Translator: ryangohsff Editor: Nora
Chapter 884 – Opening up a New Trade Route
The 60 thousand pirates that had made their way into Friendship City could not even last past the afternoon before they all surrendered.
During this battle, close to 30 thousand pirates were buried within the city. After the battle, the entire outer city was in tatters, corpses were strewn all over, and a thick blood stench spread through the streets and alleys. Even with the ocean breeze blowing, the smell still lingered.
Friendship City Mayor Gu Xiuwen took responsibility of clearing the city and calming down the people. He organized the extinguishing of the fires and calculated personnel and financial loss. Everything was done in an orderly manner.
The uneasy peoples’ sentiment had slowly calmed down.
In the manor, Ouyang Shuo was not happy despite the victory. First, they had only crushed pirates in the battle, and it was not something to be proud of. Secondly, Farrah had escaped once more. Thirdly, there was a huge scheme behind all of this; it was like a hand was controlling everything.
It was not a coincidence that Friendship City was attacked.
Although they forced back the pirates, this was a huge hit to the reputation of the capital of trade and the voyage trade route.
Along with the news spreading out, such negativity would spread around, and it would be hard to remove in a short while.
Think about it. If a territory could be attacked by pirates at any moment, would anyone dare to get their resources here? Facing such a chaotic trade route, how many merchants would dare to use it?
The answer was obvious.
The target of this sneak attack was obviously the trading roots of the Great Xia Dynasty.
That afternoon, Black Snake teleported over from Rabat and arrived at Friendship City. The order from Ouyang Shuo was simple, “Investigate who else participated in this.”
Based on his intuition, Ouyang Shuo felt that Somalia had someone helping Farrah.
“Yes my king!”
Black Snake did not dare to take this matter lightly, and he immediately gathered all his resources. He started with interrogating the pirates to try to find out who was the person behind this attack.
The second leader naturally became the heavy focus.
Only Ouyang Shuo knew that Farrah was the key person in the pirate organization, their spirit.
Hence, Ouyang Shuo ordered the Atlantic Squadron to arrange their 4th and 5th divisions to rush back to the Gulf of Aden to capture Farrah.
Only by taking down Farrah and totally wiping out the Sky Wolf Pirate Organization could he save the lost reputation of Friendship City and protect the prosperity of the trade route.
This time, Ouyang Shuo would not let him go.
Within the City Lord’s Manor, just as Ouyang Shuo was thinking about the Gulf of Aden matters, Xu Chu reported, “My king, the Major General of the Garrison Division would like to meet you.”
When Ouyang Shuo heard that, his brows jumped, and he said angrily, “He still has the face to see me? Send my orders, there’s no need to. Capture him and let the Military Law Division deal with him.”
During this battle, the Garrison Division had the geographical advantage and a city to defend. However, facing the attacks of 60 thousand pirates, they lost the outer city in just three hours.
Although the pirates were strong, the Garrison Division was too relaxed daily and the commanding was poor. If it were another Garrison Division, this would not have happened.
Under such circumstances, how could Ouyang Shuo not be furious?
“Yes my king!”
Xu Chu had rarely seen the king so furious, so he did not dare say more. He only felt empathy for the Major General. It was good if he did not come to greet the king. In such a case, the king might have given him chance. However, he had sent himself over, so no one could help him.
Due to the poor performance of the Friendship City Garrison Division, Ouyang Shuo thought about the other Garrison Divisions.
‘It seems like the Privy Court needs to have a huge test for all the Garrison Divisions.’ Ouyang Shuo thought to himself. Poor military standards were the biggest worry of a dynasty.
…
That night, Ouyang Shuo personally held a feast in the manor to welcome the merchants in Friendship City.
Being invited by the Xia King was a great fortune for the merchants.
Ouyang Shuo naturally did this to calm down the merchants. He wanted to try and lower the impact of the attacks on Friendship City trade. Originally, Gu Xiuwen could have done it, but there was a difference between him and Ouyang Shuo coming out.
In the huge banquet hall, Ouyang Shuo raised his cup, and the entire hall instantly quietened down. Ouyang Shuo looked around at the merchants, “The Imperial Court will not let this matter rest. The Atlantic Squadron has already set off and will reach the Gulf of Aden soon to destroy the pirates.”
“Xia King is wise!”
The merchants rejoiced. They often traveled through the Mediterranean, so they had learned of the name of the Atlantic Squadron. With this squadron, the Sky Wolf Pirate Organization would definitely fall.
Their unsettled hearts slowly calmed down.
Ouyang Shuo continued, “The Imperial Court has a responsibility to protect our land. Only because you trust us do you come over to dock. The losses cause by the pirates, we will pay for it all. Tomorrow, you can go to the Lord’s Manor to record your losses.”
“This….”
The merchants all exchanged glances. They did not expect that there would be such a good matter. Normally, even if the dynasty did not compensate them, the merchants would have nothing to say. Such a full compensation was pretty much unheard of.
“Thank you Xia King for your kindness!” The merchants were touched to tears. Although the voyage trading had huge profits, for one trip to be stolen, they would have lost all their assets.
The Imperial Court’s actions had saved the futures of many of them.
Ouyang Shuo nodded. He would rather spend some money to buy back their faith in him.
With such good news, the banquet was naturally a happy affair.
************
Ouyang Shuo bought their hearts, but he did not expect for bad news to spread again the next day.
The 4th and 5th divisions passing through the Mediterranean were faced with protests from the Mediterranean Lords, and it even affected the ongoing negotiations.
In their words, ‘Since the king has promised not to step into the Mediterranean, he should keep his promise. The Atlantic Squadron’s actions are undoubtedly a breaking of the agreement.”
“We doubt the Great Xia Dynasty’s sincerity.”
Helplessly, Zi Luolan could only seek help from Ouyang Shuo on how to deal with this matter.
When Ouyang Shuo got the news, he kept silent for a long while; this time, it was really his bad luck.
‘Only, isn’t the timing too much of a coincidence?’ Ouyang Shuo doubted whether the negotiation and the attack were related. It was not easy for Ouyang Shuo to come to a conclusion now.
Last night, Ouyang Shuo even promised the merchants that he would send the Atlantic Squadron over to wipe out the pirates. If he failed to keep the promise, it would be a huge slap to his face.
Facing such a situation, Ouyang Shuo turned his eyes to the southern point of the African continent. There was a place there known as the Cape of Good Hope.
Before the Suez Canal was opened up, Ouyang Shuo’s Asian trade route could only go from West Europe to West Africa, and then go south to the Cape of Good Hope toward Asia. The Cape of Good Hope became the only ocean trade route for Europeans toward the east.
After the Suez Canal was opened, although it affected this route, it was still an important trade route between Asia and Europe. Some huge ships could not pass the Suez Canal and had to take this path.
Speaking of the Cape of Good Hope, one had to mention the famous crusader’s eastern expedition.
During 1000 AD, Europe had started to change, and the Roman Catholics chased the Protestants out of the Middle East. The crusade started in 1096 and lasted for a total of 200 years.
The appearance of the European Army in the Middle East started the development of ocean trading.
Venice and other Italian merchants used this path to transport war resources and got rich from the war. At the same time, the crusader army returned to Europe with many of the middle-eastern products, which became hot commodities in Europe.
The trading gave rise to many rich European merchants.
The European nations continued to grow stronger and stronger. They set up their military and government, relying on trade tax alone to maintain the running of the two.
In the 15th century, the European countries were ready to explore the outside world.
The Portuguese were the first to act. In 1400, they wanted to control the spice trade with the east. They wanted to go past Venice and Arab to trade directly with the east.
If they could directly go toward Asia to buy these products, they would be able to greatly increase their profits.
The Portuguese explorers went to the west coast of the Africa continent and found a way from India to Asia. They came to the southwest point of Africa, the Cape of Good Hope.
Compared to the Suez Canal, this was not an ideal trading route.
This was because the Cape of Good Hope was located where the Indian Ocean warm current and the Antarctica cold weather met. The strong winds made massive waves. Apart from storms, there were also killer waves.
The fronts of these waves were like cliffs, while the backs were like gradual hills. In the winter season, there were also rotating waves. These two added together made the ocean situation really bad. There were also really strong shoreline currents. As such, when the waves and the currents met, it gave rise to a chaotic situation.
Hence, the Cape of Good Hope became one of the most dangerous ocean trade routes.
Ouyang Shuo planned for the Atlantic Squadron to go to the Cape of Good Hope and open up this route to reach Somalia because he had no other choice.
Destroying the Sky Wolf Pirate Organization concerned the reputation of the Great Xia Dynasty.
As the king of the Xia Dynasty, since he made a promise, he needed to keep it. If not, he would lose credit and losing credit was like losing control over your people.