The rise of the poor

Chapter 2109 Questions

"Zhu Ping'an is indeed courting death, and he is indeed no match for us, but you must not underestimate Zhu Ping'an, or you will definitely lose a few teeth."

Amidst the conceited voices, an inappropriate voice came from afar.

Everyone looked in the direction of the voice and saw Ye Zongman, dressed in Japanese aristocratic clothing, looking at them seriously.

"Haha, Captain Ye, why are you boosting other people's morale and destroying your own prestige?" Someone immediately chuckled and refuted.

Ye Zongman was one of the Ten Great Warriors under Wang Zhi. He had a Japanese pirate fleet with 5,000 soldiers under his command. He was a high-ranking Japanese pirate under Wang Zhi. Most other pirate leaders did not dare to say anything, but the other ship owners who were also among the Ten Great Warriors under Wang Zhi were not afraid. They thought this was a good opportunity to strike Ye Zongman and immediately spoke out to refute him.

When there are many people, there will be a world of martial arts. The Japanese pirates were no exception. Wang Zhi had a large number of Japanese pirates under his command, and they also formed gangs and factions.

No one wants to chew a hard bone, and who wouldn't want to grab the place with lots of oil and water? !

So who will gnaw the bones and who will eat the meat? Isn’t this competition? Competition requires forming cliques and factions to support each other.

"It's not to boost his morale, nor to destroy our prestige, but to remind everyone that Zhu Ping'an is extraordinary. Although he is young, he should not be underestimated. He is one of the few Ming officials who can lead troops to fight. He offended Yan Song in the capital and was demoted to Jingnan, becoming a seventh-rank county magistrate. However, in just one year, he was promoted again and again and became a third-rank frontier official. Every time he was promoted, it was for his merits in suppressing the Japanese!"

"Do you remember that last time Nakamura Yukiji led his elite troops to destroy the sea festival, the brothers who managed to escape reported that it was because of Zhu Pingan that Nakamura Yukiji failed and almost all of his troops were wiped out."

Ye Zongman said slowly.

"Nakamura Yukiji only had a few men. He was ambushed by the imperial court. The imperial court dispatched a hundred thousand troops to ambush Nakamura and his men."

Someone immediately objected.

"A hundred thousand damn troops? Can the imperial court mobilize so many?! When Nakamura Yukiji took action, the Ming army on Shazhou had only more than ten thousand people, and Zhu Ping'an's Zhejiang army had only eight hundred people." Ye Zongman snorted.

"Even if there are more than 10,000 Ming troops present, Nakamura Yukiji only has 300 men, and Xu Hai sent more than 100 people to help, so there are only about 500 people in total. In addition, Xu Hai is not obedient to King Hui, so it's good enough that the 100 people he sent don't hinder him. Nakamura Yukiji only has more than 300 people, but he is about to wipe out all the court officials at the sea sacrifice ceremony. Zhu Ping'an is nothing special."

As soon as Ye Zongman finished speaking, someone spoke up to refute him.

"Haha, if General Ye is scared, then he can just stay at the port and let us go meet Zhu Ping'an and chop off his dog head and present it to King Hui."

"That's right, General Ye is scared, so just let us go."

Immediately several people agreed.

"You guys are really good at confusing right and wrong. When did I ever get scared? I was just saying that you should pay attention to Zhu Ping'an."

Ye Zongman said angrily.

"Okay, A-Man is right. It's not a bad thing to take your enemies seriously. Zhu Ping'an is a man worth taking seriously."

Wang Zhi said seriously.

The next second, he added leisurely, "Others only need to chop once, but he must chop at least twice."

"Ha ha ha ha."

"That's right, that's right. Others can just chop him once, but we value Zhu Ping'an, so we have to chop him at least twice."

The Japanese pirates burst into laughter.

"Actually, come to think of it, I feel that it's a bit strange that Zhu Ping'an sent troops this time." Ye Zongman spoke out after everyone laughed.

"What's so strange about that?" someone asked.

"You see, the Art of War by Sun Tzu says, 'War is a major national event, a matter of life and death, a road to survival and destruction, and must be carefully considered.' It says that war is a national event, a matter of life and death, and must be handled with caution. The Book of Changes says, 'If the ruler is not discreet, he will lose his ministers; if the ministers are not discreet, they will lose their bodies; if several things are not discreet, they will become harmful.' It means that confidentiality is extremely important, and these are the words that those sour scholars often say. Zhu Ping'an is the top scholar in the imperial examination, so it is impossible for him not to know these two sentences. If he wants to attack us, he should come quietly and attack us by surprise. Maybe he can achieve some results at the beginning. But, you see, before he sent out his troops, he announced to the whole city with great fanfare that he was going to send the Zhejiang Army to wipe out our coastal strongholds, fearing that the world would not know, fearing that we would not know. Don't you think this is strange?"

Ye Zongman glanced at everyone, then slowly opened his mouth and raised his question.

"Doesn't this prove that Zhu Ping'an is just average? How smart can a person who has read the Four Books and Five Classics be?!"

someone retorted.

When talking about "how smart can a person who reads the Four Books and Five Classics be", his eyes deliberately stared at Ye Zongman.

There was a sarcasm in his words, and he was making indirect accusations. After all, Ye Zongman often boasted that he was a scholar, and he liked to quote from classics when he spoke. From time to time, he would say something like "the ancients said" or "Lao Tzu said" as if he was afraid that others didn't know that he, Ye Zongman, had been educated. These people had long been unhappy with Ye Zongman, and while they were scolding Zhu Ping'an, a man who had read the Four Books and Five Classics, how smart he could be, they took the opportunity to scold Ye Zongman as well.

"Zhu Ping'an passed the imperial examination and became the top scholar. You say he is not smart?! If he is not smart, why don't you take the exam?! You are so capable!"

Ye Zongman snorted. How could he not hear that these people were making indirect accusations? He was furious and retorted back in a bad mood.

"Being the top scholar in the imperial examination doesn't mean he's smart. There's a stupid scholar in our village who can only talk about various things and can't do anything else. If he goes to buy a bun, he can't even calculate how much money he has to pay to the store. People in our village laugh at him for being stupid because of studying too much. He is a notorious loser in our village."

Someone retorted and cited the story of a stupid scholar in their village to prove his point that being the top scholar in the imperial examination does not mean being smart.

"He swore an oath of war with great fanfare, and we got the news. He notified the whole city the day before yesterday that he was coming to attack us, and the next morning he swore an oath of war. Before the ceremony was even over, he started collecting money and asked the people to donate money and materials. In the half day, he collected at least 30,000 to 40,000 taels of silver, and several hundred livestock."

There were also well-informed people who told everyone what they had learned, saying that the reason Zhu Ping'an had sworn to go to war with such fanfare was in order to make a fortune under the pretext of going to war.

"Oh my god, he collected 30,000 or 40,000 taels of silver in half a day. That's a lot. He must be robbing people. This official is making too much money. He makes more money faster than us, and he doesn't even have to fight. Damn this dog official!" The Japanese pirates were jealous and cursed. (End of this chapter)