In the blacksmith's room on the edge of the iron ore area of Huoniucheng, Li Chengzhou was pulling the air box hard, pouring the wind into the shaft furnace, trying his best to increase the temperature to the highest, the higher the temperature can calcine the impurities in the iron ore, so that the poured out molten iron can be purer.

The craftsman next to him flipped through the book: "What is this so-called 'coal'?" Seems to be a better fuel than charcoal. ”

Of course, Li Chengzhou knows what coal is, but there are no coal mines to mine now, but fortunately, there are many forests around it, which can provide a lot of charcoal resources, which can also barely replace the embarrassment of not having coal.

From the book, iron smelting is very simple, but in practice, it took a long time to build a shaft furnace, and the lack of coal is a problem, in short, there are many problems from the beginning to the present, and even judging the fineness of molten iron is a big problem.

But fortunately, there are abundant resources and a lot of open space. Only then did their shaft furnace become more and more mature, and once the iron was burned, it was replaced in another place to continue the experiment.

The surrounding Imperial Forest Army guards this place, on the one hand, to protect Li Chengzhou, and on the other hand, to hide this secret.

In this way, after six or seven days in a row, Fang Changge also settled down Tiemu City and rushed back with the soldiers.

On the way back, Fang Changge saw smoke near Huoniu City, and he could guess that it was Li Chengzhou who was studying iron smelting.

So he went straight to the place where the smoke was emitting, and Fang Changge found Li Chengzhou, who was dozing off and still pulling the wind box.

At this time, he did not have the image of an emperor, his hair was messy and dirty.

"The stove is going out!"

The craftsman who passed by found that the fire was gradually extinguished, and hurriedly added the prepared charcoal to it, waking up Li Chengzhou, who was dozing off.

Quickly pulled a few times, this was their most successful ironmaking in the past few days, and there was nothing wrong in the middle.

Li Chengzhou widened the fire, and when he turned around, he saw Fang Changge standing at the door.

"Uncle, you're here."

Li Chengzhou gushed endlessly, telling Fang Lao about the past few days, his eyebrows fluttering.

"This ironmaking will definitely succeed!"

Fang Changge looked at the young emperor distressedly.

"Your Majesty, you still have to pay attention to rest! When the body collapses, there is nothing! ”

"Knowing my uncle, I'll have a good rest! If there's something, just watch and deal with it. ”

Li Chengzhou cheered up and continued to make iron.

Fang Changge smiled and left here, if he could explore the right way, His Majesty should be very happy, right?

Fang Changge returned to Huoniu City and called Meng Biao and the officials of all sizes in the city.

Listen to them tell about what has happened in the past few days.

Everything is going in a good direction, the soldiers of the Fire Bull Battalion are training non-stop, the leather armor they need is being prepared day and night by the efforts of the people led by the craftsmen, and the woods are being cut down outside the city to measure the land.

Fang Changge encouraged them a few words, and then let them go about their own business.

Fang Changge and Meng Biao walked on the street, discussing the countermeasures after that.

"Should we now move towards the unresponsive Yan Sun, or should we find a way to subvert Ikezawa, who has shown favor to us?"

Fang Changge was always uneasy about Chi Ze's overtures, thinking that it was more reassuring to keep Chi Ze in his own hands.

Meng Biao thought about countermeasures: "This kind of thing shouldn't wait for Chengzhou to come out, let's talk about it together." ”

Fang Changge smiled bitterly: "This kid has been addicted to iron smelting recently, and when he gets better, the flowers will be cold, and even I think we have to start acting, because no one knows how long it will take for him to be there." ”

"Who made us elders? is an old bone, and he has to help fight the world. ”

Meng Biao didn't have any ideas, but if he had to choose, he would prefer to fight Yanyang first.

If you go to fight Ikezawa, you will make too many enemies, which will not be good for your side.

Fang Lao was worried that when he was fighting Yanyang on his side, Chi Ze would come over to beat him, and he would really suffer from the enemy.

Just as the two of them were walking aimlessly on the street thinking about it, a shadow guard stepped out in front of them.

"I've seen Taifu, Taiwei!"

"Chief Ikesawa is here, and we have snuck him in through the south gate."

The two glanced at each other, what was Chief Ikesawa doing at this time?

They asked the Shadow Guard to take Chief Ikezawa Crocodile to Fang Changge's residence.

When the crocodile saw these two, he bowed slightly: "I've seen two old men." ”

"Our people in the vicinity of Ikezawa in Tiemu City say that Tiemu City is very wrong, and people who come in and out are people who have never seen before."

"I thought about it, you should have taken over the management of Ironwood City, right?"

Fang Changge nodded: "Under our friendly persuasion, the whole city of Tiemu surrendered!" ”

It's one thing to speculate, but it's another shock to hear it from these two people.

"Even if Chief Ironwood is willing, Oak is willing? Can their commanders be willing? ”

"Haha, this doesn't have to bother Xiaoyou to worry about it, in short, they surrendered the whole city, leaving us with only the people in the Iron and Wood City."

Crocodile gasped: "You killed them all?" And that's all the people left? ”

Fang Changge stroked his beard, but he didn't refute.

"I walked all the way and found that you have so few soldiers, no more than five thousand, right?"

Fang Changge is not afraid of any tricks played by crocodiles: "To be precise, there are only 2,800 people who can go out of the city to fight, and there are 1,000 defenders in each city. ”

"No, I'm afraid there are 8,000 soldiers in Ironwood City alone, and with the new forces in the surrounding tribes, the total number of soldiers can reach 10,000, right? What about them? ”

"Disbanded, turn the army into the people, too many troops will only cause waste, it is better to turn them into the people, turn them into productive forces, it is very exaggerated for the ordinary people to be the army, and besides, you are not a warring state here, why do you want all the people to be soldiers?"

The crocodile heard these strange theories for the first time, but felt that there was still some truth to them.

"I won't go around the bush, I'm here to reassure you, and even if I can, I can send an army to help you oppress the hot sun."

Fang Changge couldn't understand this young man anymore, what was he thinking?

"What are you trying so hard to help me for?"

Crocodile smiled bitterly: "Didn't I say it, for the sake of freedom, in order to put my people in the hands of reliable people who can lead them better." ”

"I don't want to be so pressured to manage everyone in the tribe."

"When I learned that you directly subverted Tiemu, I knew that you had the real thing, so I was willing to come over to show my sincerity, but to really hand over Chi Ze to you, you still need to completely conquer the hot sun."

Fang Changge thought about it, this cheap ally, don't use it in vain, use it in vain.

"We're going to send our army to Yanyang in the near future, and you'll bring Ikezawa's army over to help when the time comes?"

The crocodile promised: "No problem, call me anytime you need it." ”

At this time, a shadow guard suddenly came to the door to report something, and the shadow guard leaned close to the room chief Ge and whispered something in his ear.