Aztec Civilization: Destiny to Conquer America!-Chapter 1796 - 1289: North America’s Only Fertile Land—California Western Sea Coast

The breeze from the Seaside, blowing from the Kingdom's managed coast, sweeps towards the inland mountains. Northwards from Reagan Town and the Mayo Tribes lies the Yomei Great Tribe, which holds the open-pit coal mining belt, and the Yaki Tribes known as the "People of Firestone." Beyond the vast coal mining belt, reaching the undulating mountain valleys and the Copper Mountain that stands like a natural wonder, is the territory of the "People of the Mountain" – the Opata Alliance. Further north from here lies the hunting grounds of the nomadic and bold Hunting Tribe Alliance, the "People of the Prairie" – the Apache Tribes.

Continuing north, reaching the basin surrounded by mountains, with the flowing Colorado River safeguarding against the cold tides, is the homeland of the "Great Basin People." Among them, the most renowned is the site of Mesa Verde's "Cliff Dwellers," the most ancient Great Tribal Alliance of the Northern Continent, the Navajo Tribes Alliance!

Of course, at this moment, the ancient city-states and palaces of the "Cliff Dwellers" remain sealed away like a hidden Holy Land, passed down only in the mouths of a few Tribal Shamans and Sages. Meanwhile, at the westernmost edge of the continent along the 37th parallel north, is the territory of the "Golden Bay People," converted to the Chief Divine, belonging to the Miwoke Tribes. The West Mountain Port at the center of the Kingdom's Western Sea Coast lies amidst the Miwoke Tribes!

"Praise the Chief Divine! The Bronze Workshop at West Mountain Port has produced another batch of Bronze Tools!…"

"Chief Divine's blessing! Another small Oar-sail Ship has been launched!…"

"Chief Divine is supreme! Look, the Miwok people coming to trade are also praying to the Chief Divine!"

Currently, within the West Mountain Port, with a population of over three thousand, the four most important functional buildings are the Bronze Workshop to the east, the Shipbuilding Yard to the west, the central Main God Temple, and the public market on the northern sandbar of the port.

Among them, the copper ore and tin ore in the Bronze Workshop come from the mountain range in the eastern part of Golden Bay, both being co-occurring ores of the gold ore veins. Yet now, the glittering gold ore veins remain unexcavated, while the associated copper and tin ores are causing the Miwoke Tribes to cheer, stepping into the Bronze Age…

As for the shipbuilding yard at West Mountain Port, its size is not large. In the yard, only a few Kingdom's Shipwrights are instructing and directing tenfold the number of Miwoke Craftsmen. Originally, the task of this shipbuilding yard was merely repairing Oar-sailed Longships and maintaining vessels on the northern shipping route. But two to three years have passed, and with the improvement in shipwrighting techniques and the arrival of several new Southern shipwrights, West Mountain Port's shipyard is finally capable of constructing small Oar-sail Ships!

And when the endless stream of small Oar-sail Ships gets launched from West Mountain Port, a series of ports along the Western Sea Coast finally supplemented with rare near-coast transportation capacity, enabling a larger-scale transport exchange!

"Oh Chief Divine! A transport Oar-sail Ship arrived at the port and unloaded goods! They came from the south, and that grayish white cargo seems like salt from the Ipa Great Tribe!…"

"Salt from the Salt Lake again!… This shipload of salt is here, but who knows how long it will take to sell it all for exchange with various tribes… I heard the Black Serpent Tribe in the south recently discovered a jade mine? That must be a huge fortune!…"

"Ha! A jade mine? In the Northern Continent, jadeite isn't of much use! Just like here in Golden Bay, several large Gold Mountains have been discovered, but no one is willing to mine them… Be it jadeite or gold, only when transported back to the Kingdom thousands of miles away can they be exchanged for useful items, and round trip takes more than a year!… In my opinion, the best is Lake Bay Port in the north, able to produce iron materials to forge iron farm tools and implements… That is really what can change the tribes! If only more ships could be transported over!"

"Forget it! Lake Bay Port has just that little manpower… The Iron Mountain they discovered, far in the eastern mountain forest, is time-consuming and labor-intensive for mining and transport… All year round, the iron materials they can produce, besides fulfilling their own needs, can't spare much for other ports!… In my view, nonetheless, the local bronze smelting here in Golden Bay is more worth relying on!"

"Indeed! The Miwoke Tribes have ample manpower and have pledged alliance with us, converting extensively to the Chief Divine, truly becoming our reliable same-clan Jiao People!… Having them mine copper ore and tin ore, with our port refining it, transporting it entirely by small ships, the outcome of Bronze Tools is then divided among the tribes, couldn't be more perfect!… This is what the Northern Shaman spoke of, that so-called 'natural cycle,' 'great spirit'!…"

"Ha! What the Miwok Priests refer to as 'natural cycle' means the soul and body, not anything about workshops and materials… Don't speak nonsense or you'll provoke a tribal Warrior to challenge you to a dual…"

"Haha! Duel it is! As long as it's not those few terribly strong bear-hunting Warriors, I, the Veteran Warrior Tekos, Luo Dachui, will take the challenge right here!…"

"Hahaha! Dachui, you are still afraid…"

"You! If you've got guts, challenge me to a match!"

"Witness by the Chief Divine! A match it shall be!…"

The talks and comparisons among the Kingdom's Warriors echoed along the coastline of West Mountain Port. The swaying paddle sounds and stretching sail shadows also interweaved in the waves at the port.

The Guano Rock piled at North Bird Stone Village, the Lake Salt transiting through the Ipa Great Tribe, the impending Jadeite mined by the Black Serpent Tribe, the Copper Gold excavated by the Miwoke Tribes, the iron materials smelted at Lake Bay Port, the whale oil captured by Whale Harbor, and the food and fishery products from other ports are coalescing into a closely connected coastal trade network!

The economy determines the elite, while culture is influenced by trade and commerce. This mutually supportive trade network is bound to gradually form an economic community alongside the productivity and population development of the various tribes along the Western Sea Coast, thus creating the foundation for a large fief, an overseas governor district, or a large ecclesiastical province!

In this 4,000-mile Western Sea Coast and future community, the Kingdom's West Mountain Port is not only a hub communicating with various tribes but also a center for technology dissemination! More developed metal and shipbuilding techniques, more advanced religions and organizational forms, as well as more advantageous agricultural crops and technologies, are all radiating from here to the tribes along the entire Western Sea Coast… As for the Miwock Tribes nearby, they are the first Northern Continent tribe to leap forward!

"Chief Divine! Stop arguing!... Split into two teams and go inspect the Milpa fields around the port, and the potato fields near the hills! Also, inspect by the riverside, those four new crops the Priest wants to trial... some strange beans and rice!..."

"Captain, we just checked this morning… those soybeans and peas are growing well; we've even harvested a batch before… the millet is also okay, growing not too badly... but that rice, it consumes too much water and is really hard to grow! Watering it twice a day still doesn't work, it inexplicably falls over and dies..."

"...If it requires more water, then water more. No matter how hard it is to grow, we must plant it! This is a joint order from High Priest Keyuan and Priest Jia Shu!... Fine! I'll lead the team myself to take a look!..."

In these overseas outposts far from the Kingdom, everything requires pioneering efforts from everyone. Even the once-disengaged guards must pick up farming tools again and engage in fieldwork. 𝘧𝓇ℯℯ𝑤ℯ𝘣𝓃ℴ𝓋𝑒𝑙.𝑐𝘰𝑚

And at present, in West Mountain Port, five kinds of traditional Central American crops are being planted: maize as the staple grain, common beans as a vegetable, pumpkin as a mixed grain, sweet potato as a mixed grain, and potato. Plus, four new crops from the Western Sea: soybeans, peas, rice, and millet.

Among these four "new crops," the two types of beans perform the best, having adapted almost perfectly to the conditions in the Golden Bay area. Their heat demand is low, and they have stronger adaptability to water and fertilizer, even growing better in West Mountain Port than in the Northeast of the Wa Country!...

Similarly, millet is also an easy crop to grow, and there will be some yield, no matter what. But rice is the only difficult one! Its requirements for rain, heat, irrigation, and planting techniques are indeed very high; it truly requires meticulous cultivation.

Clearly, the farmers in America need time and experience to gradually master the cultivation techniques for such meticulous crops. And how many years it would take for rice to become a reliable staple grain is still unknown unless there is an influx of immigrant farmers from East Asia...

"Sigh! These Western Sea crops yield so little and are so hard to grow. Who knows why the Priests want to plant them?... If you ask me, the Kingdom's Milpa is still reliable! The sacred 'Three Sisters,' along with Mother Earth's potatoes, together nurture the tribes of the world with their mighty embrace…"

"Such lush and verdant farmland indeed!... With Chief Divine as our witness! This Golden Bay on the Western Sea Coast, in terms of fertility and planting potential, is in no way inferior to the Kingdom's two great lake regions!..."

"Ah! Praise the Chief Divine for granting us a bountiful harvest…"

The fields of West Mountain Port resound with sincere gratitude and prayers, from both the Kingdom's guards and many local Miwock Tribe members. After three years of cultivation, the lands developed around the port finally transformed into mature fields, beginning to show signs of harvest.

In fact, this Golden Bay area on the Western Sea Coast is the only fertile land on the entire North American continent during the agricultural era! Its excellent mild climate, mountains on all sides blocking the cold waves, above-average water and soil conditions, and irrigation rivers flowing down the mountains all lay down the natural foundation for agricultural development!

And the entire North American Western Sea Coast, together with parts of the Great Basin, forms the only two places on the North American continent during this era suitable for agriculture, settlement, and development. As for the black soil belt of the Great Lake region and the grassland belt of the North American plains, they are absolutely barren lands of the agricultural era, death zones marked by extreme cold and crop failures!

These so-called "black lands" have a development difficulty roughly similar to China's black soil in the Northeast. Until the Industrial Revolution provides a sufficient material base, the extreme cold of the Little Ice Age of the late Ming Dynasty ends, and crops are further bred for cold tolerance, stable agricultural and settlement points cannot be maintained here, and large-scale population aggregation is impossible, whether from Europe, Asia, or the closest Central America!

For without the protection of northern mountain ranges, the cold currents from the Arctic continuously bring cold waves. As long as a cold wave with temperatures below minus ten degrees appears consecutively in May and October, it is enough to reduce the year's crop yield sharply or even cause total crop failure. If such yield reductions or total failures appear three times, causing three years of no harvest, it can destroy the vast majority of farming settlements!... And during this cold period of the 15th century, such summer-autumn cold waves were all too common…

"The Kingdom's Western Sea Coast, the golden West Mountain Port, hope for the future!..."

The golden light of the setting sun rests on the golden Main God Temple, making the decorative Jin Shi stones scintillate beautifully. As the sunset gradually fades from West Mountain at 122 degrees west longitude to Great Whale Island at 153 degrees west longitude, five horses of varying sizes simultaneously raise their heads, giving a contented snort in response to the brilliant dusk.

"Lawrence!..."