scourge the qing dynasty

Chapter 125
(PS: Mid-Autumn Festival, the number of words is less, please understand my friends, and I wish you a happy Mid-Autumn Festival. By the way, please ask for monthly tickets and subscriptions. The results of monthly tickets and subscriptions are really bleak.)
On the first day of February in the tenth year of Kangmazi in the Qing Dynasty, this is another notorious day--of course it is for the mites. On this sunny day with clear blue sky, Bajia Village in the southwest of Xinxing Prefecture, Yunnan Province In the area, just after dawn, thousands of Wu Sangui's elite troops suddenly surrounded this small village that had long been abandoned during the war. A tense posture of wanting to do some evil deeds in this area.

Just after the hour, dozens of mysterious carriages pulled by two war horses arrived at Bajia Village under the close guard of a team of heavily armed Wu Sangui soldiers, stopped at the flat and open place on the west side of Bajia Village, and quickly got out of the carriage. He moved down a large pile of black silk cloth, a large pile of ropes, a huge boat-shaped rattan basket, hundreds of glass jars, and some strange things. A big fat man directed them to carefully install and tie them up.

After more than four hours, the assembly was basically completed, and what appeared in front of everyone was a huge black fish sleeping on the ground. The fish's body was densely covered with ropes—super strong ship cables carefully coated with tung oil, and under the ropes, It is a rattan boat with a strange wind wheel, and the rattan has been repeatedly soaked in tung oil, so it is very light but extremely strong.There are countless strange things on board, and I don't know what they are used for—the only thing that is certain is that they are definitely not used for good things.

At this time, from the south of Bajia Village, another cavalry cavalry of the Wu Sangui Army, who was also heavily armed, came. The leader was none other than the notorious super big traitor Wu Sangui and the old traitor Wu, and the ones following him were Pingxi The top few wolves, tigers and leopards in the palace, what Hu Guozhu, Xia Guoxiang, Wu Yingqi, Wu Guogui, Wu Yingjing, Zu Shushun, Ma Bao, Liu Xuanchu, Fang Guangchen, Wang Shirong, Gao Dejie, Wu Sanmei, Liu Yi, Qiu Kesun and Yang Shanzi Wait, wait, etc., all of them have extremely excited expressions, as if they are going to come here to do something immoral and evil.

After the team stopped outside Bajia Village, Wu Sangui swung his saddle off his horse and ran without dignity until he got to the side of the huge black fish. He couldn't wait to ask the big fat man who hurried up to salute: "Successful? This is you!" Said airship? Can it fly?"

"Back to the lord, thanks to the great blessing of the lord, the humble job is finally complete." Fatty Lu pressed his forehead to the ground, and said excitedly: "It was completely completed half a month ago, but Nule Peak was too closely watched by the court. Afraid of revealing the secrets, I changed the first flight test to here, and by the way, I invite the prince to witness the first flight of the Pingxi Palace Air Force!"

"Okay, okay, okay!" Wu Sangui was trembling all over, and he could stand still by supporting the soldiers, and repeatedly ordered: "Quick, get up quickly, and tell me, how does it fly?"

"I will obey you." Fatty Lu agreed, got up and led Wu Sangui to the rattan boat, pointed to the four round pipes with iron plates at the tail and said: "My lord, please see, the reason why this airship can fly into the sky is because Dilute sulfuric acid reacts with iron slag to produce hydrogen, and then the collected hydrogen is poured into the balloon, and the airship can fly into the sky. These tubes are used to collect and remove hydrogen, which is the core of the airship .”

"This disc with small holes is made of wrought iron, coated with gutta-percha to prevent air leakage, and can be fixed with Western screws. The sealing cover is also coated with gutta-percha. After being fixed up and down, hydrogen leakage can be minimized .”

"Please look, my lord, these four things similar to bellows are hand-operated air extractors. There are bolts on the air outlet, and they can also be fixed with Western screws. If necessary, the sealing cover on the air pipe can be removed and connected to the air extractor On board, quickly exhaust the hydrogen and allow the airship to land quickly."

"These pipes cost the most effort. Its characteristics are softness, toughness and airtightness. In order to make it, I can be said to have racked my brains. Finally, I finally came up with a way to use thin copper wire Weave a fine mesh with thin wire, sew silk on both sides of the fine mesh, and finally apply gutta-percha to seal it. It took countless hours and money to finally create these damn hoses You can put it this way, half of the reason why it took more than a month for the humble job to build the airship is because of these damn pipes."

"There is also this damn airbag. To make it, I selected more than 100 kinds of silk fabrics before I found the most suitable silk fabric. Its top is double-layered, because this position is the most stressed, and there are silk threads, as well After repeatedly selecting hundreds of silk threads, I found the most suitable silk thread to sew this balloon."

"After sealing the rear airbag with gutta-percha, I painted it black on purpose to make it easy to attract the heat of the sun to heat the hydrogen. And the top of the balloon, in case of emergency, specially designed and installed a valve, which is critical. At any time, the airship crew can use a rope ladder to climb to the top, open the valve and quickly expel air, thereby protecting the balloon."

"This damn valve is also a big trouble. It took me almost two months to finally design it..."

"Enough, enough, I'll explain later." Wu Sangui interrupted Fatty Lu's eloquence, and ordered: "Quick, fly it up quickly, and let the orphan see how this airship flies into the sky."

"Go back to the lord, this humble job can't be done right away." Fatty Lu explained in a difficult way: "It will take at least one night to fill the balloon with hydrogen by reacting sulfuric acid and iron slag. The lord can only do it first." Please go to the emerging city to rest overnight, and come back tomorrow to visit and test the flight."

"No, I will wait here tonight!" Wu Sangui yelled, "Hurry up, fill me with energy immediately, don't wait for a night, even if you wait for a day and a night, I will wait!"

"I obey you." Fatty Lu agreed helplessly, and under the watchful eyes of the wolves and hungry tigers in the Pingxi Palace, he directed the soldiers and craftsmen to quickly build a wooden frame, and then used pulleys to lift the air bag, and then poured dilute sulfuric acid and The iron slag was poured into a sealable barrel, connected to a gas pipeline, and hydrogen gas was poured into the airbag. With the gradual injection of hydrogen, the airbag with a volume of more than [-] cubic meters gradually inflated.

After a night of non-stop injection of hydrogen, and the consumption of an unknown amount of dilute sulfuric acid and scrap iron, on the second morning, when the sun rose into the sky again, the black airbag covered with a net had already floated above the gondola, like A majestic giant fish in the air swayed majesticly. A large number of sandbags were installed in the gondola, and they were firmly fixed by cables so as not to fly into the sky and never return.It was also at this moment that Fatty Lu finally ordered in a trembling voice: "Okay, stop infusing hydrogen and seal the gas port."

Thanks to God, today is also a sunny and windless day. After everything is ready, the six warriors of the Wu Sangui Army who have written their suicide notes carry parachute bags. Under the watchful eyes of the generals of the Pingxi Palace, with nervousness and excitement, he boarded the airship first and prepared to take off.But at this moment, Wu Yingqi suddenly yelled, "Wait a minute, I want to get on the boat too! I want to fly into the sky too!"

"Second prince, this is the first test flight, it's very dangerous, aren't you afraid?" Fatty Lu asked in surprise.

"Afraid of death is not Prince Pingxi." Wu Yingqi patted his chest and said, "I want to be the first prince in this world to fly to the sky."

"Okay, as expected of my son!" Wu Sangui was overjoyed and said, "Then let Ying Qi get on the airship too. Didn't you say, Yifeng, that even if something goes wrong with the airship in the sky, they can also skydive."

"I haven't tried the parachute yet, so I can't guarantee if there will be any problems." Fatty Lu was a little dumbfounded.But what makes Fatty Lu even more unexpected is that generals such as Ma Bao, Wu Yingjing, Wu Guogui, Zu Shushun and Gao Dejie jumped out together, vying to be the first generals to fly into the sky, even literati such as Fang Guangchen and Wang Shirong He also stood up and expressed his willingness to risk his life to be the first scholar to eat crabs—but it’s not surprising, there has never been a shortage of desperadoes in the Pingxi Palace, and he trusted Fatty Lu’s attainments in this area so much, he naturally argued for it. Fighting for the honor.

"No, no, I can't be a master anymore." Fatty Lu panicked, and quickly waved his hands to explain: "Generals, gentlemen, it's not that the humble position doesn't give you face. The key is that according to my estimation, this airship can only carry about two Qianjin, six airship pilots plus the second prince, already weighs more than 1000 kilograms, plus some experimental equipment, it is almost overweight."

To put it bluntly, Fatty Lu finally calmed down these enthusiastic lackeys of Wu Sangui, and personally put on the parachute designed by himself for Wu Yingqi. As the airship became lighter and lighter, the lower cabin of the airship gradually floated up.When the airship suddenly flew up to a height of more than one meter, Wu Yingqi and others on the airship were shaken, and the cheers of Wu Sangui's lackeys also sounded like thunder, "It's flying! It's flying! It's really flying!"

"Untie the cables!" Fatty Lu yelled himself, and the four cables that fixed the airship were untied at the same time.

"Second prince, throw sandbags faster!" Fatty Lu roared again, and Wu Yingxiong and others on the airship threw sandbags faster according to the order, and the huge black airship also flew higher and higher. At this moment, Wu Sangui from all directions The army soldiers also roared madly, "It's flying! Look, the thing just now is flying! The second prince, the second prince is still on it!"

During the roar, countless soldiers of Wu Sangui's army knelt on their knees and kowtowed to the airship, but all the generals of Wu Sangui's army present were either tongue-tied or on their knees, completely forgetting to restrain the army.Liu Xuanchu and Wang Shirong, the old rivals in front of Wu Sangui, simply hugged each other tightly, crying loudly together, tears streaming down their faces.

"It's worth it! Fatty Lu also had tears in his eyes. He also knelt down on his knees and wailed loudly. While weeping bitterly, he yelled, "It's worth it, more than a year of hard work!"worth it!Long live the prince!Long live the prince!Long live!Long live!Long live! "

"Long live the lord! Long live!" Driven by Fatty Lu, the hardcore lackeys around Wu Sangui scrambled to kneel down to Wu Sangui, kowtowed and shouted desperately, "Long live the lord! Long live! Long live! Long live!"

Wu Sangui remained motionless, as if he hadn't heard the rebellious words of the dog legs, a pair of cloudy old eyes covered with crow's tail wrinkles but still extremely sharp, just fixedly stared at the fish-shaped airship in mid-air, his chest was surging, a The thought that had been hidden for a long time was also frantically churning in Wu Sangui's chest, "With such a thing, in the whole world, who do I need to be afraid of? Who do I need to be afraid of?! That position in the Forbidden City is really better than my Is your airship still high?"

In fact, Wu Yingqi on the airship and the six warriors who had written their suicide notes were the most excited. When they flew up to a height of more than 100 meters, these warriors were extremely nervous at first, and even so nervous that Fatty Lu repeated the operation essentials countless times I just forgot—but it’s okay, because they were too nervous, these people completely forgot to continue to throw away the sandbags, which allowed the airship to hover at low altitude for a while, and also allowed them to get used to the feeling of floating in mid-air in a relatively safe situation.

As the nervousness gradually subsided, it was naturally replaced by incomparable excitement. All six warriors shed tears, while Wu Yingqi jumped up and down, laughing wildly, "Success! Success! I am the first in this world The prince who flew to the sky is here, the first prince to fly to the sky!"

After finally remembering the flight test that had to be carried out, the six warriors continued to throw ballast sandbags, raising the airship to a height of more than 200 meters, and then tested the propeller designed by Fatty Lu to test the high-altitude Throwing explosives, experimenting with the cluster-throwing bomb invented by Fatty Lu, and throwing a dummy doll off the airship to test the reliability of the parachute, Wu Yingqi was jumping up and down with a telescope, making trouble without help, too excited for himself.

But at this moment, as the airship became lighter and higher, Wu Yingqi and the six warriors finally discovered the mistake that Fatty Lu had forgotten—forgetting to ask them to fly into the sky in cotton-padded clothes, and one by one was caught by the sky. His face was blue and his mouth was pale from the severe cold, and he was sneezing continuously.

The first flight test lasted for more than two hours. It was not until noon that the six warriors and Wu Yingqi, who had had enough fun and were terribly frozen, opened the sealing cover, connected the air pipe to the air extractor, and the exhaust air landed.At the same time, in view of the success of using a puppet to test the parachute landing, a brave warrior stepped forward and voluntarily tried the world's first parachute skydiving test-although Fatty Lu explained this test, he did not ask them to carry it out, but Let them decide whether to skydive or not.However, there has never been a shortage of desperadoes in the Pingxi Palace. A warrior walked to the airship with a parachute when it was obvious that he could land safely...

"Second prince, brothers, if I fall to my death, tell the prince that I died in loyalty to him, and ask him to take care of my family. Long live the prince—!"

Roaring, the parachute warrior jumped off the airship, which also caused thunderous screams from the soldiers of the Pingxi Palace below, but fortunately, after falling more than [-] meters, the white parachute opened smoothly, dragging the warrior slowly. Slowly falling, like a beautiful white flower, floating and blooming on the Yunnan-Guizhou Plateau for the first time.Immediately afterwards, the uniform cheers of the officers and men of the Pingxi Palace on the ground rose to the sky, "Long live the prince! Long live! Long live! Long live! Long live! Long live! Long live!"

"My lord, I dare to reward you for the first parachute jumper! Please reward me!" Fatty Lu turned to Wu Sangui, clasped his fists and said loudly, "Because of his bravery, we let Pingxi Palace test the reliability of the parachute, and also made the parachute more reliable." From now on, the air force of our Prince Pingxi Mansion can have peace of mind and fight with all their strength, which is of great significance! I am so humble and bold, please reward this person!"

"Rewards, rewards, rewards!" Wu Sangui came back to his senses after a while, and roared: "Of course there are many rewards! But the first one worthy of rewards is you, Lu Yifeng! Say, what do you want?"

"Thank you, my lord, for the reward." Fatty Lu was about to ask the lion to open his mouth. He never thought that Hu Guozhu rushed over beside him, pulled Fatty Lu and said, "Yifeng, after the airship lands, you must have someone print the words on the airship. You should go to Pingxi." The four characters of Wangfu!"

"General Jinwu, do you think it would be better to print the word 'Wu'?" Fatty Lu was reminded by Hu Guozhu, and hurriedly said: "Just print the word 'Wu', which is not only conspicuous, but also sets off the identity of the prince and is easy to identify. It also saves the effort of changing words, isn’t it better?”

"Save the effort of changing the characters in the future?" Hu Guozhu was a little confused at first, but when he came back to his senses, Hu Guozhu immediately nodded and said, "Yes, it's better to print a word 'Wu', which is conspicuous and easy to identify, and there is no need to change it in the future." .”

"General Jinwu, then what color do you think is better for the character Wu?" Fatty Lu asked again: "How about white?"

"White? Your lord?" Hu Guozhu was not stupid at all, he immediately came to his senses, turned to Wu Sangui and said, "Old Taishan, my son-in-law also thinks white is better - adding a white on your head is very suitable, I don't know what Laotaishan thinks ?”

"What do you mean? What color is different? As long as it is conspicuous?" Wu Sangui didn't wake up for a while, but instead asked in confusion.

"It's very appropriate to add white to the prince's head." Wang Shirong also stood up, and said to Wu Sangui, "My lord, the students are also bold, so I implore the lord to add white."

"Your servants are bold, please forgive me, my lord." Wu Sangui's confidants who were present knelt down together and begged Wu Sangui with one voice.

"What do you mean?" Wu Sangui was still a little confused, but seeing the serious expressions of many confidant lackeys, Wu Sangui also began to ponder, "White on my head? White on the king..."

Thinking up to this point, Wu Sangui finally realized something, and said lightly, "Very well, let's print a white word 'Wu'. It would be quite appropriate to add a white character on my king's head."

"I will obey the order." Hu Guozhu, Fang Guangchen, Xia Guoping and a large group of Wu Sangui's best friends agreed in unison, and then kowtowed together and said: "Your Majesty is very handsome, and the destiny comes. Adding white characters is indeed very suitable. Long live, long live, long live Long live."

Wu Sangui smiled, and waved his hands to tell the lackeys to excuse him—but although the old traitor seemed to be taking it lightly, his body was already trembling slightly.

At this time, the airship finally descended to a height of 80 meters, and the cable was thrown from the boat. The generals of the Wu army hurried forward to catch the cable, pulled the airship down and fixed it, and Wu Yingqi was the first to jump off the airship. Rushed in front of Fatty Lu, grabbed Fatty Lu's neck, sneezed and roared, "You bastard, why didn't you tell me earlier that it was going to be so cold in the sky? I almost froze to death! You wouldn't Tell me to wear a cotton coat? Did you do it on purpose?"

"I forgot about my humble job..." Fatty Lu smiled wryly and wanted to say that he forgot that the sky was colder, but only halfway through his words, Fatty Lu changed his words and said, "Don't blame the second prince, I have never flown to the sky in my humble job, I don't know where the sky is." It's definitely not intentional to be this cold."

"Forget it, even if you did it on purpose, I'll forgive you." Wu Yingqi was just joking with Fatty Lu, and after letting go quickly, he hugged Fatty Lu in his arms again, and laughed loudly: "Yifeng, you Didn't embarrass me, didn't disappoint me, the people from our Pingxi Palace really flew to the sky, really able to fly to the sky! From now on, whoever dares to fight against our Pingxi Palace, we will fly to the sky immediately Go, throw dynamite on his head and see how he dies!"

"Second prince, it will take some time to perfect the airship before it will be put into the battlefield." Fatty Lu said with a wry smile: "The most important thing right now is to solve the problem of airship manipulation in the sky, so that we can fly where we want to fly on the battlefield." Fly there."

"Then do it quickly?!" Wu Yingqi grabbed Fatty Lu's neck again, and shouted: "Get it done, I will personally command our air force in the future, and blow up those bastards who dare to fight against us!" It’s clean! If it’s done, I’ll ask my father to marry Xiaotu to you immediately, if it doesn’t work out, you’ll just wait to be a bachelor for the rest of your life!”

Wu Yingqi's words reminded Wu Sangui, Wu Sangui smiled, turned to Wu Guogui who was already full of embarrassment, and said, "Guogui, my father once promised that once Yifeng helped my father make an airship that could take our Pingxi palace officers and soldiers to the sky, then I would be happy." The master promised Xiaotu to him, and now he has completed the task I assigned, look, Xiaotu..."

"My lord! My lord!" At this moment, an anxious shout suddenly came from a distance, interrupting the discussion between Wu Sangui and Wu Guogui.Immediately afterwards, a fast horse from Pingxi Palace rushed over and stopped thirty steps away from Wu Sangui and the others. The knight immediately swung his whip and dismounted, rushed to kneel down in front of Wu Sangui sweating, presented a letter to Wu Sangui, and shouted loudly. Said: "Report to the lord, the later general Guo Zhuangtu received an urgent report from the capital, and there is a major event in the capital."

"What's the big deal?" Everyone was curious for a while, Wu Sangui snatched the letter impatiently, but after opening it, he only glanced at it, and the old traitor Wu just stayed on the spot.

"Father-in-law, what's the matter?" Hu Guozhu suddenly had a bad feeling - his father-in-law is not someone who is easily intimidated.

Sure enough, Wu Sangui's distraught words made everyone froze on the spot, "On the second day of the first lunar month, the emperor issued an edict to promote Wang Fuchen to be the governor of Shaanxi, and Shi Yugui to be the commander of Haining, and they were transferred from Yunnan together. The promotion of Yifeng to Daxing county magistrate was also transferred away. Yunnan."

"Me? Called out of Yunnan?" Fatty Lu spun for a while, and sat down on the ground, knowing that the worst situation finally happened.

(End of this chapter)