Chapter 2: The Female Pirate

“…Wednesday, about to enter the Palk Strait, clear skies, northeast trade wind, half a day’s journey from Ceylon, supplies are sufficient, no stops…”

Li Huamei wrote in her nautical log, her thoughts wandering.

Ever since she received Li Siya’s instructions to infiltrate the Australians, she had sailed directly to Lingao, found a familiar naval elder in Bopu, and expressed her willingness to join the Lingao side.

Although she was very popular among the “young turks” of the navy, she was not so absurd as to think that she could immediately enter the Australian group. Li Huamei was very clear that someone like her, with an unclear “background,” would have to undergo a considerable period of “background check”—or as the Australians called it, “review”—before she could “join the group.” Especially since the Australians, when employing people, placed the greatest importance on “background.” “Everyone is investigated, everyone is vetted” was their consistent slogan.

Regarding her own background and experience, she and her sister had carefully prepared a set of stories. Fortunately, very few people in Macau knew about her relationship with her sister. The people who really knew the inside story were all loyal servants who would rather die than reveal the secrets of the Li sisters, let alone worry about them actively leaking secrets.

However, to her surprise, she was not subjected to too much “background check” in Bopu. After writing a one-page personal statement and filling out an application form, her application was considered accepted—but the other party stated that she would not be formally notified of whether her application was approved until three months later. And before that, the Colonial and Trade Department had an urgent procurement mission to Goa that they wanted her to handle.

Ever since she had established contact with the Australians, Li Huamei had monopolized the trade patent for Goa, transporting various Indian and European goods for the Senate. In 1632, she still obtained this trade patent as usual.

According to the usual Goa trade route of the Portuguese in Macau, Portuguese ships would go to Goa in January and February each year, load up on woolen fabrics, clothing materials, Indian calico, cotton and cotton textiles, crystal and glassware, clocks, wine, and other European and Indian goods, and then return in April. Along the way, they would pass through Malacca, Siam, Timor, Ceylon, Burma, and other regions, doing business all the way, exchanging the goods on board for spices, sandalwood, and agarwood in Malacca, and shark skin and deer skin in Siam, and so on. After doing business all the way, they would probably return to Macau between June and August.

However, Li Huamei’s Goa trade was a direct route—she did not trade along the way. The Australians’ demand for goods was for a small variety but a large quantity. There were strict regulations on the annual delivery figures. In particular, for certain goods they needed, they required a minimum annual shipment, otherwise her trade patent would be invalid the following year. Therefore, Li Huamei generally did not trade in the ports along the way, but sailed directly in order to make multiple round trips within a year and transport as many goods as possible to Lingao.

When Li Huamei went to the Colonial Department office in Bopu Port to collect the list of goods for sale before departing from Lingao, she unexpectedly met Si Kaide’s maid, Si Mida. Because Li Huamei was an important business partner of the Senate and often dealt with the Colonial and Trade Department, the two were quite familiar. This time, she saw that Si Mida had gained a lot of weight. With a happy smile on her face, her clothes and hairstyle had become sloppy, and her obviously bulging belly clearly told everyone that she was pregnant.

A pregnant maid naturally could not follow the chief around, so Si Kaide arranged for her to do some clerical work at the Colonial Department office in Bopu. The air by the sea was also better, and the seafood was fresher—eating more fish was very good for pregnant women.

Then Si Mida called over Li Qianji, and the three women ate and chatted together. Li Qianji was Li Haiping’s maid, and she was in the same period as Si Mida—the 4th class of the maid training class. Their dormitory bed numbers were 111 and 113, respectively. They were originally very close.

Due to the elders’ wicked sense of humor, when registering the maids, they found that there were dozens of Li Wanjis among the elders’ maids. So the General Office explicitly prohibited the use of this name. One of the beautiful and well-behaved Li Wanjis eventually became Li Haiping’s maid and was renamed Qianji—some other elders were quick-witted and changed their maids’ names to Baiji, Shiji, and Yiji. The others had to say goodbye to this name.

Not long after Li Qianji went to Taiwan, she found out she was pregnant, so she was also sent back to Lingao. Li Haiping was Li Huamei’s number one fan, and Li Qianji had known Li Huamei for a long time. As a life secretary who had received strict harem-style training, she simply called Li Huamei her older sister at their first meeting.

Now the two pregnant women were living together in Li Haiping’s officer’s quarters at the naval camp in Bopu—it was very empty inside. There was a canteen, a laundry room, and a clinic in the courtyard, and there were orderlies to clean, so there was nothing to worry about. The General Office had also specifically notified the naval base that the future of the Senate was an overriding political task…

Now Li Huamei couldn’t remember what the three women had talked about. In short, the only feeling that remained was a deep and completely inescapable sense of displeasure. In any era, a woman’s jealousy is basically directly proportional to the popularity of her man and inversely proportional to the number of her children.

Three years ago, when Li Huamei first came into contact with the Australians, she felt that men were just a kind of animal. Now she was 26 in a flash—in this time and space, she was an out-and-out old leftover woman. Looking at herself in the mirror: her face had become rounder, and there were fine lines at the corners of her eyes. The stupid Australian men who had been infatuated with her back then had now become big shots who dominated the China Sea.

What was worse, a group of kids nearly ten years younger than her were actually going to have children before her. And as for herself, what was even worse than worse was that her aesthetic taste had unknowingly changed to fair skin, slightly plump, tall, with a naive and confident smile on her face, and not-so-long hair…

This life was unbearable. Damn it, I really want to have a child… She angrily closed the logbook, put away the dip pen and ink, put on her straw hat and the sunglasses Monde had given her, slung her scimitar over her shoulder, tightened her belt, and walked out of the captain’s cabin.

“Miss, that ship to the northwest seems to have been following us.”

“For how long?”

“We saw it yesterday too. We didn’t see any lights at night, but it appeared again today.”

“That longship?”

“Yes, it moved a little further away this morning and is now approaching. If we were going our separate ways, it should have passed us long ago.”

“Hmm, starboard three, let’s head out to the open sea for a bit. If they follow, prepare for battle. Tell everyone to eat something quickly, whether it’s cooked or not, and then put out the fire!”

“Yes!”

…

“Miss, that ship is following us!”

“Prepare for battle! Ring the bell! Port five, full sail! … Ah Qiu, take your men and hang the anchor chains on the side of the ship! … Carlos, take your men to fetch water and spread sand! … Mao Da, take your men…”

“Damn it, which blind fool is actually trying to mess with me!” she cursed. … Old… mother? … Sigh!

The Hangzhou was a small 150-ton two-masted schooner. The other party’s ship looked to be three or four hundred tons, with three masts and a slender hull, similar to an English ship—it should be a Northern European type of ship. This kind of ship was much faster than her own. It was not yet known who was driving it, but it was certain that they were going to rob them.

Li Huamei was not afraid of anyone when it came to fighting at sea—except for the Australians’ big ships that spewed smoke. Fortunately, the captains of those big smoke-spewing ships were all her admirers, and many of the things she wore were gifts from them.

While thinking, Li Huamei took off her sunglasses and put them away, then put the glasses case in a tin box. No matter what, these glasses must not be lost. She took out the two Deringer pistols that Li Haiping had given her from the tin box, loaded them with bullets and percussion caps, and stuck them in her belt. She took down the Patton sword that Si Kaide from the Colonial Department had given her from the wall. She didn’t know why it was called “Eight Shields.” It was said that the Japanese called their most powerful samurai Heihachiro, but the Japanese didn’t use this kind of straight sword. And what was the deal with “Dori”? Si Kaide said, “If it’s a gift for Miss Li, it’s ‘Dori-Eight Shields’…”

Back on the quarterdeck, the enemy ship was only four or five chains away.

“Load the cannons with iron balls, the small cannons with chain shot. On my command, prepare to turn the rudder, prepare to beat the war drums…”

“Hey… lads! Keep a close watch for me and see which fool is coming to die! The first one to see the flag clearly gets a reward!” Li Huamei put one foot on the railing to boost morale, holding a sword in one hand, her curves revealed, her heroic posture striking, her red headscarf fluttering in the wind like a flame. This was also the sight the crew most wanted to see.

“What’s the reward?”

“Yeah, what’s the reward?”

“A kiss from the miss!”

“A kiss on my thing!”

A “bang” sound, and a hole had been shot in the deck between the legs of the sailor who had spoken.

“A kiss is fine,” Li Huamei blew on the muzzle of her gun. “Tonight, we’ll cut it off and have it with wine…”

A burst of laughter erupted from the crowd…

In fact, the old sailors were also a little puzzled. The Hangzhou was flying both the Portuguese and the Australian Song flags. The Spanish and Portuguese would naturally not attack their own ships. The English would normally not attack a ship flying the North Star flag. It was hard to say about the Dutch in the past, but now they certainly wouldn’t do so, unless their East India Company didn’t want the trade in Hong Kong anymore—this business was now so profitable that the Portuguese were green with envy.

“Miss, look, the enemy ship is raising its flag.”

“What flag is that?”

“It looks like Denmark. Their East India Company is only about 100 leagues from here.”

“Didn’t Denmark make peace with His Majesty?”

“The red-haired ones call them something like ‘elite pirates,’ saying they have been a pirate nation since ancient times.”

“If ‘since ancient times’ was so useful, what would we need cannons for! I don’t care if it’s a white-boned demon or a fox spirit, if it comes to our door, it’s our fat sheep.”

“To hell with them! Get ready to fight!”