The bells were ticking, the lights were dimming, and Nikolai's thoughts were surging: at the moment, Britain was already secretly competing with Russia, using its own means on the Far East issue, and it was impossible to help Russia build warships. Although France and Russia have gradually become closer, they are in the same bed with Russia on the Far East; They objected to Russia's eastward move in disregard of Germany's strategy, much to Nikolai's displeasure. Moreover, in the recent Battle of Dadonggou, the performance of the French battleship was not outstanding, and one French cruiser was lost in vain due to a power failure during the retreat. Even if the ship-building technology was fully introduced to France according to the original plan, the performance of its warships also made Nikolai have doubts in his heart. Although Italian design is among the best, it has been neglected by the world for various reasons.

Nikolai thought about it, but decided to give Cousin Willy a face. In any case, Germany did Russia a great favor in intervening and returning Liao; Without the accession of Germany, the strength of Russia and France alone would never be able to shake Britain behind Japan. It was also reasonable for Russia to return the favor by buying a battleship from Germany as a token of gratitude. As for the ambitions of the Germans to contract the entire Russian Far Eastern Fleet, it was enough to stabilize them for the time being. If the Germans' ships were indeed excellent, it would be better to order more - the decision is up to you, isn't it?

At this thought, Nikolai nodded slightly, and a smile appeared on his face. He looked at Qingying next to him and said, "Since you said so, little Etel, Shu Huang will consider it for the sake of your relationship with Cousin Willy." As long as your country's design is really excellent, our Russian Empire will definitely choose to purchase warships from your shipyards. ”

Nikolai's statement is to express his basic agreement with Qingying's words just now. Qingying's heart was slightly settled and decided to strike while the iron was hot; He took out a few pages of the paper in front of him, bound them into a stack of drawings, placed them in front of Nicholas II, and said: "During the few days I have been in St. Petersburg, the Royal Shipyard of our country has sent someone to bring this design drawing. It was supposed to be presented to the Emperor by our ambassador, but poor Mr. Rustle was wounded, so I offered it. This design was born out of the new type of battleship that will be launched this year, and represents the highest level of German shipbuilding. ”

Seeing that Qingying actually took out the real thing, Nikolai's brows couldn't help frowning slightly. He did not have the same profound knowledge of the navy as his cousin Wilhelm II, and he did not know anything about ship design. He coughed lightly and said, "Little Ettel, I don't understand this stuff. How about you wait a moment and wait for me to find a designer, and then we can talk about it? Seeing Qingying nodding, Nikolai picked up the microphone on the table and stirred the knob a few times; After waiting for a while, he began to babble to the other end of the microphone about Mao Wen, which Qingying didn't understand at all.

Ten minutes later, a spirited old man Maozi pushed open the door surrounded by the guards, he was dressed in casual civilian clothes, and was obviously called in a hurry from home. Nicholas II handed the drawings to the old man, instructed him to review them carefully in Russian, and then turned his head and briefly introduced Qingying in German: "This Mr. Lyshchenko studied in England and is currently in charge of the warship construction of the Imperial Navy, and is one of the few senior warship designers in the Russian Empire. If he reviews it, I believe that the results will be available soon. Qingying nodded slightly.

Under the bright light, old Maozi Leshchenko carefully looked at the drawings in front of him. As time passed, the expression on his face gradually began to enrich, surprised, ecstatic, hesitant, and puzzled...... Various emotions appeared on his face one after another, and finally mixed into a strange look. Seeing that Leshchenko only stared at the drawings for a long time and did not say a word, Nikolai was slightly impatient, and couldn't help but remind: "Mr. Leshchenko, what do you think of this design?" ”

Leshchenko glanced at the drawing with a complicated expression, but did not immediately answer Nicholas II; He turned his gaze to Qingying on the side, and said loudly as if venting: "With a power output of 17,000 horsepower, you only need such a small weight power unit?" Are you sure that enough stable redundancy was left and not moved directly from the protective cruiser? And this hull structure, when converted, only to account for such a small weight ratio of full load displacement is really big? You must know that this is a large armored cruiser with a full load displacement of nearly 12,000 tons, and those protective cruisers that are consumables are completely different things! Seeing Qingying's blank look, Lao Maozi reacted, and repeated it again in his extremely lame German, yin and yang.

Qingying wiped off the punctuation marks that Lao Maozi had rushed to his face, and then spread his hands and said with some displeasure: "Mr. Leshchenko, I am not a professional battleship designer, where can I understand these things you are talking about?" All I know is that Germany has always been known for its rigor and truth-seeking, and it will never do anything that is uncertain under any circumstances. This is the first regular foreign naval sales of the German Empire, and it is at stake in our national reputation of Germany, does Mr. Reshchenko think that we will do something fake in order to cater to our customers? ”

Qingying snorted and said, "All the subsystems on this design are all set up based on the battleships that my country just started construction last year; Using the power of the battleship on the cruiser is precisely enough redundancy! My father said that when your country receives a warship, if the power output is not up to standard, or if the strength of the ship's hull is insufficient, our shipyard will definitely return the construction fee with both hands, and will not charge a single mark. ”

Leshchenko's lips moved, as if he wanted to refute, but in the end he fell silent and did not speak.

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"Mr. Reshchenko, what exactly is this design?" Seeing that Reshchenko was still silent, Nikolai patiently asked him again.

After hearing the faint impatience in Nikolai's words, the old Maozi Lyshchenko didn't dare to hold it up anymore. He turned around, saluted Nikolai respectfully, and said in a deep voice: "Your Majesty, although I now have a hundred reluctances in my heart, I have to admit that if the Germans can accomplish this design index, then they will be at least two notches ahead of us in terms of technical level and design level. Even the British, and the French, who we want to learn from, can't compare to this design. ”

Hearing Leshchenko say such words, Nikolai's eyes showed a look of shock that could not be concealed. When Leshchenko was speechless before, he had already vaguely guessed in his heart that this plan must be extraordinary; But when Leshchenko gave this evaluation in an affirmative tone, he was still surprised and shocked in his heart, and he couldn't believe that it would be such an ending!

When it comes to Germany, 80 percent of people think of the country's proud precision industry, 60 percent think of football, 50 percent think of the two world wars and their formidable army, and few people associate Germany with the navy. Nicholas II was no exception. In his impression, although Germany has strong industrial strength, its navy has always been a second- or third-rate commodity that cannot be put on the table, and it has no other ability to do anything other than fiddling with some coastal defense warships floating in the coastal waters. Although the large iron ship they sold to Mites Qing last year performed well in the naval battle, Nikolai thought it was nothing more than a slaughter, and did not take it to heart. Therefore, when Qingying came to sell him the battleship this time, Nikolai actually only wanted to be perfunctory, if it weren't for Qingying's affection for his own family, he wouldn't have called Lyshchenko to come over. In his opinion, Cousin Willie's country is strong in the army and industry, how can it be possible to design a naval warship with superior performance?

But what people didn't expect was that the worst thing ended up being a completely different ending. After reading the design materials that Qingying took out, Leshchenko, who presided over the development plan of the navy, gave such a high evaluation; It's not just that it's above France, and even Britain, which has the world's first navy, is far superior! Nikolai was slightly dazed in his mind, and couldn't help asking: "What's going on, Mr. Leshchenko, do you know what the problem is?" ”

Seeing that Nikolai actually asked him about technical things, the look of surprise flashed in Leschenko's eyes, but he still said conscientiously: "Back to Your Majesty, I have just carefully looked at this design and found some key factors in the middle. In the field of artillery, the Germans are actually not stronger than us: the 210mm guns they are equipped with have a bullet weight of 108kg and a muzzle velocity of 780m/s, which is a very normal level, and the key is that I can't understand this power! On such a large armored cruiser with a full load displacement of even 12000 tons, it stands to reason that the power system should leave a lot of redundancy; But the power-to-weight ratio of the Germans' armored cruiser is about the same as that of our latest dome-armored cruiser, which is simply incredible! Is there such a big gap between our two countries in terms of technology in the power subsystem? ”

"Other than that, I can't understand the strength of this hull. 10,700 tons is the normal displacement of this ship, and it is about 9,800 tons when it is not loaded with fuel; With such tonnage, how did the Germans fit the ship with 8 210mm guns and 8 150mm secondary guns, and at the same time apply such a large area of armor? Damn, why do you only have a plane line diagram on this piece of paper, but no structural diagram of the internal parts and a schematic diagram of tensile and bending moments? If I had a complete set of drawings, I would have been able to figure out what the Germans were doing! ......" Reshchenko gushed as if he had opened a conversation, and for a moment the whole room was filled with his hoarse voice.

PS: Well, let's ask for some collections