Simulates history, but Chongzhen is the Divine Emperor at the beginning

Chapter 125: Sailing Trivia
[In front of Quanzhou Port, over a hundred small and medium-sized ships are about to set off, heading for the unknown seas just like Zheng He's fleet did back then... However, compared to Zheng He's, this fleet's destination is even more distant!]

[However, unlike Zheng He's massive treasure ships, the largest ship in your fleet is only about ten feet long...]

[This is also the result of your discussion with the court: Although the Ming Dynasty currently has ample manpower and resources, if it truly devoted all its efforts to shipbuilding, as it did during the Yongle era, it could indeed produce ships even more impressive than Zheng He's fleet... but that would be a real waste of manpower and money.]

[Plus, your goal on this trip was simply to visit the West to find some great scientists in history, so you really didn't need such an extravagant ship... So after discussion, the court agreed to resume the voyages to the West, but also placed strict restrictions on the size of the fleet.]

[And the final result is this: you can only requisition over a hundred official ships of varying sizes from the coastal areas to assemble a makeshift fleet...]

[You have no objection to this. After all, you are not the type to seek ostentation. As long as the court agrees, it's fine.]

[Just because you don't have any objections doesn't mean your fans don't... Especially the Jinyiwei led by "Yu Anmin" and others. These old guards who were promoted by you all feel insulted!]

[What is the status of the Prime Minister? He is the true monarch of the Ming Dynasty! ]

[The Ming emperor only brought a hundred or so small boats on his trip to the West? Who is this insulting?!]

Yu Anmin was furious, angrily calling the six ministers "traitors" who were neither loyal nor grateful!

[However, after your clear statement, he finally lost his temper and reluctantly accepted the result...]

[However, regarding your tour of the Western Ocean, he felt you weren't grand enough, so he planned to arrange for several thousand Jinyiwei to accompany you. If they saw any small country they disliked, they would simply destroy it. That would be considered glorious!]

[But you still refused, and personally finalized the accompanying personnel: 800 Jinyiwei were responsible for eliminating pirates and bandits along the way, thousands of civilians were responsible for negotiating trade with various countries, and then there was the "Journey to the West" team consisting of you, Li Laiheng and other veteran thieves...]

[The purpose of your trip is not to show off your wealth, nor to recruit tributary states, but to recruit talents from the West, and to open up trade routes between the Ming Dynasty and the countries of Southeast Asia!]

After all, although you don't want to engage in colonial expansion, the benefits of coastal trade are truly tempting, so you still want to get as much silver as possible into the national treasury to provide disaster relief and other purposes.

[However, the tribute trade before the Ming Dynasty was too abstract. Not only did it not generate any tangible wealth, it also disrupted the country's economy, causing the entire court, both civil and military, to collectively oppose it...]

So if you don't want to engage in tribute trade, just conduct normal trade. That way, trade can actually bring in substantial income for the court, rather than becoming something the emperor uses to boast about his merits.

[In short, trade must be opened, but the tribute trade of the Yongle period must be resisted. This is also your final contribution to the Ming Dynasty...]

[Yes, you have a premonition: your time...is running out.]

The limit of the Divine Emperor's hunger strike is drawing closer. In about twenty years at most, He will face an ominous old age and unleash a dark turmoil!

[Whether His dark turmoil this time manifests itself as the massacre of civilians or the slaughter of the Imperial Guards, it is difficult for you to accept.]

[Perhaps He still won't do anything to you then, but if something like that really happens, you will definitely commit suicide...]

So you want to make the most of your remaining time: maybe add a science course to the imperial examination curriculum, or suddenly want to resume voyages to the West and search for scientific talent.

[You know your actions are ridiculous, like castles in the air. After all, how could the Ming Dynasty suddenly embark on a technological path just because of your "Science" course?]

【Western scientists?】

Can they build an atomic bomb?

Obviously, all your efforts will not directly lead to the results you envision, because you lack so much accumulated technology and talent. It would be a wonder if you could achieve anything...

[But... there's nothing you can do.] [You've done everything you can. Under current historical conditions, you've already reached the upper limit of your era, but even then, you're still far from defeating the Divine Emperor!]

All your efforts and struggles are just placebos, with no real effect. Perhaps their only function is to comfort yourself and make you look like you have done a lot...

You are busy, but you don’t know what you are busy with.

You seem like a ridiculous lunatic. Facing a drowning person crying for help in the river, you can't do anything to help him because you can't swim. All you can do is hold out a straw that's only the length of your hand to him under his strange gaze, and frantically yell at him to grab it so you can pull him out...

[How ridiculous! How sad! How pitiful! How lamentable!]

[This is you, the Prime Minister of the Ming Dynasty, the ruler admired by all, the sage ruler of the Three Dynasties in the Confucian tradition! And... the incompetent lunatic: Zhou Liang, also known as Zhou Zifang.]

【…】

[The fleet set sail.]

Under the worried gazes of Yu Anmin and other officials in the court, your ship slowly sailed away from Quanzhou Harbor. It then joined over a hundred small and medium-sized vessels, and, pushed further and further from shore by the wind, it sailed away from the shore.

[Until the entire coastline becomes a thin line, and the people on the shore can no longer be seen...]

"Master, please return to the cabin. It's cold outside."

Lee Lai-hyung, his beard all white, cautiously advised you, and after this advice, you finally stopped looking at the distant shore... You only sighed softly, and then entered the cabin with him...

In the ninety-sixth year of the Chongzhen reign, you embarked on a long sea voyage with this cobbled-together official fleet. Although the Ming Dynasty had no experience in ocean voyages, as long as you try to stay on land, there should generally be no problems.

[Next, you will travel south from the East China Sea, first to the South China Sea, and then gradually westward...]

For ordinary fleets, this kind of voyage was extremely dangerous, as not only were there threats like wind and rain along the way, but they also faced pirate attacks... These included pirates from the Ming Dynasty, indigenous pirates from Southeast Asian nations, and even "official pirates" from Western colonists... Faced with so many threats, private fleets were basically unable to survive.

[But you are different. When the Great Ming Sun Moon Dragon Flag is hoisted, everyone who sees it will be afraid!]

[After all, the reputation of the Divine Emperor, a humanoid nuclear bomb, is too terrifying...]

[Although there were occasionally some blind men who sought to cause trouble, under the might of the Imperial Guards, the pirates were left with nothing but bloodshed and ultimately captured.]

[And so, you sailed uneventfully through the South China Sea, and amidst the welcoming throngs of small nations, you entered a foreign land vastly different from the Ming Dynasty.]

[However, you didn't have time to appreciate foreign customs, because once you revealed your identity as an official Ming Dynasty trading fleet, a large number of indigenous chiefs and kings of small countries knelt on your ship in ecstasy!]

They don't want to trade, nor do they want tribute. They only have one request...

【Included! 】

[Brothers, we've always wanted to be Ming Dynasty people! ]

……

(End of this chapter)