Tang Dynasty: Father, if you don't rebel, I will!

Li Yin's eyes were full of anticipation.

"Brother, how many of these warships can you send me?"

Li Ke smiled as he looked at his younger brother. Even though the Crown Prince had sent him to attack Silla, Li Yin's own brother, he was somewhat surprised.

But since everyone has already arrived, Li Ke, whether out of personal or public motives, decided to...

They will naturally provide plenty of support for Li Yin going forward.

but......

"This matter is not urgent. Your arrival is timely. My brother sent me an order that those fools in Japan are shameless and need to be taught a lesson. Fortunately, the Dengzhou port has been completed and the Jeju port has also been finished. As a supply depot for our Tang Dynasty navy, there is no problem at all."

"It's time to start construction on Fukuoka Port."

Li Ke was smiling, but Jin Shengman's pretty face suddenly changed upon hearing these words.

Didn't the Tang Dynasty need to rely on Japan to contain Goguryeo and Baekje?

Why would they break ties with Japan at this time?!

They might even want to open a battlefield directly in Japan.

Li Ke glanced at her indifferently. He naturally knew a lot about this candidate for puppet ruler of Silla, whom his younger brother had taken a liking to.

In fact, the Embroidered Uniform Guard had already thoroughly investigated the two royal sisters from Silla when they expressed some ulterior motives towards Li Chengqian, the crown prince of the Tang Dynasty.

My younger brother is quite cunning.

But if you think you can take over the entire Silla Kingdom with just this little bit of skill... then you're still missing something.

And coincidentally, he was about to seize this opportunity to further influence the Silla princess, who probably still harbored some ulterior motives...

After arriving in Dengzhou, Li Yin rested for two days before boarding the Tang Dynasty navy's fleet bound for the vassal state of Tsukushi in Japan.

"Woo~~~"

The resounding bugle call came from the flagship "Zhenwo" where Li Ke was at that moment.

Immediately afterwards, the other naval ships that were slowly sailing out of the port also began to change direction and form formation.

"These fools from Japan have truly angered my elder brother. This time, he not only demands that we directly occupy Tsukushi Province by force, but also that we build a port and military base there..."

Li Ke was dressed in a Han Dynasty brocade robe, with a white navy cloak draped over his back.

Standing on the deck at this moment, behind the Zhenwo ship, five treasure ships of the same specifications followed, along with medium-sized troop transport ships, supply ships, and other vessels of various sizes.

In total, there are more than 120 ships.

As the fleet departed from port, Li Yin's eyes shone with even greater awe upon seeing the magnificent Tang Dynasty fleet once again on the vast ocean.

Li Ke smiled smugly and patted his younger brother on the shoulder.

"Don't think that these fleets are huge right now. In fact... I haven't even been able to fulfill the requirements my brother gave me."

At this point, Li Ke sighed.

"My brother issued national bonds and borrowed more than 30 million strings of cash, which he gave to me to build a navy and ports and train soldiers. However, some things cannot be solved simply with money."

"It will take time... I have established a shipbuilding association in Dengzhou, selected a group of shipbuilding workshops with good skills and scale, invested in them, and sent professors from the shipbuilding academy to teach them. Only then have I managed to gather a group of private shipyards that can build this type of medium-sized seagoing vessel."

"As for this treasure ship, it was built by the Royal Shipyard of Dengzhou... and it didn't even complete half of the task that my brother asked for."

Li Ke shook his head.

However, these words, spoken entirely from the heart, sounded incredibly harsh to Kim Seung-man, who was standing nearby.

The Tang Dynasty covered a vast area.

If you want to accomplish something, as long as you invest heavily, you can achieve remarkable results in a short period of time. But what about Silla?

Let alone the entire national treasury accumulated over more than a decade, they absolutely could not come up with that terrifying thirty million taels of silver.

They possess the materials, manpower, and technology to build a ship of this size.

The navy needs knowledge of navigation, astrology, meteorology, and other disciplines to truly function, which they also cannot organize. This requires a great deal of time for civilization to accumulate and solidify.

"Brother, how many people did we send to attack Tsukushi Kingdom this time?"

Li Yin asked curiously.

"four thousand!"

Li Yin was taken aback. Four thousand?

Isn't this a bit too little?

However, when Kim Seung-man heard this number, her legs went weak. She had seen it clearly when she boarded the ship.

These so-called four thousand men were all armed to the teeth.

Moreover, she had reason to believe that these four thousand people did not include the soldiers of the Tang Dynasty navy.

"Hahahaha! Sixth brother, just watch. That so-called Tsukushi Kingdom, that so-called vassal state, don't be fooled by its impressive-sounding name... hahaha!"

Li Ke smiled but remained silent.

Naval training is no simple matter. However, through frequent sea training and voyages, the Tang Dynasty has become very proficient in navigating the waters around Japan, Goguryeo, and Dengzhou.

Along the way, minor sea storms were nothing to this massive naval fleet.

After completing a resupply at Jeju Port in the middle.

Another day or so has passed.

Japanese country, Zhuzi country.

The wisps of smoke were so clear through the monocular telescope that, across the waves of the coast, one could vaguely see a stone city emerging from the low forest.

Li Yin's expression was indescribably strange as he looked at his older brother's teasing, half-smiling expression.

Suddenly, I felt a strange sense of absurdity about the tension I had been experiencing at sea.

"This, this is the castle of Tsukushi Province?"

Li Ke smiled without saying a word, but Jin Shengman, who was standing behind Li Yin, pursed her lips and spoke softly.

"Your Highness, this... is the Kingdom of Tsukushi."

Li Yin was momentarily stunned, but after a few seconds, the shock in his heart turned into a blurt out.

"grass!"

"Is this a country?!"

He pointed to a spot where the massive fleet that had been sailing in from the sea had sprung out, and from a distance, there wasn't even a shadow as small as an ant.

Him! Prince Li Yin of Liang!

He did attend Imperial University, after all!

He knew that many countries in the Western Regions actually consisted of only one city.

but......

Their city walls weren't built of stones or earth, or even just rammed wood mixed with sand.

It should be at least seven or eight meters high.

But look again at the "city" in front of us, if it weren't for the fact that it was located halfway up the mountain.

This is even worse than some of the villages and fortresses controlled by clans in my Great Tang Dynasty, right?

"Your Silla castles aren't all made of this kind of stuff, are they?" Lee Eun suddenly turned to look at Kim Seung-man beside him.

The barely concealed greed in his eyes made Kim Seung-man's heart leap into her throat.

He quickly shook his head.

"Our Silla's defenses are still very strong... Although they can't compare to the Tang Dynasty, they're not much different from Goguryeo's."

Li Yin pursed his lips.

At this time, Li Ke had already ordered the fleet to prepare to dock.

Looking at the crowd that had gathered on the shore, Li Ke waved his hand, and immediately, a series of horn sounds with different rhythms rang out from the "Zhenwo" ship, which served as the flagship.

Behind them, on one side of the sides of several treasure ships, crossbows began to be turned around by the archers.

They aimed their gaze at the somewhat bewildered Japanese people, who were observing them from the forest along the coast...

"Aim and prepare!"

An officer held up a flag and shouted loudly, the next moment.

The flag was lowered.

"put!"

"咻咻咻......"

With a slightly piercing sound, accompanied by a huge booming sound, the ballista suddenly shot out.

And at the instant the crossbow bolt, as thick as a spear, flew away from the crossbow, the gunpowder fuse attached to the bolt also cleverly rubbed against a phosphorus spot at the firing port.

The sizzling sound of the crossbow bolts accompanied the whistling of the arrows, and in the blink of an eye, they shot into the forest where the Japanese were hiding.

next second.

"Boom! Boom! Boom..."

This was the first time Kim Seung-man had witnessed the power of Tang Dynasty firearms.

The terrifying explosion, which snapped the trees in half, seemed to send a signal of conquest to the coast, forest, and mountains.

She was too far away to even hear the screams or see the struggling Japanese fleeing from the area covered by the explosion.

"thump......"

Jin Shengman's face drained of color instantly, and her legs went weak, causing her to collapse to the ground.

"Land! Attack the city!" Li Ke gave the order calmly, without even glancing at her.

"Woo~~~"

As the bugle sounded, ships carrying Tang Dynasty cavalry and infantry began to dock.

Cheng Chumo rode his warhorse with superb horsemanship. Combined with the Qinghai steed he was riding, which came from the Tuyuhun concession, no one could see any trace of him having spent more than ten days at sea.

"Giddy up! Everyone, follow me and we'll take that stone city!"

Cheng Chumo shouted, his steel broadsword standing taller than the Japanese savages.

Behind them, a tall and burly Tang Dynasty cavalryman stepped onto the landing platform and rushed ashore.

On the "Zhenwo" ship, Li Ke did not rush to disembark. Instead, he used a monocular telescope to look at the coastline of Tsukushi Province and pondered the future location of this Tang Dynasty naval port.

Li Yin watched this scene with a mixture of excitement and... utter boredom.

"Your Silla shouldn't be as trashy as these Japanese dwarfs, right?" He slowly looked at Kim Seung-man, who was stunned to the side, but the latter seemed not to have heard him at all.

He knelt on the ground, his body trembling.

He shook his head in disbelief, looked at the Tang infantrymen who were beginning to land, and some personnel who were clearly craftsmen and clerks, and took a deep breath.

It seems that soon, after the slaves of Harsha, Japanese slaves will be added to the slave market in the Tang Dynasty...

......

The border of the Mud Kingdom.

Looking at the vast Tibetan army that had once again marched past with a group of slaves, their weapons and equipment were clearly several levels better than the last time.

Dewa Cheti, who had originally wanted to go forward and intercept another wave of the city lord of Piye Valley of the Mud Kingdom, ultimately did not have the courage to go.

"Damn Songtsen Gampo, damn Tibetans...where did they get so many weapons?"

at the same time.

Zheng De, who had endured wind and rain and slept in the open along the way, nearly becoming food for snow leopards several times, looked utterly helpless.

"Lizhen, Lizhen, your third uncle almost died in this godforsaken place this time. If you had any guts, you would have quickly gotten things done with the Crown Prince..."