Just when the decisive battle began to spread to Dongying Island, Xiao Xuan, who was far away in Yingtian, had a very bad feeling since he entered Chongzhen for twelve years.

If the year before was not too good because the year was not too good, there were still many incidents in various parts of the country, but since entering Chongzhen for 12 years, it seems to be a song and dance, although I can still see a lot of reports from the Fatang and some trivial matters from the civil and internal and external affairs reports, and there have been many strange cases or major cases in the newspapers of Hangzhou and even Yingtian. However, there are fewer things such as rising to large-scale strata and even contradictions between the government and the people, between the military and the people, and between ethnic groups. At most, the aftermath of family and clan disputes brought about by the new property law has not yet dissipated. This made Xiao Xuan feel very unusual.

It's just that one incident in the capital has aroused Xiao Xuan's vigilance, since the Spring Festival, a fire of a large scale suddenly broke out in the house of the director of a newspaper, and the thieves took advantage of the fire to blatantly murder and robbery, which became a sensational case. The case was soon cracked under the report of the anti-water activists brought by the heavy reward, and another newly opened private newspaper was implicated in the murder, and even some figures in the military behind it.

This case seems to be not small in scale, and the involvement is not small, but it is not a big deal for Xiao Xuan. It's just that when this kind of thing happened again in March, or when it was a small tabloid that reported on some local current affairs, Xiao Xuan felt that the situation seemed to be somewhat bad.

Obviously, although a series of changes in the past have made the entire Jiangdong undergo earth-shaking changes, but in essence: today's Ming Dynasty is still a centralized dynasty similar to the strengthened version of the shogunate, and because the scale of the "new people" is still in the embryonic and embryonic state, the old mechanism collapsed, and the control over the grassroots can even be said to be worse than that of the Ming and Qing dynasties. If the local community seems to be "calm" in this era of great change, it is an abnormality.

Since the last time the incident in Yuchi happened, the women around Xiao Xuan seemed to have restrained a lot, and some of the occasional rumors outside seemed to make people feel very frightened, and many people finally understood that no matter how approachable and unusual the usual monarch was, he was also an emperor with great power, and if he was not careful when he was playing, he would face serious consequences. Xiao Xuan is no longer as carefree as before.

"It seems that since returning from the expedition, I haven't personally led a team to visit the people for a long time." Xiao Xuan finally began to realize at this time: since the Ming Dynasty is still a centralized dynasty with poor grassroots rule, the use of some means is inevitable. What caused the first civil war? Isn't it because I plan to jump out of the constraints of the old framework and patrol the Quartet?

Xiao Xuan also had a feeling: if he only brought a few hundred to a thousand troops when he traveled, and he carried out a parade without scruples, and more than once, it would definitely make some forces ready to move again. Of course, if you bring tens of thousands of elites, it's a different matter. After the last patrol, Xiao Xuan actually found the problem: in order to ensure his own safety, even if he did not engage in the pomp and form of Qianlong's descent to the south of the Yangtze River, but instead dispatched 10,000 elite soldiers to carry out the parade, he only had a great choice near the Yangtze River. And when going to some places, the logistics and movements are still very large, and it is still possible for some relatively consolidated local forces to smell the wind in advance. However, if we only bring a "mule-horse brigade" composed of 7,800 to 1,000 people like the Japanese army in Guanjiayuan and the Japanese army in Loess Ridge, we will carry out the operation. Just from the beginning of Beijing, there will be a lot of concealment. This kind of bandit-like team can completely go out of the central manor from the secret passage and set off to assemble in concealment at night, which is like a "real micro-service private visit" If you can't figure out whether you are really out of the palace or not, there is no doubt that it will bring qualitative changes to some things.

Of course, it would also take a lot of risk to do so, in a deduction between Xiao Xuan and the guards around him. Premeditated and long-running "defenders" can always rely on realized ambushes and raids at a significant cost to the strength of the team. If there are no more than 1,000 accompanying guards, it will be difficult to form a relatively tight protection within a radius of 100 paces, and it will be difficult to operate in a wider range in order to deal with surprise attacks. Not to mention that if only hundreds to thousands of people are taken out of the palace, there will also be uncontrollable risks if some political changes occur in the capital.

However, what made Xiao Xuan happy at this time was that many things were prepared in advance and still brought great benefits: "I heard that the mass production of new weapons in the musket inner workshop has begun to have certain results?" Counting the time, it is about eight years, and even if it is about three years since the expedition! Let's check it out! Xiao Xuan asked suddenly.

In fact, Xiao Xuan also had some understanding of many things when he flipped through the recent workshop report. I think back then, I also had a lot of ideas at the beginning. But later, I slowly understood that the level of craftsmanship in the late Ming Dynasty was the same as that of England in the late eighteenth century, and that could not be achieved by merely improving management.

That is, after the expedition to the West, some relatively high-quality iron ore was obtained, and there were craftsmen who had considerable experience in precision processing in many aspects, and after several years of running-in, they were finally able to produce some ideal firearms that they had envisioned at an expensive but barely acceptable cost.

On a secret shooting range in the large underground passage of the central manor, the sound of guns seemed to be sporadically heard more than ten paces away through multiple doors. Seems to be a little different from the usual triple two? But that doesn't seem to be too much of a problem.

A firearm in charge of the test carried a barrel with a single stand, but carried a cannon similar to a bazooka, and when it fired, the whole body did not shake significantly, but the barrel carried on the shoulder was accompanied by a puff of white smoke, and a thick tube also flew out suddenly after firing. Almost moments later, a unique crashing sound was heard from a hundred paces away, a unique sound that seems to be made only when a metal object collides with a target such as a masonry wall, giving the impression that firearms are unusual.

(End of chapter)