Ming East India Company

"Mr. Adams, how are you feeling in Okinawa?"

Bai Ye looked at Adams, who was drinking and eating heartily in the audience, and asked with a smile.

"Thank you, King of Ryukyu. You are the great benefactor of all the crew members of the Bo'ai, and also the great benefactor of me, Adams. May God bless you."

Adams wolfed down his food while fawning over Bai Ye in broken Chinese.

Seeing that Adams had regained some of his senses, Bai Ye invited him to take the seat of honor.

"Captain Adams, have you studied shipbuilding before?"

Adams couldn't help but feel a chill after hearing this.

From the moment he entered, he realized that Baiye's hospitality was not just out of kindness, but rather to entrust him with an important task.

While in Osaka prison, Adams heard about Hakuno's situation.

In present-day Japan, there are two major powers: one is Tokugawa Ieyasu, who controls the Kanto region and dominates the world; the other is the western country composed of the Ryukyu and Mori clans.

Hakuno is currently the de facto ruler of Ryukyu, holding a very important position.

That's why he called Hakuno the King of Ryukyu from the moment he entered the house.

But Adams was genuinely unsure about the shipbuilding project.

Although he had been wandering the seas since he was twelve, he had held almost every position, from apprentice to sailor to navigator.

However, he had never actually participated in shipbuilding as a designer.

Moreover, most of his men were sailors with no shipbuilding experience.

Adams hesitated for a moment, then said to Shirane:

"Great King of Ryukyu, I truly have no experience in shipbuilding. If you wish for me to sail the seas or participate in other activities, I will certainly dedicate all my strength to you, but I genuinely know nothing about shipbuilding!"

Without further ado, Shirayuki handed him a letter of appointment:

"Look carefully, this is your reward for building ships: 3000 koku of flags. For every warship you build, I will add another 3000 koku. These lands will belong to you and your descendants forever."

And if you wish, I can even bring you and your brother's family here, so you can enjoy the treatment of nobility forever.

To win Adams's heart, Shiro even "thoughtfully" wrote out the order in both Chinese and English.

As Adams looked at the crimson letters on the letter of appointment, his heart began to stir with unease.

A landholding of 3000 piculs would be enough to make one a minor earl in England.

His former boss, Drake, fought for the British Empire his entire life and made countless contributions, but in the end he was only granted a non-hereditary knighthood.

Now, all he needs to do is build a ship, and money, land, and fame are within his grasp.

Seeing Adams's burning gaze, Shirayuki seized the opportunity to bewitch him:

"In your Western world, you might spend your whole life sailing through wind and rain, and all you can do is become a wealthy merchant in London. But here, as long as you build a ship, you'll be a hereditary noble."

I am well aware of your Western customs. Nobles and knights are clearly distinguished. In your so-called Great Britain, since the Norman dynasty was founded by the Duke of Normandy, the nobility has not changed for hundreds of years. The son of an earl is still an earl, the son of a knight is still a knight, but the son of a serf, even if he becomes extremely wealthy one day, is still a serf.

However, such a thing does not exist in Ryukyu. We have an old saying, "to bestow titles and honors upon one's wife and children." As long as one's merits are great enough, even a peasant can become a nobleman. Regardless of one's background, social status, or even race, one can achieve merit and be rewarded.

This is a blessing that countless people pursue their entire lives but could never attain. I, Hakuno, now the King of Ryukyu, am willing to share this wealth and honor with you, sir.

Seeing Bai Ye's sincere desire to recruit talent, Adams was finally moved by Bai Ye's sincerity.

"In that case, I will accompany His Majesty the King to try and win this eternal wealth."

With Shirayuki's full support, Adams immediately began construction of the galleon.

The first step in shipbuilding is to select a slipway and lay a solid foundation.

Adams rejected the suggestion of shallow flat land from the Ryukyu craftsmen and personally led his trusted confidants to survey the Kagoshima Bay coastline on foot for seven days.

He understood ocean currents and tides, and finally selected a natural harbor that was sheltered from the wind, deep enough to allow the giant ship to enter the water smoothly at high tide and to fully expose the slipway at low tide.

Nestled against verdant mountains, sheltered from the biting sea winds of autumn and winter, and with expansive waters leading directly to the open sea, this location is an ideal place to build giant sailboats.

After the site was determined, the most difficult part was the infrastructure construction.

Galleons are enormous ships, with keels that can reach up to twenty zhang in length, a hull width of nearly four zhang, a deep draft, and an astonishing weight, requiring extremely high stability on the slipway.

Adams ordered that a giant bluestone be laid as the base, and then layers of compacted loess mixed with glutinous rice paste be poured. Sturdy supporting wooden frames were built on both sides of the slipway. He personally supervised the entire process, and if even a single bluestone was placed slightly off-center, it had to be torn down and started over immediately.

The Ryukyu artisans were extremely puzzled by this.

In their understanding, building Japanese warships only required leveling the land and setting up simple wooden platforms. At the very least, they could use existing docks. But now they insisted on starting from scratch and building some kind of shipbuilding platform. They had never encountered such complicated and rigorous basic procedures before.

Many veteran craftsmen privately complained that Adams was making a mountain out of a molehill, deliberately showing off Western customs, and wasting materials and time by dragging out the work. The rumors quickly reached Bai Ye's ears, but he only received a nonchalant response:

"The shipbuilding was to be entirely entrusted to Adams. Whatever he said was to be done, and no one was allowed to interfere or criticize him."

In one sentence, he completely silenced all the doubters.

Adams was filled with gratitude upon learning of this. He had spent many years at sea and had seen too many merchants who were eager for quick success and instant benefits, unwilling to endure the tedious and time-consuming process beforehand. Shirayuki had given him absolute trust, and he could only repay this trust with an impeccable behemoth.

The basic construction took three months to complete.

When the sturdy, flat shipyard, capable of bearing a weight of tens of thousands of kilograms, was finally completed, the Ryukyu craftsmen, who had initially been full of complaints, stood on the rock-solid shipyard and looked at the base that remained unmoved by the rising and falling tides. They finally put away some of their disdain.

For the first time, they realized that this Westerner wasn't just messing around, but actually had a set of shipbuilding rules ingrained in his very being.

Next came the core of the entire ship – the laying of the keel.

The keel is the backbone of a ship, determining its strength, stability, and ability to withstand wind and waves; it cannot tolerate the slightest error.

Adams personally selected the timber, walking through the lumberyards where the wood was stored, and finally chose a teak log that had grown for a hundred years, was straight, had a dense grain, and had no knots.

Teak is hard, resistant to seawater corrosion, and of moderate weight, making it an excellent choice for building the keel of ocean-going vessels.

When the logs were transported from Zhangzhou to the seaside, it caused a sensation throughout Kagoshima Bay.

The log was 21 zhang long, so thick that it took three people to hug it, and weighed tens of thousands of jin. Adams personally designed a pulley system and a log-rolling transportation plan, mobilized more than 200 craftsmen, and spent five days to place this giant log steadily on the central axis of the slipway.

On the day the keel was laid, Shirano personally visited the shipyard.

Bai Ye, dressed in casual clothes and without many attendants, stood quietly to the side, watching Adams direct the craftsmen to calibrate every inch of the keel and secure it firmly with specially made giant ship nails and supporting timbers.

Throughout the entire process, he didn't utter a single word of urging or make any unnecessary demands. He simply nodded slightly to Adams the moment the keel was aligned and landed steadily, his eyes full of approval.

"I've been waiting for this day for a long time."

Bai Ye walked to Adams' side, gazing at the massive keel on the slipway, his voice calm yet powerful.

"The Ryukyu navy has always been filled with small boats in coastal waters. The first backbone of the ships that can truly go out and travel thousands of miles will be ours, from this bay."

Adams looked at the government before him and bowed solemnly:

"Your subordinate will do his utmost to live up to your trust and build the first true ocean-going galleon in Ryukyu, and also the first in all of Japan."

With the keel laid, the shipbuilding project has officially entered the right track.

But the problems that followed were far more difficult than Adams had anticipated.

The biggest obstacle is not materials or processes, but the gap in concepts.

The craftsmen of Ryukyu and Japan spent their lives building flat-bottomed, shallow-draft ships and galleys suitable for coastal navigation. Their shipbuilding logic was flexible, lightweight, and suitable for navigating coastal waters. In contrast, the core logic of galleons was sturdiness, wave resistance, long-distance ocean voyages, and huge carrying capacity. The two are fundamentally completely opposite systems.

Adams's drawings were meticulous and precise, marking the curvature of every plank, the dimensions of every rib, the layout of every cabin, and the location of every watertight compartment.

However, the Ryukyu craftsmen were used to the casual and experience-based shipbuilding model and could not understand the precise Western blueprints. They also could not understand why the hull had to be made into an arc shape, why multiple watertight compartments had to be set up, why the planks had to be joined diagonally, and why a towering sterncastle had to be built at the stern.

Conflicts erupted repeatedly during the daily construction work.

An old craftsman who had been building ships in Ryukyu for thirty years openly defied Adams's instructions and arbitrarily reduced the curvature of the ship's ribs, making it in the style of a galley sailing ship, thinking that it would be lighter and easier to build.

When Adams discovered it, a dozen or so ribs had already been made. The old craftsman argued that Adams did not understand Eastern shipbuilding techniques and that the Western methods were completely inapplicable.

If it were someone else, they might have turned a blind eye, but Adams did not compromise in the slightest.

He immediately ordered that all the incorrectly made ribs be burned, leaving none behind.

The old craftsman was both shocked and furious. He led a group of craftsmen to cause trouble, which reached Baiye's doorstep.

But after hearing the whole story, Bai Ye showed no favoritism and immediately ordered the man to be beheaded and his head hung on the shipbuilding platform. He then gave another order:

Inside the shipyard, Adams' orders were equivalent to those of the ruling party, and those who disobeyed were severely punished.

This time, no one dared to question Adams's instructions.

The construction is progressing more and more smoothly.

The ship's hull was built layer by layer, the planks were pieced together one by one, and the watertight compartments were sealed one by one. The lower cargo hold, the middle gun room, the upper deck, the stern tower, the bow mast, and the multi-layered mast bases were gradually formed.

Adams stayed on the shipyard the entire time.

He lived and ate in a wooden house by the sea, getting up before dawn every day to personally supervise every step of the process. He would personally correct even the slightest deviation in the position of a single nail.

"I will not rest until the boat is launched."

This was his requirement for himself, and also his promise to Baiye.

It took a full nine months, from the chill of early spring to the approach of winter, for this galleon, which embodies Adams' lifelong learning, the hard work of more than 300 craftsmen, and all of Bai Ye's expectations, to finally take shape.

It stands quietly on the slipway, twenty-one zhang long and thirty-eight chi wide, with a three-story hull. The entire ship is made of dense teak and cedar wood, with smooth and majestic lines. The curved hull is stable and imposing. The bow is carved with the patterns of Ryukyu mythical beasts, and the stern is built with a tall and sturdy tower. Three giant mainmasts stand straight, and even without the sails hoisted, it has a majestic aura that can awe the rivers and seas.

The ship was equipped with twelve watertight compartments, and the middle deck was reserved for twenty-four cannons. The bottom cargo hold could carry two thousand shi of supplies. When fully loaded, it could sail at sea for three months without docking.

On the day of the launching ceremony, the streets of Kagoshima Bay were deserted as everyone flocked to the area.

Bai Ye personally led his civil and military officials to the seaside. The surrounding people, soldiers, and craftsmen crowded both sides of the bay, all gazing up at the giant sailing ship on the slipway with awe and reverence in their eyes. Before this, they had never seen such a huge, majestic, and imposing ship.

The auspicious time has arrived.

Adams personally ordered the removal of the supporting wooden frame of the slipway and the loosening of the securing ropes.

With the craftsmen working in unison, the logs at the bottom of the slipway slowly rolled, and the giant sailboat, under the watchful eyes of the crowd, glided steadily, slowly, and firmly into the waters of Kagoshima Bay.

When the ship was completely submerged and floated steadily on the surface of the sea, deafening cheers erupted from both banks.

The waves lapped against the ship's hull, but the giant vessel remained motionless, as stable as flat ground.

Bai Ye gazed at the giant ship on the sea, his eyes gleaming. He raised his hand and patted Adams on the shoulder, his voice booming and echoing throughout the bay:

"This ship is the first ocean-going giant ship of Ryukyu. From now on, it will be called the Ocean Ship!"

William Adams, for your meritorious service in shipbuilding, you are hereby granted the status of a Ryukyu bannerman, and given a stipend of 500 koku. You shall continue to oversee the Ryukyu shipbuilding industry, constructing more ocean-going warships to expand our maritime territory and enhance our national prestige!

Adams bowed deeply to Bai Ye and remained standing for a long time.

The sea breeze ruffled his hair, and the sails of the Canglan slowly rose in the sunlight, fluttering in the wind. The giant sailboat turned its bow on the sea and sailed smoothly into the open ocean. The trial voyage was successful, the speed was steady, and its wave resistance far exceeded everyone's expectations.