisoners we captured. I’ll leave this afternoon and take men there to wipe them out. They also implicated several large families who colluded with the Japanese, which aren’t far from Chun’an. I’ll take men there on my way and ransack their homes.”

"Isn't that inappropriate? To confiscate property and arrest people based solely on the Japanese pirates' one-sided account seems rather..."

"The military situation is urgent, so we can't worry about all that. Anyway, there are no good people in wealthy families. Let's arrest them and confiscate their property first. I don't believe we can't find their faults in the Ming Dynasty law. As for the officials elsewhere, let them sue us wherever they want. We'll just get our share of the benefits."

Hai Rui glared again, because what Wang Yan said was too outrageous. How could an official act like that? How could anyone handle things like that?

“My lord, sometimes you shouldn’t be so rigid. I’m currently enjoying the Emperor’s favor, so I should make use of it. At this time, a small mistake is considered as no mistake, and a big mistake is considered as a small mistake. As long as it can be explained and His Majesty protects me, nothing will happen. If I don’t take advantage of this time to do more things, it would be a huge loss if I couldn’t do them when I wanted to.”

Wang Yan raised his glass, "Actually, even without the Emperor's favor, we wouldn't be in any trouble. Think about it, the Japanese pirates have even come all the way to our side this time, which means their activities are quite extensive. Our record is impressive: no surrenders, no harm to civilians, no holding out in cities, over a hundred enemy soldiers killed, and three hundred captured alive. Not to mention Zhejiang, it's quite remarkable in the entire southeastern battlefield."

So, as long as we don't rebel or cause trouble, everything will be fine. Besides, I got this information by killing Japanese pirates; in wartime, there's no time to ask for instructions, so I should act expediently. Alright, that's settled then. Take good care of things in the county, and don't sell the shop too cheaply. I'll be back in ten days to two weeks.”

It sounded like Wang Yan was assigning tasks to Hai Rui, the county magistrate, but Hai Rui didn't disagree; he simply expressed his dissatisfaction once again with Wang Yan's methods and attitude...

This was a common occurrence; whenever Wang Yan and Hai Rui discussed matters together, Wang Yan would always get a glare from Hai Rui.

Just as Hai Rui was giving him a glaring farewell, Wang Yan led his troops to kill the Japanese pirates that very afternoon...

"Chun'an? Wang Yan? Victory report?"

Hu Zongxian looked at the messenger who was panting heavily as he ran into the tent with a puzzled expression. He took the letter and then ordered someone to take the messenger away to rest. He then opened the letter and began to read the detailed battle report.

"Great!" After watching it, he couldn't help but exclaim in admiration, especially after hearing that Wang Yan personally led the charge and beheaded sixteen enemies.

Even if Wang Yan stole the heads of his own militiamen, it wouldn't matter, because the news that Wang Yan personally led the charge with a sword couldn't be faked. In the present Ming Dynasty, there weren't many civil officials like Wang Yan who dared to act like him.

"My lord, what good news is there? Has the military supplies been resolved?" Qi Jiguang walked into the tent and asked Hu Zongxian, who had a smile on his face.

"Military supplies aren't so easy to come by. Here's the battle report from Chun'an, take a look."

After reading it, Qi Jiguang smiled and praised, "I have long heard of the name of Registrar Wang, but I did not expect him to have such courage. He is indeed worthy of His Majesty's high regard."

Qi Jiguang had been subdued by the civil officials; he was a cautious and meticulous person, and his words were always very eloquent. Didn't he have any doubts? He didn't say anything.

Hu Zongxian glanced at him and said, "It's still good news. Let's send it to His Majesty to make him happy."

They then discussed strategies for fighting the Japanese pirates with Qi Jiguang, and the lights in the military tent stayed on all night...

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