After handing over Zhang Lihua to Xu Miao and Song Keer, the two beauties to take to freshen up and change clothes, Xiao Yao immediately found Zu Yuan and entered the secret room of the general casino with him to discuss the results of today's negotiations with Chen Xu in the palace!

"Young Master, you can actually ask Your Majesty to return the General Merchant House to us, and he also ordered the resources of the entire Chen Kingdom to cooperate with the Young Master to manufacture new artillery! With such a big stroke, it seems that Chen Xu is really burning his eyebrows now, so he is so anxious that the young master can lead his troops to attack Xuzhou as soon as possible! Zu Yuan said excitedly.

If you can't take Xuzhou as soon as possible and recover Huaibei, if you wait until Qi recovers its vitality, and then send heavy troops to reinforce Huaibei, then Gao Changgong, who has sufficient troops in his hands, will not necessarily go south to counterattack Huainan, but he will definitely make Huaibei's defense more solid, so that Chen's plan to recover Huaibei will be more difficult to achieve, and then don't want to talk about recovering the Central Plains. The dream of unifying the world is over! Now the Chen army is not strong enough, but it is necessary to take Xuzhou as soon as possible, so the generals of the Chen army dare not take this task, looking at the entire Chen country, only I, Xiao Yao, have the confidence and ability to complete this task! Xiao Yao analyzed.

"So what should we do now? I believe that the young master will definitely take advantage of this opportunity to get back our previous losses with interest! Zu Yuan said with a wicked smile.

"That's a must! Before, we handed over all the profits of the General Comptoir to Chen Guo's treasury, Chen Xu was rich, and he also expanded the army by tens of thousands, but it brought all our original plans to a standstill, and Zhou Chao's side almost stopped the Jiangzhou Iron Workshop, so that I have not yet made new muskets and artillery to install in my forward brigade that is still in Jiangcheng! So the first thing we need to do now is to ask Zhou Chao to resume work immediately, and take His Majesty's holy decree to ask Chen Shujian, the Jiangzhou assassin, to fully cooperate with us and provide all manpower and material resources, so as to produce all kinds of weapons needed by the 5,000 soldiers of the forward brigade as soon as possible! Xiao Yao commanded.

"No problem, I will immediately send someone to Jiangzhou to inform Master Zhou Chao and Master Li An, so that they can get ready, and as soon as Your Majesty's holy decree arrives, they can start work immediately!" Zu Yuan nodded and said.

"Jiangzhou is responsible for making the flint muskets used by the soldiers of the Forward Brigade with all our might, and our ironworks here in Jinling will also mobilize a group of craftsmen to assist me in making the craziest murder weapon!" Xiao Yao said with a fierce look in his eyes.

"The craziest murder weapon? Could it be that you, young master, are you going to make a weapon that is more powerful than those small iron balls that can explode? Zu Yuan said in surprise.

After Xiao Yao successfully made the yellow explosive before, he once tested its power in the wilderness, and as a result, a hollow iron ball with a diameter of only ten centimeters, after being loaded with those yellow powders, the power of its explosion actually collapsed a small mud house, and the dummy made of straw and bamboo mats placed inside was blown to pieces, the loud noise, that scene, made Zu Yuan look frightened!

"No, this new weapon doesn't explode, but it can rain bullets at the enemy, and it can be used to kill thousands of people no matter how many troops rush in front of you! It's called a machine gun! Xiao Yao's eyes lit up and said excitedly!

In fact, the conditions for making machine guns have been met after Xiao Yao and Zhou Chao improved the steelmaking technology together and produced high-strength steel, so the machine gun that Xiao Yao is preparing to make now is a manual Gatling machine gun born in the mid-nineteenth century!

And the structure of this Gatling machine gun is not complicated, that is, several barrels are loaded together, and a set of transmission mechanisms is used to rotate these barrels around a common axis, and then by shaking the handle, as long as it turns around, you can complete a complete set of shooting actions such as feeding, locking, firing and throwing shells!

As for why Xiao Yao called it a crazy killing weapon, it was because when the shooter saw the distance between the enemy and himself getting closer during the enemy charge on the battlefield, he was nervous and red-eyed, and he couldn't control his hands, so he would turn the handle frantically, and the faster the rotation speed, the faster the bullet would shoot, and the more bullets were fired, the more people were killed by the bullets!

And the rate of fire is too fast, which is the reason why Xiao Yao didn't make it!

Because the rate of fire is too fast, it means that the bullets are consumed quickly, but now Xiao Yao's production efficiency in making these metal shell bullets is still very low, and the craftsmen are all making these metal bullet shells by hand: after melting the metal copper, it is cast into a small copper cap; Then take advantage of the high temperature to press the copper cap and make a blank shell; Then it is polished by hand to make a shell of acceptable size, which is then embedded in the primer, then filled with black powder, and finally pressed into the warhead, after such a complex process, this is the metal shell bullet!

And in this era, metal copper is also a very expensive metal, so in terms of cost and efficiency, Xiao Yao will not make a money-burning weapon like a machine gun!

But now the situation is different, in the past, in order to ensure his absolute control over these weapons, Xiao Yao did not accept the conditional support from the imperial court, and only relied on the huge profits of the general trading house to produce it by himself, so he would consider the cost! Now that Chen Xu has promised to unconditionally fully support Xiao Yao to produce the second-generation artillery as soon as possible, so that Xiao Yao can go to the battlefield as soon as possible, of course Xiao Yao does not need to save money for Chen Xu, and is ready to requisition and adjust Chen Guo's resources to make the weapons he wants!

With Xiao Yao's ability, it is easy to make a Gatling machine gun, so the biggest problem now is to solve the problem of producing bullets!

Xiao Yao's solution is to use a large number of labor to replace modern machine production, and establish a copycat assembly line to improve production efficiency! Divide the workers into several parts, someone is responsible for firing copper water, someone is responsible for filling molds, someone is responsible for pressing blanks, someone is responsible for grinding, someone is responsible for measuring, someone is responsible for charging, someone is responsible for pressing into the warhead, and a bullet can be successfully manufactured along the assembly line!

In addition, it is winter now, and many farmers have stopped farming and are preparing for the New Year, so Xiao Yao can easily recruit a large number of laborers, so Xiao Yao, who has the support of Chen Xu behind him, has collected a large number of idle laborers in several counties near Jinling with official orders, and came to the iron workshop outside Jinling City to produce bullets!

Because of Xiao Yao's advanced production methods, coupled with Zu Yuan's excellent control ability, and now Chen Xu's official support, Xiao Yao's machine gun manufacturing opportunities are progressing very smoothly!

As for the crown prince Chen Shubao, who angered Emperor Chen Xu because he recited a jade tree backyard flower, he was now punished by Chen Xu to be grounded in the East Palace for two months, forbidding all outsiders to meet him, and before the New Year, he couldn't leave the East Palace for a single step!

So without Chen Shubao, the biggest obstacle, all of Xiao Yao's plans became easier!