Chapter 3: Great Age Of Navigation
After hearing Lin Qian’s question, Bai Langzai seemed somewhat conflicted, and after a moment, he still slowly shook his head.
Lin Qian shrugged and packed up the Star-Gauging Board by himself.
To him, the Star-Gauging Technique was not worth keeping secret at all. If Bai Langzai wanted to learn it, he could do him a favor; if not, there was no need to eagerly teach it.
After packing up the Star-Gauging Board, Lin Qian walked towards the Stern Cabin.
Bai Langzai silently followed behind. After walking a stretch, he suddenly spoke up and asked, “Have you really been to Luzon?”
“Of course.”
Whether in his previous life or this one, Lin Qian had never been to Luzon, but that didn’t stop him from telling some “well-intentioned lies” to “reassure people.”
Bai Langzai hesitated to speak, clearly still somewhat suspicious of Lin Qian.
Although Bai Langzai pretended to be cold and mature, he was only sixteen after all, and his thoughts were all written on his face.
During this time, Lin Qian had been observing these cheap brothers of his and had long seen that the trouble Bai Langzai was in was not small. Agreeing to seize the ship was definitely not just for the hundred-plus taels of silver.
“Your family is from Guangdong, right? Did you get into some trouble?” Lin Qian asked, pretending to be casual.
Bai Langzai was stunned again, then said coldly, “It has nothing to do with you.”
Lin Qian stopped, turned around to look at him, his gaze sharp like a knife, as if to pierce right through him.
Bai Langzai’s throat bobbed, his whole body tensed up, and his right hand instinctively went to the knife hilt at his waist.
“At most twenty days, and we will arrive smoothly at Luzon. We will unload the silk and porcelain, load up Spanish silver dollars to fill the cabins, rest for a full month, and sail back once the monsoon shifts.”
Lin Qian spoke slowly, his tone calm and firm.
“When we return to Great Ming, I will help you with your matter.”
With that, Lin Qian pushed open the door and entered the cabin.
To him, in the early stages of starting a venture, there was nothing substantial he could promise. If he didn’t even dare to issue empty promises, he might as well go home early to fish.
As for fulfilling the promise, he had only said he would help—helping all the way or doing what he could were both helping.
Exactly how he would help would depend on the scale of the trouble and Bai Langzai’s worth.
After hearing Lin Qian’s words, Bai Langzai’s expression was complicated. He stood in place stunned for a moment, then took a deep breath, regained his composure, walked to the Stern Cabin door, and stood guard with knife in hand.
After daybreak, Lin Qian came out of the cabin, saw Bai Langzai who had stood guard all night, patted his shoulder, and told him to go back to the cabin to rest.
Then he ordered everyone to correct the course and sail south along Dongfan Island.
At this time, the nautical clock had not yet been invented. On ocean voyages, a ship’s longitude could not be determined. Once away from land landmarks, it was a matter of relying on the compass and Star-Gauging Technique and leaving it to fate.
Fortunately, Manila was directly south of Dongfan Island.
As long as they didn’t stray off course and didn’t encounter storms, riding the prevailing northwest monsoon, arriving smoothly at port was practically guaranteed.
After the numbing effects of alcohol, the ship workers’ spirits were much better today.
Without the Ship Captain and Steward Wu’s oppression, the ship workers actually put more vigor into their work.
At departure, a ship worker bellowed a shanty: “Hey! Everyone pull together!”
The other ship workers chimed in: “Heave ho, heave ho!”
“Sailing with winds from all sides!”
“Heave ho, heave ho!”
“Anchor breaking thousand-fathom waves!”
“Heave ho, heave ho!”
“Bow drilling toward the heavens!”
“Heave ho, heave ho!”
One led the chant, the ship workers chimed in. Though sung wildly off-key, it was full of momentum.
Dozens of Han men chanting heave ho together sounded like muffled drumbeats pounding heavily on the heart, instantly filling listeners with heroic spirit and the courage to charge ahead no matter how fierce the winds or treacherous the waves.
……
Smooth sailing all the way.
Fifteen days later, a faint line of green appeared on the horizon.
“Land? It’s land!” The lookout at the bow spotted it first and shouted in surprise.
Instantly, the ship workers surged to the bow and ship’s rail, peering into the distance.
That streak of green on the horizon grew larger, and faintly, the cries of seagulls could be heard.
“Have we arrived?”
“Mazu be praised, Luzon!”
The ship workers were full of joy, shouting excitedly.
“Lin Laodi, you’ve got it!” Lei Sanxiang came running up laughing and slapped Lin Qian on the shoulder.
Lin Qian smiled and ordered, “Right half rudder, sail around the island, enter Manila Bay.”
“Right half rudder!” Lei Sanxiang bellowed the order.
“Right half rudder!” The helmsman repeated loudly, and the ship turned right.
Luzon was a large island; the Fuchuan Ship sailed around it for a day before entering Manila Bay.
The port was already visible in the distance, with all sorts of anchored sailboats stretching for miles, faintly discernible and most impressive.
A two-man small boat approached from afar. Lin Qian knew it was the port pilot and ordered the rope ladder lowered.
The pilot climbed up the rope ladder.
Lin Qian stepped forward in salute, but the pilot did not return it. With an arrogant demeanor, he sized up Lin Qian and said, “Newcomers? Don’t know the rules?”
This pilot had yellowish skin and black hair, a Han person; everyone could understand his words, though his accent was strange.
Lin Qian’s brothers saw how arrogant the man was and grew annoyed, but over the ten-plus days of sailing, Lin Qian had built up some authority. Since Lin Qian held his temper, they couldn’t speak up either and just glared at the pilot.
Lin Qian took an ingot of silver from his belt and handed it to the pilot with a smile. “Please guide us.”
The pilot took the silver, weighed it, and said stiffly, “This isn’t for nothing. By Han Merchant Association rules, pilotage fees for docking are standard.”
Lei Sanxiang: “You thief…”
Halfway through, he was stopped by Lin Qian’s glare.
Then Lin Qian took out another ingot of silver and offered it. “This is extra for your alcohol.”
Only then did the pilot smile. “Fine, since you’re newcomers, I’ll explain the port rules. Follow my small boat in first.”
He waved to the ship’s rail outside, and the other man on the small boat rowed over.
With his back to the crowd and gazing at the port, the pilot struck a pose like a man instructing on the rivers and mountains. “Entering or exiting this port or loading and unloading goods can only happen in daylight. After You hour, the port closes—no arbitrary coming or going.”
“Royal City is Franks’ turf. Stay away unless necessary, or you’ll lose your life for nothing.”
“Han merchants are all at Balien Market, casinos and brothels too…”
“Doing business here, Han Merchant Association takes one in twenty as protection fee, Franks take one in ten as tax…”
……
As they drew nearer the port, a massive anchored galleon caught everyone’s eye.
The ship drew very deep water, its ship’s rail twice as high as their three-masted Fuchuan Ship, towering stern cabin, dense ropes lashed along the rail—quite the spectacle.
Bigger than any ship in Great Ming, it left even these sea-hardened ship workers gaping.
Seeing their reaction, the pilot said proudly, “That’s a Franks’ ship. They call it the ‘Galleon of Manila.’ Franks guard them tight—soldiers everywhere. Any Han person gets too close, and it’s a shot.”
The ship workers half-grasped it, just finding the name profoundly arcane.
The pilot kept prattling on praising Spaniards’ sailboats; Lin Qian inwardly despised his collaborator attitude but didn’t want to antagonize him and just played along.
Lin Qian spoke Spanish and knew “Galleon of Manila” meant “Manila Galleon.”
This hull was much like the West’s famed galleon, named for its use on the America-Manila trade route.
Two centuries earlier, when Zheng He sailed Treasure Ships to the Western Ocean, Manila Galleons wouldn’t yet rival the world’s best.
But Great Ming today, after a century-plus Maritime Ban, had lost Treasure Ship blueprints; navigation and shipbuilding skills had regressed sharply, hard-pressed to match the West at sea.
Though an armed merchant ship, the Manila Galleon’s firepower, speed, ocean-going ability, hull design, and strength crushed Great Ming’s warships in every way.
It was sturdy ships and superior cannons that let Spaniards domineer Luzon, Portuguese cling to Macau, and Dutch sneak colonies onto southern Dongfan Island.
To the world, this was the golden age of great voyages.
Yet the Imperial Court remained mired in factional strife, lost in Celestial Empire delusions.
Gazing at the great ship before him, Lin Qian sighed deeply, unwilling to settle for less than achievements in this age of contention.
Up close, the galleon’s mast loomed taller, dense gunports visible along the ship’s rail—oppressively so. Even the ship workers’ voices dropped.
Lin Qian turned to eye his own Fuchuan Ship—not a single cannon—and felt it paled in comparison.
A thought crossed Lin Qian’s mind: how much silver for a Spanish warship?
His Fuchuan Ship’s cargo value might not even buy a keel…
But considering his new profession, perhaps buying a ship wouldn’t even need silver.
