Zhou Qingfeng took a fancy to a logging yard outside the city of Dashan Beizi. This lumber yard is across the river from Ekhkulen, near the city's ferry, and is open and easily accessible. It also has a large area of mountains and forests, and it is a good industry.

However, due to the lack of metal tools, the output of the lumber yard is limited. Dashan Beizi was willing to exchange it for Zhou Qingfeng's house. However, Zhou Qingfeng did not move immediately, he also faced a huge problem of food, and he couldn't do anything without enough food.

Food scarcity is a common problem throughout Liaodong, and malnourished people are everywhere. In this era, it is a miracle that a person can live peacefully to adulthood, because even the emperor's heir dies at every turn.

Faced with the dilemma of food shortage, the Han people relied on water conservancy construction and intensive cultivation to obtain a stable source of food. The Jianzhou Jurchens are also trying to find ways to develop farming, but places like Ehekulun are full of deep mountains and old forests, and they all rely on fishing and hunting for a living.

The trouble with fishing and hunting is that the food source is very irregular. In summer and autumn, there is a lot of food in the wild, and it is slightly easier to gather and hunt. But in the spring and winter, when food is scarce, you have to rely on reserves to get by. If you don't have reserves, either starve to death or go out and grab them. The reason why the barbarians could not develop was because of the bad environment and lack of food and clothing.

After curing Dashan Beizi's injuries, Zhou Qingfeng got some food paid by the other party. In fact, it is some jerky, smoked fish, wild fruits and the like. The rudimentary technique of firing pottery was clicked, and the wild Jurchens of the entire Ekhkuren were full of praise for these pottery, but they couldn't trade much of the goods.

In a slave society with low productivity, everything is lacking.

At present, Zhou Qingfeng's situation is to temporarily stabilize his position in Ehekulun, but he can't eat enough and can't starve to death. Old Man Sun specially reminded him that if he wanted to spend the winter in Ekhkulun, he had to take advantage of the fact that he was desperately hoarding more food in the wild. Otherwise, when the mountains are covered with heavy snow and the rivers freeze in winter, it will really starve to death.

"Zhou boy, I asked you to change more Jurchen slaves who can fight. You must know that going out to hunt also requires territory, you can't beat others, and you don't even have a place to hunt. When you first arrived at Ekhkulen, Guna attacked you in the wilderness, thinking that you were there to rob him of his territory. "Old Man Sun didn't listen to the old man, and he complained in front of him.

Abahai also reminded Zhou Qingfeng: "Our food can only be said to be barely enough to eat, but it is definitely not enough to survive the winter." Fifteen slaves can eat and drink enough to give us a headache, and if you recruit people and expand indiscriminately, we won't be able to save our own lives. Not only food is needed to survive the winter, but also clothing and firewood, which are lacking.

Even in Hetuala, many frail slaves would freeze to death and starve to death every winter. That's why I warned you a long time ago that the days in Ekhkuren will not be too easy, and now it will be September, and in October the weather will be cooler, and in November it will snow. At most, you only have two months to store food and firewood.

There is another thing, I asked the slave at home to inquire about Chu Ying's news. In addition to sending people to keep us from escaping, that guy is desperately expanding his power. He borrowed 500 men from Utcha for training, but he didn't know how to manage his minions.

It's autumn now, and Chu Ying's life can still be maintained. But as soon as winter comes, everyone is short of food, and I am worried that he may come to rob us when he runs out of food, what will we do then? ”

This is the harsh reality. Everyone is poor, everyone is short of food, and there is no way to trade goods, and the only way out is to rob. It is no wonder that every winter the Central Plains regime is worried that the ethnic minorities in the north will go south, and they will not be able to survive if they do not go south.

"Ugh......." Zhou Qingfeng scratched his head and said, "It seems that we can only expand the army." ”

"What?"

"My plan remains the same, I want to expand the army." Zhou Qingfeng gritted his teeth and said: "I am an outsider, and I will definitely not win if I go to grab land and hunt with the natives of Ekhkulun, and it will cause conflicts." I finally managed to get along with the nobles in the city with medical care, so it would be better for them to collect food, and we would like to find a way to expand the army.

I bet Chu Ying thinks the same way as me now, regardless of mastering an army first. When winter comes, we will rob whoever has food. Otherwise, even if we have food, what are we waiting for others to come and rob us? ”

Abahai and Old Man Sun were stunned and couldn't refute it.

"Old man, you help me let me out, I want all the slaves in the city who can speak Chinese. I can help people heal their wounds, and I can also sell pottery, so it should be no problem to feed a hundred people until the winter. ”

"Wait until the beginning of winter to start fighting. I have to feed my men and train a militia, and then take them to loot and grow through the winter. Maybe you'll be able to leave the hellish place of Ehkulen. ”

"If you want to expand the army, you may be able to barely sustain yourself, but there will be a shortage of armor. The weapon can only be a spear, which is the cheapest. It's just that the spearhead must be made of iron, otherwise there is no way to fight at all. But even an iron pot is a treasure in this hellish place, and the lack of iron tools ...... really a headache. ”

"And the armor, the iron armor is hopeless, it can only be the leather armor. The furs in the city should not be expensive, so exchange them for pottery. I'm going to think about how to make leather armor from fur. ”

"Also, you have to build the city alone, so that you can attack and retreat, so that you can have a place to rest. It just so happened that we exchanged his lumberyard outside the city with Darshan this time, and when the manpower was all there, we built a small fortress there. ”

"I also need blacksmiths, carpenters, builders, and other skilled workers. Ekhkuren doesn't look like a place where there are these people, and it seems that I have to guide it myself. But damn it, I don't know that myself. ”

Zhou Qingfeng said a call as if talking to himself, and said all the difficulties he could think of, which sounded like a big scene. Abahai couldn't help but ask suspiciously, "Can you do so much in two months?" Is it in time? What if it doesn't work out? ”

"When hunger is at its peak, cannibalism happens. It is not possible to live without armed forces, but without armed forces, it is definitely dead. We just need the ones that aren't the worst, and I'm sure it's time. Zhou Qingfeng pondered for a long time, and then asked Old Man Sun: "Old man, is there an iron mine near our Ehekulun City?" ”

"Iron ore? There are some open-pit iron ore stones, but the quantity is very small. Moreover, no one in the city knew how to make iron, and Ucha tried to make his own mine several times, but in the end he failed. I wanted to go to the border of the Ming Kingdom to trade, but there was no edict, and I was still blocking the unreasonable Jianzhou Department in the middle, so I could only find a way to rob other tribes. Old Man Sun said.

"It's okay if the quantity is small, and I don't want to make it in large quantities, just get some gun heads. I can make pottery, and if I find a way to raise the temperature of the furnace, I should be able to make iron. Zhou Qingfeng pondered for a moment, and felt that he really couldn't get some metal from the isolated island of time and space. There are a lot of fine steel bars in the ruins of the collapsed buildings, which is better than any iron.

Zhou Qingfeng planned for a long time, worked hard to be self-reliant, and worked hard to start a business. Abahai, who was just watching coldly, only sneered and said, "Actually, you don't need to be so troublesome. ”

"What's your better idea?" Zhou Qingfeng asked rhetorically.

Abahai snorted twice, "I am the concubine of Jianzhou, and the Great Khan loves me the most." Chu Ying stared at the two of us and couldn't escape, can't we let go of the wind and go to Hetuala? Let the Great Khan send someone to redeem me, and then you will have everything you want. ”

"You want Nurhachi to send someone to save you."

"Even if you don't send someone to report the news, the Great Khan will send someone sooner or later, does it make a difference? You might even be able to make some money. Abahai tilted his head and tried to pretend not to care, "At least let the Great Khan send my personal maid and clothes or something, it won't hurt you, right?" ”

It's just that Zhou Qingfeng said unceremoniously after thinking about it: "You go to Chu Ying for this matter, if he agrees, I naturally don't object." ”

"You ......." Abahai's face was bulging. How could you ask Chu Ying about this? She could only come to beg Zhou Qingfeng, after all, she couldn't command Zhou Qingfeng's servants. But Zhou Qingfeng wisely did not agree, which made Abahai leave unhappy.

Regardless of the whimsical Abahai, Zhou Qingfeng felt that the most important thing was to rely on himself. He arranged the current priorities, and felt that the most urgent thing was to get the iron forging thing done. And after affirming that Zhou Qingfeng was going to engage in large-scale steel smelting, Old Man Sun was also quite supportive.

"Zhou boy, where are you going to put the iron-making place?"

"Naturally, it's out of town. First, I don't feel at ease with the wild Jurchens in this city, and second, it's easier to get fuel outside the city. ”

"Yes, it's better outside the city. Are you going to use the lumberyard in Darshan? ”

"yes, I'll have to build a few rooms first."

"To build a house, you have to cut wood, you have to process wood, and you need tools."

"Tools, I'll take care of it."

"If you have the tools at hand, it's easy to do it, just ask Dashan Beizi to borrow some slaves."

Old Man Sun took the order and left, and Zhou Qingfeng took a few slaves out of the city to inspect the lumber yard. It was a riverbank clearing with a few logs piled up and a few huts for slaves to rest. He asked the slaves to clean up the lumber yard first, while they hid in a resting hut and entered the space-time island to find some tools.

Fire axes can be used to chop wood. Shovels, shovels, and hoes used to clean up garbage in schools can be used to dig trenches and dig up soil. Tape measures, pencils, and paper are used for drawing, designing, and recording. Although the number of these tools is too small, it is better than nothing. The most important thing is that there are all kinds of miscellaneous books in the library of the technical school, and Zhou Qingfeng found a book from it: how to make steel by local method?

Old Man Sun was busy recruiting people for Zhou Qingfeng, and was even responsible for management. Zhou Qingfeng planned the lumber yard as his temporary fortress, and at the same time had to learn how to build a soil blast furnace? It is not enough to have a blast furnace, but also to have forging processing capacity.

The old man watched him write and paint, and he had been reading books, and he came up curiously and asked, "Zhou boy, what kind of book are you?" ”

"A book of steelmaking?"

"Why are you reading this book?"

"Because I don't understand."

"Ah......., don't you know at all?"

"I really won't."

"You don't know how to start doing it, that's a lot of guts!"

"Alas, sharpen the gun in battle!"