At this time, there was no defense in the fort, and as soon as Li Zhi's army arrived, the gates of the fort were opened. The remaining 100 Dutch artillerymen, women and children in www.biquge.info fort knelt on the ground and begged Li Zhi to let them live.

Li Zhi waved his hand and said: "These red hairs are all habitual pirates, I don't know how many places they have robbed and how many Han people they have killed. The women and children were left behind, and the soldiers were all shot. ”

Two hundred soldiers of the trapping regiment rushed forward, tied up the artillerymen, and escorted them outside the fort to be shot. The rest of the soldiers searched the fort to see what the Dutch had left behind in the fort.

In the end, Li Zhi found 110,000 taels of silver in the fort. The silver was probably earned from the Japanese trade, and it was all Japanese-style dingyin. With a wave of his hand, Li Zhi gave five taels of silver to each of the 3,000 soldiers and 2,000 artillerymen of the fleet who participated in the battle, and cheered the soldiers happily.

Only one soldier was wounded in this battle, and the others were not injured at all, so it was a joy to have a bonus.

Having conquered Fort Geranza, Li Zhi was not ready to occupy him. Capturing such a fortress, which requires at least a few hundred people to defend, is a heavy expense. Li Zhi has a stronghold in Hsinchu, whether it is southward or northbound, there is a transit station in Hsinchu, and there is no need to add a foothold like Relansha.

Some of the inhabitants of the town next to Chikan Fort were found to be 2,400 Han Chinese, 300 Chinese traders, and 1,100 Southeast Asians who had been reduced to red-haired slaves.

Of course, the Han slaves were immediately freed, and those who were willing to go to Hsinchu could go to Hsinchu with Li Zhi, and those who did not want to go to Hsinchu also went to Hsinchu to wait first, and then returned to Fujian by boat. But it is expected that after these people see the richness of Hsinchu, the vast majority of them will stay in Hsinchu.

The same is true for Chinese traders.

One thousand and one thousand Southeast Asians remained in Geranza and were responsible for the demolition of the forts of Geranza and Chikan. Although Li Zhi was not prepared to occupy this stronghold, he did not want the Dutch to make a comeback and occupy it again. Southeast Asians were temporarily used as hard labor by Li Zhi, doing the manual work of demolishing the city. After demolishing the castle, Lee Sik would load these Southeast Asians into Hirado. Hirado had a Dutch trading house there, from where Southeast Asians could return to their Dutch colonies.

Li Zhi dealt with the Dutch in Geranzaborg, and there was nothing to do in Taiwan, and he returned to Tianjin with the fleet.

When he returned to Tianjin, Li Zhi had nothing to do every day, and he pondered whether he could invent some new weapons to improve the combat effectiveness of the army.

To make a new weapon, the most important thing is a new type of gunpowder. With the use of black powder, the current Mini rifle is basically the limit of black powder weapons. Historically, there is no black powder firearm that is stronger than the Mini rifle. Only by coming up with a new type of gunpowder and a new type of firing charge can the power of the guns be greatly enhanced.

However, although Li Zhi knew some chemical knowledge, there was no classification of minerals in this era. If Li Zhi wanted to produce new gunpowder, he was faced with all kinds of minerals with Chinese names. Just figuring out what these minerals are actually compounds would probably take Li Zhi a lifetime.

It is impossible to rely on Li Zhi to come up with a systematic chemistry.

Li Zhi thought about it and decided to go to Taoist priest Cao Shoudao to have a look. Cao Shoudao is proficient in alchemy and knows a lot of chemistry.

Cao Shoudao still lived in a small courtyard in the west of the city, and as soon as Li Zhi knocked on the door, a thirteen or fourteen-year-old boy opened the door. The child with the head and the horn has grown up.

Li Zhi smiled and said, "Little Daoist, I'm looking for your master, Daoist Cao." ”

The young man agreed, ran in quickly, and shouted, "Master, Master! A big official is coming for you! ”

After a while, Cao Shoudao, who was wearing a robe, walked out. I haven't seen him for a few years, and he has a few more wrinkles on his face, but he is still in good spirits. Seeing Li Zhi, he quickly knelt down and shouted, "Cao Shoudao has seen Xingguobo!" ”

Li Zhi picked up Cao Shoudao and said with a smile: "Daoist Cao, I'm here to disturb your Qingxiu again!" ”

"I can't ask for it!"

Li Zhi laughed, walked into Cao Shoudao's yard, and said straight to the point: "Dao Chief, do you know sulfuric acid and nitric acid?" ”

Cao Shoudao was stunned and asked, "What is that?" I don't know the poor way! ”

Li Zhi explained: "Maybe Daochang Cao knows, but the name is different. Sulfuric acid is an oil-like thing, but it is corrosive. If you touch paper or raw meat, you can corrode things to blackening with a single touch. Nitric acid is a type of water made from saltpeter, which can turn the fibers yellow when it comes into contact with wool or other substances. ”

Cao Shoudao pondered for a moment and said, "Uncle said nitric acid, but he doesn't know the poor way. But the sulfuric acid that the uncle said is somewhat similar to the green alum oil refined by the poor Dao. This thing is extremely domineering, even if it encounters iron, it can corrode and invade. It's a little sticky, just a little like oil. ”

Li Zhi's eyes lit up and said, "What the Taoist chief said, I'm afraid it's dilute sulfuric acid." Do you want to show me some? ”

Cao Shoudao said: "This thing is overbearing, it is not easy to store, and I make it when I need it." Since Uncle wants it, I'll burn some out for Uncle to see. ”

Li Zhi nodded and said, "That's great!" ”

Cao Shoudao nodded and went to tinker. He asked Li Zhi to go to the courtyard inside to watch how he made alum oil. He took out a number of jars and jars: a large crucible, a curved porcelain tube, a straight porcelain tube, two large porcelain jars with side openings, and a small porcelain jar with a sieve hole at the bottom.

He dug out some raw materials from several jars, and it was green alum.

There are many earthen stoves built in the courtyard of Cao Shoudao's house, and at this time, Cao Shoudao chose a stove kiln with a top opening, and its air outlet is separated from the top opening. Cao Shoudao placed the crucible inside, put in the alum material, covered the pot, sealed the edge with clay, inserted the curved porcelain tube into the opening at the top of the stove, put it on the tubular hole of the crucible lid, and sealed it with clay.

The other end of the curved porcelain tube is inserted into the large porcelain jar, the lid of the porcelain cylinder is sealed with clay, the side holes of the two porcelain cylinders are connected with straight porcelain pipes, and finally a small porcelain cylinder is set on the porcelain cylinder, and the cylinder is sealed with clay.

After fiddling with this large pile of things, Cao Shoudao finally began to light the crucible.

After burning for a while, when there was acid gas coming out of the sieve hole at the bottom of the small tank, Cao Shoudao poured well water into the small tank. After a while, bubbles bubbled up in the well water. The bubbles were quite large at the bottom, but as they moved upwards, they became smaller and smaller, and gradually disappeared, apparently dissolving into the water.

As more and more gas dissolves in the well water, the well water becomes more and more viscous.

After burning for a while, Cao Shoudao looked at the fire, nodded and said, "It's almost." ”

He extinguished the fire under the crucible, carefully lifted the water tank, and said, "Uncle, this is alum oil." ”