Mixed with salted fish in Hongwudang

Chapter 606 Window of the Western Regions!

Bayezid has been quietly listening to the discussion between his son and Ulugh Beg, without any intention of interrupting them.

When he heard the two talk about the Ming threat theory, his pupils shrank, and he began to think seriously about his relationship with the Timurid Empire.

Bayezid is a relatively bright figure throughout the history of the Ottomans. Apart from a little personal grievance with the Timur Empire, which affected his judgment on Timur, he is still very enlightened and wise in general.

After all, not everyone can withstand the Crusades and advance the front to the city of Constantinople.

Although he failed to capture Constantinople, he was able to force Western Christians to sign an alliance with him under the city. He is already the Holy Lord of the Islamic world.

"Father, my son thinks that we should allege with the Timur Empire to fight against the demons from the east!"

Bayezid nodded with a smile.

"can!"

"But some details need to be discussed!"

Murat looked happily at Ulugh Beg when he heard this.

"Father has agreed to form an alliance with you, we will be brothers from now on!"

Ulugh Beg is also very happy. While he is happy that he has completed his mission, he is also happy that he has found like-minded people with him.

"it is good!"

"The specific details will be negotiated slowly!"

"His Highness Murat, if you have time, you can follow me to the inn to read the Ming books I brought..."

"Great, I'm eager to see everything about Daming now..."

When Bayezid saw the two young people leaving the hall happily, he immediately ordered people to withdraw from the banquet, and discussed the alliance with all the ministers on the spot.

"Everyone, the alliance is a foregone conclusion, now let's discuss how to not suffer losses when forming an alliance..."

"Yes!"

While Bayezid was discussing the details of the alliance with a group of ministers, Manuel II of Constantinople was also discussing the matter with his wife, Jelena Dragash, a Serbian nobleman.

"Your Majesty, the Ming Empire from the far east attacked the Timurid Empire. Does it mean that Osman has no energy to attack us?"

"Yes!"

"The Timurid Empire and the Ottoman Empire are adjacent. Once the Timurid Empire is attacked, the Ottoman Empire must not stand idly by."

"After all, whether it is belief or culture, these two countries have similar origins..."

Jelena cheered happily when she heard the words.

"Great!"

"We Byzantium can finally breathe a sigh of relief!"

Manuel II shook his head upon hearing this.

"Queen, you are too happy, this may not be a good thing for us."

"Why did your Majesty say this?"

"Think about the Mongols more than 100 years ago..."

"Uh uh..."

Jelena was at a loss for words when she heard the words, especially when she thought of the brutality of the Mongols, who slaughtered the city at every turn, she felt a chill in her heart.

"Your Majesty is saying that Ming, like the Mongols, will bring us great disasters?"

Manuel II still shook his head.

"do not know!"

"We know too little about Daming. All we can get in touch with now is the merchants from Daming, and the silk and porcelain produced by Daming that are as gorgeous as haze..."

Jelena couldn't help but look at the long silk dress she was wearing when she heard the words. It was a dress made of Daming silk that she spent a lot of money on, which saved her a lot of face at the ball.

"Your Majesty, the Ming Dynasty can produce such exquisite silk, so it can be seen that it is a highly civilized empire. Isn't it as barbaric as the Mongol Empire?"

Manuel II smiled bitterly when he heard the words.

"Since the Ming Empire is so civilized, why did it cross many mountains and attack an empire in the Islamic world?"

Seeing her husband say this, Jelena frowned.

"Your Majesty, since you don't trust the Ming Empire, why don't you send envoys to the Ming Empire to express your willingness to make good friends with them, and to investigate their realities, understand their culture and thoughts, and prepare for dealing with them in the future?"

Manuel II's eyes lit up when he heard the words, and he kissed the queen excitedly.

"You are my angel!"

"I will let Andrew Nix go to Daming to express my best wishes for the new emperor of the Ming Empire on his enthronement!"

……

After Sapphire captured the city of Samarkand, she asked the new king several times for instructions on how to deal with it, but Zhu Yunxi did not give him any reply.

The reason why Zhu Yunxi didn't reply to Lan Yu was just to see if his uncle could understand his thoughts.

This made Lan Yu difficult, so he could only call a few veterans and Chang Sheng, the second and fifth son, over for a meeting.

"Everyone, our nephew is ignoring us, you guys think about it for us, what exactly does our nephew want us to do with Samarkand?"

When Feng Sheng heard that it was a matter of using his brain, he pretended to be dead on the spot.

"Don't drag me into this matter, it's not like you don't know, I'm notoriously brainless..."

Lan Yu glared at Feng Sheng with disgust.

"The old man didn't dare to count on you at all. I didn't expect Duke Ying to help me find a way!"

"Old Fu!"

"We can only count on you now, you can't give us an excuse!"

Fu Youde didn't want to wade into this muddy water either. In fact, he didn't want to continue to toss after defeating Bei Yuan.

I have done enough in this life, and I am old enough, how can I still be crowned king?

Therefore, after accumulating enough military merits for his incompetent young sons, he didn't want to continue fighting, and only wanted to go home to retire.

But Lan Yu has already talked about this point, and it is unrealistic for him not to help at all.

"Liang Guogong, why did you report to His Majesty before?"

"Why..."

"Think about it, old man. This is what we told our nephew, that we had already brought down Samarkand, and asked him what to do with Samarkand..."

Fu Youde said angrily when he heard the words.

"If you ask such a question, His Majesty will be damned if he can answer you!"

Sapphire asked unconvinced.

"Then what should we ask?"

Fu Youde snorted coldly.

"You should ask this question, Your Majesty, please give the new city a name!"

Lan Yu was quite unconvinced at first, thinking that Fu Youde was trying to squeeze him on purpose, but when he heard Fu Youde's words, he was dumbfounded for a moment, and after thinking about it a little more, he slapped his thigh excitedly.

"Oh, look at my pig brain, why can't I come up with such a good idea!"

"Come on, hurry up and send a telegram to our nephew and ask him to name the new city!"

Lan Yu's telegram quickly got a response from Zhu Yunxi, who only typed two words in the telegram.

"Kangju!"

Lan Yu looked at the word "Kangju" on the telegram and fell into doubt again.

"What does our nephew mean? Could it be that he named Samarkand Kangju?"

Feng Sheng heard the words and agreed.

"should be!"

"What does Kekangju mean?"

Feng Sheng and Lan Yu looked at Fu Youde together, Fu Youde shook his head helplessly.

"Look at what the old man is doing, the old man doesn't understand!"

Lan Yu didn't care about these details at all. Seeing that Zhu Yunxi had changed the name of Samarkand, she immediately ordered someone to re-carve the plaque, and hung the new plaque on the city gate of Samarkand the next day.

Since then, Samarkand, the largest city in the Western Regions, has officially changed its name to Kangju!
Next, the problem that Lan Yu had been worrying about was also solved. After Zhu Yunxi gave the name of the new city, he also gave a series of political measures.

First, do not harm civilians.

Second, protect the property of civilians.

Third, respect local customs and laws.

Fourth, employ local scholars to participate in urban management.

Fifth, immigration...

Sixth, spread the Confucian culture of the Ming Dynasty...

Lan Yu received Zhu Yunxi's instructions, no matter whether she could understand them or not, she carried them out without compromise.

Soon, Kangju City came out from the haze of war and restored its former prosperity and excitement.

Zhu Yunxi really wanted to see the splendor of the largest city in Central Asia, but he was destined to have no time to see it for himself, so he could only send hundreds of Ming officials there to manage Kangju City for him.

Although Kangju City has stabilized, the battle surrounding Kangju City has never subsided.

After Timur escaped from the city of Samarkand, he sent people to contact neighboring countries while integrating resources and organizing waves of attacks.

However, no matter how many soldiers he assembled to counterattack, they were all scattered by the Ming army without exception.

Fortunately, the Ming army was not very ambitious. After occupying the city of Samarkand, it was complacent and did not attack other cities. This gave him enough breathing time to allow him to gather the army more calmly.

Over time, Timur even had an illusion that Daming only wanted Samarkand, and after taking down Samarkand, Daming would have nothing else to ask for.

If it was what he thought, so what if Samarkand was given to Daming permanently?
Thinking of this, Timur immediately sent people to Samarkand to discuss peace talks with the local generals of the Ming army.

After Lan Yu managed a section of Kangju City according to Zhu Yunxi's order, she somehow won the support of people from all over the world in Kangju City.

Not only did they stop cursing him behind their backs, they even knelt down in the city lord's mansion together and gave him the title of merciful lord.

This made Lan Yu so happy that he couldn't wait to send a telegram to Zhu Yunxi that day, showing off his name as Lan Crazy, and now he changed his name to Lan Renci!
As for the conditions for Timur to send people for peace talks, he also sent them to Zhu Yunxie with a brain, and let Zhu Yunxie figure it out by himself.

He is too lazy to use his brain now, and since he is old, it is time to think about retirement.

After receiving Lan Yu's reply, Zhu Yunxi smiled helplessly, and then passed several telegrams to Yang Shiqi, Qi Tai, Zhang Zongjun and others to circulate.

In order to meet the needs of the war, Zhu Yunxi divided the cabinet into two, and the Nanjing Chengbei Palace cabinet dealt with the affairs of the capital and Ming Dynasty, referred to as the government affairs cabinet.His accompanying mobile cabinet is responsible for handling major military affairs, referred to as the military cabinet.

Qi Tai was already proficient in military affairs, but by chance he went to the Ministry of Rites for a tour, and now returning to his job just works.

After reading the telegram circulated by Zhu Yunxi, Qi Tai thought for a while and said.

"Your Highness, what is your opinion on this matter?"

"If you just want to imitate Genghis Khan and conquer the Mesopotamia, I feel that you can agree to Timur's conditions and draw a boundary with him. The Amu Darya River is the boundary. The east belongs to our Daming, and the west belongs to Timur."

"If you want to turn the entire Mesopotamia and the land further west into the territory of Ming Dynasty and establish a system of prefectures and counties, then you have to make a long-term plan."

"It is not unacceptable to negotiate in the short term, but in the long run, we need ten years or more to work hard to establish a complete and sound system..."

Qi Tai, who later joined the military cabinet, won the favor of Zhang Zongjun, Yang Shiqi and others with his words on the spot.

Zhang Zongjun joked with a smile.

"I have known for a long time that Qi Shangshu's literary talents are brilliant, and your Jin Ping Mei has been hailed as a masterpiece of ancient and modern times. I didn't expect you to have such insights in military affairs. I admire you so much!"

Qi Tai glanced at Zhu Yunxi full of resentment, thinking how many years he had been blamed for this guy!

"Mr. Zhang Ge's absurd praise, this old man is just a trivial skill, not worth mentioning..."

After Zhang Zongjun praised Qi Tai, Yang Shiqi also stood up to express his opinion.

"Fortunately, the late student was taught by His Royal Highness, so he managed to learn some skills, otherwise he would not be able to understand Qi Shangshu's words, hahaha."

Amid Yang Shiqi's and Zhang Zongjun's praises, Qi Tai finally found the feeling of being a cabinet member.

"You two are amazing, I still have a lot to learn from you two."

Zhang Zongjun spoke politely to Qi Tai, and then showed his ability as the cabinet elder.

"What Mr. Qi said is very reasonable!"

"However, His Majesty's previous six suggestions on the governance of Kangju City have already expressed His Majesty's views on the Western world."

"Respect its customs and laws, emigrate to the border, spread culture, and change customs. This is to manage it as the land of Ming Dynasty."

"My official guesses that the reason why His Majesty is doing this is just to give countries in the Western Regions a chance to get to know Daming and His Majesty?"

Zhang Zongjun's words instantly caused Qi Tai and Yang Shiqi to think deeply, Qi Tai even thought about it, while nodding his head affirmatively, agreeing with Zhang Zongjun's statement.

"Does Your Majesty want to use Kangju City as a window to show the strength of Ming Dynasty and His Majesty's benevolence to the people of the Western Regions?"

Seeing that several people had almost guessed their thoughts, Zhu Yunxi immediately expressed his opinion.

"Correct!"

"It is easy to win the land of the Western Regions, but it is difficult to hold it."

"It took only a few years for the Mongol Empire's iron cavalry to reach Egypt, but it lost most of its territory in less than a hundred years, and only a few khanates remained."

"To this day, apart from the Golden Horde, which is the only remaining country, which Khanate is the direct descendant of Genghis Khan?"

"Therefore, if you want to govern the Western Regions for a long time and completely bring the Western Regions into the territory of Ming Dynasty, the most important thing is to change customs, fundamentally destroy their own culture, and let them accept the Datong concept of Ming Dynasty in all aspects!"

"However, in order to achieve this, there is another prerequisite, that is, the local Daming population must have an absolute advantage."

"Population..."

Zhang Zongjun and others fell into deep thought when they heard Zhu Yunxie's question. Population reproduction has been a difficult problem in all dynasties. No emperor thinks that he has a lot of people under his rule...

But it takes time to grow the population, and this time is in units of 20 years!

(End of this chapter)