"So no matter what, I can't go back to El City, can I?" José's mind was not stupid, and he immediately understood what Jin Ming meant.

"That's right, you have only two paths, cooperate with us and live, or sacrifice your humble life for Lord Alcalázo in the city of Salvador. After Jin Ming expressed his attitude towards Qian Tiandun, he spoke more bluntly. He knew that it was probably unlikely that a big man like Qian Tiandun would spend a few hours watching him interrogate José slowly, and if he wanted to show himself in front of him, he would have to take out useful dry goods from José's mouth.

José didn't have to look in the mirror to know how ugly his face was at this time, he never dreamed that his life would face such a sudden turn. I just went to a tavern for a drink, why was I suddenly forced to make such a heavy decision?

José's hesitation was not because of how patriotic he was, but also because he was not a pure Spaniard - of course the Spaniards were originally a mixture of multiple races, and there was no such thing as a pure-blooded Spaniard after the Arab invasion of the Iberian Peninsula in the 7th century. After eight centuries of Arab rule, there is very little left of the Visigoths who originally inhabited the land.

Whether it was the accession of Ferdinand I, who marked the union of the Kingdom of Castile and the Kingdom of Aragon, in 1412, or the coronation of Carlos I as Holy Roman Emperor of Charles V in 1519, the kingdom belonged to a few nobles, not to the common people like José. As for the identity of this national, it will only be remembered by the dignitaries and nobles when they are taxed and a large number of young men are required to go to war with foreign countries.

Compared with his status as a Spanish national, José actually cared more about his blacksmith shop in Salvador City, Chicken Coop Port, which was the result of his six years of struggle in the Far East! Now these Orientals are going to make him give up these possessions completely, and José doesn't have such a big heart to say no, don't want it. Although the shop is full of broken copper and iron, if you really want to convert assets, it is at least hundreds of silver coins, how can it be said that it is gone. If you can't go back, it's not all cheaper than Lord Alcalázo in the city.

Take 10,000 steps back and say, if Jose chooses to save his life, where can he go to live in the future?△dǐng△diǎn△小△said,[email protected]▲s_(); He knew that Mingren didn't like outsiders like him, even if they would come to Salvador City with a smile on their faces, but in private he disparaged Europeans as "Xifan". If these people settle themselves in Daming, I am afraid it will be difficult to live for a long time. Jose thought about it and struggled to make a decision for a while. Although he wanted to live, he was unwilling to give up his previous living environment.

Jin Ming looked at his hesitant expression, and could roughly guess what he was worried about, so he immediately urged: "Jose, if you have any scruples, you might as well say it." ”

Jose replied: "What will I rely on to eat in the future when I leave the city of Salvador? Do I think I can adapt to the environment of the Ming Kingdom. ”

After listening to Jin Ming's translation, Qian Tiandun smiled and said, "It turns out that he is worried about the way out in the future...... You tell him that if he is willing to cooperate, he can work for us in the future. A craftsman like him with a skill will definitely be willing to be accepted by the Ministry of Industry. ”

Jin Ming diǎndiǎn head and persuaded Jose: "If you want to continue to do your old job, we can take you in and pay you to do things." You must know that being able to serve Haihan is a blessing that many people can't ask for!"

After hearing this, Jose still had to think about it, and Qian Tiandun had no patience to grind with him anymore: "Jin Ming, you sue him, if he can't make a decision right away, then the meal he ate just now will be his severed head meal." ”

Jin Ming translated it to Jose according to Qian Tiandun's statement, which frightened the little blacksmith's face to turn blue and white for a while. This time he didn't hesitate for too long, diǎn diǎn head said, "Okay, no matter what you want to ask, I will tell you what I know." ”

Once José's attitude softened, it was much easier to continue the questioning. Jin Ming followed his own list and began to ask José questions one after another. The condition of the Spaniards on the island of Taiwan is also made complete in José's narrative.

After the Spanish colonized Manila in Luzon in 1571, they used it as the center of Spanish trade in the Far East, and gradually conquered the nearby islands. Although Taiwan was not far from Luzon, Spanish policymakers at the time chose spice-rich regions such as Mindanao and the Maluku Islands south of Luzon as their preferred direction for expansion. Later, when the ambitious Toyotomi Hideyoshi planned to use the island of Taiwan as a springboard to attack Luzon, the Spaniards realized the strategic value of the island.

However, at the end of the 16th century, Toyotomi Hideyoshi launched the Battle of Bunroku Keicho (that is, the "Imjin War" in Korean history, known as the "Wanli Aid to the Dynasty" in the Ming Dynasty) and was finally defeated, and Toyotomi Hideyoshi himself died of illness in Fushimi Castle in Kyoto in the second half of 1598. As soon as the Manila authorities saw that the threat from the north had been eased, they dismissed the idea of going north and continued to keep Taiwan out of the goal of expansion.

By the beginning of the 17th century, however, the threat to the Spaniards had changed from the Japanese to the Dutch, and the hostility between the two sides in the European theater over the Dutch War of Independence inevitably spread to the Far East. The Dutch East India Company, noting that Manila's prosperity was mainly due to the Ming silk trade and the silver trade in the Americas, decided to attack the ships that came and went to Manila. However, due to the limitations of the seafaring standards of the era, the Dutch found it difficult to completely blockade Manila with a limited number of armed merchant ships, and soon realized that this strategy had limited effect. So they decided to change their strategy and follow the example of the Portuguese in establishing a base close to the Ming Dynasty.

However, the Dutch's plans to seize Macao and Penghu failed one after another, and in the end they had to retreat to the southern port of Dayuan, which was settled in the southern part of the island of Taiwan. It was only at this time that the sluggish Manila authorities realized the severity of the problem, and in order to be able to confront the Dutch, they finally made up their minds to establish their own base on the island of Taiwan.

Since the Dutch took the lead in occupying Dayuan Port on the west coast of Taiwan Island in 1624, the backward Spaniards had to land at Jilong Harbor at the northern tip of Taiwan Island in 1626, far from Dayuan Port, and began to build and settle Diǎn on Jilong Island at the exit of the harbor, which was later named Heping Island. Of course, as was the practice of Western colonizers, the island was renamed San Salvador, and the settlement of Diǎn was designed to be easily defended in the shape of a bastion.

The architect who oversaw the castle was Anonoarrnoas, the first governor of Joncoop Harbor. The fort, named by Valdés as the city of San Salvador, has a circumference of about 400 meters, wide at the bottom and narrow at the top, and is surrounded by four small circular bastions as a means of perimeter protection. However, the Spanish colonization activities did not go well, because they landed and plundered the nearby indigenous villages such as Jinbaoli Society and Dajilong Society, the local people refused to sell food and supplies to them, and the supply ships in Manila were unable to provide timely assistance due to the typhoon season, so many Spaniards experienced a very depressed period in the local area. Jose, a blacksmith who was sent to the local area as one of the first immigrants, even had to rely on eating rats for a period of time to survive his hunger, and the tragic situation can be imagined.

By 1627, the food shortage in the city of El Salvador had not been alleviated, and Valdés was forced to send a group of soldiers to the Valdeir River area to negotiate with the natives of the nearby Guirou community for food. However, the local tribes banded together to drive away the Spaniards, and seven Spaniards were killed in the clashes, while the rest fled back to Chicken Coop Harbor. The following year, Valdes sent more troops to Tamsui to defeat the natives and plunder the grain. Eventually, the natives negotiated peace with the Spaniards on the condition of ceding their land, and the Guirou Society moved away, so Valdés ordered a new Diǎn to be built in the area, which was later named Sanoono.

In 1630, Valdés returned to Manila with Anaaraso as the second governor of the chicken coop, and in the same year Guersman (San) as the first governor of freshwater.

Although the two places were not far apart, the Spaniards began to look for an alternative land route because the coastline between the two places was too rugged and the sea route was limited by the monsoon and ocean currents. In 1632, Alcarazo sent 80 soldiers up the Tamsui River, finding the veins of the Keelung River, and finally finding an inland passage connecting the two places in the Taipei Basin. The indigenous tribes along these two water veins were later conquered by the Spaniards.

In April 1632, there was a major event in the northern part of the island of Taiwan, when a Spanish ship drifted to the Lanyang Plain on the east coast of the island due to weather conditions, which was later the area of Yilan County, Taiwan. The crew and passengers of the ship were all killed by the local Kamarans, so Alcarazo, who had long coveted the area, finally found a reason to do so, and sent troops to destroy seven local villages and kill many Kamalan people in retaliation. Of course, this fertile seaside plain has been a matter of course for the Spaniards since then.

But although the Spaniards expanded their territory in the north of Taiwan faster than the Dutch in the south, their business did not get any better. Due to the strong involvement of the Haihan people in Fujian in recent years, the Fujian government and the people are more inclined to do business with the "pro-Ming" Haihan people, and there are not many Ming merchants who are willing to trade in Jilong Port, and the price of the goods supplied is not advantageous compared with Manila. In recent years, Japan has been in a state of isolation, it is difficult to open the door to trade, and there is not much oil and water to speak of just by squeezing the local indigenous tribes.

In order to maintain the garrison in chicken coops, fresh water and other places, the Spaniards had to rely on subsidies from Manila for their operations in northern Taiwan. However, Manila had to deal with years of war with the green countries of the South China Sea, and on the other hand, it had to face the current situation of declining silver production in the Americas after 1630, and it became increasingly difficult to support daily operations. José used to work with four apprentices, often working overtime, but now he has more time to spend in the tavern because the overwhelmed authorities of the city of Salvador cut military spending.

If there was no intervention of the Haihan people in this time and space, then according to the original historical development, by 1637 the Spaniards were already struggling and had to abandon the foothold of Tamsui and retreat to the chicken coop. By 1642, the Dutch attacked the chicken coop, seized the area, and drove the Spaniards out of the island completely.

Of course, after the Haihan people came to this plane, many things became different. For example, the Dutch in southern Taiwan were far less nourished than they had in their original history, and after Batavia was almost wiped out, Dayuangang had fewer and fewer supplies from the southern base camp, and they had to face the Haihan fleet that could block the shipping lanes at their doorstep at any time, and life was not much better than that of competitors in the north who had been short of food and clothing for a long time.

The fact that he was able to organize the timeline so clearly is also due to the fact that José came to the chicken coop early enough and experienced almost all the major events in the local area. Many of these are situations that Qian Tiandun did not grasp before, after all, everything that Haihan knows is from vague records in history, but the narrator in front of him is a person who has experienced these things alive, and the situation he said is far more detailed and credible than the record. Jin Ming was translating, and Du Rong next to him was making notes, these important materials were not easy to come by, and they would have to be sent back to the Sanya base camp for archiving in the future.

Jose is just a small person, he does not understand how the appearance of the Haihan people affects the situation on the island of Taiwan, and he does not know what kind of attitude the Haihan has towards Spain, but he can feel the other party's concern for the chicken coop area from the questions that Jin Ming keeps raising, and such attention is by no means kind. Even if Jin Ming didn't say it, Jose could feel that the Oriental man who had been sitting in the middle and staring at him must be a senior officer, and the kind of coercion and murderous aura that could not be concealed on his body was definitely not something that ordinary people could have.

Why did the Haihan officers pay so much attention to the situation of the chicken coop? José thought that there was only one possibility, and that was that the Haihan people, like the Dutch, coveted the territory that the Kingdom of Spain held in Taipei. However, Jose didn't think that the Haihan people would really take action against the chicken coop, after all, the Dutch had been planning for several years, and they didn't dare to take the chicken coop lightly. Of course, if Jose had really known what the Haihan militia had done over the past five years, he might not have been so optimistic.