Late Tang

Li Jing turned his head suddenly, stared fiercely at the steward, and said loudly with excitement: "What did you say? Say it again?"

The steward didn't know which sentence he said just now was wrong, his face suddenly turned gray, the two trembled, the sweat kept coming out of his forehead, and his voice trembled, "Speak, say here, little one"

"What you just said is true? This underground workshop can make horizontal knives, spears, longbows, horn bows, and even crossbows? And it also makes armor and shields?" Li Jing grabbed the steward shoulder, excited loudly.Li Jing couldn't help being excited. Shamen Town is seriously short of weapons now. Although he has started to set up workshops, so far, there is only one workshop with a dozen or so blacksmiths. In addition to making some rough spearheads, even one It is impossible to make a good horizontal knife.Not to mention bows and arrows, armor and shields.

The steward quietly wiped off his sweat, breathed a sigh of relief, and said proudly: "This workshop has been built for five years. At the beginning, it could only make horizontal knives and spears. Many excellent craftsmen have been recruited, and up to now, the entire workshop has 38 outstanding craftsmen, 160 seven craftsmen of various types, 180 senior apprentices, and [-] entry-level apprentices."

Pointing to the busy craftsmen, the steward said proudly: "Now, every eight people in the workshop make five knives in six days, seven people make eight bows in nine days, and three people make 150 arrows in two days."

Li Jing calculated with his fingers that this speed is already very good. On average, one person can make three bows in one month, one can shoot three knives in one month, and one person can make more than 700 arrows in one month.It seems that there are not many, but this is made with the cooperation of artisan heads, artisans, senior apprentices, and entry-level apprentices.The standard craftsman team of a Hengdao workshop consists of eight people, including one official craftsman, two senior apprentices, five entry-level apprentices, and eight people cooperate to make five knives in six days and make thirty qualified horizontal knives in a month.Veteran craftsmen are only responsible for guidance and acceptance, and do not directly participate in the construction.According to the steward, there are ten craftsmen in the Hengdao workshop alone, and they can produce [-] horizontal knives a month.

The production of longbows is relatively troublesome. The complete production cycle of a bow is three years, but most of the time is the early composite process, and the final bow process is seven people, nine days and eight bows.The underground workshop has 27 bow-making teams, including 270 teams of longbows and [-] teams of horn bows. Each team of seven can make [-] bows in one month, and the [-] teams can produce [-] longbows and [-] horn bows each month.

With the ability to manufacture [-] horizontal knives and [-] longbows and horn bows in a month, Li Jing was completely shocked after calculations.This production capacity is too strong, this is completely a mature weapons production base.

"What about the others? How many armors, shields, and crossbows can be produced in a month?" Li Jing now feels that he has fallen into a treasure. Compared with the fleet of eighteen ships outside, this workshop Make him more excited.

The steward said very familiarly: "The spear workshop can make a thousand spearheads every month, and the armor workshop can only make iron armor and leather armor for ordinary soldiers for the time being. There are two main styles of iron armor, zip armor and Scale armor and Zha armor are composed of square iron armor plates, which are thicker and larger than fish scale armor plates, and most of them protrude slightly outward. , the body armor piece is a large rectangular piece, the sleeve armor piece is smaller, and the layers are counter-pressed from bottom to top, and there are two kinds of weaving techniques, yin and yang."

"What is Yinxian Yangxian?"

The steward replied, "Yang line has been used below the chest and sleeves of Zhajia in the Eastern Zhou Dynasty. It is suitable for the arms, waist and other parts that need to be moved. The chest and back of Zhajia are more elaborately made, and the characteristic is that only a few very short rope segments are exposed on the surface of the armor. Now the armor and the second in the workshop are all stacked with armor pieces, and the Yin and Yang lines are intertwined with each other."

According to the steward, the Armor Workshop now mainly produces the Zha Jia, and although the other iron armor and scale armor are also produced, they are only produced in small quantities.Today, the entire armor workshop only produces three types of armor, namely two types of iron armor, armor and scale armor, and pin armor of leather armor.Armor Workshop has the most people. Zhajia can produce [-] sets a month, scale armor can produce [-] sets a month, and sell armor can produce [-] sets a month.

In another month, it can produce [-] iron pocket shields, [-] round cowhide wooden shields for cavalry, [-] square iron shields, [-] infantry regimental badges, and [-] lacquered wooden rafts.

"What about the crossbow?"

"Single soldier crossbows have one hundred pieces per month, and Fuyuan heavy crossbows have ten pieces per month. In addition, three thousand armor-shooting arrows, five thousand production arrows, eight thousand long stack arrows, three thousand crossbow nails, and heavy crossbows can be manufactured every month. A thousand crossbow arrows."

Li Jing laughed, a little uncontrollably.The underground workshop of the Wang family works in two shifts day and night, employing more than 270 craftsmen of all levels and types.The underground workshop produces 270 horizontal swords, [-] infantry longbows, [-] cavalry horn bows, [-] individual crossbows and [-] Fuyuan heavy crossbows every month.There are [-] spearheads and [-] arrows of various types.In addition, there are sixty sets of zip armor, forty sets of scale armor, and one hundred sets of leather armor.There are [-] iron helmets and [-] shields of various types.

He did some calculations, and found that a fine horizontal knife is worth three pens, a longbow three pens, a horn bow five pens, a single soldier crossbow five pens, a Fuyuan crossbow twenty pennies, a spearhead five hundred coins, and an arrow Based on the standard of ten pieces of paper, ten pieces of armor, eight pieces of scale armor, five pieces of leather armor, one piece of helmet, and two pieces of shield, the output of this month is more than 6000 pieces.This number is only his cost calculation.

Wang Jin set up such a large-scale secret workshop on Salmon Island and manufactured so many weapons. What is he going to do?

"For sale, all the weapons made were basically secretly sold to merchants in Silla, Balhae, Khitan, and Xi, and some were sold to those Goguryeo subjugated nobles in Liaodong. This business lasted for several years, and the manufactured weapons Weapons will be transported to the other side of the sea every three months to be sold, and then exchanged for rice, horses, cattle and sheep.”

"Why did Wang Jin arrange the workshop on Salmon Island instead of his Dengzhou water village or other places?" Li Jing asked.

"Because this matter is very secret, we must not let others know. Otherwise, even with the status of the Wang family, if he openly smuggled and traded weapons with Silla and other countries, he would not be able to confess. Although the water village is under the control of the Wang family, But people coming and going are easy to be discovered. Salmon Island is different. It is a semi-open smuggling port, and countless forces are entangled in it. Even Daxie Village dare not interfere here. The Wang family secretly established a workshop on the island, but instead No one found out. The fleet returned to the island to unload the cargo, just in time to secretly transport the weapons away. For several years, no one has ever discovered this secret."

"Is this workshop the Wang family's or just Wang Jin's? And how much do these weapons cost?"

The steward replied: "This workshop is run by Wang Jin alone, but the Wang family also contributes money and people, and the Wang family and Wang Jin share half of the workshop's income, but the Wang family does not intervene in specific affairs, and Wang Jin takes care of everything. As for the profit of this transaction, it is very high.”

"How many exactly?"

The steward stretched out his hand and made a gesture, which was an open slap. "Five times the cost of profit, four shipments a year, and each time the small ones will follow the sea. The payment for each shipment is [-] yuan, no more, no less."

"How much? One hundred thousand?" Zhang Hong's eyes almost popped out. "When was the last delivery, and how much inventory is there in the workshop now?" He has completely regarded the workshop as the property of Shamen Town.

The steward was a little panicked by Zhang Hong's stare, lowered his head and said in a low voice: "I just traded with the Silla people in the last few days ago, and I got back [-] shimi and a batch of cloth, all of which are in the warehouse above. Here, you have already seen it just now. There was another batch of goods produced in the workshop, but they were all taken away by Wang Fu, and now the workshop is empty, and there is no stock at all."

Zhang Hong stood there with some heartache, and sighed: "Why are so many guys sold? If you sell them later, you will die." For the time being, there is no shortage, the most lacking is weapons.

Li Jing was not disappointed at all. To him, the harvest of more than 2 stones of rice, tens of thousands of cloth and thousands of silks was already an unexpected fortune for him.Now that I know that those were exchanged for the output of the underground workshop for three months, I have no regrets.In Zhang Hong's eyes, those ready-made weapons and equipment may be very precious, but in Li Jing's eyes, the biggest gain from discovering this underground workshop is not the ready-made weapons, but the complete set of equipment workshop, and as many as seven hundred Craftsmen of various weapons for the rest of the people.

As long as there are people, there will be a steady stream of weapons produced in the future.

"What's your name?" Li Jing asked the steward.

"Young Zhang Cheng, whose name is Meng Da, is from Qingzhou." The steward replied hastily.

Li Jing stretched out his hand and patted Zhang Cheng's shoulder. Zhang Cheng was only in his early forties, with three long beards, and looked like a big housekeeper. "You performed well. I planned to continue to keep this workshop, but I have to move the tools and craftsmen to the castle immediately. I plan to continue to serve as the general manager of the new workshop in the future. Would you like to?"

Zhang Cheng stared at Li Jing in astonishment. He was satisfied with his life in Li Jing's hands, but he never thought that Li Jing would let him be the chief manager.I stood there for a while, forgetting to even reply.

Li Jing thought he had some concerns, so he smiled lightly and said, "Don't worry, as long as you work hard after you follow me, you won't be treated badly. I will double the treatment you gave to the Wang family before. In addition, your family members, I I will find someone to pick it up for you. You can manage the workshop for me with peace of mind, and I will treat you well."

"Ah!" Zhang Cheng finally came back to his senses, immediately knelt down to Li Jing excitedly, and said loudly, "I am willing, the little one is willing, the little one is completely willing."

(To be continued)