Chapter 72: The Overbearing King of Eight

  In May 1884, the Qing Navy Yamen was established and Li Hongzhang became a prominent and powerful minister of the Qing government, appointed as Viceroy of Zhili and Beiyang Admiral.

  The Qing government then decided to allocate 5 million taels as expenses every year, accelerating the construction of the navy. However, the actual funds used for purchasing warships were only a meager one million taels per year, while the rest was diverted by the government for other uses.

  The former Qing Navy was divided into three oceans: the Beiyang was responsible for Shandong and north of the Yellow Sea, the Nanyang was responsible for south of Shandong and outside of the Yangtze River in the East China Sea, and the Liangguang was responsible for Fujian and the South China Sea. Now that the Fujian Fleet is gone, the Beiyang has taken over the defense duties of the Liangguang, while the Nanyang remains unchanged - still just a nephew playing with lanterns.

  On December 17 of the same year, the Beiyang Fleet was formally established and promulgated the "Beiyang Navy Regulations" on the same day. However, the ironclad giant ships of the Beiyang were still brewing in Europe, and for the time being, they were still the previous three-masted gunboats.

  All French troops in southern Vietnam, later also withdrew from all of Vietnam on June 1 of the same year. The Gallic roosters could no longer be proud and became a true eunuch.

  Without the naval support, the army faced with the strong pressure from the Trung Sisters and the massive resistance of Vietnamese people in the southern region, they were forced to retreat back to their old nest to cultivate the "Dark Palm", wanting to return to Giao Chi again was only possible in a dream.

  The loyal and brave army once again became the reaper, after sweeping through southern Vietnam, returned a poor and chaotic south to the Vietnamese royal government. The loyal and brave army stationed in Da Nang also withdrew from the Da Nang base, facing a poor and white southern region, the Vietnamese royal government did not even dare to fart.

  If you dare to be reckless and boastful, the mighty warships and cannons of the loyal and brave army are not to be trifled with! The weak and small Vietnamese government can only obediently submit, it's already good enough for them to have an intact country! It's better for you to just live a peaceful life!

  Ding ding dong dong... A discordant guqin melody came from inside Zhou Yu's villa. Suddenly...

  Report to the teacher! Outside the gate of Zhou Yu's villa came Liu Chengliang's unique voice.

  Come on! Zhou Yu reluctantly put down the pair of jade hands he was holding tightly, and our lecherous uncle is teaching Hu Mei to "play the piano and say love"! You teach if you want to teach, but why hold someone's hands so tightly?!

  Originally, a certain uncle called himself: personally teaching the charming child, holding someone's waist in his own arms, and his own An Lushan's claws still grasped the beautiful girl's small hands, conducting on-site 'guidance'!

  In such a situation, how can our goddess possibly play beautiful music! Not directly lying there is already considered having big nerves.

  This kind of thing happens every day now, at first Hu Mei was still very shy and awkward, but now she has been fed by a certain lecherous uncle to the point where she is used to it, however, her heart rate is still like that of someone with severe heart disease, often reaching as high as 200 times per minute!

  Ever since Little Loli sacrificed herself to block the bullet for Zhou Yu, Zhou Yu was moved and also discovered that our Little Loli has become a real "hot stuff". The disguised dirty uncle finally shed his wolf-in-sheep's-clothing disguise and stopped mentioning that Little Loli is still young, instead transforming into a midnight hungry wolf.

  Although he won't go as far as to push little loli immediately, things like rubbing against each other and generating electricity still happen frequently.

  Zhou Yu gently stroked Hu Mei's jade hand, under her gentle and charming gaze, he slowly walked out of the room and into the living room. He saw Liu Chengliang and Rong Yun, both sitting properly on the sofa in the living room.

  Seeing Zhou Yu's lazy appearance, he stared at Zhou Yu with a playful gaze.

  Rong Huang said without a head or tail: Principal, you should pay attention to your body! You're not fully grown yet, can't work day and night, yeah! He even intentionally bit the word "work" particularly hard.

  Damn it! I'm already 24 years old, and I'm not mature yet? Grandma, are you kidding me?! I'm so mature that my hair is about to fall out! You're a damn idiot, tomorrow I'll arrange for a few Western red-haired big-breasted women to shut your stinky mouth, let's see if you still have the spirit to wag your tongue!

  Although I didn't have a single good word in my heart, the words that came out of my mouth were another story: Hehe, where is it? Recently, because I was worried about the French people, I had been tense all the time. Now that I have some spare time, I'll 'talk about love' to relax my nerves a bit.

  Oh! Mr. Rong, what brings you here with Liu Chengliang?...

  Principal, you're really a noble person who forgets things! Didn't you ask us to reorganize the Zhongyong Army? Now we've already done it and are ready to report the specific situation to you! Rong Huang said nice words on his lips, but in his heart he despised Zhou Yu: You're always thinking about circles and crosses, forgetting the important things!

  Oh dear! Look at my memory, I think I need to take a box of 'Brain Gold' to supplement my brain! Zhou Yu looked like he needed rest.

  Rong Huang took a look and hummed, still chasing people away. You think you can just order me around in broad daylight? I'm not going to fall for that trick of yours. So Rong Huang simply ignored Zhou Yu's eviction notice and instead spoke up seriously:

  Now my Zhongyong Army has basically rectified the newly occupied areas, and order has been restored locally. Tan Sitong's police force has effectively taken over local defense and security, and field troops have returned to their respective defensive bases!

  In terms of the army; we followed your instructions, expanded, and selected 1.2 million soldiers from the reserve personnel, forming 12 mixed divisions, 4 corps, and two army groups.

  Tens of thousands of retired soldiers were also allocated to local police forces and governments, with not a single one left idle in society.

  In addition, we selected a portion of the army officers and soldiers who had experience in naval operations and transferred them to the navy. Now our regular field troops total around 4 million people, while the navy and logistics troops also have around 1 million people.

  The warships have also undergone another round of rectification and elimination. Now we own 30 ironclad ships with ocean-going combat capabilities, which are evenly distributed among the three regular fleets. In addition, there are 8 submarines in Tian Ergou's ghost fleet. The total number of naval vessels is 38. Other eliminated vessels have been dispersed to various bases for security patrol tasks as per your instructions.

  These 30 ironclad warships have all undergone our major overhaul again, with higher ocean-going combat capabilities and fully synchronized configuration with the Navy of Zhongyong Army.

  In addition, our finished metal and non-metal products have been stockpiled in sufficient quantities, I personally believe that they are enough for the entire Huaxia to use after its founding. High-quality finished products such as diesel, gasoline, and coal oil have also been stockpiled in sufficient quantities. Therefore, I suggest that we do not need to continue strategic reserves of these materials!

  After finishing speaking, Rong Yu quietly looked at Zhou Yu, waiting for his response.

  Zhou Yu sat back on the sofa with a relaxed smile, and said to Rong Huan with a chuckle: "Mr. Rong, I understand what you mean, but we must continue to stockpile these supplies until after our country is established, when we can reassess the situation."

  As the trade protection policies implemented by Europe and America continue to deepen, the world economy is developing from free trade to monopoly trade. With the continuous progress of science and technology, more places will need these materials. From the perspective of people's livelihoods, with the increase in income of people around the world, the demand for material goods is also increasing.

  At present, countries around the world have not yet realized that in order to become a powerful country, it must monopolize resources and make necessary strategic reserves.

  Do you know why there are no mineral resources or oil fields in the northern regions? It's because I didn't tell everyone where they were, and I didn't ask anyone to develop them.

  I am waiting until the world's resources are almost depleted, then I will develop my own 'vegetable garden', this is a strategic measure. When we have completely conquered China, in China we must also adhere to this approach.

  Although we may have a short-term pain, its long-term benefits will be infinitely magnified.

  Also, the current prices of goods are not too high. By the time everyone realizes this and starts strategic stockpiling, prices will rise exponentially. When that happens, we'll look back and see how necessary our decision was at this moment!

  And our inventions of high-tech products such as cars, tractors, large power plants and modern giant warships are extremely energy-consuming.

  So I say we must stock up, and not just stock up, but stock up massively.

  Zhou Yu said, stopping for a moment, walked to the world map hanging in the living room, and with an unknown baton in his hand, he pointed to a corner of the map and said excitedly:

  As the monopoly economy continues to develop, Europe will inevitably go to war for resources, and this war will also affect countries around the world, eventually evolving into a global-scale war - World War.

  When that time comes, it will be the best opportunity for our Chinese nation to truly take off. The reserves we have now will yield a thousand times more returns. At present, our territory is small and poor in resources, with low productivity, so we can only rely on the production capacity of these Western countries with high productivity to make early-stage product reserves.

  At this point, Zhou Yu pointed to the place representing Europe with his baton and said in an impassioned tone: We are going to make a fortune from these foreign devils' war. They fight their own, we sell to both sides and contribute all the wealth they have sucked up over the years to my China!

  They want what we sell to the devils, let this place become the graveyard of European powers from now on!

  But what we must be vigilant about is the United States in distant America, which will also be one of the beneficiaries of this war due to geographical conditions and ethnic factors, so I have a series of deployments in America.

  I want to hinder the development and growth of the United States, let our China be the only beneficiary of the world war that will take place in Europe in the future, without exception! Let the United States go to hell! China is the only master of this world, supreme among all nations!

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