How big is a country? This can be seen from the weather forecast, some countries take a long time to forecast, and they can only forecast the weather in the provincial capital, if the same standard is used, while in some countries there is only one sentence, there is rain in the whole country, and then it is over.

In June, the weather in the south was hot and dry, but the Yangtze River basin was very unusually flooded this year, flooding countless areas, arable land, and houses, and the loss of land increased sharply in an instant.

Compared with the south and center, the weather in the north is much more stable, there is neither the heat of the south nor the floods of the center, but the atmosphere here is extremely tense at the moment, and even the air is filled with the smell of gunpowder.

Wang Sirui, who had been replenished with arms, had begun to gradually disdain to maintain the status quo of the current situation, so Wang Sirui, who had just completed his deployment in Shengjing, began a series of actions.

And this set of combination punches made the Japanese a little confused, and even the Japanese didn't know, what should they do next?

At the beginning of June, the troops of the five divisions of the Han Army, which had already arranged the defensive line, began a large-scale reconnaissance of the Shengjing area.

In the Scouts' ranks, it is always possible to see several soldiers writing down something on a piece of paper whenever they go. That's right, they're making a map of the proposals.

According to Wang Sirui's order, they must complete the exploration of the area within 100 kilometers around Shengjing within half a month, and they must know how many villages, rivers, and mountains there are in this circle within 100 kilometers.

At the same time, Wang Sirui ordered the workers in charge of mining the ore to make small moves, first of which there was a large-scale leave incident, which seriously affected the normal mining progress.

The original four mines were able to extract at least 2,000 tons of raw ore per day, but after the leave incident, the amount mined per day was directly reduced by half.

The Japanese only have the right to supervise but not to decide, so they can only go to the Shengjing General's Mansion again and again to protest, hoping that the new Shengjing General Zengqi can intervene and ensure the speed of mining as much as possible.

The Japanese even made even more frantic demands, asking the Shogun's Office to agree to the Japanese mining of the other two mines, and this time, the mining personnel, they will be transferred from the Korean side, that is, the supervision and management of the two mines are all in charge of the Japanese.

The price that the Japanese had to pay was a rent of 1,000 taels of silver per month for each mine.

For the Japanese proposal, Zeng Qi, who had already received Wang Sirui's instructions, naturally refused, and bluntly told the Japanese that he would persuade the people to take as little leave as possible and resume the normal mining progress as soon as possible.

Despite Zengqi's assurances, the workers' leave of absence intensified in the following days, with the combined output of the four mines reaching less than 800 tons.

And the reasons for those miners who took leave also made people smile bitterly, what kind of sows in the family should give birth to piglets, the daughter-in-law wants to go back to her parents' house for a few days, he has to accompany him back, and so on.

After several days of reduced production, the Japanese finally found a trace of abnormality, and the Japanese were not stupid, they quickly linked Wang Sirui with this matter.

In Huaxia, who else can make General Sheng Jing so obedient? I'm afraid that in addition to their imperial court, only Wang Sirui, who will help Zengqi to the throne of General Shengjing, can do it, and Wang Sirui represents the imperial court, although he doesn't believe it very much, but this is the truth.

And Wang Sirui's previous series of actions in China also made the Japanese very uncomfortable.

With the compromise of the various feudal officials in the country, the progress of the plan for the Japanese to instigate them to go north to attack the king has never been satisfactory.

The Japanese hoped that the powerful governors of the Qing Dynasty would unite and go north to attack the king, forcing Wang Sirui to transfer the troops deployed in the Shengjing area back to Guannai for defense, so that they could mine more ore.

And even if Wang Sirui wins, then this war will probably bring at least a year's buffer period to the Japanese, and with this year, the ore that Japan transported back from Shengjing is enough for them to build several or even ten battleships.

Similarly, if Wang Sirui loses, it will naturally be better, and then Japan can even take more mining areas from Shengjing without much effort.

However, to the disappointment of the Japanese, the powerful governor did not break out, and the old man just wanted to watch. And the governors of those protrusions are all governors in remote areas and have no strength. Just relying on them, it is very difficult to put pressure on Wang Sirui if they want to go north, and even whether they can go to the capital is one thing.

The Japanese way didn't work, and then Wang Sirui's second move of the combination punch came out again. The drivers who transported the ore also began to find all kinds of reasons to refuse the transportation, and if there was no way to refuse, they could only delay the transportation.

The journey that would have taken two days to get there, they dragged it out for three days, or even four days.

To add insult to injury, because of the last overload of transportation, the Japanese had to be forced to change a cargo ship to take over the transportation.

In the same way, the Japanese were worried that Wang Sirui would control these ores at any time, so they accelerated the speed of transportation, so it was naturally a common thing to overload something.

This time the Japanese brought in a large cargo ship with a full load of 5,000 tons, and when the ship left the port, it was loaded with a full 7,000 tons of ore.

The overload has lowered the ship's waterline a lot, and his speed has also been greatly affected.

The most unacceptable thing for the Japanese was that the draft dropped due to overloading, and the captain of the ship was careless, and on the way home, the cargo ship deviated slightly from the established course and hit a reef on the bottom of the sea.

And because of the loading of thousands of tons of ore, the hole that was knocked open was frantically invaded by the sea, and in the end, only five of the dozens of crew members on this cargo ship were rescued alive by other Japanese cargo ships passing by.

Overloading is a lethal existence for modern technology, let alone a Japanese cargo ship based on wood? If the engine could be made of wood, it is estimated that the Japanese would never use a single shred of steel on a cargo ship.

The result was so tragic that dozens of Japanese sailors sank into the sea with thousands of tons of ore.

On the other hand, production at four mines continues to decline, not because there are too many people taking time off, but because too many people quit. The Japanese even quietly found the miners who had quit their jobs and offered to raise their salaries, but still no one agreed to go back to work.

If the Japanese didn't know that this was Wang Sirui's ghost behind his back, then the Japanese would have lived in vain for so many years.

At the beginning of July, after a month of fighting bravely and secretly, the Japanese finally lost their breath.

For Japan, there are only two options in front of them now, either they will just admit it and abandon the mining area in the Shengjing area, but in this way, Japan's ore reserves will fall, and the ore shipped back from Hubei will also lead to high costs.

Moreover, it takes at least a week to transport ore from Hubei to China, plus loading and unloading the ship, and it can be done in four days at most.

Obviously, the Japanese do not want to give up the benefits they have already made.

The Japanese were left with one last option, to forcibly take control of the mines despite the opposition of Britain and other powers, and then mine them on their own.

On 1 July, three and a half divisions on the other side of the Yalu River were ready, and the 4th Division, which had come to support, sent a company of infantry and a company of artillery to support the front.

However, there was no expression of excitement on the faces of the soldiers of the Fourth Division, and one by one they were a little listless, as if they were declaring their dissatisfaction to their superiors in this way.

"Doctor, I'm having some diarrhea, give me some medicine." A soldier ran to a makeshift field hospital and spoke to the doctor as he packed his bags and medicines.

Since there were no large number of enemy troops deployed on the opposite side, at the same time as the commander of the Second Army, Lieutenant General Obaogong, gave the order to cross the Yalu River, they began to pack their things and prepare to cross the river with the troops.

It's just that what he didn't expect was that the latest order had just been issued from above, and it stands to reason that the field hospital should be the most quiet place, but now, it is full of people, and the hospital is even more crowded and lively.

All kinds of strange causes, diarrhea, suddenly blurry eyes, weakness in hands and feet, headaches, etc., all the reasons they could think of were thought of by this group of soldiers.

"Baga, I don't have any more medicine here for you, you must get out of here quickly, and then cross the river with the large army." The doctor, who had been a little dizzy by the Japanese soldiers, reprimanded him harshly.

"How can you fight if you are not feeling well? Are you going to let me go to fight the enemy with my stomach and pants of? The soldier immediately retorted.

"Bastard, you don't have any problems at all, cowards, you cowards, how can there be a group of you in the Great Japanese Empire?" The doctor said angrily.

At the beginning, he was quite serious about helping these people check their bodies, but then more and more people came to see the doctor, and the results of the examination were the same, no one was sick.

"If you stay here and don't leave, I don't mind giving you a ride!" At the gate of the hospital, the commander of the Second Army, Ao Baogong, stood there with a gloomy face, holding his own gun in his hand, and he was very dissatisfied with the performance of these soldiers of the Fourth Division. (To be continued.) )