Chapter 1514: Resisting the Japanese

It was already July, considered the beginning of autumn. Plus, the current era was in the Little Ice Age, and there was no heat island effect like in modern cities, so it was still very cool at night.

In the house at the wharf, the windows were all open. There was a cool breeze and the sound of cicadas. Wang Yan, who was shirtless and wearing big shorts, felt very comfortable.

However, this comfort did not last long before it was interrupted by the sound of a door being pushed open in a hurry.

"Third Lord! Third Lord!" Qi Dazhu ran in anxiously. Seeing that Wang Yan was already sitting there, he paused for a moment, then immediately said, "Japanese pirates have come, coming from the east. The ships are stopped in the river, and they are sneaking towards the county town."

Wang Yan ordered: "Send people to report to Minister Hu, let the brothers gather, send one hundred people to guard their ships, and the rest follow me to kill them behind the Japanese pirates."

"Third Lord, it's better for the little one to go. You just sit in the rear and command."

"Get out and pass the order." Wang Yan gave him a kick, neither light nor heavy, and then got up to put on his clothes, and found two local braves to put on leather armor for him.

Dealing with Japanese pirates here, paper armor was mostly used. It didn't rust or damage, the cost was low, and it was much lighter. It was even more effective against firearm projectiles.

This set of leather armor of Wang Yan was a set adjusted for him by Zhu Qi from the battalion commander's office here. In addition, he arranged a long knife. There were no procedures at all, and he got it directly for him. Handling things was really crisp and neat, and he was also taking risks.

Soon, Wang Yan was dressed neatly, buckled his helmet, pressed his hand on the knife, and walked out.

The weather tonight was very good. Although it was a crescent moon, the stars all over the sky also illuminated the earth dimly. It allowed those with night blindness to barely see the environment clearly.

For Wang Yan, it was even brighter. After all, his organs were fully strengthened, his eyes were more developed, and he received and processed more information. This dim light was definitely different from bright light in his eyes, but he could see everything clearly and plainly.

Although gathering wasted some time, under the continuous training in the past, it could be considered orderly, and there was not too much panic because of the life-and-death battle with the Japanese pirates.

Dealing with Japanese pirates was not an easy thing, because they didn't fight positional warfare and didn't go to grab any advantageous positions. They used the help of smuggling sea merchants to sneak in to cause destruction, burn, kill, and loot, and then left.

In this way, the defending side was relatively uncomfortable. The whole Chun'an County had to be guarded, there were rivers in the territory, the people lived in different places, and they didn't know where the Japanese pirates would come out, which was simply impossible to guard against.

And the local braves and young men in the county couldn't all be pulled out, delaying production, so how could that be calculated? In the whole Chun'an, there were more than 40,000 people, and the adult young men were less than 10,000. The farming in the county, as well as building houses and other public construction, all depended on these people.

So when dealing with Japanese pirates, the number of people Wang Yan mobilized was not many. A total of 3,000 people were conscripted, divided into three parts. 1,000 people in the county town, and the other two parts each had 1,000. It radiated the entire territory of the county to the maximum extent, responded to Japanese pirates at the first time, and minimized damage.

And in the county town, there were 500 troops guarding inside the city, and 500 outside, scattered and patrolling around.

What was gathered now was these 500 people outside the city.

"Japanese pirates have come, harming our wives and daughters, killing our parents, destroying our fields, and the newly built red-brick tile houses are also to be dirtied by them. They have harmed our generations for so long, and blood debts must be paid in blood."

"Now the Japanese pirates have come again. We cannot tolerate them making trouble on our land. We must kill them and capture them. There is still a lot of work to do in the county. If we capture them alive, we will use them all as livestock."

"Killing the enemy tonight, I, the old man, will personally lead the charge. For those who are killed or injured, the yamen will provide compensation, ensuring that the brothers have no worries. For those who survive, there will be no shortage of benefits. As long as I am alive, these words count."

"No more words, now, follow me to kill the Japanese!"

"Kill the Japanese!"

"Kill the Japanese!"

"Kill the Japanese!"

"Are you stupid? Why shout so loudly? If you disturb the Japanese pirates and let them run away, what should we do? Go!"

Wang Yan waved his hand with dissatisfaction, stopped these hot-blooded young men, then simply arranged it, launched an attack from two directions, and led the team to set off.

As for the more specific combat techniques of short-range engagement, those were used during daily training, and how much they could exert depended on themselves.

Soon, after running for less than half an hour, Wang Yan and the others touched behind the Japanese pirates.

Without a word of nonsense, Wang Yan directly pulled out his knife silently. After a round of arrows, he led a group of people behind him holding long knives and spears to rush up.

"Kill!"

Wang Yan didn't shout this, it was Qi Dazhu who shouted. He followed Wang Yan running, and seeing Wang Yan look at him, he took the time to scratch his head.

"Third Lord, I don't feel comfortable without shouting."

"Take care of yourself, don't worry about me."

Wang Yan didn't say much more, ran over the distance of more than 100 meters in the blink of an eye, took the lead to lift a knife, and a head flew high, blood gushing out...

"Kill!"

The sound of killing shook far away in the night, and for a while, chickens and dogs barked nearby.

Qi Dazhu took a few brothers and followed closely by Wang Yan's side, wanting to protect the Third Lord from being injured or even hacked to death.

Although after Hai Rui constantly did practical things, the people saw it in their eyes and gained the sincere love of the people, they still couldn't shake the prestige of the Third Lord. If the Third Lord really died here, they would all have to be buried with the Third Lord, otherwise, they wouldn't be able to bear the disdain of the people of Chun'an.

However, what they thought was really simple, only thinking that the Third Lord had practiced a few hands. After all, they could see the Third Lord running around the county town and boxing every morning, and for a period of time, he even exercised with the local braves.

But none of them had seen the Third Lord make a move. Where did they think that when they really fought with real knives and guns, he was so brave, and there was no enemy in his hands, directly killing through the Japanese pirate team. Even in the process, he was distracted to block a few knives for them.

With such performance, there was no literary spirit of a scholar at all, simply a peerless fierce general on the battlefield...

"Third Lord!"

Wang Yan nodded calmly, scanned the situation on the battlefield, and said: "Killing through them, these Japanese pirates are basically defeated. You don't need to worry about me, go help the brothers kill for a while, and if those who run away can be chased, chase them. Go."

Thus, Qi Dazhu and others joined the battle group again and helped kill the Japanese pirates.

Wang Yan stood with his knife, just standing there, watching the two sides fight. Occasionally, those who rushed to kill him were easily taken away by his knife.

In less than ten minutes, this battle led by Wang Yan against the Japanese pirates ended.

And handling the various matters after the battle lasted until noon the next day.

"Third Lord, a total of 178 people were killed, 359 people were captured alive, and more than 100 people ran away. We lost 49 people, and there were 76 seriously injured, and countless lightly injured."

Tian Youlu finally summarized the news and reported it to Wang Yan and Hai Rui at lunch.

Hai Rui asked: "How is the pension calculated?"

"Fifty taels of silver for each person who died, ten mu of land exempted from tax for ten years, and the money and grain borrowed for building houses and 'Replacing Rice with Mulberry' were written off. Twenty taels of silver for the seriously injured, five mu of land exempted from tax for ten years, and the owed money and grain were also written off. Besides that, all those who participated in the battle received five taels of silver each. We can still make decisions on these. What do you think, Lord?"

Wang Yan opened his mouth and came, and the pension given was quite good, really letting the families of those who died in battle live a good life.

"They are all young men who died in battle for Chun'an. How much can be given? But now the yamen has no silver, and all the people in the county have been exempted from field taxes for three years. Where can the pension come from? You are the registrar, don't you know this? Don't expect rewards from above, Minister Hu's army is still worrying about military funds..."

"I naturally know." Wang Yan took a sip of yellow wine, picking up fish and meat, "Didn't the Weaving Bureau promise to take silver to purchase the raw silk of our county at the market price?"

"That is the people's silver!" Hai Rui's eyes widened.

"Don't worry, how could I move the people's silver? Lord, have you forgotten the problem of silver circulation I told you before? When the people have silver in their hands, they will definitely spend silver."

Wang Yan ate the food contentedly, muttering, "After earning money, tear a few bolts of cloth to make clothes, buy some oil to make up for the oil, get some sugar for the children to sweeten their mouths, go to the pharmacy to get medicine for old illnesses, and it won't be long before winter comes, so you have to make some cotton clothes to keep out the cold. The children at home study, so you have to buy some stationery. All kinds of things, don't they all need money?"

"The wealthy families in our county have all been dealt with, business is withered, and the county yamen has taken over, barely managing. Now the people have silver in their hands, so those shops are easy to sell. Selling the shops is one thing, and collecting taxes when these shops sell goods in the future is another. Making up for the pensions of these local braves is not easy?"

"I'll open a shop first, specifically selling meat. The money is owed first, and I'll return it when I have money."

Hai Rui glared: "Your daily food is still owed to the yamen."

"Small matter, you haven't seen my white glaze. This earns more than cement, so can it be short of my food and drink? Speaking of which, I estimate that when our report of victory is sent up, the Emperor should receive the glass."

Wang Yan waved his hand and turned to say, "Second Lord, things are settled. Hurry up and write the battle report, report the victory to the yamen at all levels. Also, send people to Hangzhou to spread the news, saying that the people of Chun'an have silver, and the shops in the city are to be handled, attracting them to come and take over."

"Okay." Tian Youlu had no complaints, ate a large mouthful of meat, stood up and left the table, went to write the victory report, and arranged for people to spread advertisements...

Hai Rui drank a cup of wine and asked: "You do these things?"

"You are the Lord, of course it is you. Where do I have that time? I learned about their hiding places from the mouths of the captured, and I will leave this afternoon to wipe them all out. In addition, they also confessed a few wealthy families colluding with the Japanese pirates, not far from our Chun'an. I will take people to raid their homes on the way."

"Is it inappropriate? Raiding homes and taking people based on the words of Japanese pirates, it is not..."

"The military situation is urgent, where can we take care of so much? Anyway, there are no good people in the wealthy families. First catch the people and raid the homes. I don't believe I can't find their faults in the Great Ming Law. As for officials elsewhere, go wherever they want to report. We get the benefits."

Hai Rui glared again, because what Wang Yan said was too much. How could an official be like this? And how could things be handled like this?

"Lord, sometimes don't be too rigid. I have the Emperor's favor now, so I have to use it. The small mistakes I make now are equal to no mistakes, and big mistakes are equal to small mistakes. Anyway, as long as it can be explained, the Emperor protects me, so nothing will happen. If I don't do things now, and when I want to do things but can't, isn't that a huge loss?"

Wang Yan raised his cup, "Actually, even without the Emperor's favor, we have nothing to do. Think about it, this time the Japanese pirates killed their way to our side, which shows that this activity range is very large. Our battle record, not surrendering, not harming the people, not holding the city and not daring to fight, killing more than 100 enemies, capturing 300 alive, let alone Zhejiang, even in the entire southeast battlefield, it is eye-catching."

"So, at this time, as long as we don't rebel and don't do bad things, there will be no problems. Not to mention that I killed the Japanese pirates and got the news. In wartime, there is no need to ask for instructions, so we should act as we see fit. Alright, that's it. You take care of the things in the county. Don't sell the shops too cheaply. I'll be back in ten days or half a month."

It sounded like Wang Yan was arranging tasks for Hai Rui, the magistrate, but Hai Rui did not disagree, just expressed dissatisfaction with Wang Yan's way of doing things and attitude once again...

This was a common occurrence. Whenever Wang Yan and Hai Rui talked about things together, they always had to be glared at.

Under Hai Rui's glaring farewell, Wang Yan took the team to kill the Japanese pirates that afternoon...

"Chun'an? Wang Yan? Report victory?"

Hearing Lü Fang's words, Jiajing was surprised, "What victory did he report?"

Lü Fang took out the official document transferred by Hu Zongxian and said: "More than 500 Japanese pirates caused chaos in Chun'an. Previously, Chun'an caught Japanese pirates spying on intelligence, so they made preparations early. They mobilized 3,000 local braves, of which 1,000 were near the county town, 500 inside the city, presided over by Chun'an Magistrate Hai Rui, and 500 outside the city, personally led by Wang Yan. In addition, the other 2,000 were also commanded by Wang Yan."

"Since discovering the Japanese pirates spying on intelligence, Wang Yan has been living with the local braves outside the city. This time, he discovered the traces of the Japanese pirates in advance, personally put on armor and held a weapon, rushed to the front, and led the Chun'an local braves to kill the Japanese pirates..."

After hearing Lü Fang's report, Jiajing still took the victory report and looked at it, laughing and saying: "I didn't expect him to know how to lead troops to fight. Although it is a small fight, daring to personally rush to the battlefield is already very rare."

"Not only that, Master, Wang Yan interrogated the hiding place of the Japanese pirates from the mouths of the Japanese pirates. Before this victory report was sent up, he had already taken the local braves to wipe out the Japanese pirates, and strictly investigated the situation of colluding with the Japanese pirates. Master, Wang Yan is really both civil and military."

"They all have some merit."

Jiajing nodded with a smile, let out a long sigh, "Wang Yan is still considerate and can do practical things, unlike my loyal officials who always add trouble to me."

Shen Yishi's account book had already been sent up, and Jiajing had someone calculate it, discovering the corruption situation surrounding the Jiang Nan Weaving Bureau over the past twenty years. This made Jiajing very angry.

Damn it, how much silver did he earn from the Weaving Bureau? How many palaces did he build? Those people actually earned more than him? As a result, after earning so much, they were still not satisfied and had to blame him for building palaces?

This matter came out, and he was even more dissatisfied with Yan Song and his son. Even if Yan Song was the main force who helped him fight down Xia Yan, even if Yan Song accompanied him through wind and rain for decades.