In May of the eighteenth year of Chongzhen of the Ming Dynasty, Anqing City.

Located at the confluence of the Anhui River and the Yangtze River, this capital city is now the most prosperous port city in the western part of the Jianghuai Plain. It is not only a passage connecting the Jianghuai Plain and the fertile land south of the Yangtze River, but also connecting the edge of the Dabie Mountains through the Anhui River, which has many tributaries. Rice, tung oil, bamboo, tea produced in Anqing and the nearby Luzhou Prefecture, timber and various mountain goods from the Dabie Mountains, from the upstream Huguang, Sichuan and downstream Jiangnan, as well as all kinds of products from the mountains of southern Anhui on the other side, all converge here. There are even some items from the East, South and West that have been sold here for thousands of miles.

The whole city is noisy and noisy, the business is prosperous, the people are also happy, and there is a gathering of humanities, although it is not comparable to the Hankou Town in Huguang and those commercial metropolises in the south of the Yangtze River, but in the view of Chen Yongxi from Taiyuan Mansion in Shanxi, the prosperity and richness of Anqing City are incomparable to those Shanxi towns where Jin merchants gather.

However, what surprised Chen Yongxi the most from afar was not the prosperity of Anqing, but the fact that the entire city was shrouded in a strange atmosphere of slaughter.

The merchant ships of the Yao Bridge in Hankou were moored at the Yicheng Tax Customs Wharf in the south of Anqing City, and when they were waiting in line to pay the tax, Chen Yongxi, who was a little dizzy after sitting on the boat for several days, took a guy from the Yao family to get off the boat and walk around. As soon as I got out of the Anqing Pass Wharf, I saw the Ming soldiers who lined up a neat four-way column, trotting over from somewhere outside Anqing City, and then entered the south gate of Anqing City.

The soldiers were all heavily armed, wearing hats on their heads and red cloth armor, some carrying spears as long as eight or nine feet long, some carrying swords and javelins, and some carrying long bows.

This is not the most surprising to Chen Yongxi, what surprised him the most was that the weather was a little hot today, and it was noon again, and the sun overhead was the hottest time.

"Is this His Royal Highness the Crown Prince's new army?" Chen Yongxi asked with a frown.

"Yes," Yao Guyji, who accompanied Chen Yongxi, had obviously been to Anqing Mansion a few times and was more familiar with the situation, "They are An Qingwei of the New Army." ”

"An Qingwei?" Chen Yongxi was stunned, "Is it Banjun?" ”

"It's Banjun," the guy said, "but it's different from An Qingwei in the past, and it's been put in order...... I heard that it was the rectification presided over by Xiangchengbo himself, and all those who could eat and not fight were opened, and the mountain people who could endure hardships and not be afraid of death were recruited from Dabie Mountain, and 50 acres of paddy fields were awarded to each person, so they practiced day and night. ”

At present, the number of land granted to the guards of the new army is not one-size-fits-all, it depends on the quality of the land where the military guards are located, and how far away from the front line?

Anqing has fertile land, many paddy fields, and is far from the front line, so there are fewer fields.

"Mountain people can indeed endure hardships," Chen Yongxi nodded and said, "Poor mountains and bad waters produce elite soldiers...... However, in such a short period of time, the soldiers can be trained like this, and this Xiangcheng Uncle still has the ability. ”

The guy smiled and said, "How can the prince's fifty acres of paddy fields be so easy to take?" There is a last-place elimination system, and there is a quota for elimination every year, even if everyone is practicing well, you must find the worst person to be eliminated, and as soon as the person leaves, the granted job field will be withdrawn! Do you think the people below can do a good job? ”

Chen Yongxi was stunned, "What?" Such a cut-off method? ”

"The last one is eliminated, Chen Jishan, you will know when you become the official of the prince...... Those who are officials must also be eliminated at the end, this is Wei Ge's old method of rectifying officialdom. ”

Yes? After becoming an official, he still does this...... Zhang Juzheng is not like this! Chen Yongxi said in his heart: This Wei Zaode is too fierce, right? Aren't you afraid of the anger of officialdom? Aren't you afraid that the official Yushi will impeach him every day?

Thinking of this, Chen Yongxi was not in the mood to visit Anqing City anymore, turned around and was about to return to the merchant ship of the Yao family, and walked outside the Anqing Pass wharf, but was stopped by a small group of tax customs guards who were also fully armed.

"Martial law now! An hour later! "The one who loudly declared martial law was Zongzi, who had already been blackened by the sun. He has survived the devil training of Xiaolingwei and has become a fierce Ming "tax policeman".

"Why martial law?" Chen Yongxi stepped forward and arched his hand, "Below is Ji Shan, who is acting as the king's mansion, and he is from Datong......"

"Less nonsense, come back in an hour!" With a wave of his hand, the sect interrupted Chen Yongxi's words.

How so? Chen Yongxi said in his heart: Ji Shan is also an official, how dare you be a soldier...... He was about to get angry, but the Yao guy on the side pulled him and said in a low voice: "Ji Shan, he is a sect son, and Tianhuang is noble!" ”

Zongzi? It's like black charcoal, and I still wear so many clothes on such a hot day...... Chen Yongxi thought to himself: Prince, you treat your brother like this, Emperor Taizu Gao will be angry when he finds out!

Chen Yongxi, a black charcoal-like sect, didn't want to provoke him, so he stepped aside with the guy, found a tea stall and sat down, and asked for a pot of tea and a few snacks.

When the tea was served, the guy from the Yao family asked the owner of the tea stall: "Has Anqingguan Wharf been under martial law recently?" ”

"It's not very often, three or four days ago, I also had martial law, I don't know what to transport to Anqing, I only saw many big boxes, and let Anqingwei's people carry them."

Three or four days ago, a batch of guns and gunpowder was transported, all of which were used to equip An Qingwei!

Although An Qingwei is not the front line, it is the key point of the Yangtze River. The south wall of the Anqing city wall was built along the embankment of the Yangtze River, and outside the city is the wharf and the Yangtze River. The river in this area is very narrow, only two miles wide. As long as you set up cannons on the south wall of Anqing City, you can completely block the river - the south wall of Anqing City Wall is very long, and dozens of cannons can be set up. If those cannons can be used correctly, Anqing City will be an impassable fortress on the Yangtze River.

Therefore, soon after Zhu Cihong pacified Nanjing, he sent Li Guozhen, the uncle of Xiangcheng, to Anqing as the chief soldier of Anqing Mansion. also asked him to vigorously rectify Anqingwei, form a new army of Anqingwei, and also allocated a pen of money to let him strengthen the city wall of Anqing - the wall of Anqing Mansion is rectangular, and there is no need to worry about the side adjacent to the Yangtze River. However, the other three walls had to be strengthened and rebuilt to make the outer side of the wall have a certain inclination, and at the same time to build prismatic platforms.

Because the south wall of the Anqing City Wall did not need to be rebuilt, Chen Yongxi did not notice the Anqing City Wall reconstruction project. But he encountered a batch of artillery arriving from Nanjing!

Today, the coolies and An Qingwei's soldiers pushed out of the dock are six brand-new bronze Hongyi cannons, which are the products of the Nanjing Artillery Bureau under the Generalissimo's Office, which is a government-run military factory composed of "righteous craftsmen" who followed Tianjin Wei, plus some craftsmen recruited in the southeast. López hired several foreign technicians from the Macau Bugarao Artillery Factory as engineers to supervise the construction of artillery. And there are only three kinds of products of the Artillery Bureau.

One is the standard 12-pounder Hongyi bronze cannon—not a self-improved product, but a standardized imitation, cast from easy-to-process bronze. The field artillery mounts used were also designed by foreign technicians in Bugarao. The six 12-pounder Hongyi bronze cannons that Chen Yongxi saw were the first batch of artillery guns produced by the Nanjing Artillery Factory.

The second is artillery shells, which are solid bullets, shotguns, and chain bullets, all of which are standard imitations.

The third is gunpowder, which is also refined and processed in accordance with the standards of the Bugarao Artillery Factory.

In addition, Alfonso. López also procured dozens of three-pounder regimental guns for Zhu — most of them products from the Bugarao Artillery Factory, but also expensive bronze cannons bought from Goa. They will be used as field guns for the artillery regiments of the Model Army.

And this kind of three-pounder regimental cannon, in the near future, will also become the mass production weapon of the Nanjing Artillery Factory - according to Zhu Cihong's plan, the Nanjing Artillery Factory will only produce two standard guns for a long time in the future, namely the 12-pounder Hongyi cannon and the 3-pounder regimental cannon, and all of them are relatively easy to produce copper cannons.