Manila's harbor was filled with ships flying rectangular red flags, including Manila's castles and forts, which were now owned by the Ming army. The most special thing is that all the battleships have a huge devil's head painted on the sails, and hundreds of ships without exception. After the naval battle, Deng Ming found that the devil's head was very useful, and it was better than he imagined that using a searchlight to dazzle people's eyes, so when he was resting, Deng Ming painted more sails with grimaces.

In the ensuing battles, Deng Ming carried out continuous night raids, and each time the effect was very good. The fleeing Spaniards had spread the word of the alliance between the Ming army and the devil, and whenever the defenders of the fortress saw the devil suddenly emerge from the darkness of the night, they abandoned their armor and fled. A small number of brave Spanish soldiers also experimented with many new weapons under the priest's command, such as holy water cannonballs and the Great Cross Array, but to no avail.

With the successive victories of the Ming army, Deng Ming eventually developed to the point of painting grimaces on the sails of every boat. Although the Ming army continued to attack at night, it was no longer sneakily driving to the enemy's fortress to land, but openly turning on the lights, shining on the grimaces of hundreds of ships and attacking head-on.

After the Ming army landed near Manila, a large number of Spanish soldiers deserted. The Governor of Manila prayed for three days and three nights, then scattered thousands of urgently made crosses and painted images on prominent heights in the harbor of Manila. The Governor's Mansion was also occupied by psychics and revelators for a time. In the past, most of these people would be burned as sorcerers and witches, but the governors and military officers who were sick and rushed to the hospital seriously discussed with them the plan to exorcise ghosts, and even the priests, who had always been at odds with these sorcerers, put aside their prejudices and did not object.

Last night the Ming army launched an attack. The Ming fleet turned on searchlights to cover the infantry attack. When he discovered that the huge circle could not stop the fangs and claws of the devil from approaching the port of Manila, the governor made a final move, ordering a choir of 500 boys and girls to sing hymns to the Ming fleet. When this failed, the devil's ship did not sink to the bottom or be expelled, and the morale of the Spanish defenders was completely broken, and they abandoned the outer fortresses and fled back to the city. Subsequently, the governor surrendered to Deng Ming and surrendered the fortress of Manila on the condition that they would guarantee their spiritual freedom.

"Governor, please see, this is our luminous equipment, they work on the principle of ......" After capturing Manila, Deng Ming immediately invited senior Spanish officials and generals to visit the searchlights of the Ming army, and asked them to operate them themselves. As for the hideous devils on the sails, Deng Ming also let the captives look at these lifeless portraits up close. Deng Ming then ordered the troops to help every curious Spanish captive to see the equipment, and the Ming army should unreservedly help them understand what electricity was all about.

"Why did the prime minister tell them?" Feng Xifan was very surprised, and did not understand why Deng Ming had revealed the secret to the Spaniards.

"Because after the war is over, we will have to do business with the Spaniards." Deng Ming smiled: "If the Spaniards really think that we have made an alliance with the devil, it will affect the trade between us. Now that we have taken Manila, our war with the Spaniards is coming to an end. ”

"But what about the Dutch?" Feng Xifan remembered that Deng Ming said that the purpose of this expedition was Batavia, not simply to Manila.

"Yes, so we'll release the Spanish captives later. Even if this doesn't work, we already have a fleet that is not inferior to Batavia. "Deng Ming intends to recruit some instructors and sailors from the Spaniards to help the Ming army raise the level of naval warfare as soon as possible. With the help of these Spaniards, plus the searchlights of the Ming army and the new shells, Batavia was not out of reach.

Feng Xifan thought for a while, and then said to Deng Ming: "The lowly post will not follow the prime minister to Batavia, and the lowly post plans to return to Taiwan to resume his life." ”

"Oh, so fast?" Deng Ming was a little surprised, because the battle with the Spaniards was never played by firearms, and it was basically by grimaces to open the way, which probably did not play much role in Feng Xifan's plan to reform the military system; However, even if he fights with the Dutch in the future, Deng Ming will most likely continue to use this trick. Spanish mercenaries, new shells, were a last resort, and he would use them unless the Dutch were completely unfooled. Deng Ming guessed that Feng Xifan probably thought that he would not be able to collect too much experience in the firearms war if he continued to follow, so he planned to go home.

"Yes, following the prime minister to sea has benefited him a lot." Feng Xifan Zhengse said: "The lowly position finally understands that the previous lowly position has completely gone into the evil road. ”

"What evil way?" Deng Ming was a little confused.

"Didn't he tell the prime minister that he planned to build a firearms army, and he also persuaded King Yanping to buy the Taixi warship?"

"Is this the wrong way?" Deng Ming was taken aback. When Feng Xifan talked about his reform ideals, Deng Ming could see that the other party's eyes were full of confidence and longing, and Deng Ming also admired Feng Xifan's foresight, so he planned to help him -- the Taiwan army is now a friendly army, and it will also be part of the Chinese army in the future.

"The last general decided to go back and study the art of war, and the art of war is the right way." Feng Xifan said solemnly, his face full of determination, as if he was more determined to reform now than he was at the beginning.

"The Art of War?" Deng Ming had a vague premonition that he might have destroyed Feng Xifan's original ambition with his own hands.

"Yes, the first king was able to defeat the great ships and muskets of the Hongyi with his blessed ships, and conquer their fortresses; The prime minister can also defeat Hongyi's big ships and conquer their fortresses with a grimace. The first king and the prime minister won not by weapons, but by the art of war! Wang Shang and General Liu are right, the humble position is indeed shorter than the military affairs, because they have no experience, so they are whimsical, and they think that weapons are the most important. This time I followed the prime minister on the expedition, and I finally understood that the weapon is not the most important thing, but the person who uses the weapon is important. Therefore, when he returned this time, he would no longer be arrogant and suggest that the king carry out any reforms, but should study the art of war in a down-to-earth manner. ”

After finishing speaking, Feng Xifan ignored the armor on his body, bowed deeply to Deng Ming, straightened his waist and bent down deeply, such as the third: "The prime minister's words and deeds, I am grateful for my humble duties." ”

Deng Ming looked at Feng Xifan silently, and was sure that the other party had just abandoned the "weapon-only theory", and from then on, Taiwan would have one less military reformer and one more master of the art of war.

didn't think about how to pull Feng Xifan back to the old road for a while, so Deng Ming also diverted the topic and took the officers to inspect the treasury in Manila first.

The gold stored in the fortress of Manila naturally became the trophy of the Ming army. Deng Ming walked into the warehouse of the Governor's Palace in Manila, which was filled with pockets of gold coins. Deng Ming asked the soldier to drag a bag out of it, opened it and fell to the ground, and the golden ocean piled up a small mound on the ground, reflecting the faces of the people around him in gold.

Although the people who followed Deng Ming on his tour were all people who had seen the world, but seeing so many gold coins rolling around on the ground, as well as a whole room of gold, many people's breathing became heavy.

"This must have hundreds of thousands, millions of taels of gold, right?" Zhou Kaihuang said excitedly.

Deng Ming nodded lightly. Both the Spaniards and the Portuguese gained enormous wealth from South America, with Portugal alone receiving more than 300 tons of gold, and Spain's income can be described as innumerable. What was in front of Deng Ming was nothing more than a few dozen tons of reserves in the Manila Governor's Palace.

Grabbing a handful of gold coins from the ground, Deng Ming stared at them earnestly for a moment. Manila has stored Spain's savings for many years, and the Philippines itself is one of the world's largest gold and copper mines. After taking control of Manila, China will no longer have to worry about metals such as gold, silver and copper for a long time to come. Not to mention that after taking Batavia, the spices, porcelain, and silk needed for Europe had to be exchanged for precious metals, or to provide rubber, saltpeter, and other goods that China needed.

Relying only on the seizure of the Manila Governor's Palace, Deng Ming could still get at least 500,000 taels of gold in addition to the dividends to the Allied army and the bonuses to the army. Deng Ming tilted his palm slightly, letting the gold coins in his hand fall from between his fingers one by one and fall back to the gold mountain on the ground. Without looking back, he asked Zhou Kaihuang behind him: "Do you know what this gold means?" ”

"It means that when the prime minister returns to the capital, he can scatter a lot of gold coins." Zhou Kai said with a ridiculous smile.

"With this money, those girls in Hubei can live to adulthood even if they are born in poor families; It means that the people there will no longer need to sign a deed of sale, and they will no longer be bought and sold casually, just like the Tongxiucai in Sichuan. With this money, Deng Ming was able to ransom land and population from more Kuidong generals, end the tenancy relationship on these sites, and pay the poor to support their daughters.

Throwing the last gold coin back in his hand, Deng Ming turned around and walked out of the warehouse.

Representatives of the local overseas Chinese have been found by the Ming army. In addition to overseas Chinese in Manila, there are also overseas Chinese representatives from various ports and cities. After they were found by the reclamation group, Deng Ming invited them to Manila together. Most of these overseas Chinese are from Fujian or Guangdong, and a small number are from Zhejiang, most of which are from Ningbo.

In the past, when the war was still ongoing, Deng Ming knew that most of the overseas Chinese were still suspicious, and he didn't know if the Ming army would leave after a short stay and let this land fall into the hands of Westerners again, so Deng Ming did not talk about post-war construction prematurely at that time. Now that the Spanish governor had surrendered to the Ming army, and the final victory of the Ming army was obvious, Deng Ming felt that it was time to explain to these Chinese representatives how he intended to rule the land.

Author's note: I saw that many readers questioned whether the technology in this book can be implemented in our real world, and another reader asked today...... Well, the author admits that this issue was never considered.

The author feels that the sail electromagnetic gun battleship is an interesting setting, which will bring a lot of interesting phenomena to the war in the world of the novel. There are a lot of interesting changes that some of the technologies come to the book early on, but does it take time to think about how they will be implemented? No one will travel to a parallel world and be misled by the technical details of the author's book, right? Just like the tactics of this searchlight and devil's head, the author is concerned with the fun of the battle process and results, so these equipment are arranged; No one really thinks that the author should seriously study the means to conquer Manila in the 17th century after crossing over, no one thinks so, right?

All technologies and equipment may or may not appear under the laws of physics in the real world, but the author has not pondered these. The technology in the book is the same as the characters' thoughts, actions, and language, and it is what the plot needs to be. Originally, the author also conceived some plots such as cold weapon battle scenes with walkie-talkie communication, and the use of cameras to secretly take pictures of the opponent's secret weapon design drawings - electroplating helmets. In fact, the author thinks these burdens are quite interesting. As for the process of technical realization, it is better to imagine that the physical laws of the parallel universe are different, and as for how to achieve this technical effect, the author does not know. However, since many readers can't accept it, let's save these passages for the next book.

As for the personal relationship issue mentioned by the "bloody" netizen, I haven't read the book you mentioned, if there are different opinions, I am very happy, which means that my work has attracted attention; But I'm convinced that this is not the case, because all fictional worlds are fictional, and tech trees are all in the service of the story. Whether it's easy or difficult, whether it's the same or different from our world, it's all to advance the plot of the novel, and will there be any novel author who doesn't understand this truth?