Chapter 1487: The Ming Surname Is Zhu, India's Surname Is Li

What a familiar feeling!

Standing atop the walls of New Shuri and watching the Shun troops coming ashore plant banner after banner bearing the character "Roving" on the surrounding hilltops — then watching the great host of soldiers in blue coats and white caps pour endlessly over the mountain pass three or four li west of New Shuri — Zhu Cizhao felt a sense of déjà vu.

The Roving King Li Zicheng had come sweeping in with just such ferocity back then, breaking through Beijing and very nearly overturning the Ming realm, and he had even taken Zhu Cizhao — then a callow youth — alive, holding him prisoner for a long stretch.

During those days imprisoned in the Roving camp, Zhu Cizhao, still a boy, lived in constant terror. Every night, the moment he closed his eyes he would see that great host in blue coats and white caps charging at him with murderous intent, coming to cut him down. Those days were truly no life for a human being!

Later, after he had finally struggled through to the other side, he became Zuo Liangyu's puppet in Jingzhou — if not for meeting Mengmei...

The moment he thought of Zuo Mengmei, tears welled in Zhu Cizhao's eyes — he and Zuo Mengmei truly shared the deepest bond of husband and wife!

"Imperial Father, do not be afraid. With your son here, I will never let the Roving Bandit break in!"

Zhu Yunyi, who attended Zhu Cizhao, saw his adoptive father weeping and assumed he was afraid of Li Jicheng, so he immediately beat his chest and made this vow to the old man.

Zhu Cizhao glanced back at this big, dark, rough-and-ready bargain of a son. "Your father is not afraid. Your father was only thinking of your mother."

"Imperial Father," Zhu Yunyi hesitated, then said in a low voice, "Mother has been gone all these days now; you ought to consider remarrying. That daughter of the King of Siam, Pawongchao Chaiyade — your son has seen her, and she truly has a face to topple kingdoms. She is not pure Thai; she has one-quarter Portuguese blood and one-quarter Persian blood, and what is more, she has passed the examination for Jinling Women's University. King Narai is even willing to give a dowry of one million taels of silver. The moment you nod, the matter is as good as settled!"

Zhu Cizhao shook his head and frowned. "At a time like this, you speak to me of that? If you have leisure for such thoughts, you would do better to think hard on how to drive off the enemy."

"Imperial Father, your son has already summoned all the household retainers into the city. The trading quarter at South Battery Bay and the salt works on the island have both been evacuated; some of the merchants have entered the city, and the rest have taken ship and withdrawn to Krabi County, held by the Western Army on the opposite shore. The muster order has been issued; we expect to call up eleven hundred samurai and nine hundred female warriors — more than enough to hold New Shuri."

"Furthermore, your son has inspected all three batteries of New Shuri. All twenty-one cannon of various types are completely intact!"

New Ryukyu Island was not large — only five or six hundred square kilometers — yet through the efforts of the Shang dynasty and Zhu Cizhao, the island's agriculture and fisheries had still seen a measure of development. It now possessed several dozen rice-growing farms and more than ten fishing villages.

And after Zhu Cizhao took over New Ryukyu Island, he made use of the beaches and pure seawater found everywhere on the island, along with the ample sunshine of the dry season, to open the largest solar salt works in the Southern Ocean region.

Moreover, New Ryukyu Island (Phuket) was superbly situated, lying exactly between the Burmese port of Haidu and the port of Temasek at Malacca — the distance from New Ryukyu Island to either place being two thousand li.

Thus New Ryukyu Island (Phuket) became a supply port for merchant vessels in transit — a port of little value in the age of ten-thousand-ton steamships, but of great importance to oar-sail ships of two or three hundred tons burden that could only sail along the coastline (there is little wind around Malacca, so oar-sail ships are of considerable value there).

Because oar-sail ships carry many sailors and have limited cargo capacity, they cannot carry large quantities of supplies, or there would be little space left for goods. So New Ryukyu Island became a mandatory stop for small and medium merchant vessels plying between Temasek and Haidu — ships coming and going north and south all had to buy fresh water and food here, and would also pick up some salt and salted fish along the way.

Driven by the transit trade and the salt industry, New Ryukyu Island, though it could not compare with Temasek, Batavia, the Golden City (near the Siamese capital of Ayutthaya), Ca Mau City (capital of the Ca Mau Army), Haidu, or the several Spice Islands, still counted as one of the more prosperous places in the Southern Ocean.

Otherwise Zhu Cizhao would not have kept hurling silver bullets at the "Sea Roving Bandits"!

Of course, over these past years, the "Sea Roving Bandits" and New Ryukyu Island had in fact shared common interests — the more the "Sea Roving Bandits" plundered from India, the greater the volume of trade between Haidu and Temasek! And New Ryukyu Island, as the maritime transit hub, naturally skimmed its share of the profits along with them.

In fact, Zhu Cizhao himself was also participating in the trade between Temasek and Haidu.

Precisely because of that, he was all the more willing to buy off the "Sea Roving Bandits" with silver bullets rather than alarm the Southern Ocean Fleet and the Malacca Fleet.

And the "Sea Roving Bandits" were likewise unwilling to raze New Ryukyu Island to the ground. To put it plainly, New Ryukyu Island was one link in the Sea Roving Bandits' chain for fencing stolen goods... If that chain were broken, how would they convert their plunder into cash? How would it become the various things they needed?

So when he discovered the Sea Roving Bandits coming in force, Zhu Cizhao was not overly alarmed. He did not even rush to seek help from Temasek Island, but instead dispatched his own purveyor merchant Wei Qingshan (Wei Qingmu's brother) to go and negotiate a price with the Sea Roving Bandits...

Just as Zhu Cizhao was observing the enemy from the city wall, Manager Wei Qingshan had already met the "Sea Roving King" Li Jicheng, who had personally led his forces on this campaign, at the dock of South Battery Bay.

Li Jicheng had grown darker and thinner over these past years — darker because he had to lead troops out to sea every few days, and the great sun at sea had tanned him black. Thinner because he had suffered a serious illness the year before!

Tropical disease had not spared him either; he had contracted dysentery, and the diarrhea had nearly sent him off to meet Li Zicheng!

And after the diarrhea ended, Li Jicheng still had to kill people — he killed Sun Kewang and his daughter!

Because this father-daughter pair had schemed during Li Jicheng's illness, plotting a palace coup to restore Li Laiheng to the throne. In the end the restoration failed, and they paid with their lives...

Of course, Li Jicheng was a filial son, so after killing his stepmother he immediately went to his father to beg forgiveness, and even presented ten beauties plundered from India as compensation.

Still, the affair dealt a blow to Li Jicheng's already somewhat declining standing... The cost of the Shun's shift toward Burma had been terribly heavy! Li Jicheng, exalted as he was as the Imperial Lord, had been laid low once by dysentery and nearly become the Late Emperor — how much worse for ordinary people?

In these past years, no fewer than three or four hundred thousand of the Shun nation had perished from various tropical epidemics. The history of the Shun's colonization of Burma was, at its root, a history of blood and tears!

And in order to restore his prestige, Li Jicheng had no choice but, barely recovered from his great illness, to launch an offensive against the Great Ming.

Furthermore, word arriving from India that the King of Portugal had reached Goa and was seeking aid from the Great Ming and the Timurid Empire also spurred Li Jicheng to take action against the Great Ming.

He did not know why King Afonso of Portugal had come to Goa, nor why he had thrown in his lot with the Great Ming and the Timurids. But he did know that behind the defection of Afonso and the Portuguese of Goa there was certainly the black hand of Zhu Cilang.

This was a sign that the Zhu Emperor was about to intervene in India on a grand scale — once India fell under Ming control, the Shun would truly be bottled up to death.

So Li Jicheng joined forces with Philippe I, Duke of Orléans, the newly arrived French Governor-General of India at Pondicherry, and with the Dutch India Trading Company, to launch a joint operation, striving to beat back the claw the Great Ming was extending toward the Indian Ocean!

India is the Shun's India!

"Hmph, I don't want Zhu Cizhao's stinking money!" Li Jicheng's voice was somewhat hoarse, and it sounded dark and rather frightening. "Go back and tell Zhu Cizhao: this time I've brought the heavenly host here precisely to make peace with him. I will take the western mouth of Malacca as the boundary — the east belongs to the Ming, the west belongs to my Shun! Henceforth the Ming is forbidden to interfere in Indian affairs. This India is my Shun's India!"

"This, this..." Manager Wei Qingshan did not know what to say upon hearing this. Zhu Cizhao was, after all, only the Prince of Luo — what authority did he have to alter the Ming's India policy? Even if he agreed, it would be of no use!

Li Jicheng narrowed his eyes and continued: "Zhu Cizhao had better not think he can fool me with empty words. I also want a hostage — his grandson Zhu Yijin is to come to Haidu as a guest!"

(End of Chapter)