When the army of the Northern Expedition arrived here in Tongshan, Zhu Zhanji finally broke through. Purely in terms of the realm of martial arts, he has surpassed Xuan Zhen and Yiqingzi.

In addition to his physical weakness, Zhu Zhanji is already on par with them, because Zhu Zhanji still has rich fighting experience in the previous two lives.

The copper hill covers an area of about three square kilometres and two ore zones have been discovered that can be mined directly in the open pit.

In Zhu Zhanji's eyes, this copper mountain is not big, because in his previous life, he had seen the world's top ten super mines in Australia, Peru, and Chile.

But for the people of the Ming Dynasty of this era, the value of this mine is unparalleled. Although relying on the current technology, it is not clear how many reserves this mine has, but just by what can be seen, it exceeds any copper mine in Daming.

Today, the copper mine in Yunnan has just been discovered, and the annual output is only a few tens of thousands of catties, a total of less than 50 tons.

At present, the largest copper output in the country is Zhejiang, Jiangxi, and Sichuan, and these places together are less than 150 tons a year, which is the output of the whole country.

And this copper mine can produce more than 2 million tons of copper, which is equivalent to the current output of 10,000 years in the Ming Dynasty.

Not to mention the reserves of more than a hundred tons of gold and more than a thousand tons of silver.

When Zhu Di heard Cao Daming's report, almost all of the exposed hills were gold and copper, his eyes were about to pop out. And the other generals also opened their mouths in surprise one by one, and they couldn't close their mouths for a long time.

For the Ming Dynasty, which used gold and copper as currency, this is a veritable mountain of money. As long as the gold and copper here are controlled, Daming will never worry about running out of money.

The army that was originally going to retreat came here and didn't leave at all, Zhu Di couldn't believe that it was all gold and copper here, and he was willing to leave only if he saw it was believing.

And the eyes in his eyes when he looked at the guide of the Uliang Habe were full of murderous aura.

In this northern expedition, except for a few Han guides, all armies and guards were equipped with attached Northern Yuan guides. Among them, the Wuliang Habu, who completely succumbed during the Hongwu period, is the most popular person in Duoyan Sanwei.

Three hundred miles north from Beiping, out of Zhangbei, the grassland there was given to the Wuliang Habu for grazing.

Although the Ming Dynasty set up the guards in Kaiping Qiantunwei, that is, the Xilin Gol League in later generations, the dominance here was not in the hands of the Ming Dynasty.

The Ming Dynasty implemented a policy of restraint in the grasslands, that is, the kind of autonomy model of later generations.

The main reason is that the Ming Dynasty does not look down on the land here, the cost of garrisoning here is too high, and the benefits are too small.

But now everything is different, for the sake of this mine, Zhu Di can mobilize hundreds of thousands of Han people to move over, and firmly control this place in his own hands.

Since Zhu Yuanzhang, the Zhu family has been fond of migration, and the famous Shanxi locust tree immigration has only been 40 years ago.

In order to increase the population in the north, after Zhu Di ascended the throne, he also moved more than 100,000 people from Shandong and Jiangnan to Beiping.

In the past, he couldn't look down on the land here, so he could let the Wuliang Habu graze here, but with this mine, in order to ensure the safety of the transportation line in the future, Zhu Di began to think about it.

And those border soldiers and border guards were also excited, and they all wanted to stay here to protect Copper Mountain. With this copper mountain, their days will never be sad, which is much better than the days of guarding a few acres of land.

Recently, dozens of senior generals other than the Beijing Army and Jingwei have turned Zhu Di's Chinese army tent into a vegetable market, a court trial scene, and a gladiatorial arena.

Zhu Zhanji didn't think it was a big deal to watch the excitement on the side, but thought it was very interesting.

Whether ancient or modern, all people have a strong fighting spirit for the sake of profit.

Even Zhu Di, the emperor, couldn't hold back the scene, he couldn't scold everyone just because the generals rushed to garrison here!

It was Liu Sheng's words that woke everyone up. "Everyone, if you want to fight, you have to wait until you see clearly whether this place is worth fighting, right?"

He is not detached from the world, but because the Shenji Battalion was first determined to be able to get a piece of the pie, so he has his current posture.

In this war, everyone saw the restraint effect of firearms on the Beiyuan people, no matter how good your riding skills are, there is no power to resist in the face of firearms.

It is necessary to leave a Shenji battalion here to protect the mine, and besides, gunpowder is needed to open a mine, and when it comes to playing with gunpowder, except for those craftsmen who mix gunpowder, only they play the best.

And the craftsmen who dispense gunpowder belong to high-end technical talents in Daming, and they are all protected in the territory of Daming, and they will never be allowed to come to the grassland.

Therefore, in addition to the task of guarding, the Shenji Battalion also has the task of technical guidance for mine opening, and they are also the remaining troops that were determined from the beginning.

Then, the mine is uninhabitable.

Because, deafening explosions can be heard all day long, and the dust around the mine is everywhere every day.

But except for Zhu Zhanji, no one disliked it. They looked at the smoke rising and the dust in the sky, but they had an intoxicating sense of enjoyment.

Including Zhu Di.

More and more copper ore of high purity was discovered, and everyone's emotions became more and more excited. When an associated gold vein was found at a mineral vein, even Zhu Di, the emperor, personally ran over to look at it for a long time, trembling with excitement.

There is no need for Zhu Zhanji to go to great lengths to explain the importance of the grassland to the Central Plains, and no one regards staying in the grassland as a chore.

After a full month of quarrels and struggles, Xuanfu and Datong, which were close to the grassland, won the competition.

A cavalry of 100,000 people will be left on the grassland, and 100,000 guards will be relocated, and a minimum of 100,000 peasant households will be moved from Shandong and other places, and this will be regarded as the most important stronghold of the Ming Dynasty on the grassland.

Of course, these 100,000 farming households are not mainly for mining, but for transportation.

Because the refining of copper will not be carried out here in the mine, but will be placed in the front of Kaiping. It is also the Xilin Gol of later generations, with rich coal resources, and it is also closer to the Ming Dynasty.

In this era, there was no chemical refining method at all, and only charcoal or coal could be relied on to melt copper ore and then purify it.

For this reason, Zhu Di also decided not to repair the Great Wall first, and transferred the craftsmen who repaired the Great Wall to build a road from Beiping to Tongshan.

This road from Beiping to Kaiping Qiantunwei, and then to Tongshan, almost 1,100 kilometers, although it will consume a lot of manpower and material resources, but what is dug out here directly is hard currency!

Post stations and guard barracks will also be set up along the road to protect the smooth flow of the road, and an army of no less than 100,000 people will be stationed to guard before Kaiping.

It will also become the most important economic and military relay point of the Ming and Mobei grasslands in the future.

This is enough, even better than Zhu Zhanji's expectations, everything is just because of a mine.

Now that the Ming Dynasty is thriving, the Northern Yuan is twilighting, as long as they are not given much room to recover, they will always be weakened.

At the very least, it will never be like in the original history, where a good game with an advantage is turned into a dead move.

The army began to retreat on June 11 and arrived at the mine on June 16. But it was not until July 20 that the affairs here were arranged, and we continued to hurry.

However, Zhu Di only brought back 600,000 people, leaving nearly 300,000 people in the local area to protect this copper mountain.

Before leaving, Zhu Di waved his pen and left three big characters of Beimingshan.

This name also became the official name of Copper Mountain.

Zhu Di also discussed with the generals including Zhu Zhanji during the trip, and after returning to Beiping, he would hold a court meeting to prepare for the construction of a capital office and a political envoy here.

The Metropolitan Government was in charge of the military, while the Envoy was in charge of civil affairs.

In the past, it was not cost-effective to manage here to make ends meet. But now this copper mountain can bring countless benefits, in addition to enough military expenses for the army, but also to bring much-needed copper, silver, and gold to the country.

Seeing that everyone was excited and excited about this matter, Zhu Zhanji's heart was truly proud.

Sometimes, you don't need to bother to work against everyone, and you don't need to work hard to suppress each other.

All it takes is a slight flick of the weight on the scale, and the balance will naturally tilt to your side.

This feeling of manipulating history and putting all the historical figures on your own chessboard is really cool!

On July 30, the army arrived at the Kaiping Qiantunwei and repaired for three days.

Zhu Zhanji went to inspect the open-pit coal mine here, and planned to build several charcoal kilns here in the future.

During the Tang and Song dynasties, the ancients had learned to burn charcoal, in addition to charcoal, bamboo charcoal, and dried coal into charcoal, the best charcoal was exclusively for officials and nobles, and the charcoal was for ordinary people.

But this is not absolutely. Like Huaibei and Yangzhou, there are very few mountains and forests. Therefore, people here have long learned to bake bituminous coal at high temperatures to turn it into smokeless coke, and most people use this charcoal for heating.

In the imperial dining room of Yingtianfu Palace, coke produced in Liyang is used, and the amount is not small.

The Ulianghabe did not know how to make coke, in fact their use of coal was still in its infancy, and when it was cold in winter, the poor people would pull a cart or two of exposed coal and go back to burn it to keep warm.

Zhu Di and his gang of war maniacs were unwilling to let the Uliangha tribe take advantage of them, if it weren't for the scruples of face, they would have driven the Uliangha people away directly.

However, Zhu Zhanji persuaded Zhu Di and used the ready-made interests to entrap the Wuliangha people, which was a good opportunity.

Instead of adding an enemy to yourself, you should add a friend.

Standing at the south gate, Zhu Di knows more clearly than Zhu Zhanji. was woken up by Zhu Zhanji, and before the army arrived at the Kaiping Qiantun guard, Zhu Di had already issued a summoning order to the Wuliangha departments.

After the army was stationed, Zhu Di entertained the leaders of the tribes for three consecutive days. According to Zhu Zhanji's proposal, he gave all the coal to the Wuliangha tribes and tied them to the chariot of the Ming Dynasty.