Jian'an County, Dong'an City.
Quan Cong was impressed by this. His father had died at the hands of the Han army, which made him extremely ashamed.
Now the navy is being trained secretly in Dong'an City, and in the future, a sneak attack on Jiaozhou from the sea will surely avenge him.
"General, among those private ships, are we bad at any of them?"
"Let them go do business with Jiaozhou?"
"With less tax revenue, how can Wu support his soldiers?"
The captain Wei Wen's face was ashen. Although he understood these nobles, he did not agree with their actions.
"Wei Wen, did you know that my whole family is included in these private ships?"
"Don't you know, Your Majesty, that the nobles are using private ships to do business behind his back?"
"Jiangdong and Cao Wei, in the final analysis, the emperor and the scholar-bureaucrats share the world."
Quan Cong sighed: "In order to win over these nobles, we can only suffer the common people."
Wei Wen felt a little uncomfortable. He was not a nobleman, but came from a poor family. He had reached the position of captain by relying on swords and guns.
Compared with Quan Cong, he was more aware of the sufferings of the people and could not bear to see the people burdened with heavy corvee labor.
"General... what about the Shu Han? Liu Bei and his son, don't they rely on the nobles?"
Wei Wen's words aroused Quan Cong's dissatisfaction.
"Hmph! Those who weave mats and sell shoes have been hoping that nobles will join them all their lives!"
"I heard that the Shu Han people have already abandoned the inspection system!"
"No wonder they have fewer and fewer talents!"
The imperial examination system was the main means for nobles to become officials, and Liu Bei's move was tantamount to solving the problem at its root.
In particular, the popularization of nine-year compulsory education in Jiaozhou broke the gentry's monopoly on knowledge and culture.
What kind of bullshit are you talking about, scriptures and classics?
The imperial examination was about mathematics, physics and chemistry!
If it weren't for the gentry in Jingzhou and Yizhou who had contributed so much at the beginning, Liu Bei would probably have followed Liu Mang's advice and directly popularized nine-year compulsory education, leaving no room for rogue officials to hide.
"General! Lord Colonel! Ten ships have appeared nearby in our military waters!"
His subordinates came to report that Quan Cong was in a bad mood and needed to vent his anger.
"Haha... tell them, a ship costs a million!"
"Get the money and let me go, otherwise go back."
Private ships were developed in Soochow, and the army was also happy to do so.
Each family's private ship will give a sum of money to the military generals. If there is money, everyone will make money together. Why not cross Sun Quan?
However, Quan Cong always accepts things when he sees fit. After all, everyone is an acquaintance, and accepting too much will inevitably cause dissatisfaction.
But now the ten building ships hit the muzzle of his gun.
"Yes, General!"
…
Above the vast sea, Liu Mang saw countless walking boats approaching his own fleet.
Gan Ning geared up and laughed: "Your Highness, look, these are the ships of the rats from Jiangdong!"
Liu Mang nodded, "Let's see what they want to do."
"If we can spend money to avoid disaster, we'd better keep a low profile."
Gan Ning wanted to have a confrontation with the enemy. Even those who approached him said that Jiangdong Navy was invincible, but he was not convinced.
It's a pity that Liu Mang said this, so he could only obey his orders.
"People on the other side, listen up! This is within the territory of Dong'an, under the jurisdiction of General Quan Cong!"
"Passing ships need millions of dollars in tolls to pass!"
"Otherwise, we will go back to where we came from."
Quan Cong stood on the walking wheel with his hands behind his back. He had seen many of these merchant ships.
In the end, instead of obediently paying the money, I chose to settle the matter.
"Your Highness?"
Gan Ning looked at Liu Mang and reminded him in a low voice: "It's a shame to ask for a million dollars, so why don't we..."
Liu Mang is now poor and has only money left. If ten ships cost a million to pass by, then he can completely accept it.
"Okay, I'll give you a million dollars, just make way quickly!"
"Wait a minute, our general has said that it's a million dollars for a ship!"
Quan Cong's men reminded him, but little did he know that this sentence completely angered Liu Mang.
"Shameless, these Soochow rats still don't understand His Highness as a person!"
"Looking at this, he is definitely angry!"
"I'm sure I'll be able to kill a lot today!"
Gan Ning wiped the Bahai knife and waited for Liu Mang's order.
"Haha, so majestic!"
"Xing Ba, give the order to sail the ship and rush over to me!"
Ten behemoth building boats rowed with all their strength and rushed directly towards Zou Ke.
The Soochow side originally wanted to use walking boats to surround the building boats, but unexpectedly Liu Mang was not used to it at all and directly used the building boats to break through.
Many walkers had no time to react and were smashed to pieces by the building boats.
Fortunately, the Soochow soldiers were familiar with water and did not drown.
When had the navy led by Quan Cong ever suffered such humiliation?
"Set me an arrow! No one on the boat will be left alive!"
The Wu troops on board the boat quickly picked up their bows and arrows. They had long been accustomed to the bumps on the ship and were able to use bows and arrows skillfully.
Seeing the rain of arrows coming, Liu Mang gave the order without changing his expression.
"Xingba, give these Soochow rats more strength!"
"The general will get the order!"
Gan Ning gave an order, and the Jinfan thieves walked among the ships with hooks and ropes, and soon boarded the ship to kill the enemy.
Quan Cong didn't recognize these conspicuous people wearing bird feathers on their heads, he just thought they were foreign pirates.
"It turns out to be a pirate!"
"Don't show mercy, let the armored ships go to war!"
"Destroy all these pirates!"
The building ships had successfully broken through the encirclement at this time, and Guan Ping commanded the ships behind them to constantly harass Soochow's Ke Ke.
After all, the ability of small boats to withstand arrows was limited, so many Wu soldiers had no choice but to jump into the sea to prevent being shot.
Gan Ning and others were skilled in killing people, and then used hooks and ropes to return to the building ship again.
The opponent's fleet was too fast, and when the matter was over, he brushed off his clothes and hid his merits and fame.
By the time the Dongwu armored ship sailed out of the port, the group of pirates had long disappeared.
Wu's army lost more than 500 soldiers in this battle, but only got the opponent's pirate flag.
Seeing that cute skeleton with a straw hat on its head, Quan Cong was so angry that he wanted to curse.
"Publish a reward for me. If this group of pirates can be caught, I will personally pay one million dollars!"
"General, what should I call this group of people? From my perspective, they are just a group of alien pirates!"
"Damn it, are you blind? It's obviously the Straw Hat Pirates!"
Quan Cong cursed angrily, but his men did not dare to reply. After all, they could all see that the general was angry.
"The march is so fast and the coordination is so skillful, no matter how you look at it, it looks like an army!"
"It seems there are no islands east of Dong'an. What are those pirates doing there?"
Wei Wen was puzzled and couldn't help but think about it. Unfortunately, due to the limitations of the times, he didn't know where Yizhou was.
"Your Highness, we clearly could destroy these Wu dogs just now, why did we leave directly?"
Gan Ning was not satisfied yet. After all, in his opinion, the Soochow Navy was nothing more than that.
"Xingba, the purpose of our trip is to occupy Yizhou, and our main focus is to keep a low profile."
"Besides, wouldn't it be beautiful to let the legend of the Straw Hat Pirates spread in this sea area?"
Liu Mang smiled calmly: "By the way, I promise you one thing. There are four islands in the north of Yizhou. If the people there resist, you will kill me without stopping me!"
