The land here in Hualong City is very fertile, and it is basically a plain, so after the immigrants came, they simply cultivated the land shallowly, revealing the oily black soil. After planting the seeds sent by the government into the fields, the immigrants have nothing to do after tidying up the houses they have been allotted to them.

Cao Bianjiao chose to recruit workers at this time, just so that the immigrants could increase their income in their spare time, which was naturally welcomed by the immigrants. Later, some Tatars also came to ask if they needed their help. Naturally, the Ming army had no reason to refuse, so in the end it formed an international infrastructure team composed mainly of immigrants and supplemented by Tatars and Kazakhs.

The infrastructure team did not go directly to repair the castle, but first built the road from Hualong City to the castle according to the line of the design department. This is mainly a plain, and the so-called road construction is nothing more than separating the road from the surrounding land, planting street trees on both sides of the road, and then slightly rectifying the road surface, and then laying a layer of sand on top of it, and the road is built. Even if it is just such a simple repair, this road looks not much worse than the cement road in China.

If you look down from the sky, Hualong City is located in the middle, and ten straight roads lead to distant places, and at the end of the road is where the castle is located.

After the road was repaired, the construction of the castle began. The immigrants used fire to peel off the stones on the mountain, and then used horse-drawn carts to transport the stones to the construction site, Cao Bianjiao's requirements for the castle are high and strong, it can accommodate 500 soldiers in peacetime, and it can become a refuge for nearby immigrants in wartime, and the design of the castle is of course the business of the design department of the research institute.

On the basis of the original domestic dock fort, the design department referred to the graphics of the fortress drawn by His Majesty the Emperor, and designed a kind of fortress in between. According to the idea of the design department, 500 men guarding this fortress should have no pressure to deal with the enemy army without artillery within 20,000, and it should also be able to inflict a lot of casualties on the enemy. As for the enemy army with artillery, it depends on whether the enemy's artillery can break through the defense of the fortress, anyway, the design department is now targeting the 12-pound cannon used by the Ming army to attack the city, and the 12-pound cannon cannot cause effective damage to the fortress.

And the defensive artillery on the fortress is not like the siege artillery, even if you use the eighteen-pound cannon or even the twenty-four-pound cannon on the military ship, there is no problem, if you use the eighteen-pound cannon, then the area around the fortress for more than two miles will be the enemy's forbidden area. It is impossible for the enemy to get close, so how can you attack the city?

Cao Bianjiao thinks that the design department is thinking too complicated, and the staff will agree to place eighteen catties of guns on these forts? As the Ming army advanced further westward in the north, the only enemy here was the Kazakh Khanate, and the Kazakh Khanate dared to attack the Ming army? Could it be that he didn't beat them up badly?

He talked to the professor who led the design department about this problem, and the professor said helplessly: "I also asked the General Staff before I came, and the General Staff said that His Majesty asked to strengthen the combat capability of Hualong City and its surrounding castles, not to mention eighteen catties of artillery, even if twenty-four catties of artillery are needed to ensure supply." I asked him privately, and he only said that His Majesty was very wary of religious countries, and this was to guard against the Kazakh Khanate. ”

Cao Bianjiao remembered that during the siege of Almaty, those Kazakh warriors charged at the fire array with swords, although they knew that rushing up was death, none of them flinched, and there seemed to be a strange look on their faces, thinking that it was actually a good thing to send them to death. He nodded, somewhat understanding the emperor's concerns.

Soon after, the people of the Armory Bureau came to Hualong City, made a long list of them, told him to send someone to collect brimstone and saltpeter, etc., and told him that His Majesty the Emperor had decided to build an arsenal here. The Ministry of Railways also sent people to explore the railway line from Hualongcheng to Tomsk, and domestic immigrants continued to come to Hualongcheng, and the imperial court even sent a civil official to serve as the prefect of Hualongfu. He knew in his heart that Hualong City would be built into an important military base and food base for the Ming Dynasty, and would become a base for the Ming army to march to the northwest or even south.

The Ordnance Bureau requisitioned a large area of land near the fortress of Hualong City and began to build an arsenal. Because Hualong's steel mill had already begun to produce steel, the Armory Bureau began to manufacture machines first, and when the machines were almost ready, the collected materials had already arrived, and it was just in time to start making weapons.

The first cannons manufactured by the Hualong Arsenal were eighteen catties of cannons, which were first installed on the Hualong Military City, and then installed on the fortresses. Twenty eighteen-pound guns were installed in one fortress, evenly distributed in all directions, forming a full coverage of the fire outside the fortress.

In addition to the original flintlock firecracker, the firearm made by the arsenal also made a kind of firearm with a short pipe, so that the whole firearm was only two feet long, which was specially used for cavalry. This way the cavalry could attack the enemy with this firearm on their horses. Of course, the range and accuracy will be a little worse than the original long gun, but when fighting on horse, the distance is close, and these shortcomings do not affect its practicality.

Soon, Cao Wenzhao sent a brigade to Hualong City, and the arrival of this state brought the Ming army in Hualong City to nearly 20,000 people. Cao Bianjiao had enough troops to match the people of each fortress and the cannons, in addition to the five thousand people in the fortress, there were nearly 10,000 people in Hualong City, even if the Kazakh Khanate attacked at this time, he was not afraid.

Maybe it was because of the last time that Cao Bianjiao and Batur beat hard, the Kazakh Khanate has not attacked, and it doesn't even mean to attack. According to the report of the spies sent by Cao Bianjiao, it seems that the Kazakh Khanate has a trick to compete for succession, and it is impossible to have the energy to deal with Hualong City for a while.

Cao Bianjiao made up his mind a little, since the Kazakh Khanate did not dare to fight him, it was impossible for him to fight over, so let's occupy some places first? He asked Cao Wenzhao for war and asked to take the opportunity to attack the Kazakh Khanate.

Cao Wenzhao replied to the letter rejecting his request, and only asked him to train the soldiers in Hualong City, waiting for the next course of action. And any provocation to the Kazakh Khanate was strictly prohibited.

The reason why Cao Wenzhao strictly forbade provocations to the Kazakh Khanate was that the General Staff positioned Hualongcheng as the end point of the current stage to the south, and the main direction of the Ming army was still to the north and west. At this time, Sun Fumin had already sent enough small detachments to find out the situation nearby, raised troops and advanced more than 800 miles to the west, occupying a place called Omsk located along the Irtysh River.

After Cao Wenzhao received Sun Fumin's report, the Ming army began to move westward again, and the garrison of the Northern Naval Region was moved to Ob City.