Zhang Fei was a little schadenfreude, and said to Guan Yu: "The eldest brother just doesn't listen to persuasion, he doesn't want to learn from the foolish father, and the children and grandchildren are endless." ”

Guan Yu persuaded him: "Big brother, can't you dig elsewhere here?" ”

Liu Ze shook his head, all the coal in Yangquan was hidden deep underground, shallow more than ten zhang, deep thirty or fifty zhang, and the place he chose was precisely the shallowest part of the nearby coal seam. Damn, if only there was an open-pit coal mine. I want to come to the largest open-pit coal mine in Shanxi in Pingshuo, but there is a long way away, in the Han Dynasty, where the transportation capacity is not yet developed, to Pingshuo coal mining is tantamount to a fool's dream, and the Huns plundered from time to time, Liu Ze gave up the idea of going to Pingshuo early on.

The next morning, the excavation workers came to report that there was a huge rock blocking the road on the excavation face, and I don't know how big it was, and it was impossible to excavate again. Liu Ze personally climbed into the cave (in order to reduce the workload, Liu Ze had a specific hole with a height of five feet, and he could only bend his knees to pass Guò), and a boulder in front of him was completely blocked on the working face, and there were no edges on all sides, and ordinary excavation tools could not do anything at all.

Liu Ze thought that modern coal mining uses explosives, but explosives were invented by Nobel, and the chemical name is **, which cannot be made at all with the current level of science and technology, and it also needs to be detonated with **. However, black powder is one of the four great inventions of our China, although the power is not as good as yellow explosives, but Sun Simiao in the Tang Dynasty can invent it, and the technical difficulty must not be high. Liu Ze checked the information and was overjoyed, sulfur, saltpeter, and charcoal are all ordinary things, and as long as the granular black powder with blasting function is made in strict proportion and according to the production process, everything is OK.

Three days later, Liu Ze ordered workers to dig a small hole with a diameter of one foot in the middle of the boulder, and then he personally went in to fill the small hole with gunpowder, and finally he lit a long fuse outside the hole. Everyone retreated to ten zhang away, watching the flames rush into the hole, no one spoke, only Liu Ze was tinkering around alone in the past three days, no one understood what he was doing, and they didn't believe that just that small bag of black things could break the boulder.

There was a loud "boom", and the ground under his feet trembled, and thick smoke came out of the hole. After the smoke cleared, Liu Ze sent someone in to see that the boulder had been blown apart, and everyone believed that the black powder made by Liu Ze was infinitely powerful.

Zhang Fei pinched a handful of small black particles and said, "Big brother, if this thing is tied to a person and exploded, it will definitely be able to blow up five horses and split the corpse." ”

Liu Ze said with a smile: "It's not just the five horses splitting the corpses, if it really blows up, at least it will have to be crushed." Liu Ze immediately thought of the future war, and the black powder he "invented" (Liu Ze couldn't help blushing a little when he thought of the word invention) would definitely be able to show his skills, but he must not leak the formula, this is an absolute secret weapon.

The progress of the work that followed was greatly improved, and when the first coal was pulled out of the mine a month later, everyone was cheering. Later, Liu Ze recruited nearly 100 workers and dug six mines at the same time, and a steady stream of coal was dug out from the depths of the mountain and piled up like a small mountain. Liu Ze arranged horse-drawn carriages to transport the mined coal to Quyang every day, and the vehicles came and went endlessly.

Seeing the normalization of mine production, Liu Ze decided to go back to Quyang to burn bricks and porcelain, and before leaving, he arranged the work of Yangquan Mountain to Hu Liu, the most stable among the men, and specially told him to pay attention to safe production, especially gas emission, ventilation, roadway support and the preservation and use of gunpowder.

Back in Quyang, Liu Ze immediately built a kiln to fire refractory bricks. When the refractory bricks were fired, they began to build kilns to burn porcelain. There is no difficulty in burning refractory bricks, and the ordinary gray brick firing process is basically similar, the difference is that the raw material of gray bricks is clay, and the refractory bricks are made of crucible soil. The difficulty of firing porcelain is much more difficult, and many craftsmen have never seen coal, let alone know how to use coal to make porcelain. All the work had to be done by Liu Ze himself, site selection, kiln building, billet making, painting, firing, and the first batch of blue and white plates out of the kiln, it was already in early October, heavy snow fell in the sky, and midwinter came suddenly.

Everyone looked at these orchids on a white background, and the exquisite plates were all dumbfounded, white as jade, thin as paper, bright as a mirror, and sound like chime, which were many times better than the plates and saucers used by people.

Liu Zeji hangs the Boy Scouts, seeing that the midwinter is coming, and the children are still wearing single clothes, I wonder how they are now? At the moment, the work of the kiln factory was arranged, and with more than 1,000 pieces of winter clothes and heating utensils that had just been sewn, accompanied by Guan Yu and Zhang Fei, he rushed to Phoenix Valley. It has been more than a month since he returned to Quyang, and Liu Ze was so busy with the affairs of the kiln factory that he was relieved that he had to return to Phoenix Valley when the kiln factory produced the first batch of porcelain.

In the snow, the children lined up in a neat queue, and under Guan Hai's powerful slogan, they walked in front of Liu Ze, as if they were being inspected by Liu Ze. Liu Ze was greatly moved, a few months ago, these children were still yellow and thin, weak and couldn't help the wind, and the queue was also chaotic, there was no order at all, I haven't seen them for a few months, these children have grown taller and stronger, neat pace, high-pitched slogans, showing heroism and passion, who said that the homeless people are cheap grass, can be trampled on at will, only give them the opportunity to exercise, they can also become the pillars of the country.

Zhang Fei nodded uncontrollably on the horse, and said: "This Guan Hai looks like my old Zhang, five big and three thick, I can't see that there are really two brushes, look at how these children practice in his hands." ”

Liu Ze waved at Guan Hai, and Guan Hai immediately trotted all the way to Liu Zema, and bowed his hand and said, "Lord." His title has been changed again, but Liu Ze is also very satisfied with the title of the lord, and he is now the commander of a thousand armies, and it is a little inappropriate to use a title like Gongzi. Thinking that the title of the lord was mostly used to address the princes of the late Han Dynasty, Liu Ze gladly accepted it.

"It's hard work."

"Serve the Lord, be willing to smudge your brains, and do not give up."

Liu Ze introduced Guan Yu to him, and briefly mentioned the matter of the three of them forming a righteous relationship.

Guan Hai clasped his fists at Guan Yu and saluted, "I've seen the second master." Guan Yu returned the salute. Guan Hai saluted Zhang again: "The third master is good." ”

Zhang Fei smiled and said: "It's not good, we went all the way over the mountains and mountains, slept in the open air, and almost didn't feed the wild wolves on Taihang Mountain, so you are at ease here." Hey, brother, I see that you have trained these children well, Kong Wu is powerful, can you train a mighty teacher for the eldest brother in a few years? ”

"Many of these children have the talent to practice martial arts, and they are diligent in training, and they will definitely be able to cultivate a team of Yum after a little vacation."

"Ziqian, that's all for today's training, the car behind is full of winter clothes, you tell someone to assign it, and everyone has a set." Liu Ze pointed to the materials in the car behind him and instructed Guan Hai.

Guan Hai was very excited, and said: "I've been waiting for winter clothes for the past two days, it has just snowed, and the weather is cold, I'm really afraid that the children will freeze." He immediately turned around and ordered the leaders of each group to come and bring back the winter coats of each group.

Liu Ze said again: "Ziqian, this time I brought dozens of stoves, one for each tent, this year there is no need to use firewood for heating, the fuel used for the stove is coal and stone, first unload a few cars, I will regularly let people send coal and stone here." ”

"Coal stone?" Guan Hai was slightly stunned, he had never heard of this thing. "Is it better than firewood?"

Liu Ze said with a smile: "This is not an ordinary good burning, the stove is burned with coal and stone to ensure that the tent is as warm as spring." ”

Guan Hai was immediately eager to try, Liu Ze waved his hand, and said, "Don't worry, it's time for lunch soon, let's eat first and then set up the stove." ”

After the change of clothes, it was almost three o'clock in the afternoon, and it was just time for lunch, and the men had already put the food on the big table. Today's lunch is two dishes and one soup, carrot stewed beef, cabbage stewed vermicelli, egg soup, the staple food is dough cake, completely according to Liu Ze's previous recipe, each person has a wooden plate, carved out of four grooves, the size and depth are equivalent to the coarse porcelain bowl, just hold two dishes, one soup and staple food.

This dinner plate Liu Ze didn't have when he left, Guan Hai said quite complacently: "Back to the lord, the big porcelain bowls used before were coarse porcelain, one per person, and each person had to serve dishes and soup several times during the meal, which was quite inconvenient and a waste of time." Seeing that the valley was surrounded by large trees, his subordinates thought of making a wooden dinner plate that could hold all the meals at once. When his subordinates were in their hometown, they had learned carpenter's skills for a few years, but they recruited more than a dozen carpenters to cut down dozens of trees, in addition to making some wooden dinner plates, they also made dozens of cases, and sealed the valley mouth with a wooden fence, leaving a door, and prohibiting free entry and exit. ”

Liu Ze came in just now and found that the valley mouth had been sealed with a fence, but he never thought that Guan Hai had done it himself, nodded and said: "I am very relieved to think of it thoughtfully. ”

Zhang Fei grinned and said, "Brother Guan, you have this skill to support your family, why do you still go to the business of robbing the house?" ”

"When I was at home, I ran a carpentry shop, but I didn't have to worry about food and clothing, and then the county came to a Taishou, and he levied and extorted taxes, and he had to collect taxes. Guan Hai said that he was helpless when he talked about the past, no one was born to be a thief, the officials forced the people to rebel, and the people had to rebel.

Hearing this, Guan Yu nodded frequently, and Liu Ze couldn't help sighing.