Jiangdong's secrecy once again gave Li Sheng a headache. Pen | fun | pavilion www. ｂｉｑｕｇｅ。 On that day, Kong Ming unprecedentedly proposed that the noise in Jiangdong was just a farce of acting, and after quickly realizing what kind of things would be hidden under this farce, Li Sheng quickly instructed his white clothes to investigate this matter. However, this time the investigation did not go very smoothly, under the continuous secrecy of Jiangdong's "passing water", Li Sheng did not learn until the beginning of February of the 26th year of Jian'an, what Sun Quan's side had been arguing about to keep secret: pirates! Sun Quan is actually preparing to develop their piracy business on a large scale! That's really ......

“…… The monarch is a shareholder, directly involved in the share of it. Although there is no explicit admit, in fact, the newest warships of Jiangdong have been transferred to the pirate army, and the six major families have selected excellent personnel to serve as the commander of the privateer fleet. One hand is tightly grasping the trade, and the other hand is using this kind of attack. The thinking of these people in Jiangdong is really ahead of their time. In the face of this investigation information about Jiangdong, which was almost sent at the same time as the defeat report of the attack on his own merchant fleet, Li Sheng muttered quietly, but on the other hand, he secretly admired Sun Quan's methods: "Such a policy is simply the same as the policy that later generations of Britain relied on to make a fortune." Alas...... It seems that there are still talents in Jiangdong. But they immediately saw the weakness of our current layout. Li Sheng sighed helplessly.

In fact, Jiangdong's approach is aimed at Li Sheng's weakness, which is not entirely correct. However, it is an indisputable fact that Jiangdong's arrangement caused Li Sheng a headache. Although Li Shengjun far surpassed Jiangdong's side in the manufacture of ship types and ships, Jiangdong was much stronger than Li Shengjun in the accumulation of experience in building ships and the recruitment of sailors. To put it simply, after using a series of new technologies, the warships on Li Sheng's side are stronger than Jiangdong's in terms of flexibility, speed, and attack, but the warships of the Jiangdong Army are stronger than Li Shengjun's warships in terms of size, applicability, and survivability. If the two clash normally, Li Sheng can also rely on the strength of the weapon to easily defeat Jiangdong's side. However, if the Jiangdong side uses its own warship technology to carry out pirate operations, then the maritime lifeline on which Li Sheng depends for survival will be seriously threatened by the Jiangdong side. You must know that there are no powerful attack weapons similar to artillery on the Jiangdong side, but their bed crossbows, especially heavy bed crossbows, are still a great threat to Li Shengjun's warships. The power of the bed crossbow is something that even Li Shengjun's fleet that has entered the range of the Jiangdong Navy has to take into account, not to mention that Jiangdong is using weapons like the bed crossbow to deal with Li Shengjun's merchant fleet.

"The large sea-going ships used by the merchant fleet far exceed any of the warships equipped by our sailors. But such a merchant ship was a ship of complete trade transport, and it could not even have a bed crossbow on it, except for a few sailors, and it was not too fast to escape the pursuit of the warship. Once it is targeted by a battleship, even if this battleship is a warship that is not very fast on the Jiangdong side, its resistance is zero, and its ability to escape is also zero, so it can only obediently let the Jiangdong army rob it. Analyzing the types of ships used by his own merchant ships, and imagining the situation after the pirate fleet of the Jiangdong Army and his own merchant fleet met on the vast sea, Li Sheng was very depressed and came to such a conclusion: "If there is no warship to escort it." I'm afraid that as many merchant fleets as we send out, we will lose as many merchant fleets, and everything we lose will appear in Sun Quan's mansion as spoils. This is no longer something imaginary, but as a reality, happening in front of us. ”

Is there any solution that no?

Naturally, the problem has already arisen, and the next thing that needs to be thought about is the solution to the problem.

How to fix it? There are several ways in front of Li Sheng: first, temporarily suspend all merchant ships, recycle all merchant ships and refit them, such as adding bed crossbow batteries, and increasing the speed through some methods. This is one of the means to cure the root cause, but it is not so easy to achieve; The second is to implement the strategy of escorting warships against important merchant ships. This is a means of curing the symptoms, which belongs to the kind of grasping the big and letting go of the small, for themselves, although this can ensure most of their own interests, but it will also make some vulnerable groups suffer further losses; Third, guide the Ordnance Department under the Jinghai Governor's Government to develop frigates suitable for the ocean, which requires fast speed, strong adaptability, and small tonnage, but requires to be able to be equipped with standard bed crossbows and artillery, and can bear the requirements of the ocean. Of course, the price of such warships must be controlled within the range that the common people can afford - Li Sheng intends to give such warships to his merchants to use, so that they can withstand pirate burning; Fourth, in the name of Li Sheng himself, he asked Cao Cao and Sun Quan to cooperate with him in the fight against piracy for such a high-sounding reason as maintaining maritime trade. Naturally, this union is likely to become a superficial formality, but what Li Sheng needs is nothing else, that is, such a high-sounding reason. In Li Sheng's opinion, as long as there is such a reason, at least on the surface, Sun Quan and Cao Cao's side will not blatantly protect those pirates.

"Only with our own hands hardened, and with the cooperation of the name of righteousness, can we minimize the impact of pirates." At the high-level talks that convened Kong Ming and others to participate, Li Sheng said this after throwing out his thoughts.

"In other words, we know that the pirates were planned by Sun Quan's side, so we can't say that Sun Quan's mistake is wrong, but must we list the pirates separately to be calculated?" Kong Ming pondered Li Sheng's words for a moment and asked.

"Exactly." Li Sheng nodded, and then made a decision that surprised everyone: "At the same time, I have decided to sell military bed crossbows, especially military bed crossbows at sea, as a commodity. At this stage, we will first sell some to our own merchants, and then we will find a way to sell them to Sun Quan and Cao Cao. ”

"What? Why do you want to do this? Aren't you afraid that Sun Quan and Cao Cao will find a master to crack our weapons? You know, with the massive use of weapons like the bed crossbow in recent years, our enemies have become very interested in this aspect. Except in some respects, they are no less skilled in the making of bed crossbows than we are. If we really open up the sale of bed crossbows. I'm just afraid of ......," Kong Ming said and stopped abruptly. He didn't say what he was afraid of in this last one, but both Li Sheng and the others here understood the meaning of Kong Ming's words from such a fear.

"There's nothing to worry about. You also said that in terms of weapons like bed crossbows, the level of Cao Cao and Sun Quan's side is about the same as ours. Even if all are inferior, the part that is inferior is small. If that's the case, can I understand that as long as Cao Cao and Sun Quan are given some time, they are perfectly capable of making bed crossbows of the same level as us? Li Sheng asked Kong Ming with a smile - Kong Ming, who was the order to join the army, was in charge of this part of the related work.

"That's for sure, if Cao Cao and Sun Quan have capable people under them, or if they have enough means of intelligence organization, our lead, which is not much in this regard, will be replaced by Cao Cao and Sun Quan, and then we can only have the advantage of a huge production scale." Kong Ming nodded and said, he is a delicate person, and he naturally understands the part he is responsible for very thoroughly.

"Since it won't be long before they catch up with us, why don't we use this last bit of advantage in our hands to get more out of our favor. No one is too little for money. And things like the bed crossbow will one day be replaced by more powerful weapons. In fact, in addition to having some advantages over the copper cannons that we are now producing in small quantities, the bed crossbow is not as good as the copper cannon in terms of power and volume. Not to mention that the copper cannon we are currently only a primary product, there may be more powerful and more convenient gunpowder weapons in the future. Li Sheng said with a smile.

"Is that so?" Although Kong Ming and the others had also seen the power of the copper cannon and felt that the power was strong enough, he was still a little puzzled by Li Sheng's view of the development of gunpowder weapons: "It seems to be a bit exaggerated, right?" Kong Ming muttered to himself.

"Exaggerated?" Li Sheng chuckled and shook his head: "Before the gunpowder came out, how could people have imagined that there was such a powerful weapon that could burst out in one breath in an instant? Before the bed crossbow was improved, who would have thought that it would be possible to attack the enemy directly from two miles away? There are some things that we may not think are going to happen right now, but over time there are some things that are imaginary that will become reality. Can you imagine what would happen if we converted our Bronze Cannon's shells into bursting shells like Thunderbolts? What if the bronze cannon body was changed to one made entirely of iron or white steel? Not to mention the change of front-loading guns to rear-loading guns. Do you know why I've always put so much emphasis on these technological changes? Because when these technologies, such as hollow charge technology, large-scale steelmaking technology, and the latest developments in mechanism technology, are applied to the military, our weapons will become more powerful, but we only need a certain number of troops to be able to occupy the whole country. Moreover, at that time, we will no longer be afraid of problems with our generals, because the deployment of large-scale gunpowder weapons will bring about a large-scale logistical expansion, and once we control these logistical deliveries in the rear, the generals at the front will lose the ability to change chaos. Li Sheng babbled so much, and the more he talked, the more passionate he became. This is actually a dream that has been buried in his heart for a long time, and he himself knows that he can only see the dawn of this gunpowder age, but he can't see the agitation when gunpowder weapons completely replace cold weapons. Because he couldn't see this, he buried his mind very deeply. If it weren't for the fact that even Kong Ming questioned himself with some skepticism today, he wouldn't have said everything so quickly.

"Is this really possible?" At this moment, it was not that Kong Ming was a little skeptical, but everyone present at the meeting showed such expressions. Perhaps they were originally suspicious of Li Sheng's words, and they couldn't understand that Li Sheng didn't mint most of the copper transported from Luhan into coins, but minted them into artillery. You must know that all the copper needed for a cannon will be minted into coins, and I am afraid that it will be tens of thousands of dollars.

"Absolutely." Li Sheng nodded heavily, and whispered some news that only he and Luo Zhao knew: "In fact, our artillery is about to have further development -- the development of the ship gun withdrawal mechanism and the army gun carriage has been completed, and the military artillery charge standard has also been formulated. As long as our artillery is executed according to the standard, it can completely reach the artillery to a distance of three miles, which is already completely beyond the range of the bed crossbow. Research on flowering shells is also underway, and it is entirely expected that in a few years we will completely replace the bed crossbow with a copper cannon. ”

"And how many bronze cannons do we need?" Kong Ming slightly believed Li Sheng's words, but he began to calculate the amount he needed.

"About 10,000 2,000-pound fortress guns, 20,000 800-pound aviation guns, 50,000 400-pound army guns, and 50,000 200-pound light artillery." Li Sheng thought about it for a while and said.

"So we're going to cast 130,000 guns of all kinds?" Kong Ming's eyes widened: "How much copper does it have to consume?" He looked at Li Sheng with the eyes of a loser.

"Hey, that's just the scale that needs to be formed at the end. It seems like a lot, but we can take our time. Li Sheng chuckled indifferently at this: "We can use the copper mined in Luhan to directly process our cannons, that is, we can directly build an arsenal in Luhan." In the future, we used merchant ships to transport the guns of the Han Dynasty to Liaodong, and then completed the armament of the warships in Liaodong. ”

"Hmm...... I understand. Kong Ming nodded understandingly: "The lord's goal is not just in the country. Kong Ming sighed.

"That's nature." Li Sheng does not deny this, "I don't want to conquer the whole world, that's crazy." But my request is for us Han people to stand at the top of the world, to have the best life and the most support. To this end, we need to vigorously develop trade, workshops and armaments. Don't you think it's easier to get money from the sea than from the land? We have so much money at sea that I think we can wait for the right opportunity to announce a tax exemption on agriculture. ”

"Huh...... That's a good deed. Kong Ming was very excited about this.

"But that's all for later. What we need to do now is to take advantage of our current advantages and prepare us to occupy the highest position in this new era, which has already shown some hints. Li Sheng smiled at the incomprehensible light of everyone and said leisurely: "The next era is the era of the ocean." ”

"The age of the ocean?" For the new noun that Li Sheng popped out of his mouth from time to time at this time, everyone seemed to be a little numb, and they no longer cared whether they had heard this term before, but paid attention to what the meaning of this term was. They pondered Li Sheng's words, and suddenly came to a conjecture: "The lord is saying that we will pay attention to the affairs of the sea in the future?" ”

"That's pretty much it. After the treaty was signed, I think that in the next few years there will be a lot less large-scale conflict between us and Cao Cao and Sun Quan. As both Cao Cao and Sun Quan turn their eyes to the sea, the competition between us and them will gradually shift from land to sea. Of course, this is not to say that land disputes will become unimportant in the future, after all, the most important thing to dominate the world is to rely on the army. It's just that before the final battle comes, the turmoil on land will be much smaller than that at sea. Because both Cao Cao and Sun Quan saw through a little bit, the foundation of our prosperity lies in the sea. ”

"So ......," the crowd asked.

"So we're going to pay more attention to the Navy. The reconstruction of merchant ships, the armament of ship guns, the design of large warships, the design of escort ships, etc. There's a lot going on. Li Sheng smiled and narrowed his eyes, he groaned slightly, but he turned the matter to another position: "As for the affairs on land, it is mainly the arrangement of Liangzhou." I plan to put Meng Qi back in Liangzhou, and let him and Zilong discuss how to deal with the threat north of Liangzhou. At the beginning, the strategy I formulated to base ourselves on Jingnan, and to cross the two states of Jiaojiao and Yizhou, and to embrace Liangzhou has been completed. In the next stage, what we have to do is to come out and compete with Cao Cao and Sun Quan at sea, which is to take down the grassland for me. China is still at war, and until we unify the world, I will not allow any side forces to spy on our land, our people and our wealth, especially those Hu people on the grasslands. ”

"It seems like another burden for us." When Kong Ming heard Li Sheng say that he was still going to take the grassland, he couldn't help but stretch his voice and complained: "Your Majesty, can't you stop a little and let us really cultivate for a few years?" ”

"Uh...... This time is urgent. But I don't think there's a problem. Although there are more troubles, but Kong Ming, I remember that our income and expenditure situation has not deteriorated in recent years, and it seems to have increased a lot. Isn't it enough to sustain our little crusade with our money and food now? Actually, I don't want to do anything about the grassland, I just want to build a training ground there. Li Sheng smiled and said: "The first few times, because of the lack of combat experience of our own soldiers, we have a lot more, and we should not have losses. It was our mistake, and I didn't want to do that this time. ”

"In other words, does the king need a place where he can train his soldiers?" Kong Ming said in confirmation.

"That's right, and it's just a small rotation. No more than 50,000 troops were sent at a time, and the time spent on a training session was only a few months. I think we're perfectly fine with that. Li Sheng said indifferently. He didn't pay for it, and he didn't know how much it would cost him to bring it up at this moment.

"Alright then......!" Kong Ming slightly estimated the military expenses and the income of his own forces that his lord thought of for this method, and felt that it seemed to be within the acceptable range, so he agreed in one breath.

At this time, the staff officer Ling Xu Shu, who had been silent, opened his mouth to put forward his opinion: "Lord, I think it is necessary for us to further strengthen our investment in white clothes. Although the current white clothes are still very strong, but after the intelligence organizations on Cao Cao and Sun Quan's side have been strengthened, the white clothes have been a little difficult to obtain intelligence. I think we need to address this issue. After all, knowing each other and knowing oneself is invincible. ”

"Well...... This aspect! I think I'll leave it to Zhong Ming, you to be responsible. You're a professional in this area. I'm a layman who doesn't talk much. Li Sheng thought about Xu Shu's words for a while, and felt that it was indeed very reasonable, so he directly handed over the task to Luo Zhao: "You will do the matter, the money will go to Kong Ming, I only need the result." Li Sheng mostly uses this method on issues he doesn't understand.

"I understand......" Luo Zhao nodded calmly and took over the task given to him by Li Sheng. He was the head of intelligence, and how to maintain restraint was something he was already familiar with.

The meeting continued, but it was late. As a high-level meeting, not many people know what these people at the meeting talked about, and they can only guess the movement of Li Sheng's side from the several orders issued by Li Sheng later on the situation of the Tang Dynasty: Ma Chao, the overseer of Yizhou and the general of Shenwei, led 100,000 Yizhou troops to Liangzhou, and Li Sheng's explanation for this move was the rotation of the Yizhou Guards and the Liangzhou Guards -- this is a very high-sounding reason, and it is reasonable to say, but no one believes it. After the army was transferred, Li Sheng announced that he would travel to Jiaozhou. He said that he was going to Jiaozhou to play, and he also brought his wives with him, but both Sun Quan and Cao Cao believed that Li Sheng's move was to make a big move to his fleet.

"Keep an eye on the movement in Jiaozhou!" Cao Cao ordered loudly.

“…… Can't give me a moment to relax, I need to hand in the most detailed report of the state. For Li Sheng, Sun Quan is also very concerned.

For a time, a large number of spies were dispatched. Countless spies gathered in the city of Guangzhou, which caused the inspection yamen of Guangzhou city to have a headache about this, although they knew that most of them only wanted to get those so-called first-hand information, and it was unlikely that they would have any unfavorable actions against their own king, but the inspection yamen of Guangzhou still mobilized the naval army and marine battalion to help maintain law and order in the entire city of Guangzhou after consulting the Jinghai Governor's Mansion. Because Li Sheng wanted to directly disclose his actions, the inspection yamen could only monitor the guys on the list handed over to them in white clothes, instead of directly arresting them.

Due to Li Sheng's intentional or unintentional indulgence, his own actions in Jiaozhou quickly turned into paragraphs of text that appeared on the intelligence of Cao Cao and Sun Quan. Regarding Li Sheng's purely playful actions, although the spies also wrote it, they wrote it very plainly. After all, that kind of thing simply attracted the attention of Cao Cao and Sun Quan. As for those military-related things, the spies recorded them in great detail and presented them in front of the two kings of the north and the east:

“…… A new type of battleship was launched. Unlike the ships we've seen before, this is a pure sail battleship. Four masts and six sails, 60 zhang long, 12 zhang wide, 5 zhang high, 5 zhang under the water, 3 zhang 5 under the water, the deck is divided into two floors, there is no enemy building, the middle floor, it seems to be a pure bed crossbow as a means of attack warship, using a window partition type shooting hole, the upper layer is equipped with 46 heavy bed crossbows with 8 stone power, the lower layer is equipped with 30 medium bed crossbows with 6 stone power, and the single-sided attack point is 38, which is an ocean-going warship with a load of 1,500 stones. According to Li Sheng's meaning, this kind of warship will be used as the main warship of the second fleet of Li Sheng's navy. Li Sheng intends to divide his current navy into two parts, namely the East Ocean Fleet and the South Ocean Fleet. The Oriental Fleet is the existing fleet of Li Shengjun, commanded by General Gan Ning of Jinghai; The Nanyang Fleet, on the other hand, was commanded by a subordinate descendant of the Shi family named Shi Hong, and was equipped with the latest warships, that is, the pure sail warships mentioned above. Li Sheng meant to build the Nanyang Fleet with twenty pure sail warships, and declared that the first task of the Nanyang Fleet was to combat pirates in the Nanyang range......"

"...... fight piracy?" Cao Cao was slightly stunned by this reason: "Is it necessary for the regular army of a force to take some small thieves so seriously?" He looked at Jia Xu beside him in confusion.

"In general, it's not necessary." Jia Xu gave Cao Cao a positive and expected answer, but this answer is only the first half of the whole answer, and for Jia Xu, there is still a "but": "...... However, the key to Li Shengjun's prosperity now lies in the support of maritime trade in Jiaozhou. These fragmentary pirates had little effect on Li Sheng's regular army, but they were a mortal threat to Li Sheng's merchant fleet. You must know that the merchant ship itself does not have much combat capability. No matter how large a merchant fleet is, it is usually a dead end when it encounters pirates. Nowadays, pirates are raving, and the safety of the shipping routes is greatly threatened. Just as we must think about the safety of those families in our territory, Li Sheng naturally must also think about the safety of those merchants under Li Sheng. So...... It is not surprising that Li Sheng would have made such a decision. ”

"That's also ......" Cao Cao nodded and agreed with Li Sheng's statement: "Now it will be difficult for the descendants to have power." Cao Cao chuckled ill-willedly. Although it was not officially made public, it was no secret that Sun Quan supported those pirates to trouble Li Sheng. Cao Cao knew the power of Li Sheng's fleet, so he seemed to be looking forward to what fierce sparks would collide between Li Sheng and Sun Quan. "That's dazzling!" Cao Cao did so.

"Hehe, Sun Quan is in difficulty, and it is still a dilemma?" Jia Xu looked at Cao Cao's smiling face and said according to the meaning of his words.

"Huh? What's going on? Cao Cao was puzzled.

"Actually, Sun Quan, like us, received an official letter from Li Sheng-Li Sheng's side asked us to send people with Sun Quan to participate in the signing of a new covenant." Jia Xu said with a smile.

"A new covenant? Li Sheng won't be dizzy. It's just that he signed an alliance with Sun Quan, and he still wants to pull us in? Do they know that we have a hostile relationship with him, Li Sheng? Cao Cao couldn't imagine what Li Sheng meant, he groaned slightly, but asked Jia Xu: "What kind of agreement will Li Sheng and we sign?" ”

"A pact to unite the fight against piracy!" Jia Xu told Cao Cao with a smile: "Li Sheng said that pirates are like thieves on land, they belong to the kind that bite whoever they see." Their presence is a threat to the entire sea route, and for the sake of the sustainable and effective development of the three of us, we can also benefit from this ocean. He suggested that we sign a treaty to jointly exterminate pirates, and promised that if we signed this treaty, Li Sheng would provide us with new escort ship technology and bed crossbow products, so that our merchant fleet could have some resistance in the event of pirates. ”

"New escort ships?" Cao Cao was not very interested in bed crossbows, but he was very thoughtful about escort ships.

"Well, Li Sheng's specifications for us are as follows: 'County' class escort ship, with a combined oar-sail battleship type, five masts and eight sails, sixty-five zhang long, ten zhang wide, five zhang five high, two zhang underwater, three zhang and five on the water, the deck is divided into two layers, the middle of the deck has a spacious enemy tower, a window-partitioned shooting hole, equipped with fifty bed crossbows, twenty-five one-sided attack points, and an ocean-going warship with a load of 1,800 stones." Jia Xu saw Cao Cao's interest, so he quickly reported the information provided to him by Li Sheng.

"Hmm...... Except for the fact that the attack points of such warships are not as high as those battleships that Li Shengjun has just launched, the others seem to be stronger than Li Shengjun's new battleship. It's strange, why didn't Li Sheng keep this kind of good thing for his own use and transfer it? Cao Cao estimated, but became more and more confused.

"This ...... I don't know very well. However, according to my observation, Li Sheng really wants to announce this battleship as a concession. My lord, I think we should agree to Li Sheng's request. After all, compared to the Jiangdong side, we really lack large warships similar to this kind of escort ships in the navy. Jia Xu whispered to persuade Cao Cao.

"Hmm. You're right. Cao Cao nodded: "The era of competition on the sea is coming, in such an era, how can we be missing?" Since Li Sheng is so kind, take us and agree. Not...... Let's let Man Pet go and negotiate with Li Sheng. ”

"No!" Jia Xu bowed down to receive the order.