Originally, Zheng Zhilong thought that it was just a simple matter to nominate a few representatives to Beijing, because as Chongzhen said, most ship owners had to catch up with the trade season.

Since Emperor Chongzhen showed such sincerity, he invited them to Beijing for talks and made security guarantees. Zheng Zhilong originally planned that if the number of representatives was insufficient, he would let his two brothers go to the capital to see the world together.

But the development of the matter was beyond everyone's expectations, not only a few leaders of the Eighteen Zhi wanted to be representatives, but even several maritime leaders who had always kept a low profile also showed great interest. Of course, these people care more than just the opportunity to meet the saints, they value more than the power to participate in the formulation of overseas trade rules.

Although Eighteen Zhi is a group that includes pirates and maritime merchants in the Ming Sea in this era, it is just a loose pirate alliance. On the surface, the leaders of the Eighteen Zhi are Zheng Zhilong, Liu Xiang and others, but in the dark, the most powerful are several maritime families in Fujian and Guangdong.

In this era, whether you are a pirate or a maritime merchant, you need to have the following conditions: first, loyal and reliable manpower; second, it has the ability to organize the supply of goods in the mainland; The third is to have the ability to build ships.

The reason why the Ming Dynasty could not implement the maritime ban policy was entirely because these families who had been engaged in maritime trade for generations were constantly transfusing blood to these pirate gangs. Otherwise, without the replenishment of ships and manpower from the mainland, no matter how strong the pirate gang is, it will eventually become beggars on the sea.

The reason why the Manchus were able to complete the policy of locking the country that the Ming Dynasty could not complete was precisely because the Manchus made a policy of relocating seaside residents and created a 30-mile no-man's land. This barbaric and bloody method hit the soft underbelly of the pirate group at once. Since the fall of the Ming Dynasty, the pirates off the coast of China have never been able to reproduce the glory of the Ming Dynasty pirate group.

Why is this so, because fighting at sea is that the big ship beats the small ship, and the fast ship beats the slow ship. Shipbuilding is an industry with a high degree of resource concentration, and it takes 3-5 years to dry the ship materials alone, not to mention the number of craftsmen and strict technical requirements required to build large ships.

The main reason why Eighteen Zhi was able to cross the sea was that their ships were not at all weaker than the warships of the sailors, and even better in some aspects. And these ships were all built in the private port of Fujian, and it can be said that the sailors of the Ming Dynasty did not lose to Zheng Zhilong, but to those maritime merchant families in Fujian and Guangdong who united with Eighteen Zhi.

The main reason why these Fujian and Guangdong maritime merchant families supported the Eighteen Zhi to attack the Ming coastal area was that these maritime merchant families were different from the Fujian gentry who relied on privileges to monopolize overseas trade, and they did not have spokespersons in the imperial court, so they were the main targets of the Ming maritime ban policy.

Supporting pirates to fight the Ming Dynasty sailors, first, was to break the Ming court's maritime ban policy and force the Fujian sailors to turn a blind eye to coastal smuggling; The second is to use these pirates to warn the gentry in Fujian, the gentry can use the policy of the imperial court to engage in monopoly trade, so they will use pirates to blockade the coastal areas of Fujian, and everyone will simply not do overseas trade.

Historically, this strategy has been successful. The decay of the imperial court sailors made the gentry of Fujian immediately see the situation clearly, and soon they would persuade the civil officials of Fujian to compromise with Shibazhi, and Fujian became an open smuggling base. The Ming lost the tax revenue from overseas trade, thus achieving Zheng Zhilong's maritime kingdom.

It is precisely because of the amazing hidden strength of these maritime merchant families that pirate leaders such as Zheng Zhilong and Liu Xiang have always been both wooing and vigilant against the representatives of these maritime merchants. When the four major maritime merchant families of Pan, Ye, Huang, and Wu joined forces to obtain representatives to Beijing who formulated overseas trade rules, Zheng Zhilong, who did not attach much importance to this number of representatives, immediately became alert.

Since these maritime merchants, who have never cared about Zhao'an affairs, have become interested, it proves one thing, the places of these representatives are very valuable. Competing for the hearts and minds of these deep-rooted maritime families, Zheng Zhilong felt that he had no chance of winning.

He immediately said to his subordinates: "Although Gonggong Lu said that the representatives who enter Beijing need to be elected by everyone, and they must select people with prestige. But in the past few days, more than 20 delegates have been elected. In my opinion, these 20 people have similar status in everyone's hearts, and there is no difference between superior and inferior, forcing everyone to choose 10 people from among them will only hurt everyone's harmony, I think we don't have to choose any more, it is better to think about other ways to pick out 10 people from these 20 people as representatives. ”

When Zheng Zhilong saw that the signs of electing representatives were wrong, he immediately announced the change of rules, Pan Bizheng hesitated, and wanted to go back and discuss with several other people whether to oppose it.

With his hesitation, someone responded to Zheng Zhilong's proposal. Although Zheng Cai is also on the list of 20 people, because he has entered the Eighteen Zhi at the latest, his reputation among the 20 people is also the lowest.

Therefore, when Zheng Zhilong said that he wanted to change the rules to select people, he was the first to stand up and express his support, and quoted scriptures and classics. The main meaning is that this representative who enters Beijing should not only have a certain prestige, but also have basic etiquette qualities, and it is best to be able to read and write hyphenated, so as not to collide with His Majesty when he enters Beijing to face the saint, and it is not good to be pulled out and beheaded.

Zheng Cai was stunned by these pirates, who were mostly illiterate, and many pirates suddenly began to worry about the leaders they had befriended in the list, and some even began to speak out to dissuade them.

Zheng Zhihu couldn't stand it anymore, originally he had a good impression of Zheng Cai, who flattered him all day long, but after being stabbed by Zheng Cai in the hall a few days ago, he immediately felt that this person was too inauthentic.

Zheng Zhihu, who has an upright personality, once he has a prejudice against people, he likes to fight against people everywhere. He completely ignored his brother Zheng Zhilong's approving look at Zheng Cai, and directly retorted: "The conditions put forward by Your Majesty are for the sake of ordinary maritime merchants everywhere, will such Your Majesty pull us out and behead us because we have lost our honor?" Or in the eyes of Zheng Junshi, His Majesty is a gentleman? ”

Zheng Zhihu's unscrupulous attack suddenly made Zheng Cai roll his eyes and speechless. Zheng Zhihu's words also reminded the leaders who were almost taken to the ditch by Zheng Cai. Li Kuiqi said with a dark face: "Master Zheng, what do you mean by what you just said, do you want to intimidate everyone so that you can go to Beijing?" I just thought it was strange, why do you have to read and hyphenate when you meet the emperor, do you want to say that you are the most suitable to be this representative? ”

"That's this, that's this, don't spend the belly of a gentleman with the heart of a villain, am I Zheng Cai that kind of person? I have all my heart and soul in mind for the safety of your leaders. Zheng Cai defended himself with a red face.