C26

Guo Liang remained silent. Like most people, Guo Liang also believed that the father and son of Zhu Family were just putting up a front to show off their military strength. If it really was a large-scale army, with Zhu Yisu's current holy family, after next year's output of new grain, he would be able to rise to the position of the head, captive, and Tiancheng 2 Guard.

At that time, the size of the military base would be even greater. This would be a disaster!

Even a young boy like Zhu Hongzhao was so courageous. He had been practicing martial arts since a young age, did he not have any guts?

Guo Qingyan sized up the two silent people, put away the chess pieces silently and carried away the small chess table.

Liu Tie waved his hands, and the two servant s left the courtyard. Sun Hee curled his lips, gave Liu Liangzuo a look, and left as well.

After letting out a long breath, Guo Liang stared into Zhu Hongzhao's eyes and said, "Young master still has one more thing to say. If this town can feed itself well, how can the officials of the dynasty handle it?"

Zhu Hongzhao's expression did not change, but his pupils shrank.

In the past, the Ming Dynasty collected taxes on grain, shipping from the south to the north was a huge waste. In order to reduce the pressure and consumption of the food, 9 rich merchants from all over the place would organize the people's villages in Border Town and use the output of the food instead of the salt tax to exchange for the salt marketing license.

After a short while, the grain stores were filled with grain. The grain market had more than enough supply than demand, so one silver coin could buy three stones of grain. When he read till here, he had even scolded the imperial government for being stupid. He had a deeper meaning here, even if it was to starve the entire border army to the point of not letting them have their fill!

It was all for the sake of controlling the border army and economic means! Even if it meant increasing the pressure on the court, this bunch of civil servants were truly hateful!

Staring at Guo Liang's twinkling eyes, Zhu Hongzhao paused for a second and then said, "It is the mission of father and son to request for the garrison. If we do not do it, it will be deceiving the Emperor! Not only that, my father and I need to train our troops to produce an elite! If Master Guo was worried that they would settle the debt, I would go to my father and ask him to come home to Taiyuan. "Farewell!"

"Young master, please wait!"

Saying that, he picked up his felt hat and was about to leave, but was stopped by Guo Liang. Guo Liang laughed bitterly: "Lord Commander is eager to return to the country, could it be that I, Guo Liang, am a cowardly rat that covets power and power? "Young master is at ease, this lowly one shall begin on this matter immediately. Young master, please assign the armor to me."

He was a smart man. He didn't mention the military village. The military village still had some time left to grow winter wheat. In the past few days, he had been talking about farmers. What could he do if he didn't take this opportunity to train?

"It's a deal then. When the equipment for the Xinping Fort soldiers are insufficient, I will go to the Da Tong Kingdom to find Garrison Eunuch Wu Steel to allocate them."

Zhu Hongzhao turned around and revealed a smile. He put on his red tassel felt hat and walked out of the mansion.

Looking at his small back, Guo Liang rolled his eyes, turned around and walked towards the house.

Outside the mansion, a group of young men were eating fruits in the shadow of a corner. Sun Hee was the most quick-witted as he brought a rope and came over to welcome Zhu Hongzhao on the train. At the same time, he smiled and said, "Young master, I've asked the old man at the castle about that place, and the old man said that as long as it's not a rainstorm, there won't be a flood on the Xi Yang River."

Zhu Hongzhao was going to build a manor by the river. It was not strange that he chose a place with a narrow river and rapid flowing water. "As a Southerner, Sun Hee was naturally sensitive to water disasters. As soon as he came out, he pulled an old man by the side and asked him a few questions.

"Very good, return to the Xinping Fort."

Zhu Hongzhao was too preoccupied with his own matters. He lazily climbed onto the carriage and laid down on the bamboo mat. His felt hat was pinned to his forehead to block the light. Sun Hee boarded the bus and waved his bull-whip at the youths who had not had enough rest. With a stern look in his eyes, he drove the ox-cart away.

A group of youngsters wailed as they followed the oxcart. Among them were youths picked out from the soldier system, as well as descendants of hereditary military officers.

Not to mention Zhu Hongzhao, the direct son with a saint's family, even Zhu Honglin, the bastard, had a bunch of youths surrounding him.

They were the children of military personnel and knew the importance of forming a group from a young age. In the future, they would have to go to the battlefield together. If they did not settle their relationship well, they would definitely be blinded when they went to the battlefield.

In the Residence of Hundred Families, Guo Liang wrote on the ink while Guo Qingyan held a brush.

He had a good appearance, good martial arts training, and only knew how to read. He could write, but he could also write crookedly.

After reading it once, he lifted his pen and wrote out a name that sounded like it was written in cursive script, praising, "These words are for coming here at the last minute, I heard that Young Master Zhu had a hand that made Daizhou's He Zhizhou exclaim in surprise. I don't know if it's his calligraphy that's better, or mine."

Guo Qingyan rolled his eyes. He thought that he was praising this little boy, but he didn't expect that he was actually praising himself. This made Guo Qingyan speechless.

Drying the ink, Guo Liang sighed and clenched his fists, "Cousin, I want to make a bet. If you win, you will bring glory to your ancestors. If you lose, you will go home and farm!"

Guo Qingyan raised his pen and wrote down a string of words: "The father and son of Zhu Family represents the nation, Hee Chong is easily distracted, you should be on guard."

Guo Liang nodded, then took the piece of paper and left the room. He stuffed it into a wooden basin. The words were blurred, and the muddy water was poured into the garden. Summoning one servant s, he handed the envelope over and said: Go to Xinping Fort and inquire about the situation outside the fort. Hand this letter over to my third uncle personally.

Xinping Fort didn't have much military equipment either. The former Commander, Ma Chengxuan, had received a thousand pay, and the thousand guards had all eaten too. The only two thousand people there were three horse teams, with the exception of the officers, servant s, who could still use their weapons, the rest of the twelve hundred people were wearing tattered clothes, their weapons and armors rusted.

Where was the weapon? The military officer had a post as an Imperial Censor or an Imperial Censor. Why didn't he pursue the loss of two thousand sets of weapons?

Sold. Sold to the edge. Everyone earned money together. This was the border town.

Zhu Hongzhao was already numb to this news and did not care at all. Back to when Xinping Fort father and son pair were walking on the narrow streets, talking about the military village.

Zhu Hongzhao only said that the land was abandoned because of the looseness of the army, and that the people were worried that the land would be taken away from them. He didn't say the deeper reason, he was afraid that his father would admit defeat.

After buying some pecans and having a meal outside with his father, Zhu Hongzhao went back to the Wu Steel Manor.

The maidservant Heir the King fed eight young geese, while the other four died on the road. Under the shade of the tree, Zhu Hongzhao's feet were soaked in cold water. He leaned on the table and held the goose feather pen in his hand as he drew lines on the paper.

As a member of the semi-industrial gang, Zhu Hongzhao knew the greatness of mechanical power. Compared to hydraulic power and wind power, human and animal power were like slag.

He planned to build a hydraulic mill in the manor he was about to build, and also think of a way to hire some blacksmiths and carpenters.

He understood the principle of firearms, but he did not have the industrial foundation to give him the platform to experiment on. I also don't understand chemistry, so I can only research the way of using hydraulic power first, and use hydraulic power to pull out the rifling line for the fire blunderbuss!

The flintlock was not a problem. He had met them in the past two days. Hee Chong's group of guards that were transferred over to Garrison Eunuch were the flintlock. Chen Xuanguang's grandpa and grandson's fire blunderbuss were carved with rifling lines and were also flinty.

Using hydraulic power was the first method he thought of. Then he would burn it, burn it with earth, and use it to make iron. This way, he would have sufficient iron resources. Even if he were to use manpower, as long as there were sufficient manpower, he would still be able to produce Fire Rod.

The third method was to create a steam engine. This principle was not difficult, and it was hard to find processing technology. As long as he worked hard for a few years to create a few steam engines, he would be able to get rid of the restrictions of the hydraulic system and gain more power.

Then he would do machine tools. What kind of gears would be beaten with a hammer? All he had to do was create a machine tool and continuously calibrate it to standardize the scale. With the steam engine as the driving force, the first industrial revolution was completed.

This was what he had been thinking about all this time. Now that he had the territory, what he lacked was time and manpower.

However, everything was difficult at the beginning, but had to start from this manor.

After wasting a stack of straw paper, he finally drew a satisfactory infrastructure blueprint. After that, he found Zhao Qi and told him about the construction of the manor. Sun believes that the manor is not as safe as the castle, but still went to do it, probably after the repair of Zhu Hongzhao will not go to live. After all, the Xinping Fort was indeed a little small. If Commander lost his position in the family one day, this manor would probably become Zhu Yisu and his son's last resort.

Zhao Qi took his men on inspection and reported to Zhu Yisu at night. Zhu Yisu didn't like the hustle and bustle of Xinping Fort either. It was good to build a manor outside as he spent 5 taels of silver on it.

Basically, the labor force needed to build this villa was free, and the required masonry and wood could also be sent to the military or even the soldier to be a logging stonecutter. The same was true for the local Garrison Army officials. Let the soldiers go out to work so that they won't starve to death because they took the land. It was easy for him to be a military head who could work as a contractor.

The rest of the time, the entire Xinping Fort was busy. Zhu Yisu smoothed out the interior of the Thousand Clans Clubhouse and maintained a basic harmony with the two senior military officers. He began to make up the balance of a thousand families, and to select those who had the ability to do so.

Only a fifth stage Qian Hu still needed to go through the Ministry of War Assessment, but this was a in the early Ming dynasty. If one were to be appointed or removed from the Acropolis Hall, all one had to do was to make a list of the Five Imperial Forces and the Governor's Palace, as well as their Ministry of War.

The bustling Mashi finally stopped and Zhu Yisu didn't do anything. Besides the necessary points, he only had 42 cows left. In addition to the filial piety during the period, nearly half of the cattle he bought were at his expense.

This is the cattle of the prairie. If you want to use their land, you still need to tame them. Now that the winter wheat was sown right in front of his eyes, he gathered the hundreds of cows in the City Guards Institution and sent them out together for domestication.

3 taels of silver for one of these cows, and 7 taels of silver for one cow in its prime to the south. It was almost equal to the price of a servant girl. Perhaps, he could sell it for a bit more.

This was also normal, as oxen represented the most basic level of productivity. Having an ox meant that he could plough the ground open. If he were to use manpower, he might not even be able to plow an acre of land every day even if he died of exhaustion.

The Ming Dynasty had an acre of land of about 600 square meters and an acre of land of about 100 mu.

On the 28th of July, Zhu Hongzhao watched as servant controlled Yellow Ox to reclaim the land outside the villa.

1 head of cattle day 1 also 9 plough open 1 mu of land outside the head, this land abandoned for a long time, reclamation difficult. As for the oxen, they rested for two days, appearing to be even more pampered than humans.

Zhu Yisu also wanted to buy more cows and also had money to spare, but this time, there were around 5,000 cows shipped here from the north. The merchants not only bought the cows themselves, but they also sold the cows for the big families who were short of cows.

Zhu Yisu has tried his best to buy four cows. Cattle were their productivity. They could continuously turn the land's fertility into food and money. They were the most sought after goods, and no one would ever complain about having too much of it.

4 this year, 4 next year, cattle can also produce cattle. Zhu Yisu was not discouraged. After this year, his Xinping Fort might not be lacking anything like farming cows anymore.

"Young master, report to Da Tong Prefecture!" "Lord Commander …" Hee Chong rode over alone and tumbled down to the ground. His face was pale and lifeless as he gasped for air: "Lord Commander looked at the Tipao and fainted right away!"

Zhu Hongzhao's face turned pale. If something happened to Zhu Yisu, his good foundation would be ruined. Even more so, he was worried that his father would meet with some mishap, and lead a group of people to rush to the Xinping Fort.

In Commander's residence, it was a scene of mourning.

Zhu Yisu's face was pale and bloodless. He looked sad as he passed the Tipao into his son's hands.

I opened it and saw that after 48 years, the Emperor passed away...

Zhu Hongzhao's heart sank. His biggest backer was gone.