Valley Emperor

The nineteenth year of Xuanping was definitely the year that changed the most after the Tang Empire unified China.

And this change is not simply a military victory, territorial expansion, restoration of people's livelihood, or some political innovation or technological progress, but a huge change in the entire society.

This year, people began to travel by train and ship, and the travel time between Jinling City and Shanghai has been compressed into one day!

The Lady of the Yangtze River Shipping Company, in order to compete with Feng's Shipping Company and defend the title of the No. 1 shipping company in China, took the risk of continuous sailing day and night, and risked damage to the steam engine, or even the risk of shipwreck, and created Jinling City Record of sailing time to Shanghai.

They kept the average speed at more than 12 knots when the wind was smooth, the sails were fully opened, and the steam engine was fully powered, and the whole journey took less than 18 hours. They made history!

On the Jingzhen Line, the Zhili Railway Company began to shout the slogan of 'one day round trip'. People start from Jinling City in the morning, arrive at Zhenjiang at noon, and then return to Jinling City by train, and return to Jinling City in the evening. , complete a day's round trip!

This year, a large number of factories began to use higher-efficiency, lower-cost high-pressure industrial steam engines, and produced more and cheaper goods, and then filled the market.

Thanks to the development of steam engine technology, the cost of power in factories that already use high-pressure steam engines has dropped by at least half.

This year, the Datang Chaobao officially announced that the heroic Master of the Tang Dynasty has recovered most of the territory south of Heilongjiang, and the grace of the Son of Heaven will be spread all over this land, making this piece of land that has long been occupied by barbarians. The occupied land has returned to the glory of Chinese civilization.

Not only did the empire control all the territory south of Heilongjiang, immigrants were gradually entering the northeast, and the military announced that it would continue to advance northward, until one reached the Arctic Ocean on the map.

This year, the Tang army tried to launch a medium-scale offensive in the northwest region to test the attitude and strength of the Tartars. About 10,000 cavalrymen crossed Jiayuguan and attacked the Tubo, which had been completely controlled by the Tartars. In the region, countless enemies were defeated, and countless gold, silver, cattle, sheep and horses were seized.

Immediately afterwards, instead of taking military action to retaliate, the Tatars took the initiative to send envoys to seek peace with the empire. For this, they were willing to pay a huge price, not only sending some of the daughters of the Tatar nobles and the Tatars from the empire. Numerous princesses and other noble ladies of foreign races were plundered from the Western Regions, Central Asia and other places, and there were countless gold, silver, cattle and sheep, and even the most precious strategic material 'horses'. The Golden State of the Tang Dynasty was the name of the country, and Altan Khan called himself the King of Shunyi, and paid tribute every year.

The wise and great Son of Heaven had insight into the conspiracy of these barbarians, and knew that this was just a tactic of the Tartars to delay their troops. They tried to paralyze the Tang Empire, so as to deploy more troops for the westward expedition.

According to the news circulating in the northwest region, the Tatars have become addicted to the western expedition, and they cannot take care of themselves after the Eastern Chagatai Khanate. The Kazakh Khanate and the Yerkian Khanate have fought. As for why they fought with the two khanates in the west at the same time, why else? People think that he is too powerful, and he can single-handedly take out two opponents with one hand. home!

So, now the main cavalry of the Tatars is in the west, fighting against the Kazakh Khanate and the Yarkand Khanate. After being voted by the empire behind this, they are faced with the dilemma of fighting on two fronts. , anyway, the Datang Empire can't be beaten, so just ask for peace. As for the lost property in the east, grab more from the west and get it back.

That's why Antan Khan took the initiative to ask for peace!

Considering the difficulty of supplying supplies in the northwest region, the Northwest Railway will not be able to see it for several years. It is too expensive and difficult to maintain the army for a long time.

At the same time, taking into account the misfortune, let the Tatars go to Central Asia and even West Asia and Eastern Europe to vote first, and use the hands of the Tatars to first take advantage of the local areas such as the Kazakh Khanate, the Yerkian Khanate, and even the Persians further west. The Safi Dynasty, the Ottoman Empire and other messy barbarian natives will kill them first.

To ease the resistance that the empire encountered during its large-scale westward expedition, it was normal for the Tartars to fight against alien races, destroying their homeland and destroying their country wherever they went.

Of course, to ease relations with the Tatars does not rule out the relationship between dozens of women of different races sent by Altan Khan. In addition to the Tatar noble women, um, including a direct granddaughter of Altan Khan, there are also There are many princesses and the like from different countries and nationalities, each with a different style.

And Altan Khan spent a lot of time trying to please the Son of Heaven. At least he learned about Li Xuan's aesthetics. The women sent here are all in line with the Son of Heaven's aesthetics.

Under the combination of many circumstances, the Datang Empire reluctantly accepted Altan Khan's request for peace.

However, it was only a promise on the surface. In fact, the Northwest Railway is still under construction, and the Army is also hoarding grain and ammunition in the Northwest. When the Army is ready, the next attack is inevitable.

As for the peace treaty and the like, sigh, that's what, anyway, it is not the first time that the Tang Empire has torn up the peace treaty with the Tatars. It was already torn up once during the Hetao Battle, and it is not a big problem to tear it up the second time. .

This year, the navy announced that the circumnavigation fleet they sent three years ago had successfully completed the first circumnavigation. Midway, the Honolulu Islands, the west coast of North America, and knowing that the area is rich in gold, named the area on the east coast of North America where they arrived 'New Gold Mountain'.

Then the fleet went south along the western coastline of North America, entered Central America, then South America, and finally bypassed the southernmost tip of South America. Contact, because of the good relationship and cooperation between the Spaniards and the Datang Empire, the two sides can use the ports controlled by the other side for supplies, so the Spaniards did not embarrass the expedition fleet, but provided some help, such as along the way. supply and so on.

Then the expedition fleet sailed northward along the eastern coast of South America, but it didn't take long for the Portuguese to encounter the Portuguese. At this time, the Portuguese controlled the coastline of Brazil, and although the Portuguese and the Tang Empire had a cooperative relationship, they were still in the process of cooperation. However, with competition, the Portuguese did not welcome the ships of the Tang Empire to appear in the Indian Ocean and the Atlantic Ocean.

When the Portuguese refused Datang's expedition fleet to enter the port for supplies, and even rejected the proposal of Datang's expedition fleet to moor outside the port and then use money to buy supplies.

Faced with this rude provocation by the Portuguese, as a last resort, the expedition fleet was forced to carry out 'active offensive self-defense', by shelling the port of the Portuguese to show the friendship of the Tang Empire, and dispatched two hundred Many people landed and used bullets to cordially condolences to the local Portuguese garrison. After killing and wounding hundreds of people, this is the harvest of Portuguese friendship and successful access to supplies such as food and fresh water.

After that, in order to avoid trouble, the expedition fleet changed its course directly, gave up the plan to go to the east coast of North America, and prepared to cross the South Atlantic directly.

In the end, they successfully reached the west coast of Africa, then bypassed the Cape of Good Hope and entered the Indian Ocean. This sea area is not very curious to the Tang Dynasty. They did not go to India, but crossed the Indian Ocean, using the ocean current to directly He went to Australia, and after arriving in Australia, he returned north to enter the South China Sea, and finally returned to Shanghai Port.

The entire round-the-world voyage lasted for about three years. The reason it took so much time was because they had to spend a lot of time looking for supplies, repairing ships, and exploring the land they encountered along the way.

And complete a very important job, that is, in all the places encountered along the way, whether it is an island or a mainland or something, a stone tablet is erected, all of which are the territory of the Tang Dynasty!

On the surface, the yellow ball voyage this time did not bring any economic benefits, nor did it even have any pioneering significance, because Europeans had already explored the global route, but for the Tang Empire, it was still a It is very important. In the past, I could only see it from the map, and I only listened to what others said, but I saw it with my own eyes, and made a very valuable nautical chart.

This will play a very important role in the operations of the Tang Empire on a global scale in the future~www.wuxiaspot.com~ According to the continuous exploration of the Pacific Ocean and the Americas, the Navy has already formally proposed, and it is time to start colonizing the Americas .

Today, the Empire has colonized Midway Island and Honolulu Island. Although the administrative area of ​​overseas territories has not been formally established, it has only been managed by the naval military area, but there is no doubt that these two places already belong to the territory of the Empire.

The immigration plan led by the Datang Navy has already immigrated nearly 3,000 people to the Honolulu Islands, and established small ports there. It is expected that in the near future, these two places will also be the same as other overseas leaders. Set up a formal administrative region and become one of the empire's many overseas territories.

Of course, not now!

At present, the Honolulu Islands are still too far away from the mainland. For the convenience of management, they are only managed in the name of naval bases for the time being.

And this place is also the bridgehead for the Tang Empire to march into America in the future. The navy attaches great importance to it. Although there are only 3,000 immigrants in the area, the navy has set up a complete squadron here, that is, the Sandalwood squadron.