All the officers secretly pouted, and said in their hearts, "Can your fellow mountain people compare with us?" Isn't this a stumbling man? After these few days of getting along, I also know that this foreign woman with amazing force value has a lot of tendons, and she never beats around the bush, not deliberately sarcastic.

Lian Zining casually asked someone a few questions, and sure enough, the answers were very appropriate, he was satisfied, and said with a smile: "Everyone, follow me to a place, how much can the strength of our Wu Yijun be improved, but they all land there!" ”

Everyone looked at each other, and they didn't know what Lian Zining was selling, so they all went out with him, and a group of people got on their horses, and galloped towards the south of the city surrounded by their own soldiers.

It didn't take long for him to leave the city and arrive in front of a very large manor. The area of this manor is huge, the width of the front wall alone is hundreds of steps, and the courtyard wall built is more than two zhang high, with battlements and arrow towers on it, and there are people constantly walking and patrolling on it, which looks no different from a small castle.

At first glance, you can tell that it is the mansion and manor of a wealthy local family.

The people in the manor had already been informed, and at this time, a group of people were already waiting outside, and when they saw Lian Zining and others coming, a middle-aged man wearing a staff shirt led the crowd to kneel down, and said in unison: "Grass people Liu Huateng (...... Knock on your lordship! ”

"Hey, Liu Yuanwai is polite, please get up." Lian Zining hurriedly got off the horse, helped Liu Huateng up, and said with a smile: "Outside Liu, the official got your letter, so he immediately rushed over in a hurry, but you want to give the official a surprise?" ”

Liu Yuanwai bent down and smiled: "I will definitely not disappoint the adults!" ”

The attitude is humble, but the words are full of confidence, and obviously they are very confident about their own things.

Lian Zining was no longer verbose, and a group of people entered the manor, which was really a huge area, first of all, there was a large square, but there were blacksmith shops on all sides, and the sound of tinkling iron kept coming, sparks splashed, and it looked very lively. There is a number of hearts, and I can't help but smack my tongue, there are hundreds of blacksmith shops here!

With such a huge scale, how much will be produced in one go?

In fact, this Liu Huateng is the largest steel merchant in the land of the six counties, and all the farm tools, scissors, kitchen knives, spoons, keys and even iron needles in the land of the six counties, but everything that is stained with iron is basically produced by his family. Although salt and iron have always been monopolized by the state, but in the Ming Dynasty, this article had long been liberalized, and the people had to consume so many iron products a year, couldn't they all be made by the imperial court? How many craftsmen does the imperial court have to raise? Does the Ordnance Bureau still want to build weapons? Sharpen your kitchen knife every day! So this iron ban has long been opened.

The Liu family goes to the iron mine in Jiaodong every year to buy ore, and then smelts and builds it themselves, and sells iron products to the people, and even sells them overseas - take the iron needle as an example, this kind of thing that is absolutely indispensable in ordinary life, in fact, the technical content is quite high, and in East Asia in this era, except for the Ming Dynasty, no country can build this gadget! The iron needles used in this book, North Korea, and even Southeast Asian countries are imported from the Ming Dynasty, and a package of iron needles can be exchanged for the same weight of silver when you get it.

What a huge profit? Therefore, it is not surprising that the Liu family is rich and strong, of course, it is far from being able to deal with officials and businessmen like Lian Zining, but in the entire six counties, it is also a big family that can be counted.

Lian Zining also handed over the weapons needed to be built by Wu Yijun's costume change to the Liu family this time, 8,000 people need to change their clothes, this is an out-and-out big deal, the amount involved is calculated in 10,000 taels, and the Liu family also attaches great importance to it.

Lian Zining just planned to let them make this money.

In fact, he did this, not only for convenience, but also to win over these squires—the turmoil of the previous student tide could not have been solved so easily without the great help of the squires. Since they are working so hard, Lian Zining naturally can't be treated badly, in fact, this time he handed over this big business to the Liu family in order to send a signal to the squires in the land of the six counties: Follow me, I won't treat you badly, and it is only a matter of time before you get rich.

This has also had an effect, and there have been a few families who have come to knock on the side in the past few days, do you need any service from us?

The oppression of power is only a temporary expedient measure, and the use of a chain of interests to connect everyone is the fundamental and long-term policy.

"My lord, here, the things you want, a few samples have been created, hardwood, steel, all the materials have been prepared, as long as you can see it, we can build thousands of them in one day!" Liu Huateng said with a smile.

Lian Zining nodded, and the group of people followed Liu Huateng to enter the innermost blacksmith workshop, but it was different from others, it was very wide inside, and it was very clean and tidy, the ground was made of large bluestone slabs, and the four sides were divided into small compartments with half-human-high stone slabs, and each of them was placed in this big anvil, and there were one or two young men who looked like apprentices tinkling and banging there.

Liu Huateng pointed to an old man with gray hair but still tall and burly in the crowd who greeted him, and said to Lian Zining: "My lord, this Master Yang is the most skilled master here in the grass people, and everything you want is made by him." ”

Then Master Yang hurriedly said that he didn't dare.

Liu Huateng retreated from the others, and the group walked inside, and when they turned the corner, they entered a spacious small courtyard, and Master Yang entered the house, and soon held two things, looking at his appearance, it was very laborious.

Two things, one is a spear, and the other is that everyone is not quite sure what it is, it looks a bit like a spear, but it has a large axe on the head, and a sharp hook on the back of the axe.

The spear was incomparably long, it looked no more than two feet and five feet long, and its thickness was less than an inch, and it was black and heavy from beginning to end, and it seemed to be made of iron, and it looked extremely solid. Everyone was a little surprised, these professors, they also all knew that after this overhaul, the main weapon of the military formation was this spear, you must know the length of the spear, but they didn't expect that it was cast in iron! How heavy is that? Pick it up?

Lian Zining took the spear from Master Yang's hand, and his hand sank slightly, but it was not very heavy, he nodded, and looked up and down carefully. This spear is very beautifully made, the whole body is slender, like an enlarged horse lance, the body of the spear is dark, about two zhang long, at the length of two zhang, is a fist-sized ball, and above the ball, is a five-foot long blade. The blade is sharp on both sides, shining with cold light, and you can see that it is extremely sharp at a glance.

Lian Zining shook his wrist, and the tip of the spear shook out a ball of spear flowers, and then shot out like a poisonous dragon out of a hole, stabbing fiercely on a big tree in the corner of the yard, Lian Zining didn't use much force, but the tip of the spear was more than half a foot long, and its sharpness was self-evident!

"Good marksmanship, my lord!" Liu Huateng said with a smile on the side: "My lord, this spear is two feet five feet three inches long, with a diameter of eight points, the blade is made of pure iron, and the body of the spear is a white ash pole selected, scraped and dried for three days, and the outside is wrapped with a layer of iron sheet. The whole gun weighed nineteen and a half pounds, of which nine pounds were made of iron. Look, my lord, is it still easy to get along? ”

Lian Zining nodded: "This thing is playing well, and the official is very satisfied, but I don't know how much it costs." ”

After that, it was passed on to the officers behind them, so that they could try to weigh it, Qi Wei took it first, gestured it in his hand, and said excitedly: "My lord, this spear is really good, much better than the one we used at the beginning, our spear is made of wooden poles, and it was cut on it with a sword, and it broke in a few strokes, and now it is wrapped in a layer of iron outside, and the solidity has increased a lot." ”

This spear is the main weapon of the Wu Yi Army, which is about to be redressed and reorganized. In all dynasties, the infantry phalanx used to deal with the opponent's light and heavy cavalry, its main weapon was the spear, and because the armor of the heavy cavalry became thicker and thicker, the impact ability became stronger and stronger, and the infantry became more and more unable to resist, so the spear became longer and longer. In sixteenth-century Europe, the spear was taken to the extreme, and in the Swiss phalanx of this era, the general length of the spear was about seven meters, and in a few decades, even eight and ten meters of spears appeared.

There is no doubt that the longer the spear, the more effective it is to resist the impact of light and heavy cavalry, but the longer the length, the heavier the weight, the more inconvenient it is to operate, and the spear is made of wood after all, which is too long and easy to break.

So after Lian Zining and Qi Wei discussed, they chose a compromise length - two zhang five feet three inches, about eight meters and one in length, and the outside was wrapped with a thick layer of iron sheet, which also greatly increased the degree of solidity. And the weight is not a problem, nineteen and a half pounds, which is completely within the range of bearing.

Even the officers behind Zining looked at it in turn, and they were also amazed, this kind of long-grown killing weapon, everyone really had never seen it before.

Liu Huateng said with a smile: "But let the adults know that all the ash poles of this spear are not the best, only the middle and lower, but they are less than five years old." Coupled with the price of wrought iron, plus the cost of manual labor, the more this number is for a spear! ”

He stretched out three fingers: "Three, two, seven dollars!" ”

"Three, two, seven." Lian Zining nodded, this price is already quite kind, if you build it yourself, the cost is estimated to be more than double this, as for the idea from the imperial court, don't even think about it.

He picked up the weapon that looked like a spear and an axe, weighed it, turned around and smiled, "What do you guess this is?" ”

Everyone shook their heads, and Lian Zining smiled: "This thing is very famous in the West, called the Swiss halberd." ”

"Swiss halberd?" Everyone listened to it in a foggy way.

(To be continued)