"I know you have a lot of things you want to ask me, but in this case, I guess you need to answer my questions first." The man looked at me coldly, "What's your name and where are you from?" ”

"My name is John Adam von Bell." I hurriedly replied.

It's a bit ridiculous to say, and when I say the name, it suddenly feels strange, as if I were talking about someone else—for I've become completely accustomed to referring to myself in recent years.

Then, I told him exactly where I came from, what I had experienced, and what I wanted to do in China.

He listened to me without saying a word, and it was only when he had finished listening that he looked at me noncommittally, as if he was thinking about what to do with me.

"May I know your name, sir?" In order to lighten the mood a bit, I took the initiative to ask him, "Of course, if you find it inconvenient, it doesn't matter if you don't answer me...... But I thought, since God had arranged for us to meet thousands of miles away, why shouldn't we be kinder? ”

Perhaps touched by my words, the man suddenly grinned.

"My name is Louis de Rocheford, and as you have just tempted, I am a man of membership, if not already excommunicated."

His words confused me very much, and I felt a sense of closeness and a little more vigilant = wary. Why did he say he might have been disfellowship? Could it be some kind of priest who has broken the vows?

At this time, he explained to me again.

"I was a clergyman, or I was a clergyman, and I was in Rome. However, I belonged to the Santo Dominicans, and I had to leave Rome because of the Jesuits. ”

Although his tone was flat, I felt very uncomfortable listening to it, after all, I am a Jesuit priest!

However, it is not in Europe now, and I am not interested in arguing with him about religion.

"Before God, we are also his lost lambs." I tried to get him to cut some of his hostility towards me.

Judging by the attitude of the person who escorted me, he was an important person here.

It seems that Zhao Jin has done so many unconventional things, and there must be a lot of influence from him.

When I thought of this, I also breathed a sigh of relief, and it seemed that my worries at that time were unnecessary—the priests of the Santo Dominican Order were much easier to get along with than heretics, and perhaps the two of us could cooperate in the future to influence Zhao Jin and get him to support our missionary cause.

At the same time, I am also very curious about this person, and it must be a legendary experience to become a very respected figure under Zhao Jin.

At that moment, he beckoned me to come up to him.

"Alright, now that we're all here, let's stop talking about those sects, I have other things to ask you."

I complied with his request and walked up to him, and it was then that I realized that he seemed to have just come out of the workshop, and that he had a lot of soot and dust on his body, and that the white undershirt under his coat had been dyed gray and black, and that he didn't seem to care.

"You just said that you were invited by the imperial court of the Ming Kingdom to go north to the capital with cannons, right?" Although his tone was quite kind, his attitude was still a little arrogant, "Before you came, the cannon you brought with me had already been transported to me. ”

"Yes." I replied, "These cannons were a gift to make the Ming Empire more receptive to our mission. ”

"And yet I took their money." The man replied with some sarcasm, "So, do you yourself make cannons?" ”

"I know a little bit about mechanics, but there are better people with me, and I think he's better at making cannons than I am." I replied cautiously.

"Well, I am honored to inform you that as of today, you are already one of my assistants, assisting me in the manufacture of cannons for my employer." In an unquestioning tone, the man said to me, "You should thank yourself for learning this, or you will be sent to a black cell, where the treatment is much worse than this." ”

Ignoring his impolite tone, I asked him in surprise.

"This is where guns are made?"

No wonder Zhao Jin wants to make this place so secretive, I see, I finally understand.

"Yes, this is now the largest gun factory in Asia." This De Rocheford replied to me rather reservedly. "Although it is not as good as the best factories in Spain and the King of France, I believe that in a few years, in our hands, it will become the largest gun factory in the world."

"But...... I'm a missionary, sir. I tried to hide my anger and protest at him.

"Come on, now that you're here, you don't have a choice, haha!" He looked at my embarrassed face and laughed.

There was a smug tone in his tone, and it seemed that his long-term management work had cultivated his arrogance.

However, I still didn't understand his hostility to me, and it wasn't until later that I realized that his hostility to me did not come from the sect, but that he didn't want us to take away his advantageous position, and he wanted to use his special role in front of Zhao Jin to continue to make profits for himself.

At this moment, of course, I had no way of knowing what this man was thinking, so I had to obey his orders - though very reluctantly. I treat him as Zhao Jin's agent here, and the head of arms production.

This was a mistake on my part, and I should have thought that it was impossible for a person like Zhao Jin to be in charge of his most important arms factory to a foreigner.

After this extremely unpleasant conversation, I was taken back to my dormitory. However, in the expectant eyes of a group of colleagues, he said what he had just encountered.

As I expected, my colleagues were hit with shock and apprehension at the same time. Then we had to start a serious discussion about our future.

Of course, we don't want to take our original ambitions and suddenly disappear here and become poor prisoner craftsmen, but we don't dare to disobey Zhao Jin and that person's orders.

Obviously, though I am also a priest, I see not much mercy for us in that man—I have no doubt that if we do not cooperate, then his threat will surely become a reality.

In the end, after a long and rigorous discussion, we decided to contribute our abilities here first, and then look for an opportunity to go out.

The reason why we think this way is because we think that as long as we show enough ability, Zhao Jin will not always ignore us, even if it is just to build better guns, he will definitely find a way to meet some of our requirements.

At the same time, there are people who think that after we have been missing for so long, the court of the Ming Empire will put pressure on Zhao Jin to release us sooner, so we only need to cooperate for a short time. This idea, in the back, is considered to be a naïve idea that does not understand the shape of the shì - but, at least at this time, we still feel that the Ming imperial court will have some influence on Zhao Jin, and at least Zhao Jin can be respected on the surface.

In this way, we spent our first day in the dormitory in a state of trepidation. By the way, from what we've seen, the standard of our food is excellent.

The next day, we were woken up by a knock on the door early in the morning. These able-bodied men came to our dormitory, called us up one by one, and told us that this was the time when the craftsmen of the factories here went to work en masse, and that we were now one of them, so that every day we must get up at this time and assemble outside the door without the slightest delay.

A colleague who had not been in good health lately protested, and was quickly forced to change his mind by their fierce eyes, and finally we all had to acquiesce to this unreasonable request - I must admit that this was the lowest point in our trip to Xuzhou.

The group then led us out of the dormitory and walked towards the factory area.

Perhaps in order to make the most of our knowledge and prevent us from colluding in private, they scattered our people into separate workshops. They wanted us to be the mentors of the craftsmen and to teach them the European experience of mechanical engineering.

I feel a bit honored that I was assigned to one of the largest workshops.

When I walked into the workshop, I was almost suffocated by the heat. After a moment of distraction, I found that there were several large iron furnaces inside, as well as some animals pulling machinery. And between these railways and machinery, a group of people in thin clothes and even shirtless are constantly toiling in them.

I was not very good with the cattle, because by this time the river was frozen, and the machinery could not be propelled by water, so I had to rely on animal power, but I was interested in the iron furnace, because it was so strange.

It was a strangely shaped stove with an opening in a strange place, and it looked completely different from the ones in European workshops. I'm so intrigued by this that I can't help but want to go over and take a look.

But soon I stopped, because it was so hot, and although the bellows kept blowing the wind at the iron furnaces, this wind only intensified the temperature inside, and although there was still some distance between the iron furnaces, I still felt sweating profusely.

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