Ming Dynasty: My Brother-in-law is Zhu Youxiao

  Chapter 43 West Factory needs talents like you, trainer

  Historically, Zhou Yuji began to emerge in the Ming Dynasty because of his meritorious service when the Qing soldiers attacked the capital in the ninth year of Chongzhen.

  Now he is just a guerrilla in the Beijing camp.

  When he learned that Zhang Gui, the left governor who was in charge of the military administration in Beijing, wanted to see him, he was also very surprised. When he came to Zhang Gui, he hurriedly saluted: "I have seen Uncle Guo!"

   "Lead the officers and soldiers under your command to the school grounds, and the governor will inspect them!"

  Zhang Gui nodded, and gave an order.

"yes!"

   Not long after, Zhou Yuji brought the officers and soldiers under his command to the school field, and reported to Zhang Gui: "Report to Commander-in-Chief, the officers and soldiers under the last general's command have assembled here, please review!"

  Zhang Gui took a look and found that Zhou Yuji had few officers and soldiers, only about 500 soldiers.

   "Practice!"

   Zhang Gui then ordered.

"yes!"

   Zhou Yuji led his soldiers to practice.

"kill!"

"kill!"

"kill!"

  …

  As the drill ended, Zhang Gui couldn't help nodding his head frequently: "They are all powerful soldiers! How many such powerful soldiers are there in the Beijing camp?"

  Zhou Yuji replied: "Returning to the commander-in-chief, the general does not know how many are in the capital camp, but there are only so many under the general's command, and the remaining one thousand people are all old, weak, sick and disabled."

   Zhang Gui nodded after hearing this and said: "You, Zhou Yuji, are a talent for training soldiers, and our West Factory is in need of a talent like you!"

"From now on, you will concurrently serve as the criminal officer of our West Factory, and at the same time organize the Beijing camp for the governor. Take the official letter of the governor and go to the entire Beijing camp to select usable brave men to form a battalion, called the Qianfeng battalion. After you come out, the governor will ask His Majesty to appoint you as a general of the vanguard battalion!"

   "You must not be negligent, this Qianfeng Battalion will be the main force to defend Gyeonggi in the future, the safety of the capital depends on the Qianfeng Battalion, understand?!"

   Zhang Gui asked again after speaking.

   "The general will understand! Thank you Dushuai for your support!"

  Zhou Yuji hurriedly made another big gift.

  He is not good at making money. In the original history, he had to wait until the ninth year of Chongzhen to get a chance to be promoted by virtue of his strength. Now Zhang Gui suddenly promoted him, which naturally made him very grateful.

"Also, the five hundred strong soldiers you have trained now are also talents. Our West Factory is also in need of such talents. After the governor has asked for the order, he will also serve as the official school of the West Factory, and the salary will be doubled. From now on, I will be like you, obeying Ben Du's orders!"

   Zhang Gui continued to give instructions.

   Zhou Yuji took the official school under his command to thank him again.

   Next, Zhang Gui asked Zhou Yuji to bring his official letter to select the best soldiers from other battalions in the Beijing camp to form the forward battalion.

  And Zhang Gui came to the west mountain with the five hundred soldiers that Zhou Yuji had trained.

  As soon as he arrived at Xishan, Zhang Gui asked the five hundred soldiers: "Which of you has the highest official position?"

  At this time, a strong man with a big arm and a round waist stood up in armor, and said loudly: "Show General Sun Yingyuan to see the commander-in-chief!"

Zhang Gui nodded after hearing this: "From now on, you will also serve as the official of Xichang's 100 criminal households, and lead them to deploy defenses and build cities in Xishan. Anyone from the Western Hills will be killed!"

   "Yes! Thank you Dushuai for your support!"

  Sun Yingyuan agreed.

  Zhang Gui then came to see Man Gui and asked, "How is the training of the servants in this house?"

  Man Gui replied: "The queue training and long-distance running training required by Uncle Guo are already in progress, and the phalanx training will soon follow."

   Zhang Gui nodded after hearing this: "Let them show me the drill tomorrow."

"yes!"

  Early the next morning, Zhang Gui came to the military training ground in Xishan, watching the 800 soldiers he had recruited were performing a drill under the command of Man Gui and the subordinate soldiers.

   After the queue exercise, Zhang Gui's servants, led by Man Gui, ran around the entire Western Mountain.

  After the run, Man Gui came to Zhang Gui: "How does Uncle Guo feel?"

"not enough."

   Zhang Gui said suddenly.

  Man Gui was a little surprised: "What does Uncle Guo mean?"

Zhang Gui said: "I mean, their long-distance running training is not enough! Naturally, all the servants in my Taikangbo Mansion must be elite. After all, there can't be too many servants in the mansion. Since there can't be too many, then we must It is a rare soldier selected from a hundred miles, and the best infantry must have the ability to travel hundreds of miles in a day, and be good at fighting the enemy in motion."

   "Uncle Guo, isn't this asking too much for the servants?"

   Man Gui asked in surprise.

  The infantry that penetrates hundreds of miles a day, even the battle-tested Man Gui has to admit that this requirement is too high.

   "If you don't meet this requirement, don't be my servants in Taikangbo Mansion! Tie sandbags on them and continue long-distance running training! Supplying them with so much meat every day is not for nothing."

   Zhang Gui ordered.

In Zhang Gui's view, he will need a lot of people in the West Factory in the future, and this means that his current servants must be trained strictly, so as to ensure that all these servants will be released from the mansion in the future and arranged to go to the West Factory. become the backbone.

   Therefore, Zhang Gui is not so much training the family members, as he is cultivating backbones for the future expansion of the West Factory.

"yes!"

   Man Gui had no choice but to agree.

   After all, this is not training servants for himself, nor is he paying money, and there is no need for him to stop it.

   "Is my family's night class going?"

   Zhang Gui then asked Song Yingxing.

He didn't let Song Yingxing only be in charge of mining, steelmaking and other industrial matters, but also asked Song Yingxing, a juror, to teach his family members night classes and spread knowledge, mainly to let his family members have the national spirit and the idea of ​​​​loyalty to the master, and to follow in the future. Zhang Gui prepares to turn the world around and die at the hands of alien races.

  After all, Zhang Gui is essentially cultivating his servants as the backbone to control the world for him in the future, so it is naturally impossible not to educate.

  Song Yingxing nodded and said: "The disciples have been teaching them, and they have basically learned the characters now."

"very good!"

  …

   "Put on sandbags! Run with me!"

  One day not long after Zhang Gui gave such instructions, Man Gui ordered Zhang Gui's 800 family members to tie sandbags and run.

   "Ah! How can you run with such a heavy sandbag!"

  The whole family couldn't help complaining.

  Seeing this, Man Gui immediately ordered the servants of the headquarters under his command who enforced the military law: "Put him down immediately and beat him with twenty army sticks! If he commits another crime, he will be expelled from the ranks of servants!"

As he said that, Man Gui looked at the other family members and said, "The family member must obey all the orders of the master, and he must not have any complaints. How many times have I said this, do you not understand?! Also, don't **** complain to me here. , your patriarch, Uncle Guo, is watching from the mountain, if you really can’t stand it, you can request to quit and give up your qualification to be the servant of the Earl’s Mansion!"

  These servants were refugees who were hungry not long ago, so they were not willing to give up their status as servants of Taikangbo Mansion.

   You must know that in Xishan, the families of Taikangbo’s family members are all first-class honorable households, with the highest subsidies, and they are treated differently by the uncle of the country.

  So no one is willing to easily give up the qualification to be the servant of Taikangbo Mansion.

  The servants obediently tied heavy sandbags to their legs and continued to run.

  At the beginning, the servants were naturally very tired from running, and their chests were on fire.

  But with this kind of training every day, the servants gradually got used to this kind of training intensity.

  While training his servants, Zhang Gui is still considering what kind of equipment is better for his servants.

   Regarding equipment, whether it is firearms, armor, knives and guns, high-quality steel is inseparable.

   And good steel has always been said to be made into steel after hundreds of tempering.

   That is to say, the manufacturing process of good steel takes a long time and requires a lot of practice.

   Fortunately, Zhang Gui has already asked Song Yingxing to organize people in the steel workshop to carry out crucible steelmaking and wicker frying.

Through crucible steelmaking, coal can finally become a fuel for steelmaking, because the crucible in the crucible steelmaking method effectively isolates the contact between coal and molten iron, thereby preventing impurities in coal from entering molten iron and affecting the steelmaking effect, that is, Improved steelmaking efficiency.

  The key is that when the crucible is making steel, graphite is also applied on the surface of the crucible, so that the molten iron can absorb the elemental carbon in the graphite, and then high-carbon steel can be smelted.

  High carbon steel can be used as tool steel to process various steel products.

This is a steel smelting method that only appeared in the 18th century, but because it is not difficult to operate, it is only a breakthrough in scientific theory, that is, it is enough to know that graphite is simple carbon, so it was directly used by Zhang Gui as the Xishan smelting method. A new steelmaking process in the steel workshop.

  As for the wicker fried steel, the purpose of controlling the carbon content of the steel is achieved by stirring the molten steel with willow wood, and then achieving various steel products.

  This is the ironmaking method written by Song Yingxing in "Tiangong Kaiwu" during the Chongzhen period in history, and it has not yet appeared.

   But it is only more than ten years away from its appearance, and the technical difficulty of realizing it is not too big.

  Zhang Gui then let Song Yingxing know this method in advance, and it also became a new steelmaking process in Xishan Steelmaking Workshop.

  So, in summary, it is no longer a problem for Zhang Gui to obtain a large amount of good steel in a short period of time.

"Steel with a hundred steelmaking effects is now in our Xishan. It is true that it can be produced in large quantities through crucible steelmaking and wicker frying steel, and it can also be directly filed. It is very fast for making gun barrels and armor. The workshop is also faster than other workshops in weaving cloth, so Uncle Guo’s servants can wear cloth masks and use the best bird guns in a short period of time.”

  Song Yingxing also reported when Zhang Gui asked about Xishan's ability to make guns and armor.

  (end of this chapter)