At the end of Qin, I became a son of the plane

Chapter 291, Extravagant heavy cavalry and Xiang Yu taking the initiative

August 25, the fourth year of the Han Dynasty. Guanzhong, Meiyang County, Han Army Horse Farm.

The pastures on the horse farm are prosperous, and they constantly make rustling sounds under the gentle autumn wind. The grass and trees sway with the autumn wind, and the scene is extremely comfortable.

On the side of the grassland, Xu Fan was wearing a big straw hat and a white towel. He was holding a sickle more than ten feet long in his hand. The sickle's vent was extremely wide and sharp. It looked sharp under the sunlight. It looked a bit like Death Scythe.

This is not Xu Fan playing cosplay, but harvesting grass. As long as Xu Fan swings the sickle vigorously, a large piece of grass will be cut off. Zhang Liang, standing behind Xu Fan, quickly bundles the grass and carries it to a carriage nearby.

In order to personally improve the status of workers, Xu Fan, a manly emperor, would basically do basic manual work (technical work was not possible) wherever he visited. Zhang Liang, who had been following Xu Fan, also became proficient in various farm tasks.

At first, Kong Yu and others tried their best to stop Xu Fan's behavior, thinking that such an action would damage the emperor's prestige, but Xu Fan understood that it would not happen at all. He would let the people at the bottom understand that he stood with the ordinary people. The prestige will be higher.

On the contrary, if you don't contact the people and break away from the bottom, that is the real danger. You will formulate some policies that say why not eat meat. Obviously you want to do something for the people, but in the end, all the benefits go into the pockets of the powerful. He will become a fool who doesn't even know how much money an egg has.

Everyone in the world wants to create an information cocoon for themselves. If Xu Fan wants to avoid being deceived, he can only take the initiative to contact the bottom. Xu Fan has learned too many such lessons in later generations.
Therefore, the emperor Xu Fan stayed in Guanzhong for two years, either communicating with craftsmen on the construction site or communicating with farmers in the fields. Over the past few years, the emperor's prestige did not decline. On the contrary, the people of Guanzhong respected Xu Fan more.

After Xu Fan did this a lot, the various government offices in the Han Dynasty had adapted to Xu Fan's behavior and were no longer as nervous as at the beginning.

This kind of long-handled scythe is more suitable for cutting grass. Of course, the shortcomings are also obvious, and it costs iron and money, but this amount of iron is nothing to the big man who is constantly building blast furnaces, so all the workers in the ranch wield long-handled scythes.

Xu Fan was strong and his sickle was sharp. With his constant waving, he quickly cut out a large area. It can be seen that the combination of Xu Fan and Zhang Liang is extremely efficient.

Although Chen Lin and Qin Bo on the side are also veterans, they are older and their efficiency is not as good as that of the young and strong Xu Fan.

There are a large number of such harvesting teams in this pasture area. The herdsmen work in teams of two and wield scythes to quickly harvest the forage. After the carriage is filled with forage, they will be transported to a storage that specializes in silage processing. In the room.

"Dang, Dang, Dang! It's time for dinner." A ranch hand struck a copper bell to notify everyone.

When Xu Fan heard this voice, he wiped his sweat and said to Zhang Liang, "Let's go eat."

Then a few people walked under the shadow of a tree, where the servant's servants had already arranged the Han table and Han stools. (Don’t worry about the fact that these things don’t exist in this era. The protagonist has been in this world for several years and will definitely come up with some things that are convenient for him.)
The conditions of the pasture are simple and there is not much care. Xu Fan, the emperor, Zhang Liang, the false image, sat together with Qin Bo, the Shaofu Ling, and Chen Lin, the imperial servant.

After half a day's hard work, the four of them had a great appetite and started eating very quickly. The food on the table was quickly cleared.

After dinner, Xu Fan asked: "How many horses are there in this racecourse? How many horses are there in Guanzhong?"

The servant Chen Lin said: "Meiyang Racecourse has 8145 war horses, 2210 foals, 3112 breeding mares, 2034 war horses, and the remaining horses can only be used as baggage horses."

"There are twelve such horse farms in Guanzhong. Among them, the Longxi horse farm has the largest number and the best quality of war horses. There are about 8 horses in Guanzhong, and nearly 3 can become war horses.

Since your Majesty began to attack the Huns, because of the capture of a large number of Huns' livestock, plus the war horses sold by the princes of Liaodong and the war horses sold by the princes of Hexi, the number of war horses of Taipu has increased rapidly, with an increase of 3 this year alone. . "

"It just so happened that your Majesty captured a large number of barbarians this year. They are all the best herdsmen. Because of recruiting them, the number of war horses bred this year has increased significantly. I also plan to breed in Shangjun, Yunzhong County, Jiuyuan County, and Yanmen County. , separately opened horse farms in Liaodong to expand the source of horses for the Han Dynasty, but the prime minister has not yet given me the budget, so I can only find someone to find a suitable pasture first. "

The fake Zhang Liang smiled and said: "Every racecourse is a gold-eating beast. Each one costs hundreds of millions of dollars to build. Chen Taipu, you want to build five racecourses at once. Even the financial balance of the entire Han Dynasty is not enough for you. Of course, Prime Minister Zhou I won’t agree.”

Chen Lindao: "But this is related to the military strength of our Han Dynasty. If we don't have qualified war horses, where will our Han cavalry come from? Ji Xin and Ge Ying have been urging me every month, asking us to provide war horses. The imperial cavalry camp and the Yue cavalry camp are also We need to find our Taipu. The Taipu's horse farm has to provide thousands of war horses to the Han army every month. Now that the emperor has said that he will send 600,000 troops, the number of war horses is even more insufficient. "

Xu Fan thought for a while and said: "The Prime Minister has no surplus food. You servants still have to use the power of the people. I remember that the Wu family provided a large number of war horses to the First Emperor during the Qin Dynasty. You servants can unite with these knowledgeable people." The folk power of horses absorbs their capital and technology to jointly open a ranch.

Don't just raise war horses, you can also raise cattle or even sheep for sale. You servants must find ways to be self-sufficient and cannot just rely on the court to support you. Han farmers need a lot of cattle, and caravans also need a lot of horses. These are huge markets. "

Although Taipu is a functional department of Jiuqing, it is actually more like a large government-owned enterprise, but their only customer is the imperial court. It used to be the imperial court of Qin Dynasty, but now it is the imperial court of Han Dynasty.

If there are frequent wars and strict supervision, the Taipu department can still play a big role. But during the peaceful period of the unified dynasty, not only did the servants spend a lot of financial income, they also failed to do their jobs well.

Xu Fan remembered that there was a historical novel written, probably during the Ming Dynasty. The servants who raised horses cost the court hundreds of thousands of taels of silver every year and occupied a large amount of fertile land, but they could not produce a qualified war horse and were eventually killed. The protagonist is eliminated.

Now the imperial servant can still play a positive role, but Xu Fan knows without thinking that before long, the imperial servant will become rampant in corruption and become a yamen with no positive value.

Then we might as well restructure now and transform from a yamen to an enterprise. It would be much easier to lay off and replace people if we can't keep the horses well.

Chen Lin hesitated and said: "War horses are a weapon for the military and the state, should we let private merchants control it?"

Xu Fan said: "What's wrong? If the court is short of horses, it will buy them from the private sector. If there is no shortage of horses, you ranchers will sell horses and cattle to the private sector to make money. In this way, you don't have to look at the court for appropriation."

This is a semi-monopoly industry. As long as corruption is not too serious, making money is inevitable.

Zhang Liang hesitated and said: "What if those profiteers raise the price?"

Xu Fan said with a smile: "The swords and government offices controlled by the imperial court are still afraid of these profiteers. When they need war horses, they will purchase war horses at a fair price according to wartime laws. The imperial court will not take advantage of these merchants, but if these merchants dare to ride in the imperial court On top of his head, the sword of the imperial court is really bad."

Merchants can ride on the head of the imperial court. It's not about how powerful the merchants are, but essentially the powerful people behind the merchants who make the imperial court take advantage of them.

But if a court cannot even control the powerful, then it is better to perish as soon as possible, so as not to let the people of the world suffer with such a court.

After they rested for half an hour.

Xu Fan said to Chen Lin: "Select the 100 best horses from your racecourse."

"promise"

Then Xu Fan looked at Qin Bo and said, "Bring the things here too."

Qin Bo said: "No"

Not long after, Chen Lin asked the herdsmen to select the 100 strongest and tallest horses, which appeared in front of Xu Fan. In front of each horse was a herdsman holding the horse rope.

Although Xu Fan didn't know how to read war horses, these war horses were obviously taller than other horses.

And Qin Bo also appeared here with three carriages. Then the young official of the Shaofu carried the things off the carriage with difficulty.

"What is this, armor?" Zhang Liang asked hesitantly.

This was obviously iron armor, but the size was a bit exaggerated, and it didn't look like something a human could wear.

Qin Bo said: "This is the iron harness that your Majesty asked us to build."

"Iron harness!" Zhang Liang has seen horse-mounted cavalry. They are really invincible and invincible. But those harnesses are only leather armor, bamboo armor, and at most paper armor. But how strong it must be if it is replaced with iron armor now. , Zhang Liang simply couldn't imagine what kind of wild beast the war horse would turn into. "Some people come to help." Qin Bo shouted.

Xu Fan asked his personal guards to go up to help. A dozen of them were busy burning incense for half a day, when ten armored heavy cavalry appeared in front of Xu Fan and the others.

The armor reflected the light of the armor in the sun, and even the war horse looked bigger because of the layer of armor.

Qin Bo smiled and said: "This kind of iron horse gear weighs more than 200 kilograms. It can prevent bows and arrows within 30 steps and crossbows within 50 steps. Ordinary swords, guns, swords and halberds can't do anything with this set of iron armor."

Zhang Liang hesitated and said: "It's so heavy, how can a war horse still gallop?"

Qin Bo said helplessly: "This is also the biggest flaw of this harness. Ordinary war horses cannot support such a heavy harness, let alone fight. Only the largest and most durable war horses can be equipped with this kind of iron armor." ”

"Chen Ye, ride these war horses back and forth for ten miles," Xu Fan said.

"promise"

Generally, armored heavy cavalry are only used to break formations. You don’t have to run hundreds of miles (you don’t have this ability), but you definitely need to run for more than ten miles. This is already the most basic requirement. You can’t run for more than ten miles. , then the enemy formation cannot be penetrated, and such heavy cavalry is useless.

Chen Ye led nine personal guards to form a small front formation, and excitedly started running on the armored horse.

The war horses were heavily armored, and the armor on their bodies had no flaws at all. They could not think of any enemy that could defeat them with such iron cavalry.

But not long after running, he found that these war horses ran very slowly. Not long after the horses galloped, they slowed down. After traveling seven or eight miles, they began to pant. In the end, their ten-man armored heavy cavalry could only barely After running back, two of the horses fell down as they approached the finish line.

Chen Lin immediately ordered his men to run over and untie the harness, but the horses inside were already exhausted and foaming at the mouth and could not stand up. The herdsmen began to rescue these horses on the spot. The ones Chen Lin chose were all high-quality BMWs, which were priceless. Not an exaggeration.

Chen Ye said helplessly: "Although the armor is good for defense, it is too heavy for the horses to float. We are not fully armed yet, otherwise I am afraid that these horses will not be able to run back at all."

Xu Fan said: "Find a few more tall and endurance horses to experiment with."

"promise"

After the last experience, Qin Bo and the others specially found a few tall and endurance horses, and these horses performed extremely well. They could gallop and run back. Although their condition was not good, on the battlefield, At least you can charge and break the formation in one round.

Only Chen Lin said helplessly: "Your Majesty's iron harness has too high requirements for war horses. There are only 50 war horses in our entire racecourse that can meet such requirements, and these fifty horses are all the best BMWs in my racecourse and can be sold. Most of the money above yuan was used by the minister to breed horses.”

Zhang Liang was surprised and said: "To set up such a heavy cavalry battalion requires five thousand such BMWs, and the war horses alone will cost one billion? If you include the iron armor and various weapons and equipment, a heavy cavalry battalion will cost ten billion." Hundreds of millions of dollars?”

Even Xu Fan couldn't bear this price. He lowered the price of steel and harnesses were no longer an obstacle. However, he didn't expect that the price of war horses would become the biggest obstacle to heavy cavalry. He forgot to click on breeding. War Horse's technology tree. Without a technology tree, the cost of heavy cavalry cannot be reduced.

Chen Lindao: "The key to being able to barely afford this price is maintenance. Such heavy armor will cause extremely heavy wear and tear on war horses. Even if there is no war, hundreds of horses will be worn out every year just for training, which will cost hundreds of millions of dollars." , If a war breaks out, the cost will be even greater.”

At this time, Xu Fan finally understood why the heavy cavalry slowly disappeared in China. Just like an agricultural country wants to build armored divisions, even if you sell iron and buy tanks, you can't afford them. And the Central Plains is so vast. The mobility of the heavy cavalry was too poor to keep up with the larger troops, and its cost-effectiveness was so low that it was gradually eliminated.

Xu Fan thought for a while and said to Qin Bo: "Find another way to reduce the weight of this vest."

Qin Bo said: "No"

Then Xu Fan said to Chen Lin: "The servant will use these horses as a standard and prepare 1000 horses."

"promise"

Although the tens of thousands of armored heavy cavalry planned by Xu Fan cannot be obtained, if he first obtains a thousand, and then adds cavalry with paper armor, such a reduced version is not bad, but the maintenance cost can be reduced to an extremely low level. . Although this kind of combined heavy cavalry battalion is not the strongest, it is the most suitable for today's big men.

August 27, the fourth year of the Han Dynasty. Xue Jun

What Ge Ying was most worried about happened. The powerful people in Wuyan County colluded with Qi State and raised troops to rebel the day before yesterday and captured Wuyan County. Ge Ying was worried that the powerful rebel forces would spread to the entire Xue County and even the Central Plains.

So he said to his deputy Song Liu: "You are stationed in Lu County to guard against Xiang Yu. This rebellion must be related to them. Don't let Qi take advantage of the loophole. I will lead the Iron Armor Battalion to exterminate the rebels in Wuyan County."

Song Liu said: "For such a rebellion, it is enough to send a captain. Why should the general send out himself?"

Ge Ying said firmly: "The powerful people in the Central Plains are dissatisfied with my big man. Xiang Yu's rebellion has made them ready to take action. If the rebellious powerful people in Wuyan County cannot be extinguished immediately, I am afraid that the powerful people in the entire Central Plains will take the opportunity to cause rebellion. This time I will go Wuyan County wants to kill the chicken to scare the monkeys, so that the powerful people in the Central Plains can see the power of my strong men and warn them not to act recklessly. "

Then Ge Ying led 5000 cavalry towards Wuyan County.

The surname of the rebel Wuyan tycoon was Jiang, which was also a popular surname in the local area. When the Han Dynasty occupied Lu County, a large amount of land in the Jiang family was forcibly acquired because they wanted to divide the soldiers. This caused great dissatisfaction with Chang Jiang, and then 30% of the Han Dynasty Tian Fu aroused his hatred.

When Fan Zeng contacted the Central Plains tycoons, Xue Jun was the closest, and the Jiang family immediately defected to Xiang Yu. After Xiang Yu destroyed Tian Heng, Fan Zeng began to secretly deliver a large number of weapons and armor to the Jiang family.

After receiving the support of weapons and armor from Qi State, Jiang Chang felt that his strength had greatly increased. Jiang Chang led 400 private soldiers to directly kill the magistrate of Wuyan County, occupied the county seat, and officially launched an army to rebel.

After occupying Wuyan County, Jiang Chang united with several strong men in Wuyan who were dissatisfied with the Han Dynasty. At the same time, they arrested the people of Wuyan County to serve as soldiers, and soon gathered 3000 people.

With so many troops at hand, it was enough for him to hold the county seat for a month. There will be enough time for the King of Qi to support him. When the time comes, he and the Qi army will attack from inside and outside, enough to destroy the Han army in Xue County.

But he thinks too highly of himself. He was right to rebel against the Han Dynasty for his own land, but why did the people of Wuyan County rebel? Was it because the Jiang family would bully them again and take away their land?
Therefore, as soon as Ge Ying's army arrived in Wuyan County, soldiers opened the gates of Wuyan County, and Ge Ying's 5000 armored cavalry rushed into Wuyan County instantly.

"Master, the Han army is coming." Jiang Chang, who was still in the county office and fantasizing about repelling the Han army, suddenly heard these words and was frightened to death.

"How did the Han army come here?" Jiang Chang couldn't imagine how he couldn't hold on for even a day with three thousand soldiers in his hands.

Jiang Chang's personal soldier said: "It was those soldiers who opened the city gate and let the Han army enter the city."

Jiang Chang said viciously: "The traitor who eats everything inside and outside."

"Master, let's run away."

Jiang Changdao: "Yes, let's run away quickly. The warships arranged by Fan Yafu in Wenshui told a certain person that if they can't defeat the Han army, they can ferry them to Qi State. Let's leave now."

Jiang Chang immediately fled Wuyan County with several hundred personal guards, while other powerful men also fled with their own private soldiers.

Ge Ying discovered that the rebellious Jiang Chang and other powerful men had escaped, leaving 2000 soldiers to guard the prisoners, while he and the remaining cavalry continued to pursue Jiang Chang.

(End of this chapter)