Bringing the Railway to Daming

I don’t know whether it was due to poor communication by the translator or the people of Naghadaha didn’t believe it, but after the 8,000 Chu vassal army landed and lined up at the dock, they still didn’t open the gate to surrender.

Zhu Zhen immediately ordered, "Let the local soldiers attack this stronghold, so that I can see their quality."

"Yes, sir!" Zhang Xiangdeng responded and ordered the local soldiers to march out.

Although the local soldiers were of low quality, they understood that now that they had a powerful backer like Chu Fan, and they were armed with spears, steel knives and other sophisticated cold weapons, their strength was much stronger than that of the people in the village.

In addition, the local soldiers' camp was commanded by a deputy captain of the Chu vassal and several general flags, so they performed very bravely.

I saw them rushing towards the village carrying more than a dozen long ladders, climbing up quickly like monkeys.

Only then did the few natives in the village subconsciously try to stop them - mainly by throwing stones and stabbing with spears. As for hot water, there was no hot water, and "golden juice" was even less likely to be available.

However, they were too few in number, and their spears were made of low-quality wooden shafts and low-quality iron spear heads, which could not break the rattan armor of the Chu vassal soldiers.

That's right, Zhu Zhen didn't equip the soldiers with cloth armor. Instead, he had the native women learn to weave rattan armor and equipped them with it. Although it was only crude rattan armor and not refined, it was much better than no armor at all.

With a huge advantage, the local barracks captured the village in just a quarter of an hour.

Zhu Zhen shook his head upon seeing this. "Such an enemy, such a small stronghold, and it still took a quarter of an hour to capture it? They are truly useless."

Zhang Xiangdeng felt slightly embarrassed and explained, "The natives are dull, and the training time is too short after all."

Zhu Zhen said nothing more. He ordered his men to search the wooden stronghold and then marched along a dirt road with 8,000 soldiers.

Two or three hours later, the Chu vassal army arrived two miles away from the Naghadha royal city.

Zhu Zhen held a telescope and looked across the rice fields outside the city. He found that the city gate was open and some natives were slowly coming in and out. The soldiers guarding the city also looked lazy, and some were even dozing off against the city gate. No one noticed their arrival for a while.

Zhu Zhen smiled.

Lu Gang also laughed and shook his head. "The intelligence provided by the Bright Guard said that Naghadaha was powerful and might destroy Tansongpuri in a few years. I didn't expect the defense of their royal city to be so lax."

Chen Ju, who was accompanying the army, also shook his head and said, "These Nanyang natives are really not worthy of being on the stage."

Zhu Zhen waved his hand and said, "Send a message to Ma Qin to lead the cavalry into the city and attack the palace directly. Don't let King Naghadaha escape."

"As ordered!"

When Zhu Zhen was granted fiefdom in a place like Nanyang, he would not raise too many cavalrymen at the beginning - he only raised one hundred, and the one who led the troops, Ma Qin, was only a centurion.

Ma Qin knew that it was a rare opportunity for the cavalry to make meritorious service in the early stage, so after receiving the military order, he led a hundred guard cavalrymen to rush towards the city gate from two or three miles away.

The local soldiers guarding the city finally woke up and saw a large group of cavalry rushing towards them. They were so terrified that they turned around and ran into the city. No one dared to stop them.

In this way, Ma Qin and his hundred cavalrymen rushed into the city smoothly, and also announced the fall of the Naghadaha Royal City.

The natives in southeastern Borneo did not know how to make bricks at that time, so the city of Naghadaha was built with stones. Its circumference was about four miles, which was not even as good as some larger county towns in the Ming Dynasty.

Moreover, the city had only one gate, which was the South Gate. Therefore, after more than a quarter of an hour, the entire city was basically controlled by the Chu vassal army.

Zhu Zhen led his main civil and military officials to the palace of Naghadah.

It was seen that the palace was also built of stone, but it was not the crude, unpolished stone like the city wall, but rather fine stone carefully polished by native craftsmen - Zhu Zhen and others could not identify what kind of stone it was.

The palace is not large, roughly the same size as some larger temples in the Ming Dynasty. There are many Brahman mythological creatures carved on the walls of the palace, and some places are inlaid with gold, silver, gems, pearls, etc., and some places are hung with silk. However, there are also many places with skulls and finger bones hanging, making the atmosphere of the palace look particularly strange and bizarre.

Zhu Zhen walked around and had the skulls and finger bones thrown away. He then said, "Bring King Naghadha here!"

"Yes!"

Soon, King Naghadha was brought over. He was a middle-aged native man, covered in gold and jewels, which made Zhu Zhen's eyes hurt. When he saw Zhu Zhen, he knelt down, mumbling something and making gestures.

Zhu Zhen didn't understand at all.

Ouyang Gao immediately translated, "Your Majesty, he asked why we are attacking them."

"Why?" Zhu Zhen's face turned serious. "I have been establishing a vassal state near Naghadaha for over a year, and he has not bothered to send an envoy to pay me a visit. This clearly shows contempt for me and disrespect for the Ming Dynasty. Is this a sufficient excuse?"

After Ouyang Gao's translation, King Naghadah was stunned.

He then explained that he had no idea that Zhu Zhen had established a vassal state nearby, nor that he was a prince of the Ming Dynasty. He also said that as long as Zhu Zhen was willing to withdraw his troops, he would immediately send an envoy with jewels to visit him.

"Innocent."

Zhu Zhen sighed and didn't want to continue talking to the local king, so he had him taken away.

By the time the sun set, Lu Gang, Chen Ju and others had finished counting the spoils of the battle and brought the prepared booklet to report to Zhu Zhen.

"Your Majesty, the total amount seized this time is 73,500 taels of gold, over 54,000 taels of silver, over 1,000 bolts of various silks and cloths, and 23 chests of gems, pearls, and other jewels."

This number is not much for a Nanyang country, but it is not small either. However, it cannot satisfy Zhu Zhen.

He asked, "How much food was seized?"

Chen Ju said, "Your Majesty, only 5,800 dan of rice and other grains were seized from the public treasury."

"Why is there so little food?" Zhu Zhen became even more dissatisfied.

Chen Ju said, "I think it's probably because the climate in Southeast Asia is so hot that food doesn't last long. Plus, rice can be harvested three times a year, and there's plenty of fruit, fish, and meat to go with it. So, like those native tribes, the Naghadaha don't have the habit of storing food."

Lu Gang said, "Your Majesty, no matter what, we easily captured the royal city of Naghadha in this battle. This is the only city in the country, and almost all the dignitaries are in it."

"It can be said that we have already destroyed the Naghadaha Kingdom and resolved the problem of our southern expedition to Majapahit next year."

"We've also seized hundreds of thousands of taels of gold and silver, dozens of boxes of jewels, and other valuables. We'll also be able to control hundreds of thousands of civilized natives in the country in the future. This is already a great harvest."

After hearing this, Zhu Zhen's mood improved a bit. He said, "Then I'd like to trouble Mr. Lu and Mr. Chen to quickly compile a specific number of the inhabitants of Naghadaha and the number of acres of land they own."

"Yes."

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In a blink of an eye, it was mid-December of the 24th year of Hongwu.

The cold wind was howling and heavy snow was falling in the capital, but it could not hide the increasingly strong New Year atmosphere in the streets and alleys.

In such weather, Liu Kuan neither stayed in his office in the Tiangong Academy to work, nor stayed at home to enjoy the floor heating, chatting and playing with his wives, concubines and children. Instead, he brought his entourage and guards to a piece of land in the northwest of the outer city of the capital, which belonged to a guard of the emperor's personal army.

Because the greenhouse planting experiments under Tiangong Institute are carried out here.

When Liu Kuan arrived at the place, King Zhu Zhi of Liao, who was responsible for collecting experimental data today, was already waiting outside the greenhouse.

"Joo Shik has met the teacher."

Liu Kuan also bowed and saluted, "Your Highness the Prince of Liao is honored."

The two had been teacher and student for many years and there was an age difference between them, so after going through the basic etiquette they did not engage in meaningless small talk but went straight to the point.

Zhu Zhi looked worried. "Teacher, we've tried several methods, but the weather is too cold now, and it's hard to raise the temperature in the greenhouse. The off-season vegetables we planted before can't keep up."

As he spoke, Zhu Zhi lifted the heavy curtain of the greenhouse and led Liu Kuan in. (End of this chapter)