The sun was setting, and the sky was dark.

Zhu Jun stood on the bank of the river, looking at the raging river, on the other side of the river, is the brightly lit Burmese royal capital Ava, the rolling waves and the towering city wall blocked Zhu Jun, but also blocked the last trace of hope of Nanming.

The former kingdom of the Celestial Empire is now just some walking corpses begging for Gou An in the villages outside the city. The magnates in the royal city of Burma knew that the Ming Dynasty was over, a new dynasty was rising in the north, and hundreds of thousands of Manchus would rule over trillions of minions.

This is the shame of the Han people, what is more shameful is that their Yongli Emperor not only did not have the courage to resist, but also did not wait for the Qing army to enter Yunnan, he fled into Burma like a panicked dog, the moment he stepped into the border of Myanmar, the Han people have no hope, the Ming Dynasty that once dominated the world, the Ming Dynasty that swept Mongolia in the north gave up everything created by its ancestors, gave up its people, and there is no possibility of turning the tables again.

Everything is about to change, Zhu Jun stands on the bank of the river, watching the waves of the river crashing against the riverbed.

Emperor Yongli is no longer the son of heaven who escaped, although everyone did not notice it, but when they suddenly woke up, the whole world would be turned upside down, every night after the crossing, Zhu Jun tossed and turned, finally, he woke up, since this era chose him, then whose luck should it be, and whose misfortune should it be. A huge plan began to emerge in Zhu Jun's mind, and then the whole plan began to be continuously refined and extended.

Fight! Zhu Jun's blood burned, for himself, but also for the 9,000 remnants who were displaced to Myanmar behind him, and for the trillions of people in his mother country.

"Your Majesty, it's cold at night, so let's go back and rest early." Mu Tianbo's old voice came from behind him.

Zhu Jun didn't move: "Mu Aiqing, I ask you, is there still hope for Daming?" ”

Mu Tianbo's expression was gloomy, and he was silent for a long time and said: "The old minister said something heart-wrenching, please don't blame the emperor, Nurhachi can raise troops with thirteen pairs of armor and thirty people, crisscross Liaodong, and then seize my Daming country, so why can't we Han people?" ”

"Your Majesty, you need to know that people will win the sky, things are man-made, no matter what decision the emperor makes, my Mu family will receive the emperor's favor, even if it is a sea of swords and fires, it will never be negative."

Mu Tianbo's voice became a little excited, he found that since the emperor came back from this hunt, he had completely changed, he always sighed in the past, but he was thinking about his own life, and he didn't take Daming to heart at all. But the emperor in front of him was thinking about how to get rid of the control of the Burmese, thinking about letting the craftsmen make bows and crossbows, and even asked himself if there was still hope for the Ming Dynasty.

Could it be that the heavens are immortal? Or did the emperor suddenly open his mind and no longer care about his personal life and death?

Zhu Jun turned sideways, in the night, the thin figure still looked calm and calm, and he sighed softly: "Mu Aiqing, let's go back." ”

In front of Zhu Jun's thatched house, there were already two figures rubbing their hands and waiting anxiously, only to hear a stout figure say: "Brother Li, did you say that the emperor took advantage of the excitement to talk to us casually, and at night he forgot about the imitation of the bow and crossbow." ”

The thin figure snorted: "Don't talk nonsense, you don't joke, the emperor called us here, let's wait here." ”

The stout figure scratched his head: "That being said, the eunuch at the door said that the emperor was not in the house. ”

"Xu is the emperor has something, let's wait." The thin figure glanced at the little eunuch guarding in front of the hut, swallowed his saliva, and lowered his voice: "Brother Chen, is the eunuch called casually?" It's okay for our brothers to talk in private, how can you say it blatantly, be careful of being cut out of your tongue. ”

"Haha, I still have to say something in private, come, tell me about it." In the darkness, a figure gradually revealed, and Zhu Jun took a step and approached the two of them with a loud smile.

"Long live the emperor." The two hurriedly saluted, they were the two craftsmen Chen Sanxi and Li Tieda during the day, and Zhu Jun asked them to come at night to get samples of steel crossbows.

"Let's go, follow me into the house, I will have a place to borrow you in the future, don't be so polite." Zhu Jun smiled and greeted the two casually.

After entering the house, Zhu Jun casually handed over a delicate and small steel crossbow to Li Tieda's hand, Li Tieda squinted and carefully held the steel crossbow in the palm of his hand, his fingers gently stroked the texture and stitching of the steel crossbow, and his face was blue and red for a while.

The steel bow plate is fastened with iron rivets to another iron plate made into a flat-bottomed "U" shape, which is tightly clamped around the wooden arm and riveted with iron pins.

The bowstring is made of multiple strands of ox tendon and silk thread, two feet eight long, nearly three points thick, and the two ends are tied outside two iron rings. When winding, you only need to put the iron ring on the round tube at both ends of the bow plate with a little force, which is very convenient.

After hanging the string, the bow is two feet nine feet wide, the crossbow arm is two feet long, and the total weight of the bow and crossbow is less than fifteen catties, which is very light.

The crossbow arm is made of five inches thick and eight large, and it is made of dry yellow wood. The entire bow arm is delicate and smooth, and each corner is transitioned in a circular arc. There are three three-and-a-half-width arrow grooves on the upper plane of the crossbow arm, and an iron stirrup is installed at the lower end of the front to step on the foot and pull the string. A square hole of an inch long was dug in the front end of the crossbow arm and under the arrow groove in the middle and rear of the crossbow arm, and a magnet polished into the rectangular body was tightly pressed into the hole. The front end of the crossbow arm is equipped with a crosshair made of thin iron sheets, and a thick iron plate with a groove in the middle and a card iron plate that can be raised and lowered are erected at the back, and a gap about a minute above the iron plate is opened as a lookout mountain. In front of the handle bent at the back of the crossbow arm, an elastic iron suspension knife (trigger) is mounted for easy firing, and a steel jam iron is exposed above. There is also a lock on the side of the crossbow arm of the hanging knife, as long as the lock is dialed, the hanging knife cannot be fastened, which is safe and practical. The middle of the bowstring, two feet and four lengths, is clamped on a string support that is square in the front and the width of the crossbow arm, and arcs at the back and extends out of each side of the crossbow arm for one inch as a handle. A thin sheet of steel with an extremely elastic arrow pressure is also nailed in front of the string holder, which can firmly hold the shaft loaded into the groove. Once the bow is hooked up, one or three steel arrows can be shot from the bow arm slots, or several three-inch steel nails. The steel parts fit tightly and evenly, but they are extremely flexible and polished to a smooth and shiny finish.

"Your Majesty, this is a sharp weapon, the villain has been making a crossbow for twenty years, and he has never seen such a skillful hand crossbow, let alone such a smooth material, a good thing!" Li Tie let out a sigh, and the harazi was about to flow out.

"I asked you if you could make a replica." Zhu Jun asked.

Li Tieda replied very simply: "No." He continued, "The rest is easy to say, but the little man of such a good steel has never seen it, and it is necessary to imitate this kind of crossbow unless it can be forged with such smooth steel." ”

Zhu Jun nodded, after all, it is a steel crossbow brought by modern times, and he doesn't expect to be able to imitate the exact same, but this kind of crossbow doesn't know if it can be replaced by steel from this period, but he has seen the steel refined in this era, the best steel knife is the one inserted in Zhang Youde's waist, the hardness is basically just a little higher than ordinary iron, Zhu Jun can be sure that if you take this kind of steel knife to cut people, I am afraid that before you cut people down, the blade will be rolled.

Using this kind of inferior steel to make crossbows made Zhu Jun unwilling, and he thought to himself: "Even the steel made by the soil method during the Great Leap Forward is probably many times harder than these scrap steels." ”

"By the way, I have an idea." Zhu Jun clapped his hands, although the hardness and elasticity of the steel smelted during the Great Leap Forward were not enough for the standards of that era, but for the late Ming Dynasty hundreds of years ago, it was a first-class good steel, and the hardness alone was at least several times that of this era, and this steelmaking method was simple to make, only needed to build a small blast furnace with clay and bricks, and the weapons made of this steel were at least several times better than ordinary swords.

"Does the emperor have an idea?" Li Tieda asked cautiously, his palm constantly rubbing the steel crossbow in his palm.

"I have a way to make steel, but I can't say it for the time being, now we are still outside Ava City, wait one day to go to southern Myanmar, you first bring this steel crossbow back to study its structure, then I will naturally come to you, as for Chen Sanxi, you will accompany Li Tie to play imitation steel crossbow for the time being, but the craft of making muskets should not be left behind, and I will use it in the future." Zhu Jun restrained his smile, and remembered the current predicament, and he didn't know if the king of Myanmar would agree to go to southern Myanmar by himself, if he didn't agree, even if he knew the method of steelmaking, it would be useless. Thinking of this, my heart became melancholy again.

"The villains will definitely not disappoint the emperor, take a good look." Li Tie thumped his chest.

In the next few days, Zhu Jun was much more honest, and every day he summoned some officials to the hut to chat, and from their mouths he tried to extract some information about the living habits and manners of the former Yongli Emperor, and he showed his own feet.

In Ava City, the Han general Zhou Chubai is very busy, since receiving Zhu Jun's "Phantom Swallow Sitting Map", he is sincerely willing to do the migration to southern Myanmar for Zhu Jun, what he is looking forward to is the benefits after the fact, after all, he is an emperor, the emaciated camel is bigger than a horse, and it is enough for him to pluck the hair out at will, and he has only eaten a few lifetimes of Luo Dixiu, who went to a foreign country to eat for a few lifetimes, and he gave a famous painting worth thousands of taels of silver as a gift alone. Would it be good to do this for him?

Fortunately, Zhou Chubai has been mixed in Ava City for so many years, but he has made friends with a few Burmese officials, and after some accommodation, he followed them into the palace to meet the King of Burma, Myanmar is a small country, naturally there is no such grandeur as the Heavenly Empire, some ministers close to the King of Burma brought someone into meet the King of Burma, and the King of Burma has also seen Zhou Chubai a few times, and his impression of him is quite good, so after the palace guards reported, they checked Zhou Chubai's body and did not bring any weapons, so he let him in.

Wang Mangda, the king of Burma, had a calm face on his face, and his pot-bellied body was half leaning on the throne, listening carefully to the dialogue with Emperor Yongli relayed by the Han people, and his face smiled from time to time, laughing.

"This is nothing more than the kingdom of the Heavenly Dynasty, Yongli this kid pretended to be garlic with this king when he entered Myanmar, and wanted to make a condescending posture, but he didn't expect to give the manchurian ass urine flow."

"What the king said is extreme, Yongli's kid was embarrassed at the time, and repelled the truth he said to the villain, it seems that this escaped son of heaven is really worthy of his name." Zhou Chubai laughed and joked about Yongli, and the Burmese king Wang Mangda laughed again.

"Look, the king, whether to answer their request, this Yongli is also a poor man, I heard that in order to save his life, he fled for thousands of miles non-stop, and finally arrived under the jurisdiction of the king.

The king of Burma nodded thoughtfully: "This guy is indeed a trouble, the Manchurians kept sending envoys to use Annan to ask the king to hand over people, but Li Dingguo in northern Myanmar is not easy to bully, he still has tens of thousands of subordinates, if the king hands over the people, Li Dingguo may want to find trouble with the king, most of the ministers also think that the Ming Dynasty is orthodox after all, and advise the king not to hand him over to the Manchurians." Since he still wants to escape, then let him go to southern Burma first, and when the time comes, he will sail out to sea, and it will save the king from being sandwiched at both ends and not being a good man. ”

"The king is wise." Zhou Chubai flattered, he couldn't imagine that things would go so smoothly, and he couldn't wait to immediately put on his wings and return to Zhu Jun to report the good news and receive the reward.

"You go and tell that boy Yongli that this king agrees to his request, but for their safety, this king will send a general with a team of men and horses to accompany him to protect them."

It's nice to say, the accompanying protection is just accompanying surveillance, Zhou Chubai thought to himself. However, his task has been completed, and it has nothing to do with him whether he is accompanied by monitoring or accompanying protection, so he only promised a few words, and slapped the king of Burma with a few words, and then retired.