When the battle between Zheng Zhilong and the Dutch was over, a small sailing ship returned to Fujian, and thirty or forty people came ashore looking depressed, and two of them even knelt on the ground and wept bitterly.

This group of people was the eleven shipowners and some entourage that Su Buheng released when he traveled to northern Taiwan. The news quickly spread to Ishii, and some shipowners even went to Ishii to cry to Zheng Zhilong.

Zheng Zhilong was so angry that he broke the teacup on the spot, he fought with Hongyi people for a long time, and his feelings were all done by Shandong.

But soon, Zheng Zhilong calmed down coldly, suddenly sighed, and said to the servant: "Go and call those guys, there is something to discuss." ”

A few days later, even Zheng Cai, who was sitting in Xiamen, arrived in Shijing. Eighteen Zhi arrived for the most part, except for those who died.

"Things have turned out so unexpectedly!" Zheng Zhilong took a sip of tea, "So far, we haven't grabbed a single ship, not only have we broken some manpower, but they have robbed eleven ships. As you know, he was defeated in the Battle of Changping, and he was very angry. ”

"Now that the court is urging a shipwright, how is this good?" Zheng Zhilong asked, this is the most disturbing thing, the imperial court actually asked for 20,000 shipwrights, and they were all transferred to Shandong.

"Big brother, we can't grab the ship, because there are too few of their ships, there are so many boats coming and going, either the speed is too fast, or they are dispatched together, it is really not easy to rob, unless most of our warships are dispatched, if we want to grab their ships, we will be able to capture them." Gan Hui's face was not very good-looking, "Big brother, we might as well go north and rob their port." ”

"." Zheng Zhilong patted the armrest, "We are now an official army, if we rob the port, wouldn't we have fallen into the trap, if we really make a big fuss, the court will inevitably ask." ”

"What can the court do with us?" Gan Hui asked puzzled, and couldn't help but wonder in his heart, didn't the eldest brother not have much interest in the imperial court before?

"What can the court do with us? It can kill us! Zheng Zhilong said sharply: "At that time, we gave him Zhao Yan's justifiable excuse, how can he resist from the land army?" ”

"Big brother, this Zhao Yan has become a climate." Zheng Cai shook his head and said, "He is strong on land, and if he competes with us, he will already be invincible." ”

At this time, Li Guozhu said: "According to the report, Zhao Yan has a strong artillery in his hand, and there are two shipyards in Denglai, Shandong, one in Qingdao and one in Longkou, both of which are well defended, and at the same time there is another shipyard in Songjiang, which is also full of heavy artillery. In the same way, if we give them shipwrights, they will surely build many ships in a few years. ”

When Li Guozhu mentioned this, everyone was moved, and they all realized the seriousness of the matter.

"He also built a piece of land larger than Shandong in 'America', and even grabbed more than a dozen warships in America." Li Guozhu found out the news everywhere, and many crew members of the Shandong Navy came from Fujian, which also made Zheng Zhilong's intelligence work much easier.

"America? How did he get through it, thousands of miles away? Zheng Cai asked in surprise.

"This man has a lot of ambitions, and he set his sights on thousands of miles away when he was young, and at first he sent four warships that he had snatched from the Hongyi people, and when he got there, he plundered them on a large scale, although there were few warships, but they could often defeat stronger opponents." Li Guozhu continued.

"It's hard to deal with! Their ships were all snatched by the Hongyi people, and they were much faster than ours, and if there was a fierce battle between the two sides, they could fight it, but they could outrun it. Shandong has rich people again, and when they build warships, they will fight stronger and stronger. Zheng Zhilong said distressedly.

"Big brother, little brother thinks that those shipwrights can drag it if they can, and they simply don't give any of them." Gan Hui waved his hand and said, "Then we can form an alliance with the Hongyi people and deal with him together." ”

"No, Zhao Yan is not afraid of fighting at all, he can afford to lose, but we can't afford to lose." Li Guozhu clearly understood the situation, "If we lose at sea, we will lose everything, and if Zhao Yan loses, it will not hurt the bones at all." ”

"It's a big deal to go back to sea." Gan Hui said indifferently.

Zheng Zhilong suddenly looked at the roof, this room is made of high-grade wood, the roof tiles are glazed tiles, and there are a few skylights bought from Shandong.

In this stone well, the magnificence of this Zheng family's mansion has surpassed the imperial palace, although it is not as grand as the imperial palace.

The atmosphere suddenly became quiet, Zheng Zhilong shook his head half-loudly, this body of glory and wealth, he couldn't let it go, "Send someone to talk to Zhao Yan!" In the future, the two sides will go their own ways and will not interfere with each other. ”

"Big brother."

"Big brother, are we going to give up the benefits of sea trade to others?" Zheng Cai exclaimed urgently, and everyone was unwilling. Shi Daxuan said at this time: "This Zhao Yan's momentum is too strong, I'd better not offend, Zhao Killing Star is not in vain, if he wins the power in the future, what will happen to me?" If there is erosion today, there are too many variables, and Zhao Yan has more elite soldiers and horses than the officials and soldiers from all walks of life, and it is very likely to gain power. ”

"Besides, to negotiate peace with him, it is not to give up the benefits of sea trade, he Zhao Yan relies on nothing more than strong ships and artillery, and we don't have it, he can make artillery, and we can do the same. Therefore, as long as we keep forging ahead, if he loses ground, we can beat the water dogs. Shi Daxuan continued.

"What Da Xuan said is extremely true." Zheng Zhilong nodded with satisfaction, and then asked Zheng Cai, "How old is nine years?" ”

"Back to the eldest brother, there are only 13 million taels, and Ben's business is not good." Zheng Cai replied, feeling a little weak, guarding Xiamen is a fat poor, and he can embezzle a lot every year. This year, due to the fact that business is not doing well, there are still 23 million taels in the account, thanks to more than 3,000 merchant ships in Fujian.

This thirteen million taels is still a surplus, not including the expenses of the 100,000 sailors. The expenses of these 100,000 sailors were as high as seven or eight million taels.

Zheng Zhilong is in Fujian, a merchant ship has to collect an export tax of 3,000 gold, and if more than 3,000 merchant ships go to sea, there will be 90 million taels.

Of course, this is impossible!

First of all, under such high tax conditions, there is a greater risk in trade, so not all ships go to sea every year.

At the same time, there are some small boats, and the export tax will also be reduced.

At his peak, Zheng Zhilong was able to earn 50 million taels a year, and he was absolutely rich enough to rival the country. Of course, this is a group, and the profits will be divided step by step, because Zheng Zhilong himself is a pirate, and his surname is difficult to change, if he does not use gold and silver, this group will only collapse.

As for Liu Xiang and Li Kuiqi, the required conditions are too high, and Zheng Zhilong can't meet them when they betray, or they are unwilling to be subservient.

Over the course of a year, most of the profits earned will go into the pockets below, and less than half of the silver will be collected.

Sometimes the sea trade will also be affected, for example, when the governor of the sea ban, the profits earned that year will be reduced, although Zheng Zhilong is domineering, but with more and more comfortable words, he does not dare to easily offend the government.

"Bring out one million taels and send it to Denglai, just say that it is to celebrate the victory of General Jianwei." Zheng Zhilong thought for a moment and decided.

"What about the boatsmith?" Zheng Cai asked.

"Drag, don't give." Zheng Zhilong said without hesitation.

…… Before the Chinese New Year, Zhao Yan summoned people in Zhaojiabao to discuss, and the content of the discussion was how to spend the silver, and at the same time, there was also the issue of internal adjustment.

In terms of adjustment, starting from next year, commercial banks will no longer touch sales, after all, this part is too cumbersome, and there is not much profit to be made.

The commercial bank was changed to the Industrial and Commercial Bureau, which was managed by Zhao Quan, and only controlled the six major fields of smelting, textile, glass, maritime trade, salt, and banking, and the three industries of smelting, textile, and glass were only responsible for production, and all sales were handed over to the vendors. Except for the monopoly of the textile industry, glass manufacturing, maritime trade, and salt drying, smelting and banks do not monopolize. Other industries with similar profits but not large are all sold out and no longer interfere in operation.

Militarily, the original Denglai Army was changed to the Shandong Army, and the second-line corps of Yingzhou and Handan were changed to the Liaodong Army, with the strength of the Shandong Army being 55,000 and the Liaodong Army being 40,000.

After continuous expansion, the Shandong Army has three infantry battalions, two cavalry battalions, two artillery battalions, one cavalry artillery battalion, one engineer battalion, and one baggage battalion.

Each infantry battalion had 8,000 men, pikemen 1,500 men, musketeers 2,000 men, artillery 1,000 men, rocket corps 200 men, baggage corps 2,000 men, sappers 200 men, scouts 300 men.

The cavalry battalion was the largest in size, and since there were enough horses, it doubled in size, reaching 8,000 cavalry in each regiment, but half of them were still training and could not be on the battlefield for a while.

In cavalry combat, the most important thing is not horsemanship, but discipline and formation, as long as you rush up and form a neat formation, you can defeat the enemy with superb horsemanship in a thousand miles.

This is like the difference between one chopstick and multiple chopsticks, it is easy to break all the chopsticks one by one, but it is difficult to break these chopsticks together at once. If the cavalry is not disciplined and formed, it will be very loose, and very loose, and it will be very easy to be attacked.

Therefore, the requirement for cavalry is not how high the riding skill is, as long as the riding skill reaches a certain level, the main requirement is whether the formation can be maintained during the battle, plus the discipline and will of steel. The newly recruited 8,000 cavalrymen obviously have not yet reached that level, and they will have to train for another half a year if they want to go to the battlefield.

The artillery battalion has been expanded to 3,000 people, equipped with 10 200 mm howitzers, this heavy gun weighs 1,000 kilograms, can fire 15 kilograms of shells, and has a range of 3,000 meters, 15 kilograms of shells can sweep the enemy within a diameter of 10 meters, and because the shells are too large, the barrel is designed to be short, and the firing range is only 3,000 meters.

It is a psychological weapon, a weapon used to fight the will of the enemy and boost the morale of one's own side. The actual killing effect is not as good as that of light artillery, so there are only 30 guns. The Germans once built a 'Paris cannon', which was moved by railcars and could shoot shells into Paris on the front line. But it turns out that the psychological weapon is too exaggerated and does not have much effect, it should be that the cost is too high, the surname price ratio is very low, and it is not convenient to move.

There were also 300 kg 125-mm cannons, another version of the 125-mm cannon of the Navy, which was designed for siege purposes. The barrel is half shorter, and the effective range is only 500 meters, because the army does not need artillery to attack the city so far, because the Manchu artillery does not have so much, even if they have Hongyi artillery, the artillery battalion can use howitzers to knock it out first, and then advance to 500 meters to bombard the city wall.

There are 220 300-kilogram 125-mm howitzers with a firing range of 2,000 meters, which is 800 meters more than the 150-kilogram 75-mm howitzer, and its lethality is greater.

The artillery battalion must be stronger and more fierce than the infantry battalion in terms of firepower, otherwise there is no point in existing, which is a kind of formation that can assist the infantry or break away from the infantry. Because the infantry battalion has its own artillery, it does not necessarily need the fire support of the artillery battalion, and there is no such strong requirement for the mobile surname of the artillery battalion, which also allows the artillery battalion to bring heavy artillery into battle, once they bomb the enemy, they will definitely bring nightmarish thunder to the enemy, and at the same time can be competent for siege tasks.

The cavalry battalion has 1,000 people, and it is still equipped with 100 75mm howitzers, which is the first to be mobile!

Engineer battalion 2000 people.

5,000 people in the baggage battalion.

The Shandong Army has a total of 55,000 people, complete and well-equipped.

Liaodong Army, four infantry battalions, two cavalry battalions, and two artillery battalions, one cavalry artillery battalion, one engineer battalion, and one baggage battalion.

7,000 infantry battalions, 1,500 pikemen (originally 3,000), 2,000 musketeers (1,800), 1,000 artillery (200 guns), 200 rocketeers, and 2,000 baggage troops.

The cavalry battalion has 5,000 people, and it uses inferior military horses, and its mobility and durability are worse than those of the first-line cavalry troops.

3,000 people in the artillery battalion, 1,000 in the cavalry battalion, 2,000 in the engineer battalion, and 5,000 in the baggage battalion.

The Liaodong Army has a total of 40,000 people, and in addition to horses, the equipment is the same as that of the front-line troops, and the logistics support is also the same, and the training is inferior to that of the Shandong Army.

The Liaodong Army was separated from the Yingzhou Regiment and the Handan Regiment, and was no longer under the command of the Yingzhou Regiment and the Handan Regiment, and was directly incorporated into the combat corps and would be put into the Liaodong battlefield.

After the adjustment of the establishment, the baggage battalion was expanded. Each battalion had its own baggage troops, while each corps had a baggage battalion.

The baggage troops of each battalion were responsible for carrying the food, grass and ammunition of the battalion for twenty days, while the baggage battalion was responsible for carrying the whole army for a month's supply.

Because the battalion's baggage troops had to keep up with the troops' march, there were more people and fewer with them. The baggage troops of the entire army carry more things, generally hoarding supplies somewhere, and then sending them to the battlefield in batches, of which 3,000 are elite soldiers, used to defend the area where supplies are hoarded.

It will definitely be too late to reload rifled guns, and the production of rifled guns will have to wait until after the beginning of spring. Due to the application of bullets in the meter, the long-range advantage of rifled guns makes rifled guns have application value, if they can only shoot 300 meters, the combat surname of the smoothbore gun can actually be better, because the smoothbore gun has a faster rate of fire, and it is not easy to distinguish which one is better.

In addition to the defensive troops, the Shandong Army and the Liaodong Army were stationed near Longkou, and Longkou became a closed military area, and no one was allowed to approach it, only waiting for the spring to launch an attack on Liaodong.

If Hwang Tae-gil does not attack Korea in the spring of next year, then the military headquarters will adopt the 'B plan' and directly attack the city and seize land in Liaodong.

(To be continued)