But how to use such a heavy crossbow, do you have to make a trolley for it? No, this crossbow was not to be used on land, but was to be installed on new sailboats as a long-range attack weapon for sailboats. Since it is to grab the land, you have to think about the difficulties fully, there is no sign of human habitation over there, but there is no guarantee that no one will go there. In case someone passes by, from the land, he will be greeted with a crossbow, and if he passes by the sea, he will shoot with this crossbow.

When the time comes, remove the arrows of the crossbow arrows, tie them to a bamboo tube, which is filled with whale oil, and shoot it on the opponent's ship, the bamboo tube will explode, and the whale oil will sputter out. After a few more hits, directly change the whale oil torch to launch, once the whale oil on the opponent's ship is ignited, that thing is not easy to extinguish, watering is not very good, and it can be used to deal with wooden boats. Especially for sailboats, there is no guarantee that there is no difficulty in lighting the sails of the other party. Hong Tao also deliberately did experiments, whale oil torches will not be extinguished by high-speed air flow after shooting, and a sufficient amount of whale oil is ignited, although the burning speed is not as fast as gasoline, but it is also quite powerful.

No matter how many offensive means Hong Tao can't think of, if this can't destroy the enemy, then Hong Tao doesn't plan to continue to fight with the other party, relying on the speed of the boat, pick up the people and run back, just treat it as a failure to open up the wasteland, it doesn't have a big impact, everyone continues to live on Ximaozhou. This crossbow can also be used as a whaling fork, and when you go out to sea to hunt whales in the future, you don't have to chase whales on a windsurfing board, and shoot directly on the boat. Large boats of nearly 20 meters are not afraid of being easily overturned by whales, and as long as the distance is controlled, whaling can be made not too difficult.

This matter is a secret of Hong Tao and the Tan family, and I don't plan to tell Luo Youde and Luo Dacai for the time being, the two sides should cooperate as before, as for whether to talk about it in the future, it depends on the future development. Not only did Luo Youde not know about this matter, but the families who had already decided to follow Hong Tao, except for their family master, the rest of the people were also kept in the dark, and Hong Tao planned to inform them two days before leaving. Fortunately, in this era, the head of the family still counts, even if there are descendants who are not very happy, there should be no ** annoyance.

The four seasons on Hainan Island are not too obvious, spring and autumn are almost negligible, and if it were not for a drizzling rain, Hong Tao would not have felt that spring had come again. After the Winter Food Festival, the new sailboat was finally ready to be launched, and when it rushed into the sea along the log slide, Hong Tao's heart couldn't help but twitch. If it succeeds, even if the hard work of the year after he arrived in the Southern Song Dynasty is not in vain, the road behind will become more and more open. If it is not successful, or even miserable, then its own year's foreshadowing is basically in vain. Prestige, connections, and confidence will be greatly reduced, and whether the next new ship can be built exactly as it was intended is a big question.

The new sailboat is more than two laps larger than the Explorer, with a length of exactly 17 meters, a mast height of 18 meters, and a soft sail, which is almost identical to the Explorer just by looking at its appearance. But the inside of the hull is very different, this is a ship with a real cabin. Although it is not comparable to the exquisite cabins of those aluminum alloy and fiberglass sailing ships of later generations, at least there is a place to cook and sleep. For the voyage, it is very important to eat well and rest well, if people are too tired, the brain and body will be sluggish, and it is easy to make all kinds of mistakes.

The ship's cabin is divided into two sections, the aft cabin is used by the crew to rest, there are a pair of bunk beds that can be stowed, and the two corners are the galley and the captain's quarters. said that it was a kitchen, but in fact there were only charcoal basins and simple stoves, on which Hong Tao improvised a smoking hood in a barbecue restaurant. The captain's area was supposed to be a closed captain's room, but the space was not enough, so Hong Tao simply didn't pay attention to it, and only used a partition to slightly block it. Behind the partition is a chart table, a small cabinet with a lock, and a simple single earthen spring bed made of three layers of whale tendons, which is Hong Tao's independent space on the ship.

Part of the front cabin was used as a cargo hold, also considering that this was a workboat rather than a recreational boat. It can be filled with fresh water, food, vegetables, harpoons, cables, spare sails and simple carpentry tools, and can also be loaded with goods, whether it is blubber, whale meat or other items, with a volume of about nine square meters, and can hold about ten tons of cargo. The displacement of this new ship Hong Tao has not been understood, because the Song people calculate the size of the ship according to how many materials, Wen Laoer said that the 650 materials are not yet known as a volume or a unit of weight, but visually, the unloaded displacement of the new sailing ship should be about 15 tons, and if it is fully loaded, it can reach more than 30 tons.

In addition to the cabin, there is a more obvious difference between the new ship and the Explorer, that is, the sails of the new ship are no longer the black cloth of the Li nationality, but have become pale yellow whale skin. A reinforced rib of black cloth is sewn on it at intervals of half a meter, which increases the tear resistance of the whale skin and minimizes the weight of the sail.

Whether the Predator can meet Hong Tao's requirements or not, it is useless to just look at the appearance, and you have to try it at sea to know. It just so happened that the day of the Tan family to catch the sea in spring had come again, and Hong Tao was ready to use this ship as the flagship of the territorial sea people, and take the Tan family fishing boats gathered in Zhenzhou Port to catch the sea. Since he killed the first whale when he caught the sea last autumn, the old man Rong gave up the title of the people who led the sea to Hong Tao, and he himself was not idle, and he still wanted to go to sea again, but he was on Hong Tao's boat, which was a bit of a way to help Hong Tao on the horse and send him off again.

The title of Territorial Sea Man has no privileges, it is more like an honorary title, which is generally used to refer to the Tan family with the most experience, the best skills, and the most fishing. There is no hard and fast rule on age for this title, and the Tan family is more aware of personal ability, and whoever can lead everyone back safely and catch more fish with everyone will follow whomever they want. According to this rule of the capable first, Hong Tao is obviously very compliant, his boat is faster than other Tan family members, not to mention the fish, and now some people's rows of boats still have a few salted whale meat and are reluctant to eat.

Hong Tao didn't shirk this honor, he didn't want to play any low-key in the Tan family, the higher the honor, the better, he also wanted to attract more Tan fishermen to follow him, just right, take this opportunity to give everyone some benefits, and it's easy to talk when we meet in the future. In addition, you can just try the performance of the Predator, even if the ship sinks on the sea, don't be afraid, there are so many small wooden ships following behind, at most it will lose some face, and it will not lose your life.

"What is this?" Old man Rong is already 70 years old, and in this era, he is regarded as a long-lived person, and he is honored as Weng Weng. What's more valuable is that he has a very good personality, cheerful and lively, like a young man, very curious about Hong Tao's new ship, and after a look inside and outside the boat, he finally found the big crossbow on the stern of the ship that was covered by a whale skin sleeve.

"It's a harpoon, it's used for whaling!" At this time, the Predator had already sailed away from the sea of Zhenzhou, and Hong Tao was not afraid of being found out of this contraband, so he opened the holster and revealed the real thing inside.

"What a weird thing, it can be used as a harpoon?" Old man Rong probably had never seen a crossbow at all, and he didn't feel familiar at all when he looked at this reverse crossbow, but he was just a little curious.

"Well, when you get to the place, you can try it for the first time, it's not clear if it's good or not." Hong Tao had tried the power and accuracy of this crossbow on land, and it was not bad, but he really didn't know if it could be used well at sea. It's just right, let this old man try it first, and it can be regarded as a pat on his ass.

"Okay, you are capable, your grandfather has picked up a treasure! I hope you can take our family to live a good life for a few years, and like last year, one person will not die and a boat will not sink, then I can close my eyes! Old man Rong felt very good about Hong Tao's attitude, and he didn't continue to talk about the crossbow, but changed the topic.

"Last year, it was still your territorial sea leader, and this is all your credit!" Hong Tao hurriedly humbled and made the old man happy, this is what every junior should do, even if it is a strange old man, if he can coax it without losing his own interests, he will coax it, and he will not lose meat anyway.

"Don't fool me with your good words, no native of our Tan family will say, but they know better about good and bad, without your whale's meat to share with everyone, the time to come back will drag on for several days, and they won't be able to survive this half a year if they have fish." Old man Rong was really not confused, and he heard that Hong Tao was ignoring him with words.

"Weng Weng, in my opinion, our Tan family is not born destined to live such a hard life, there are other ways to live, do you want to listen to me?" Hong Tao began to set up others again, and he used interests to tempt others to wear a pair of pants with himself, which is what he is best at. He was never afraid that someone would share benefits with him, he was afraid that no one would play with him, and that it would be too lonely.

"I know that your family is trading with the natives, and you are living a good life, but the natives are unreliable!" Old man Rong's news is quite well-informed, and now it is not news that these families on Ximaozhou do not go to the sea to fish much, and the nearby Tan family basically know each other, and it is difficult to hide it if they have a few buckets of rice at home.

"We don't plan to live on the natives, we should say that we are cooperating with the natives. We produce goods, they sell, in exchange for the benefits of everyone according to the amount of effort. If you are interested, why don't you bring your family to give it a try, you only need me to feed more than a dozen families. In the future, I will have more big ships, but there are no good sailors, our Tan family are all good sailors, why bother to go to the sea to fight, and there is not enough food and clothing, if you can work together with a few more families, everyone will not have to suffer too much. The entire Tan family in the vicinity of Zhenzhou can eat three meals a day, have access to land for farming, and have children who can read and write. Hong Tao didn't say too specific, just said the result.

"Will the official family allow our family to read and write? Will we be allowed to farm ashore? "Old man Rong doesn't believe Hong Tao's words very much, it's as incredible as if you told an old man in the future that you can be an official casually.

"I said yes, you don't believe it, so let's wait for us to come back from the sea, you go to Ximaozhou to talk to my grandfather and them, now there is a shortage of manpower, but I don't want to look for people randomly, if you can come, I think my grandfather and they will not be unhappy." Further down, Hong Tao can't say, although this old man is good, there is still a distance from being trusted, and people's hearts are separated from their stomachs.

"Okay, I'll go to your grandfather when I come back, if it can really be done, Weng Weng will be able to find more than a dozen families immediately, all of whom are the duty of our Tan family." When Old Man Rong heard that Hong Tao had lifted Chen Mingen out, he had to pay attention to it. Young people love to brag, but old people are not so unreliable, and he is very curious about how Hong Tao let the Tan family go ashore and go to school.