Huang Dagen was the only high-ranking member of the Perak Army who followed Ouyang Xuan to Diaoyu City - there were too many affairs under his control at the moment. Also accompanying Li Shuang was Li Kaipeng, Li Shuang's distant nephew. He was promoted to a mid-level manager in the Ministry of Commerce because of his outstanding performance in doing business with Qian Lu. This time, he did not accompany him on the trip, but after arriving in Chongqing on the same ship, he then took the opportunity to lead a team to Lin'an to inquire about information from North Korea and China. Due to the extremely delayed news of the closure of Shu, and the fact that Yu Xing and others deliberately blocked information from the Perak Army, the top brass of the Perak Army had no idea of the current situation outside Sichuan.
Li Kaipeng's mission in Lin'an was two-fold. One was to use business as a cover to collect intelligence information, and to take the opportunity to make friends with the ministers of the DPRK and China. They brought a large amount of money and belongings with them on this trip, as well as Ouyang Xuan's jacket and empty drink bottles. These two things were priceless treasures in the late Southern Song Dynasty; secondly, if the time was right, they would set up trade strongholds on the islands along the southeast coast. Collect political, military, and economic information while doing business, and even establish an armed guard. Regarding the requirements for stronghold construction, Ouyang Xuan talked a lot with Li Kaipeng. He not only introduced to him the locations of several large islands, but also focused on explaining to him the development direction and other related matters. The task Li Kaipeng accepted was extremely difficult, and the journey was long and the return date was uncertain. Therefore, Ouyang Xuan ordered Zhu Tiaozi to equip him with twenty flexible assistants, and he also took a platoon of elite guards from the armed caravan to accompany him. Of course, this amount of manpower is not enough to achieve a successful career, so Ouyang Xuan also authorized him to recruit businessmen and guards.
In addition to Li Kaipeng's team, there are also several firearms technicians accompanying this trip. They will disembark in Jiading Prefecture to guide Yu Xing's craftsmen in casting cannons. In fact, the Perak Army had sent cannon-casting technicians to Jiading Prefecture some time ago, but Yu Xing actually didn't want technology at all, he just wanted ready-made artillery and ammunition. In his expectation, Ouyang Xuan should ship a large number of finished firearms instead of sending a few craftsmen to deal with him. In particular, I heard that in order to cast cannons, iron-making furnaces and tools must be rebuilt, and the quality of iron and carbon required is extremely high, which is a lot of money. In fact, casting artillery and making ammunition required iron and money, but it was not too difficult for Jiading Prefecture's financial resources. You must know that among the Sichuan Song Army, the wealth of Jiading Prefecture is second only to Chongqing Prefecture. It's just that Jiading Mansion has long been regarded as privately owned by Yu Xing, and he is a miser, so he is willing to spend money there. Therefore, the quality control of the cannons cast by the Pili Army turned into a piece of paper when it came to the Jiading Prefecture.
According to Yu Xing's requirements, Jiading Prefecture's cannon castings should save as much as possible, keep everything simple, and try to use the tools and raw materials from the military blacksmith shop. What's even worse is that Yu Xing regards the cannon-casting craftsmen as lowly as slaves, which is in sharp contrast to the Pili Army's great respect for technical talents. The craftsmen are naturally unwilling to work hard. Therefore, although twenty artillery pieces were built, the quality was extremely worrying. Not only were the inner walls of the barrels uneven, but the thickness was evenly uneven. This kind of artillery needed to be recast in the Perak Army. In fact, the technicians sent by the Pili Army have suggested this many times, but Yu Xing listened. The cost of casting these cannons has made him extremely heartbroken. Do you want to scrap them and recast them? impossible!
Yu Xing ignored the dissuasion and forcibly installed the cannon into the army. Unexpectedly, the cannon exploded during the first test and several people were killed and injured, which made him very angry. On the one hand, he wrote a letter to reprimand Ouyang Xuan for his poor performance and asked him to compensate Jiading Prefecture for the losses; on the other hand, he ordered the Perak Army to transport finished artillery to atone for his merits. Ouyang Xuan excused himself because he had no finished artillery and the cargo fleet could not pass through Pengshan City occupied by the Mongolian army. Yu Xing was extremely unhappy but had no choice but to ask for skilled craftsmen to be sent again. In his opinion, the reason why the artillery exploded was not the reason for Jiading, but the poor quality of the craftsmen sent by the Perak Army.
The escort for this trip was an elite company of a navy brigade, which was equipped with two light artillery ships and four escort ships. In addition, it was also equipped with auxiliary ships such as picket ships and transport ships. According to Li Shuang, Lu Dezhi and others, Ouyang Xuan should not take risks at all. In their view, the Battle of Mahujiang proved that the Mongolian navy was no longer what it used to be, and following Niulin along the river to Chongqing was really dangerous. However, Ouyang Xuan had already decided to leave, so they had to tell Huang Dagen to select the ships and personnel. In short, the ships should have good guns and new guns, and the personnel should be able to steer the guns, maneuver the guns, and be able to fight in close combat and join gangs. In addition, they asked Dong Hu to draw the most elite platoon from the special battalion to accompany him, requiring personal protection for Ouyang Xuan. Although Ouyang Xuan is very busy, he never relaxes and exercises. He even often trains with soldiers. Whether it is long-distance marching, survival training or fighting, he is no worse than the special forces. He is especially familiar with water. It's just that Li Shuang and Lu Dezhi, as veterans, know best the importance of Ouyang Xuan to the Thunderbolt Army. In their opinion, any protective measures are not too much.
When passing Pengshan, the Mongolian navy in the city did not dare to take action at all, and did not even have the intention to do anything. However, they were still bombarded by the gunboat commanded by Liao Niluo who was accompanying them. In order to ensure the smooth passage of Ouyang Xuan's fleet through Pengshan, Liao Nilu dispatched all the gunboats in Xinjin City-including ten powerful heavy gunboats. With this blast of artillery, he not only sank most of the ships in the water village of Pengshan City, but also blocked the inlet and outlet channels that the Mongolian army had finally cleared. The docks, ship repair yards, water village fences and other facilities were also bombarded to pieces. fall. It seems that in just a few months, Pengshan City's naval forces will be unable to slow down.
When the ship arrived at Jiading Prefecture, Ouyang Xuan ordered a escort ship to wait, while Li Kaipeng took the other ships straight downstream, while he went to visit Yu Xing, pretending to be Huang Dagen's entourage. Huang Dagen came many times as an envoy of the Perak Army. Yu Xing accepted the property he brought many times, so he naturally recognized it. Although Yu Xing knew that the person in charge of the Perak Army was Ouyang Xuan, who was also the magistrate of Yongkang County, he had never met him. In the days before, Yu Xing had written many times asking Ouyang Xuan to come to Jiading to report on his work, but Ouyang Xuan always excused him by saying that the war was urgent. It only takes two or three days to travel down the river from Chongqing Prefecture to Jiading Prefecture, but the top brass of the Perak Army strongly opposed Ouyang Xuan's trip, mainly because they were afraid that Yu would rise up and take the opportunity to detain or harm Ouyang Xuan, and then annex the Perak Army.
Using the Hongmen Banquet to seize the power of subordinates is not uncommon in troubled times. Wang Kui, the prefect of Jiading before Yu Xing, was trapped and killed by Yu Jie. This Wang Kui was strong and cruel by nature, and he brutally tortured the people in order to steal money. The people in Sichuan complained about this and called him "Wang Yaksha". After Yu Jie entered Sichuan, Wang Kui always ignored Yu Jie and refused to obey restraint. Later, Yu Jie killed Wang Kui in the name of summoning him to discuss matters. After Wang Kui's death, Yu Xing took over as the prefect of Jiading. He later followed suit and killed several state and county officials who did not obey orders. It's just that the people Yu Jie killed were all cruel military leaders, while Yu Xing only killed people to annex territory and greedy people's money. This is why Ouyang Xuan asked the other ships to wait downstream. The artillery on these ships and the property carried by Li Kaipeng are both valuable. More importantly, the accompanying transport ship also has two heavy fortress guns and supporting equipment given to Diaoyu City. If the ammunition was discovered by Yu Xing, where would it be let go?
According to Su San'er, who has become the captain of Yu Xing's personal army, Yu Xing often instructs his subordinates to confiscate and detain the property of passing business travelers in the name of "tax inspection". This Su San'er was captured by the Mongols during the Battle of Chengdu, but was fortunately rescued by the Perak Army scouts. After he returned to Jiading Prefecture with Yu Xing, he was selected into Yu Xing's personal army because of his strong combat prowess. After the Perak Army occupied Xinjin City, Dong Hu established an intelligence network in the direction of Meizhou and Jiading Prefecture. On the one hand, Su San'er was grateful to the Perak Army for saving his life. On the other hand, he also hated the greed of Yu Xing and his son. Therefore, when the captain of the inner guard battalion who rescued him, Cheng Yu, approached him, he became an intelligence agent of the Perak Army without hesitation. . Now his intelligence network has more than forty people, covering various groups in Jiading Prefecture and Meizhou.
