Tribute? !
Zheng He's expression changed and he took a step forward: "What do you mean by tribute?"
Youyun pointed to the northeast: "Grave!"
Mao Zhoutai, Chai Datian and others became excited. After receiving the news, Shen Wei, Yuan Yichen and Wan Qinglin arranged for their lieutenants to stay on shore.
Wan Qinglin was impatient and urged Youyun to lead the way.
Zheng He did not act hastily, but ordered the organization of 200 heavily armored sergeants. At the same time, he ordered a group of sergeants to replace their swords with crossbows and fire blunderbuss. As a precaution, the accompanying general also brought a batch of grenades and other firearms.
After being fully prepared, Zheng He ordered You Yun to lead the way.
Mao Zhoutai, Yu Bing, Lu Zhanggong and others observed Zheng He and learned from this great naval general that he was as steady as a mountain. Whether facing a storm of despair or an event of ecstasy, one needs to remain sober and steady, and not put the sergeant in danger due to negligence.
After all, this is a wild land, and there are pythons as tribute, which means that there are at least pythons in this forest.
Torches were lit and the army marched through the forest.
It's more than three miles, not too far.
You Yun found the general direction, but couldn't find the tomb just now, and seemed to be confused.
Wan Qinglin became anxious: "You must be confused and see the shadows of pythons and graves, right?"
You Yun was sweating profusely: "Impossible, I saw it clearly, but why is it missing?"
Zheng He raised his hand to interrupt Wan Qinglin who was about to scold him, and looked at Shen Wei: "Let the scouts explore, it must be around here!"
It was cloudy and sunny at night, and in this dense forest, fallen leaves were piled up, and there were no traces of walking. No one dared to find the way. But if the general direction is right, then it won’t be too different!
try to find!
Shen Wei personally led the scouts and carefully spread the search around.
Zheng He waited quietly until a sentry arrow exploded in the air. Shen Wei ordered someone to report it, and Zheng He led people there.
The location here is more than 200 steps away from where You Yun brought him.
The lights are bright.
Zheng He approached and saw a tomb that was not very tall. The most eye-catching thing was the tombstone in front of the tomb. The tombstone is not made of stone, but a long wooden board. The wooden board has been flattened and polished so smooth that there are no burrs on the edges.
On the wooden stele, there is a large vertical character carved:
The tomb of the sergeant of the Wuyi Fleet of the Ming Dynasty!
At the bottom, there is a row of small characters engraved on it, which you can identify carefully: Gao Wan, Yu Zhengtu, Ma Jiu, Huang Yang, Xu Sui.
Five names combined!
"They were here!"
Zheng He clenched his fists and his eyes were moist.
Shen Wei, Wan Qinglin and others could not help but feel sad.
How much trouble did they go through to get here!
Who set up the monument for them, and where are those people now? Are they still alive?
Shen Wei looked at the python skin on the side, which was wrapped around the side of the tombstone. The python skin was damaged a lot, and the head was separated from the body. Someone had obviously cut it off.
It is conceivable that at that time, the python most likely attacked the Ming sergeants, and after a hard battle, five sergeants were still injured.
"Set up an altar, open the grave at noon tomorrow, and take them home!"
Zheng He raised his head and ordered in a deep voice.
The sergeant responded and went to prepare.
Mao Zhoutai carefully inspected the python skin and told Shen Wei, Wan Qinglin and others: "There are no holes in the python, and there are no injuries caused by firearms. There are only a few stab wounds."
Wan Qinglin sighed: "In such a long time, they must have used up all the firearms they carried with them, and they were probably already weak at that time, so they were harmed by this beast!"
"There's a discovery here!"
The fish soldier shouted.
Zheng He, Shen Wei and others walked over.
In front of me is a tree whose main trunk has been cut off. Although the tree has sprouted new branches from the trunk, the new branches have not yet grown to the thickness of an arm.
There is still some discarded and unused wood on the ground, but it is somewhat rotten.
The fish soldier touched the tree stump and said to Zheng He and others: "Obviously, these sergeants brought saws and planes with them. There are no traces of axes or swords here. They are sawed trees. The tomb slab must have been smoothed with a plane. Yes. Judging from the names on the carvings, they also brought carving knives."
Zheng He stared: "Judging from these, the treasure ship of the Wuyi Fleet must have been damaged beyond repair. As a last resort, after landing ashore, he took out all the shipbuilding and repairing tools and placed the shipwright among the sergeants."
Shen Wei checked it carefully, agreed with Yu Bing's analysis, and then asked, "Can you guess when this happened?"
Yu Bing shook his head: "I can't, but He Yunga should be able to. He studied at the Agricultural College of the Imperial Academy and studied botany."
"Let him come!"
Zheng He ordered.
He Yunga quickly went ashore. After arriving, he checked and speculated: "There are no people here. It is a wild land. It stands to reason that the growth rate of plants is relatively fast. Judging from the newly grown branches, the time should be six months." Months ago. Judging from the rotten wood on the ground and the tombstone, it can probably stand for six months, and it will not exceed ten months at most."
Zheng He frowned.
This means that people from the Wuyi fleet were active in this land half a year ago! I just don’t know how many people came here, nor where they went.
"Centering here, light a smoke column every fifty miles! I want the smoke column to keep burning along the coastline!"
Zheng He solemnly ordered.
The appearance of the tomb proved that the Wuyi fleet did not capsize on the sea, and that a group of them had been here!
Half a year ago?
Where have they been during this time?
Pillars of smoke ignited and billowed toward the sky.
On the second day, the grave was opened.
Zheng He led his navy to collect the five skeletons intact and carefully transport them to the treasure ship for placement. In addition to the armor, there was only a knife and no other burial objects in the tomb.
Five sets of armor and one knife indicate that the person leaving took other steel knives with them.
After staying here for two days, the smoke pillars were billowing endlessly, but there was still no sign of human beings. The sergeant on the lookout on the hot air balloon kept staring at the mountains and forests, but no one appeared or any big movement was seen.
If there really were soldiers from the Ming Dynasty nearby, they would definitely make some noise when they saw this scene. Even if they shouted a few times, they would be able to inspire the birds to fly high.
But no!
Zheng He summoned everyone to discuss.
Wan Qinglin speculated: "They appeared here, but then they probably went eastward and penetrated deep into the Americas. They probably hoped to return to the east coast and then leave here and return to the Ming Dynasty. In six months, even if they walked , it’s enough for them to walk over, and it’s normal not to see the converging smoke plumes.”
Shen Wei agreed with Wan Qinglin's view: "Although they appeared here, we don't know how large a team they are, whether it is a dozen people, dozens of people, or how many. We searched all around and found no camp. , and we haven’t found a place to bury pots to make rice. We can be sure that they are probably just passing through this place and not staying here for a long time. Unless we can find a place to camp, we can’t determine how many people they still have.”
Looking for a place to camp is not easy.
With the tomb as the center, it goes north, east, and south for at least forty miles.
Sending sergeants to search in such a large area will inevitably cause certain casualties. Moreover, there are too many shelters in the mountains and forests, and there are trees everywhere, making it difficult to find them, even in a short period of time.
Mao Zhoutai stood up and said: "The sergeant here encountered danger and died here. The fact that the remaining people chose to bury him on the spot shows that there is no camp nearby, and it also shows that there are not many people left. If there are still There were many people, or there were more soldiers in the nearby camp, so why would they be buried on the spot? They should at least be brought to the camp."
"There are various signs that this is a team that has lost contact with the main force. It is likely that they went deep here to look for crops, but lost the ability to return and had to stay here.
. But later they encountered more and more changes, and they had to choose to leave. We need to determine the direction they are leaving and then pursue it. "
Wan Qinglin frowned and asked, "The direction they can only leave is eastward. What kind of judgment is needed?"
Mao Zhoutai shook his head: "In my opinion, the direction they can choose is not just to cross the entire North America and return to the east coast. With the number of people reduced too much, they have determined that they will not be able to return. Once they take this route again, The road is a dead end for them. But there are shipwrights among them and the tools to build ships. I think they will definitely choose to build a ship somewhere, even if it is a raft, it is better than walking back through it!"
Shen Wei frowned: "If you build a ship, it will definitely be near the sea, but we searched all the way and found no trace of man-made things."
"north!"
Zheng He, who was silent, suddenly spoke, then stood up and said, "They must be somewhere in the north! Keep looking north!"
Shen Wei thought for a while and nodded: "If they really entered the depths of the forest, it would be too difficult for us to find them and it would be almost impossible to succeed. Search north. If we can find some traces left by them, maybe You can tell where they are."
Zheng He's fleet only had more than 16,000 people. He could send 10,000 people into the forest to search. But throwing these 10,000 people into the vast wilderness would be like looking for a needle in a haystack. The only feasible way at the moment is to look for its traces first, and then determine how to find it.
Since there are shipwrights among this group of surviving people, combined with the ships that appeared in Dingyuan Province, there must be a shipbuilding place somewhere along the coast!
must!
Zheng He did not hesitate. After leaving a treasure ship behind, he led the main force to continue northward.
A huge hot-air balloon was towed at the rear of the treasure ship. There were four sergeants on top of the hot-air balloon, taking turns in pairs, observing the distance with telescopes.
This wild world seems to be filled with the tranquility of death. Even though there are occasional birds flying in the sky, there are not many sounds.
Night is coming.
Zheng He had to order the fleet to stop, and the sergeants searching along the coast began to rest.
The cold wind kept blowing and the temperature dropped suddenly.
On the hot air balloon, Sergeant Lanhai looked into the distance, and suddenly he noticed that a light seemed to be shining on the mountain in the distance.
A fleeting moment.
Lan Dahai quickly called Lin Shi beside him, and the two of them stared at the hill. After an unknown amount of time, just when Lan Dahai thought he had made a mistake, a beam of light suddenly flashed and disappeared again.
"Something was discovered!"
Lan Dahai shouted at the top of his voice to the people on the treasure ship.
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