Chapter 940: The Protectorate

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The steamship's whistle let out a clear, bright cry.

The Jinghai slowly docked at the port.

Before the warship arrived, the marine soldiers landed a step ahead.

To ensure Zhao Xu's safety, they quickly cleared the battlefield, preventing any surviving enemy soldiers from taking potshots.

At this moment, the soldiers under Commander Pan Zhang also entered the trenches, accepting the Franks' surrender while taking control of the entire battlefield.

When Zhao Xu stepped onto the land of Manila, Pan Zhang had already brought over the Luzon Governor Ferrero and his subordinate Colonel Balensa.

"Your Highness, how should they be dealt with?" Pan Zhang asked.

Beside Ferrero followed an Overseas Song Person.

Upon hearing this, he immediately translated Pan Zhang's words.

"Your Highness Yan Wang, I have already surrendered, please spare my life." Ferrero was like a defeated rooster, his face full of pleading.

At the same time, he cautiously cast a glance at Zhao Xu.

He naturally had not expected that the Dayan Wang would come to Luzon in person.

And this Yan Wang was so young.

"Who said that surrendering means one can avoid death? Isn't it because victory was hopeless that you surrendered? If you had surrendered from the very beginning, this King might have considered it, but now..." Zhao Xu's gaze turned icy.

Ferrero's eyes widened instantly, his legs went weak, and he clamored wildly out of fear, "Yan Wang, I am a Governor; if you kill me, you will offend the Franks, you will offend the Western Lands, and they will not let you off."

"It sounds as if I let you go, they would let me off." Zhao Xu laughed even more coldly.

He paused and said: "In your twenty years in Luzon, every dirty deed you have done, this King knows clearly. Just the Overseas Song People who died under your butcher's knife number more than twenty thousand. If I let you go, who will pay for their lives?"

Ferrero was stunned.

When he slaughtered the Song People, he had never thought that one day, someone would take revenge for them.

After all,

in his eyes, these Overseas Song People were not even as good as the natives of Luzon.

Killing them was practically the same as killing a dog.

But now, the person to take revenge for them had arrived.

And the reason the Yan Wang gave was simply flawless.

"Even if I am to be judged, it should not be by you; it should be the Western Lands world that judges me." Ferrero was still quibbling.

Zhao Xu was already too lazy to listen to him anymore.

He simply waved his hand, having his soldiers drag Ferrero and the other surrendered Frankish officers away.

As for the surrendered Frankish officers and soldiers, they would be handed over to the marines for trial.

Those guilty of heinous crimes would be executed as they deserved.

The rest would be sent to the plantations to let them experience the suffering of the Overseas Song People who had been locked in them.

Immediately, under the escort of his soldiers, he moved from the coast into the Governor's Mansion in the center of Manila.

This was a three-story white, ancient castle-style building.

Ferrero, the Frankish officers, and the civil officials all worked here.

Now, the Franks in this Governor's Mansion had all been driven out by the Dayan soldiers.

Arriving at Ferrero's office, Zhao Xu saw a rough world map on the wall.

This map was naturally not precise, but it had the general outlines of the various regions of the world.

On the map, the color of the Franks was purple, and Luzon was also purple.

Besides this, the west coast region of South America was also all purple.

The locations corresponded to areas like Panama, Chile, Argentina, Brazil, and Venezuela.

Presumably, these were all colonies of the Franks.

They were considered part of the Franks.

However, as far as he knew, their colonies in South America had already been encroached upon quite a bit by the Sam Country.

On the desk in the office were some documents, and on top of them were a bottle of red wine and a glass wine cup.

"Your Highness, what should we do next? The King of Luzon also supported the Franks in their war against us. We have driven away the Franks, but we cannot let him off easily." Zhou Yi followed by Zhao Xu's side.

Soldiers kept coming over to report the situation in Manila to him.

"Of course we cannot hand Luzon over to him," Zhao Xu said, "and he is not the king of all of Luzon, but only one of three kings."

Luzon was actually composed of three regions.

The northern region with Manila as its core, the scattered islands in the middle known as Cebu, and a larger island in the south called Mian Island.

Each of the three regions had a king.

This meant that the current Luzon was not the concept of a single country, but a region.

He pondered for a moment and said: "Actually, after conquering Dongying, I had an idea to establish a Protectorate in the conquered regions."

"A Protectorate?" Zhou Yi was stunned; he had never heard this term before.

Zhao Xu nodded; he was not surprised by Zhou Yi's reaction.

Because there had been no glory of the Han or Tang dynasties here, naturally there were no Protectorates.

"Yes, the duty of this Protectorate is to soothe the vassal states and pacify foreign enemies," Zhao Xu explained.

The Protectorates of the Han and Tang eras were not direct administrative agencies; at that time, the small states of the Western Regions that submitted to the Han and Tang were still directly ruled by their own leaders.

A Protectorate was actually a military organ; the meaning of the two characters 'Protector' (Du Hu) was to supervise and protect through military means.

Currently, he had already stationed troops in Gaoli and Dongying; in fact, their functions were not much different from a Protectorate.

It was just missing a formal name.

However, before this, he only had a vague idea of it.

Now that Luzon has been taken, this idea has become clear.

This is what he meant by military support for the Overseas Song People.

Overall, regarding the governance of the Southern Region, on one hand, he will allow the Overseas Song People to enter the power center of the Southern Region, and even become kings in the future.

On the other hand, he will establish a Protectorate to protect the Southern Region.

He has even thought of the name for this Protectorate; it shall be called the Southern Protectorate.