Hongwu Survival Guide

Chapter 140 Luck is Important

Wen Zao arrived at Zhoushan Island by boat, hurried to Yaojia'ao in the mountains north of Changguozhou City, and then hurried down the mountain to a riverside compound on the west side of the Zhoucheng City, which was obviously only recently enclosed and guarded by soldiers.

This is the eighth day of August.

After the notification, they entered the courtyard. There were no houses in the courtyard, only some simple sheds and a few small fire kilns built with bricks and stones, which looked like the kind used for firing porcelain.

There are not many people in the courtyard, but not only the young master Ying Haishi is here, but also the captain of the navy is here.

Wen Zao also saw Qiao Wang who was supposed to be in Jinling, the father of the maid beside Yinghai Envoy, and the one who was in charge of Zhiyongzhai's accounting.

Others, except for the personal guards guarding nearby, are some craftsmen, all of them are wearing the kind of light work clothes designed by the young master Yinghai Envoy, which looks quite neat.

Surrounded by the crowd, the little adults are doing their own hands, standing in front of a small scale on the table, holding a wooden spoon, scooping out various powders from different or containers or pockets, weighing and handing The craftsman stirs and mixes, and then puts them into black barrel-shaped crucibles of different sizes.

Qiao Wang is holding a splint covered with paper and is taking notes with a pen.

The atmosphere in front of him calmed down the already excited Wen Zao. After waiting patiently for a while, he saw that the little Yinghai envoy finally rubbed his wrists and paused his work. After clenching his fists, the lord took off the package at his waist and sent it: "My lord, the news from the north, our army has broken through Dadu, and captured Emperor Zheng and the entire family of the Yuan court."

Speaking of delivering the package, he glanced at the captain of the navy, and then continued loudly: "When the little one returned, the lord personally said that the lord will open up the sea food road to ensure the supplies of the army, contribute to the strategy of raiding the capital, and have hot air balloons." To deter Yuan soldiers from collapsing without a fight is because, in the battle of Dadu, your lord will take the lead!"

After Wen Zao finished speaking, the surrounding people were surprised for a short time, whether they were soldiers or craftsmen, they congratulated Zhu Yuan one after another.

Some of them couldn't help looking at Huagao.

Hua Gao didn't have much taste, so he patted Zhu Yuan's shoulder happily twice: "I knew it... oh, I knew it."

Zhu Yuan waved his hands with a smile, opened the package Wen Zao handed over, first found Lao Zhu's letter and quickly read it, then turned to another detailed report on the Battle of Dadu, and turned to Hua Gao who was full of curiosity beside him After the two finished reading together, Hua Gao shook his head again: "It's... really... Hanlin, why is the hot air balloon made for me to see?"

"It's nothing unusual, let Yao Feng and the others find one for you to take a look at."

As Zhu Yuan said, he was actually surprised.

Most of them were breached, but it was only because of a hot air balloon that accidentally disconnected and flew away.However, thinking about it again, Zhu Yuan can also understand.The whole thing echoed the previous sentence about opening up the ocean.

Fear stems from the unknown.

I don't know what it is to be scared.

This kind of trick can be used once or twice at most. As long as it is widely known, the third time may not be so easy to use.

Moreover, even if he didn't show up, most of the cities in history would have been breached. Zhu Yuan didn't have the excitement of the people around him when he heard the news.

I still want to say something.

After thinking for a while, Zhu Yuan said to Hua Gao: "Dadu is a great victory, let's celebrate too. Today is the eighth day of the lunar new year, and it will be the Mid-Autumn Festival soon. I will have a three-day holiday on the Mid-Autumn Festival, and then prepare some activities such as lanterns and operas. It will be lively." In addition, all the soldiers and civilians who are registered in the Navy's Dudufu and Yinghai Division, um, only in Mingzhou, too far away to control, and give a rice reward, this will be distributed as soon as possible. Come to pick it up or put it on the account."

Hua Gao took out the war report, read it carefully, and nodded: "You can decide."

Zhu Yuan signaled to his hundreds of households staying in Dinghai not far away: "Tao Pu, send a letter to the land and ask Liu Lian and the others to make a plan."

Standing at the periphery of the crowd, a lean man about 30 years old held his fists and led away.

Only then did Zhu Yuan look at Wen Zao again, and while he was busy arranging the materials in front of him again, he said, "Are there any interesting things over there at the front line?"

Wen Zao glanced at Qiao Wang, nodded, and said with a smile: "All the naval departments in the north of the city went to the city first with General Chang Da. Huai Wang Timur doesn't spend money, but remembers great merit."

Zhu Yuan looked at Qiao Wang, who had an agitated expression, and asked bluntly, "Is there any news about Huayue?"

Wen Zao paused for a moment, then shook his head in embarrassment: "Young one... I have never heard of it. I want to come to Huaqianhu and Zhao Baihu. It should be safe and sound."

Zhao Baihu is obviously Zhao Xu.

"It's good to be alive," Hua Gao watched as Zhu Yuan dug out a kind of powder and weighed it, and smiled to help Wen Zao relieve the embarrassment: "Whether you can make a contribution to this battle depends on fate. How about bravery?" , what can I do if I can't meet the fat fish?"

Zhu Yuan also understood this truth.

The battlefield is like a casino, no matter how much you dare to fight, you can't bear the word 'luck', typical, Li Guang can't seal it.

Thinking of it, Zhu Yuan asked curiously, "Who has the Zhizheng Emperor and his son?"

Zhu Yuan suggested that Lao Zhu offer a heavy reward for a certain "primary strategic goal", and Lao Zhu also agreed, and any one of the Zhizheng Emperor and his son would be a hereditary Marquis.

This is the biggest prize of the Battle of the Metropolis.

Wen Zao also understood why Zhu Yuan would ask this question, thought for a while, and said: "Yuan Lord came out on his own initiative, Yuan Prince... wanted to break out of the encirclement, bumped into General Chang, and killed himself. It seems...no Who can fall into the hands."

Zhu Yuan was a little surprised: "Just... no one snatched it?"

I remember that after giving advice to Lao Zhu, Zhu Yuan also flipped through "Historical Records" and found the passage about Xiang Yu.For Liu Bang's "rewarding thousands of gold and ten thousand households", the Han army who snatched Xiang Yu's body killed each other.

There is another interesting thing about this.

Xiang Yu's body was divided into five, and one of the soldiers named Yang Xi grabbed a thigh and was named Marquis of Chiquan.The Chiquanhou family was not only quite prominent in the Han Dynasty, but also a descendant named 'Yang Jian' created the Sui Dynasty several hundred years later.

Do you think this is the end?

No.

Hundreds of years later, in the current Ming Dynasty, a general under Lao Zhu's command, named Yang Jing, was leading the southern expedition to Guangxi at this time. Looking back, Yang Jing was also a descendant of Marquis Chiquan.In the third year of Hongwu's reign, Yang Jing was granted the title of Marquis of Yingyang.

What is this called?
It is precisely what Zhu Yuan and Lao Zhu mentioned, a century-old dynasty and a thousand-year family.

Speaking of which, there are many similar cases, for example, there is another one under the same old Zhu.

Feng Sheng.

Although Feng Sheng was bestowed to death in Lao Zhu's later years, only one person died. The Feng family was not in decline. After hundreds of years, it was quite wonderful.

This is off topic.

At that moment, Wen Zao heard Zhu Yuan's question, but shook his head: "Prince Yuan slayed himself, and General Chang was present at that time. When Lord Yuan surrendered, it was General Xu who personally went to talk about Xiang."

Zhu Yuan could only shake his head and said with a smile, "What a waste."

The two hereditary marquises disappeared just like that.

But, think about it again, even if you are already changing history, the Marquis under Lao Zhu is not so easy to be. If you really get it, who knows if it is a blessing or a curse?
Thinking of this, Zhu Yuan chatted with Wen Zao for a few more words, then sent him to rest.

Then keep busy.

At the moment, I am planning to try firing glass.

Various preparations have been going on during this time.

The first is the material.

Zhu Yuan specially wrote a letter to Wang Guangyang, who participated in politics in Shandong, asking him to try to mine and refine coke on the spot in Yizhou, and to burn it on a small scale on his own side.

It was officially released yesterday.

Coke, as a high-temperature fuel, is a prerequisite.

Then there is the alkali material.

There is no soda ash and sodium carbonate, Zhu Yuan is still not sure whether soda ash mine exists in nature, and even if it does exist, how to explore and confirm it needs to be specially pondered.

However, lime alkali is still very easy to get.

It is potassium carbonate.

At the fish-baking workshop, large quantities of wood are burned every day, so there is as much plant ash as there is.

Take plant ash, soak it, filter it, boil it, and the initially obtained ash alkali is melting, saturated and purified... During this time, thousands of catties have been accumulated.That is... considering the large amount of manpower and material resources consumed in the refining process, the cost is really high.

Then there is the quartz sand.

The selection of quartz sand is not a problem, the key problem is crushing, which is also a very labor-intensive matter.

As a result, the cost of the quartz powder produced is also very high.

There is also limestone.

The calcium carbonate component, too, is expensive in the crushing process.

These are the three main raw materials that Zhu Yuan remembers.

However, since he started to make it, Zhu Yuan felt that it is necessary to have the spirit of exploration. If you can use various other raw materials of this era to try and burn them, maybe something will come out.

So I found various other materials.

Such as Glauber's salt.

Although it is also called 'nitrate', it is not a nitric acid compound. The specific composition is temporarily unknown.

There are other stones as well.

Make them all into powder, mix them blindly, and see what kind of strange things can be burned.

The only thing Zhu Yuan thought of and didn't use was 'lead'. He remembered that lead glass had many benefits, but he instinctively resisted adding it to glass.

Second, is the tool.

The first one is the kiln that was built recently in the yard.

Compared with porcelain kilns, or the large number of brick and tile fire kilns on the other side of the Yongjiang River in the south of Dinghai City, the furnaces here are very small, and can only hold two to three hundred catties of materials at a time, but the construction is quite expensive.

The first is a total of three stoves.

The stove in the middle is for the stuffing, and the sides are just for the hot air.

Moreover, the three furnaces are all considered to be of the highest craftsmanship in this era. From the inside to the outside, they are divided into refractory layer, insulation layer and reinforcement layer. There are three layers in total, and the materials of each layer are different.For the hot blast stoves on both sides, Zhu Yuan not only designed the foot-operated blower equipment himself, but also used thick and bent iron pipes like the later floor heating pipes for the hot air pipes, in order to heat the air as much as possible when passing through the hot blast stoves. .

There are also crucibles for holding materials.

It is still the graphite crucible conceived and designed by Zhu Yuan himself. I mentioned to Lao Zhu at the beginning that graphite is the best heat-resistant material, including kilns. In traditional crafts, Zhu Yuan also let the craftsmen try to add graphite.

For this reason, Zhu Yuan specially asked someone to transport [-] jin of graphite from Anqing on the upper reaches of the Yangtze River, which is the only small graphite mine approved by Lao Zhu.

Finally, there is manpower.

Although Zhu Yuan doesn't think much of glass because of the time travel, he also understands that in this day and age, besides planning to make thermometers, other glass products can definitely be sold for a lot of money.

You know, Zhu Yuan happened to remember that for the sake of glass crafts, Westerners came and went with all kinds of brains.

In short, it is a source of wealth.

It just so happened that I was in charge of Yinghai Division again and made it. When the time comes, I will sell it to a sea merchant at a high price... Well, it must be very fulfilling.

But, then again, looking at how much work has been done before, and the cost is so high, the glass is not cheap at all, even if you only consider your own investment.

Therefore, it is impossible to sell cheap.

In order to protect this source of wealth, Zhu Yuan specially called Xieyi's father Qiao Wang over from Jinling, intending to let him take charge of the property.

And artisans.

Whether it is building a glass furnace, or being in charge of glass shaping, or other critical processes, all relevant craftsmen have signed contracts, just like the master craftsmen in the pen workshop, they are directly controlled in their own hands.

Compared with other pens that can be copied as long as they want to make, Zhu Yuan intends to completely monopolize the craftsmanship if this glass can be made.Of course, not monopoly profits.

It is conceivable that even if the relative cost is not low, the profit of this glass will still be huge.

Therefore, it is not suitable to be eaten completely.

As for how to distribute the profits, we will talk about it in the future.

Now it's time to burn things out first.

at the moment.

Twenty crucibles, large and small, 100 jin for the big one and [-] jin for the small one, totaled more than [-] jin of raw materials, and Zhu Yuan quickly prepared them.

After ordering the craftsmen to install the furnace, Zhu Yuan took Qiao Wang's records and looked through them carefully.

Qiao Wang's main record is the recipe.

For example, the same quartz, soda ash, and lime have as many as ten kinds of ingredients, and they are placed in crucibles of different specifications. Different crucibles are used to test how much raw materials can be mixed at one time. If possible, larger ones can be used in the future. The crucibles are even stacked directly into the kiln.

Zhu Yuan was flipping through the materials, and Qiao Wang personally picked Yan Qi, the general in charge, to step forward carefully, cupped his hands and said, "My lord, the materials and coke are all installed, do you want to close the kiln and light the fire?"

Zhu Yuan agreed without raising his head: "Order."

After thinking about it, he said: "For the first time, um, try to burn it for six hours."

Yan Qi hesitated: "My lord, is six hours less?"

Yan Qi was born as a porcelain firing craftsman, and it took ten and a half months to make porcelain.

What kind of glass is this, he has never heard of it, but it must be very important to watch the battle of this high-ranking little adult, so how can it only be burned for a few hours?

Zhu Yuan probably understood what he was thinking, and said with a smile: "It's not the same, maybe six hours have been long."

With high-heat coke and two hot blast furnaces, Zhu Yuan believes that even if the temperature of the furnaces does not reach 2000 degrees, the difference will not be much different.Such a high temperature is enough for various raw materials to complete chemical reactions.

Yan Qi saw that the little adult said with certainty, he didn't dare to refute, and he obeyed the order to close the kiln and light the fire.

Just a little worried.

This batch of ingredients is not cheap, if it gets messed up, I hope this high-ranking little adult who is not familiar with temperament will not blame himself.

(End of this chapter)