Zhu Mo's trip was primarily to verify if Yu Dayou's words were true.
This involved a fundamental question:
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Was it reasonable for these merchants to operate under the control of a transnational force like the Wokou pirates? After several days of observation, beyond the shocking reality, he also felt a sense of profound dread.
The Wei Suo system,
Indeed, it was more corrupt than the Nine Garrisons.
If the Nine Garrisons' Wei Suo still had some households that defended their posts, meaning there were still some usable individuals, then the coastal Wei Suo had nothing left. The military households were almost impossible to find, having completely blended into the common populace. In terms of resisting the Wokou, the government was a mere formality.
Every time the Wokou attacked, the populace offered almost no resistance. Instead, it was the mountain bandits and common bandits who would occasionally fight the Wokou.
The Wokou's control was insidious: any town that organized resistance was completely massacred. However, those that did not resist, and even willingly cooperated with smuggling, were left unharmed.
This created a very unfavorable situation:
The government was utterly unable to mobilize resistance against the Wokou. The populace dared not step forward because they had seen too much. Once they stepped forward, and the government troops left or were defeated, the Wokou's brutal retaliation would inevitably follow. After a few such experiences, no one dared to speak of resisting the Wokou again.
The most terrifying aspect was the mindset of the people:
In the coastal areas close to the Wokou's presence, the populace had been tormented by the Wokou for decades and no longer knew what the government was. While they knew they were subjects of the Great Ming, where was the protection of the government troops? Over time, these people lived in a state of moral ambiguity. Gradually, they accepted the indirect rule of the Wokou.
The indirect rule of the Wokou was implemented through some local gentry and merchants. These individuals organized the supply of goods and labor, acting like tax collectors, regularly sending them to the Wokou. And the Wokou, unlike the Tatars outside the Nine Garrisons, had a semblance of fairness: they would always pay money! This added another layer of deception, which explained the strange phenomenon of coastal townsfolk willingly sending their children to Wokou ships.
Precisely because of this,
The territory of the coastal Wei Suo could be said to be a land without a master, or as Yu Dayou and others said, a state within a state indirectly controlled by the Wokou. The resources of these areas had formed a pattern of supplying the Wokou bases. How could Yu Dayou and Li Wenjin's talk of overthrowing the Great Ming not be true?
...
At this moment,
Gazing at the distant specks of fire on the sea.
Zhu Mo couldn't help but smile wryly: No wonder Qi Jiguang's soldiers were called Yiwu soldiers. That was because Jinhua was not coastal, and belonged to Qindongyang Prefecture, with a history of many Central Plains immigrants. These areas closer to the interior, including the mountainous regions of Jiangnan, were where the populace had not fallen into ruin.
Lu Kun was a man of unique literary insight, recording everything he saw along the way. Regarding the current state of the coastal Wei Suo, he felt a chill run through him. Gazing at the Wokou water village, he couldn't help but sigh:
"Zi Xuan, Jinshan Wei is one of the Four Great Garrisons of the realm! I could never have imagined it would fall to this state... Those of Xuanda were already derelict enough, but this place, it's not even derelict, it's simply gone..."
Heh heh,
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Zhu Mo also sighed, "It is gone... If we want to reform, in such a situation, how can we possibly succeed? Without eradicating the Wokou, there can be no progress whatsoever."
He had already realized—
This was a conflict zone between two modes of existence!
For the common people, was the Wokou's violent merchant mode better? Or was his (Zhu Mo's) balanced mode better? That was the true question.
Thinking of this,
He suddenly made up his mind to go to Ligang to see for himself. Thus, he asked,
"Uncle Jian, I want to go to the island to take a look... We won't bring these soldiers. Let's disguise ourselves as merchants, go and procure some silk first, and personally try smuggling ourselves?"
Lu Kun was surprised. "No! Zi Xuan, you cannot go! If something happens to you, what will become of the grand reform effort?"
Zhu Mo smiled, "We'll be disguised as smuggling merchants, who would recognize us? Besides, I have some money on me. At worst, we can use money to buy our way out. There will be no danger..."
Zhu Mo acted immediately. That night, they arrived at Huating. He exchanged money at a branch of the state-run bank, purchased over five hundred bolts of silk, found several smuggling merchants, and together hired ten fishing boats.
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...
The next day, as night fell,
The two disguised themselves as inland merchants and set sail from a pier in Jinshan Wei.
In the middle of the night, riding the wind, they took nearly three hours to reach an island reef water fortress. They saw warships lining the shore, but the flags were very diverse, completely different from those of the government troops.
At this time,
Zhu Mo saw with his own eyes that most of these Wokou soldiers were indeed pirates and refugees. There were also some Japanese ronin, but their numbers were indeed only about two or three tenths. Within the Wokou, each faction managed itself. Mountain bandits had their own leaders, refugees had their own chiefs, and pirates had their own captains. The Wokou, being slightly more organized, had natural hierarchies. Those bearing clan emblems were naturally the leaders.
As the fishing boats passed the gate, Chinese personnel collected fees: ten taels of silver per merchant, and at least a thousand taels for the cargo. After passing the water fortress, it was another half hour's voyage before they reached Ligang.
Gazing into the distance,
Zhu Mo and Lu Kun saw houses stretching for miles, numbering no less than two to three thousand. On the high ground by the shore, there were watchtowers, and at the base of the towers, there were also battery emplacements. On the side facing the mainland alone, there were more than twenty, with a total possibly not less than fifty.
Upon docking, laborers naturally came down to help unload the goods, hoisting them up with rope and large baskets. As for the merchants, immediately after disembarking, they were escorted by a patrol of soldiers onto the island.
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Zhu Mo could now see clearly that this patrol unit consisted entirely of Europeans! They were likely of the Latin descent, with only two who appeared to be Dutch. Without surprise, each of these patrol soldiers carried a firearm, but upon closer inspection, they were matchlock guns, still a significant step behind his own flintlocks. The weight on his heart began to lessen.
Once on the island, they found a wide, flat area backed by mountains, a good location for building a city.
The houses and streets on the island were already established, with a scale that could even surpass that of a small county town. In the center stood a five-story wooden building, known as the Town Hall, with a wide open space below. Merchants bustled about, their shouts filling the air in a scene of great liveliness. Along the simple roads, there were both residences and shops, selling only daily necessities. They were also thronged with people, and the prices were almost ten times that of Hangzhou.
Further on, by the foot of the mountain near the woods, there were several taverns and clusters of inns, capable of accommodating at least two to three thousand people simultaneously!
However, such a lively place was also extremely chaotic. Drunkards, prostitutes, bandits, and pirates made a great din. Brawls occurred on the streets from time to time, and the patrol soldiers seemed to turn a blind eye as they led the merchants to the central square.
Today, the buyers were three major bosses: one named Lin Xian, another named Chen Dong, and a Portuguese man in his fifties who could speak some Chinese and was known by everyone as Mr. Pinto. At this moment, the three were seated in the hall below the Town Hall's wooden building, chatting and laughing, while their subordinates handled the receipt of goods outside.
These three men were of considerable influence. The two Chinese merchants heard from their peers that these three had been consistently purchasing goods for years, with each transaction involving over a hundred thousand bolts of silk. Furthermore, each of them owned a fleet of ships capable of long voyages to the West.