Chongzhen Daming: Starting from Coal Mountain

Chapter 390
In addition to gold and soft, there are also a lot of other goods.

Among them, there are [-] pieces of Shu brocade alone, [-] pieces of Hangzhou silk, and [-] pieces of Songjiang flannelette. In addition, goods such as Persian carpets, tea, pepper, and ginseng cannot be counted in a short period of time.

Ding Kuichu sighed in his heart, most of his life has been for nothing.

A person like Qian Guogong really lives like a person.

With emotion, Ding Kuichu said to the heads of the Forty-Eight Departments: "You have also read the account books, and you already know the specific amount of goods. How about this, the governor and the heads each take 250 boxes of soft and soft plus 16 silver. Two, all the remaining property should be handed over to the imperial court, is that okay?"

Forty-eight chiefs agreed.

Ding Kui said: "Then start dividing the gold and silver."

"Thank you, Mr. Department Hall." The head of the Forty-Eight Department was overjoyed upon hearing this.

At present, under the leadership of Ding Kuichu, the forty-eight wolf soldiers began to divide up the gold and silver. Ding Kuichu, the governor of Guangdong and Guangxi, was really brave enough to divide up such a huge wealth in private.

……

At this time, the Ming army camp in Pingyi Weidong.

Chongzhen took Zhu Cijiong with him, Wang Chengen, Gao Qiqian, Hu Guozhu, Wu Batan and a dozen or so Yi Ding, eating a mouthful of soy and crumpled rice.

Until now, Chongzhen still maintains a simple style.

Because Chongzhen deeply understands a truth, it is easy to go from thrift to extravagance, but difficult to go from extravagance to frugality. If you are really used to eating delicacies from mountains and seas, you will lose your appetite, and then it will be difficult to eat the same crumpled rice and feast as the low-level soldiers. .

Before the eradication of Jiannu, Chongzhen planned to maintain a hard and simple style.

To be honest, it is really difficult to eat wrinkled rice with hard salt cubes, steamed cakes and fermented soybeans.

Just imagine, just a bowl of rice soaked in water and a little miso, without the slightest bit of meat, how can you eat it?
But no matter how unpalatable it is, you have to eat it. Such food standards were a luxury for the soldiers of the Ming army before, and they had to be hungry more often.

While Chongzhen was eating, Xu Yingwei walked into the big tent excitedly.

"My lord." Xu Yingwei said excitedly, "The rebels have divided their forces!"

"The rebel army is divided?" Chongzhen was about to drop the boiled rice in the phoenix-winged helmet into his mouth, then directly buckled the phoenix-winged helmet on his head, stood up and walked out.

Zhu Cijiong, Hu Guozhu and others also hurriedly ate up the wrinkled rice in the phoenix-winged helmet or the bowl, put the phoenix-winged helmet or the bowl on their heads, and followed Chongzhen to the outside of the tent.

Xu Yingwei led Chongzhen to a lonely peak on the right side of the camp.

This isolated peak is hundreds of feet high, almost a natural watchtower. Xu Yingwei set up a lookout post on the top of this isolated peak.

It was the lookout post here that discovered the movement of the Shadingzhou rebels.

On the top of the isolated peak, Chongzhen directly opened the three-section telescope, and with the help of the field of view of the three-section telescope, he could see very clearly. He saw groups of soldiers leaving from the west gate of Pingyi City. Divided into two strands, one towards Guangxi Mansion in the south, and the other towards the north.

"Your Majesty." Xu Yingwei stretched out his hand and said, "The rebels going south must have returned to rescue Mengzi. If there is no accident, the Guangxi wolf soldiers led by Ding Butang must have killed Mengzi."

"Then what are the rebels going to the north going to do?" Zhu Cijiong asked.

"That's hard to say." Xu Yingwei shook his head and said, "Maybe he wants to go back to Kunming, or he may want to go from Zhanyi Prefecture in the north to Pu'an Prefecture, waiting for an opportunity to cut off our army's food transportation channel."

"However, one thing is certain."

Chongzhen said: "Then the rebels in Shadingzhou are indeed in trouble."

"Yes." Xu Yingwei said, "Otherwise, we wouldn't divide the troops at this time."

"Then there's no need to hide it anymore." Chongzhen said with a smile, "Pull out the artillery battalion, crush the Pingyi guard with a thunderous force, and defeat the main force of Shadingzhou."

"Lead the decree." Xu Yingwei was overjoyed when he heard the words.

He had been looking forward to this day for a long time.

……

At this time, Sha Dingzhou was sitting in the shaft drinking wine.

Because the latest news has come from Kunming and Lin'an respectively, not only Kunming has been lost, Mengzi Prefecture has also been occupied by Guangxi wolf soldiers, and Ergelong Laozhai has also been lost.

Thinking of the billions of dollars of wealth he had deposited in Er Gelong's old village, Sha Dingzhou felt like a knife was twisting his heart.

A total of more than eight million taels of silver, [-] boxes of soft goods, and countless treasures such as Shu brocade, Hangzhou silk, and Songjiang flannel cloth all belonged to others.

Recalling the ecstasy when I first got these goods from the Duke of Qian, it was like a dream.

After waking up from the dream, there is nothing left, and the billions of wealth still belong to someone else, and he is still the clinking poor Mengzi and Ami state chieftain, why?
Sha Dingzhou put the wine bottle on the table heavily, really unwilling!
Footsteps sounded, and the general Li Rifang rushed in angrily and reported: "General Mansion, something is wrong, the red barbarian cannons of the official army have arrived!"

"What did you say? Hongyi Cannon?"

When Sha Dingzhou heard this, all the hairs on his body stood on end.

At this time, Tang Jiabin, Tie Zhihu and others also came in.

Even Wan Shi followed into Xingyuan in shock.

This old godmother was also fateful, so she escaped to Pingyi City safely.

"Husband." Wan Shi asked as soon as he came in, "I heard that Er Gelong's old village has also been lost?"

However, Sha Dingzhou didn't even look at Wan's eyes. He had never felt Wan's face as disgusting as at this moment, and thought that he was really bewitched by a ghost to marry this old and ugly woman.

Standing up, Sha Dingzhou walked out with a dark face, ignoring Wan Shi from the beginning to the end.

Arriving at the east gate tower at the fastest speed, Sha Dingzhou just took a look, and his heart sank.

Because Li Rifang was not talking nonsense, the Ming army really pushed out the Hongyi cannon from the camp, not only one, but now five cannons have been pushed out of the gate, and there will be more behind.

With so many Hongyi cannons, can Pingyi City still be able to defend?
Sha Dingzhou looked away from the Hongyi Cannon, and then landed on the tower at his feet.

The Acropolis of Pingyiwei was built in the middle of the two mountains. There are only two gates in the east and west. There is no south gate and north gate. The only official road from the middle of Guizhou to the east of Yunnan passes through Pingyi City. .

Therefore, if the Ming army wants to enter eastern Yunnan, it must break through the Pingyi Guard.

The wall of Pingyiwei was originally three feet high and two feet wide at the bottom.

After several rounds of reinforcement, the height of the city wall has reached four feet.

However, the thickness of the city wall is still only two feet and two feet, and it is not covered with bricks.

When the acropolis of Pingyiwei was first built during the Hongwu period, it was actually covered with bricks.

However, after more than two hundred years of wind and rain erosion, the bricks are gradually crumbling and falling.

Even the rammed earth of the city wall has eroded a lot. It is said that it was three feet thick at first.

A city wall of this thickness would probably be difficult to withstand several rounds of shelling from the Hongyi Cannon.

"Quick!" Sha Dingzhou Dang even yelled, "Quickly thicken the city wall, thicken the city wall!"

Tie Zhihu, Li Rifang and other generals also realized the danger, and hurriedly led the soldiers to thicken the city wall.

However, it was too late to think of thickening the city wall at this time. The Ming army had already launched the Hongyi cannon, so what's the point of thickening the city wall?
……

The Ming army launched a total of 20 Hongyi cannons.

These 20 Hongyi cannons are not the Hongyi cannons produced by the previous Bingzhan Bureau or Weapons Supervisor, but the latest model of standard field Hongyi cannons produced by Daming Arsenal.

At present, the Daming Arsenal only produces one type of Hongyi cannon.

This type of Hongyi cannon, together with the gun body and the cannon cart, weighs 1600 kilograms. The body is one foot long, the caliber is 4 inches, and the multiple diameter is 25 times the caliber. It was not advanced at the time, but it was by no means backward.

Qu Shawei, the Portuguese instructor, also came, leading the artillerymen to test the parameters nervously.

The scholars in the artillery battalion were already very skilled in measuring parameters, and each scholar led a team of new artillerymen to push the cannon to the predetermined position as quickly as possible.

Then there is ranging, and then the pitch angle is calculated based on the distance.

After calculating the pitch angle, adjust the shooting angle through the winch.

After adjusting the shooting angle, report again: "The first shot is good, the second shot is good..."

"Load the cannonball!" Qu Shawei gave another order, and the Paoying soldier took out a paper shell wrapped in thick hemp paper from the ammunition box. The shell is fixed.

The outer diameter of the paper shell bullet is slightly less than three inches, and the fixed amount of gunpowder inside is 6 catties.

The soldiers of the Paoying directly stuffed the paper-shelled shells into the muzzle, and then used the gun rod (equivalent to the cleaning rod) to stab the paper-shelled shells to the bottom of the gun bore, and then loaded the 16-jin iron bullets into it, and used the cannon The rod presses the bottom.

After the loading of each gun is completed, report to the artillery instructor Qu Shawei again.

Qu Shawei gave the order to fire the cannon, and the twenty artillery battalion scholars simultaneously inserted the red-hot iron brazing into the cannon door.

Immediately there was a continuous loud bang of "bah bah bah bah bah", accompanied by the loud sound of firing, the 20 Hongyi cannons and the cumbersome cannon carriage retreated at the same time, which is troublesome for cannons without braking devices.

The twenty Qinwang scholars were busy resetting the cannon carriage and measuring the parameters again.

Qu Shawei raised the binoculars to observe the impact of the shells. The first round of shelling was effective.

The 20 shells basically landed on the point he chose, and the error rate was less than five steps.

At a distance of [-] steps, this error rate is not bad, not very good, but not bad either.

The point Qu Shawei chose to hit was in the middle of the city wall twenty steps to the right of the city gate. The outer wall of this part of the city wall has been dented a lot due to wind and rain erosion, which is a weak point.

The 20 shells just now basically hit the pit.

I saw a large amount of rammed earth falling in the smoke and dust.

After a while, the smoke and dust dissipated, and Qu Shawei could clearly see more than a dozen bullet craters the size of pot lids in the pits on the outer wall with the help of a telescope. The effect was good.

"One door is good, two doors are good..."

The Paoying scholars quickly completed the measurement of shooting parameters.

"Load the shells." With Qu Sha's slight order, the soldiers of the artillery battalion began to load the shells again.

It's just that the second loading is much more troublesome than the first time. You have to use a hooked brush to hook out the shredded paper and gunpowder residue in the gun chamber, and then use a water-soaked brush to clean the gun chamber and extinguish the unextinguished ones. Mars, and then wrap the barrel with a dry cloth to dry the barrel before reloading the paper shell.

Qu Shawei estimated the time, and the first shot took just over a minute.

But the second shot took a full three minutes, doubled.

"Let go!" Following Qu Shawei's order, the artillery battalion began to fire the second round.

Qu Shawei raised the binoculars and focused his field of view on the impact point in front again.

When the smoke and dust dissipated, Qu Shawei could clearly see that the craters in the wall had been connected into pieces, and there were even tiny cracks like spider webs, which was a good sign.

Chongzhen suddenly brought Zhu Cijiong, Wang Chengen and others to the artillery camp.

"Qu Shawei." Chongzhen asked, "How was the result of the shelling? No problem?"

"Oh, His Majesty the great, unprecedented, wise, powerful and omnipotent emperor, why did you come to the artillery camp? This is not where you should appear." Qu Sha stroked her chest slightly and said, "You should go to the back."

"Speaking in human terms." Chongzhen shook his head and asked angrily, "How long will it take to bring down the city wall?"

Only then did Qu Shawei say proudly, "The city wall can be knocked down within two hours at most."

"Two hours?" Chongzhen was a little surprised, he thought it would take three to five days.

"Yes, two hours is enough." Qu Shawei said, "Pingyiwei's city wall has been seriously aged, the bricks are falling off, and the rammed earth is also seriously weathered. If there is no accident, it will collapse in two hours."

"That's great." Chongzhen turned to Xu Yingwei who was accompanying him.

"Youzhen, you guys should also be prepared in case Sha Dingzhou jumps over the wall in a hurry."

"Your Majesty, don't worry." Xu Yingwei said, "If the rebels don't come out, that's all. If they dare to come out, they will never come back!"

……

Shadingzhou has been withdrawn under the city wall.

The Ming army had already pushed the Hongyi cannon to within [-] paces, so it was too stupid to expose himself to the tower at this time.

Even if they were hiding under the city wall, they could still hear the huge impact.

He could still clearly feel that Pingyiwei's east city wall was trembling slightly.

"General Mansion, something is wrong!" Tie Zhihu poked his head out from the female wall and shouted, "The Ming army's Hongyi cannons are bombarding a point twenty steps to the right of the city gate. There was originally a dent on the surface, but now the dent has become bigger and deeper, and there are many cracks, it seems that it may not last long."

"It won't last long, and how long?" Sha Dingzhou said with a dark face.

"I don't know that." Tie Zhihu scratched his head and said, "It's only a day or two at most."

"Can it only last for a day or two?" Sha Dingzhou's face completely collapsed, troublesome.

"Husband, let's hurry back to Master Ami Prefecture." Wan Shi didn't know when he would follow, and said anxiously, "Although Ami Prefecture is not as steep as Mengzi Prefecture, it is easy to defend and difficult to attack, and there are still many My people, as long as we return to Ami State, we can hold on for a longer time."

[Kneeling for a monthly pass]

(End of this chapter)