"Big handsome, does Old Thief Xie really plan to retire this time?" Early in the morning, looking at the Wei soldiers who began to pack up one after another under the city and looked like they were ready to go on the road, Li Dingbei asked suspiciously.

Ning Zhiyuan sneered: "What can he do if he doesn't retreat." Yinglin has been taken down by us, and we have firearms in hand, does he dare to bypass us and lead the army deep into the interior, is he really afraid that we will make dumplings halfway?

The most important thing is that they don't have much food and grass anymore, and it will be a little longer if they don't leave. ”

Ning Yafeng couldn't help but say, "Father, since we have a big killing weapon like a musket in our hands, why don't we take advantage of the victory to pursue and kill them again." ”

"Yes, Dashuai, the second prince is right, as long as there is a musket array, the Wei army is not our opponent at all.

While they were retreating, we were taking advantage of the victory. ”

Several other generals also agreed, looking eager to try.

After seeing the power of the musket array with their own eyes, they were all fascinated by the new weapon.

Regarding the active invitation of his subordinates, Ning Zhiyuan shook his head and said, "Although we have muskets in hand, the number of Wei troops is far superior to ours after all.

As long as Old Thief Xie doesn't divide his troops into multiple ways and thin forces, even if we catch up, we won't be able to deal a fatal blow to him.

Sometimes fighting a war is like gambling money, you have to know how to take it when you see it. Don't bet all your belongings as soon as you see that you have won, this will only lead to bankruptcy.

In this battle with the Wei army, we have won a great victory.

Rather than risk chasing them, it is better to let them go. ”

"That's true, handsome and wise." Li Dingbei also did not approve of the pursuit of the Wei army, after all, the difference in strength between the two sides was too far.

Seeing this, the other generals had no choice but to extinguish their desire to pursue the victory.

Ning Yafeng asked, "Father, what about the two cities of Huiyang and Anqing?" Do you really want Wei Jun to hold it in your hands? ”

Ning Zhiyuan said confidently: "Don't worry, they can't hold it."

As soon as the army retreats, Huiyang and Anqing will become isolated cities.

We can even take a key city like Yinglin in just a few hours, let alone Huiyang and Anqing.

Old thief Xie lost so many troops this time, he would not waste a lot of manpower and material resources to defend these two lonely cities.

However, based on the urine nature of the old thief, I estimate that when he withdraws his troops, he is likely to set fire to the city, I hope I don't really guess it. Speaking of this, Ning Zhiyuan's expression immediately became solemn.

But it's a pity that Ning Zhiyuan's guess still came true.

A few days later, the two large cities of Huiyang and Anqing were on fire.

The flames were in the sky, and the smoke was everywhere, almost a hundred miles away.

These two historic cities were reduced to ruins in the raging fire.

As Ning Zhiyuan had speculated, the Wei army did not leave men and horses to guard Huiyang and Anqing. Instead, when the troops were withdrawn, the two great cities in the northwest were burned alive.

Although they had expected it for a long time, many military generals, including Ning Zhiyuan, were still so angry that they gritted their teeth after knowing about it.

In this battle, the Northwest Army led by the Ning family won a great victory.

In addition to the total of more than 60,000 defenders in the three cities of Huiyang, Anqing, and Yinglin, all the troops were wiped out, plus the loss of men and horses in the siege of Shanglin and the border pass defense of the city, the Northwest Army lost nearly 70,000 people in total.

As for the Wei army, the attack on the three cities of Huiyang, Anqing, and Yinglin alone has already killed and wounded nearly 200,000 people. Coupled with the 40,000 defenders killed and captured in the sneak attack on Yinglin City, as well as the men and horses killed and wounded by the musket array on the frontal battlefield, the number of casualties of the Wei army approached the 260,000 mark.

This is only the statistics in terms of personnel, and in terms of materials, with the Wei army setting fire to the city, the Northwest Army lost the two big cities of Huiyang and Anqing, which is not a small loss.

The biggest gain of the Northwest Army was to capture the captured Yinglin City and successfully obtain a large amount of grain and grass stored in the city by the Wei army, which greatly alleviated the dilemma of the shortage of military food.

But no matter what, judging from the casualty ratio of 70,000 to 260,000, the Northwest Army can definitely be said to have won a complete victory.

It is worth mentioning that after the Northwest Army captured Yinglin City, it also captured Xie Changyu, the grandson of An Guogong, alive.

The victory in this war is of great significance.

It not only won valuable time for the development of the entire northwest and northeast, but also allowed the two new weapons that crossed the era to be truly put into actual combat on the battlefield, which had a huge impact.

Chi Fei believes that after this battle, not only will the northwest continue to make more muskets, but the Great Wei court will also devote all its strength to desperately copying this kind of murderous weapon, and even the Hu people may compete to imitate it.

With the abundance of muskets, it won't be long before the whole war scene becomes completely different.

Not only will it become bloodier, but it will also become more brutal.

As Chi Fei expected, after returning from the defeat, the first thing An Guogong did after returning to the capital was to order the Ministry of Industry to immediately find out the drawings and objects of the former dynasty's firecracker, and then step up the time to study and improve. And it must be made within a year to make the same firecrackers as the Northwest Army, otherwise all of them will be held accountable.

After receiving this order, the Ministry of Engineering dared to slack off, and immediately turned out the front fire gun that was almost moldy in the warehouse, and then studied it.

Due to the lack of physical objects in their hands, the people in the Ministry of Engineering did not know what the firecrackers in the hands of the Northwest Army looked like, so they could only improve them according to the descriptions of the front-line soldiers and the drawings and patterns of the firecrackers of the previous dynasty.

The difficulties can be imagined.

Fortunately, from the carcasses of some horses, they found lead bullets fired from muskets.

From this, it can be seen that the firecrackers in the hands of the Northwest Army no longer use iron sand or gravel like the firecrackers of the previous dynasty, but use lead bullets as ejections.

This discovery made the whole Ministry of Industry very excited, and finally found a clue.

……………………

Chi Fei didn't know about it, and even if he knew, he couldn't do anything about it.

At this time, he, like his father-in-law Ning Zhiyuan, was very busy.

Although the war with the imperial court is over, there is a mountain of things to deal with, and almost everything is important.

The most important of these is the reconstruction of the two prefecture cities of Huiyang and Anqing.

Since the two large cities of Huiyang and Anqing had been burned to ruins by the Wei army, they could no longer be inhabited, and large-scale reconstruction had to be carried out.

The reconstruction of the abandoned city is definitely a protracted project, and Ning Zhiyuan has summoned a large number of craftsmen from the northwest and northeast to participate in the reconstruction.

But the question arises as to who will pay for the rebuilding of the houses of ordinary people.

According to the practice of the Hu people invading the northwest in the past, the government could only build simple thatched houses for the people who had nowhere to live for temporary resettlement, and the final rebuilding of the houses had to be solved by the heads of the households themselves.

After all, the house was burned by the Hu people, and this account cannot be counted on the head of the government, and the government does not have so much money to rebuild the houses of each victim.

This time the situation was similar, a large number of bungalows in the city were burned by the Wei army, and they should have been dealt with in the same way as before.

But Chi Fei doesn't think so, because there are too many burned houses this time, and the extent of the damage is far from comparable.

The Northwest Authority, as the governing body of the region, should provide full assistance to such a large-scale disaster, rather than just resettle the affected people. It should play a greater role, otherwise where will the people's will come from?

And most importantly, with the financial capacity of the northwest now, it is enough to rebuild the two cities.

Chi Fei is the prefect of Jiujiang, and he is very clear about the huge profits generated by Jiujiang every year, so he knows that his father-in-law has enough funds to do this.

But he also knows very well that this matter cannot be started casually.

Otherwise, in the future, if there are wars, typhoons, earthquakes and other disasters, the people will habitually wait for the government to pay for the reconstruction of their houses.

If the government does not have the money to rebuild, there will be strong resentment among the people, which is obviously not a good thing.

To this end, Chi Fei came up with a compromise approach, that is, the government stepped forward to lend money to the people to rebuild their houses through long-term low-interest loans.

The term of this official loan can be extended to 10 to 15 years, with very low interest rates, preferably no interest.

In this way, not only will the people have the money to rebuild the house, but the government will not have to pay for nothing, which can be regarded as killing two birds with one stone.

Also, in terms of wage settlement, Chi Fei felt that he could not use the conventional daily calculation, but calculated it by piece.

Because this is the reconstruction of the whole city, the amount of work is far comparable to usual.

If you pay on a daily basis, the cost of reconstruction will be extremely high.

The so-called piece-by-piece settlement means that after a house is built, the owner pays the craftsman according to the price agreed at the beginning, and no matter how much time the craftsman spent on building, as long as it is built, he should pay.

As for the quality of the house, the owner himself will supervise the whole process, and the government only plays a role of supervision and coordination.

In this way, the craftsmen will definitely increase the speed of building houses in order to take on more projects. This speed increases and homeowners move into their new homes more quickly, which is beneficial for both parties.

As for changing the way wages are settled, it is not a big problem, but the real key is the government's proposal to provide low-interest loans to the victims of the disaster.

Once this example is opened, it is likely to become the norm in the future.

Chi Fei didn't dare to put it forward in front of others, but first made these two suggestions to his father-in-law in private, wanting to see what he meant first.

After Ning Zhiyuan listened to Chi Fei's proposal, he looked at him with a complicated expression and said, "This time the burning of the Twin Cities is a man-made disaster, and it is likely to be a natural disaster in the future."

Do you know that once you open this head, we will have to spend a lot more money in the future. ”

Chi Fei smiled: "So we have to vigorously develop commerce and sea trade, so that we can make more money to support our families." ”

Ning Zhiyuan glared at him angrily, and then said to the eldest son on the side, "Go and call Lao Zhang in, and let's discuss this matter together." ”

"Yes, father." Ning Yabai couldn't help but laugh and walked out quickly.

Ning Yafeng, who was also standing aside to watch the excitement, simply smiled with a smile on his face, he knew that his father had basically agreed to this matter.

……………………

A few days later, Huiyang and Anqing posted government billboards, which roughly meant that the government was willing to provide low-interest loans for 10 to 15 years to all victims to help them rebuild their homes and restore their old businesses. Those who are willing to accept loans can go to the local yamen to register for the record.

As soon as this list came out, everyone who had no money to rebuild their houses was excited, and they rushed to tell each other.

After the news spread, the prestige of the Ning family in the northwest was further enhanced, and it was in full swing.