Chapter 042
People always grow unexpectedly.
The same is true for Cheng Shijie. When he was Zuo Qianhu, he always rode in a car. It wasn't that he didn't want to ride a horse, but his butt was too big and the saddle couldn't fit at all.
But over this period of time, Cheng Shijie has lost weight. Although he still has a belly, his double chin has disappeared and his weight has dropped to less than 200 pounds. However, he is tall and does not look so fat anymore.
The most important thing is that when he was fat in the past, he would feel very tired after traveling more than 200 miles from Dengzhou to Zuoqianhusuo, but now he doesn't feel tired anymore.
He led more than 2,000 military households, including their family members, totaling 4,000 to 5,000 people, and he felt like he was the king of the mountain. Speaking of Sun Yuanhua, the governor of Denglai, he was really courageous.
Speaking of the establishment of the Ning Navy, they did not send any supervisors or even an accountant, leaving it entirely to Cheng Shijie.
It's just a pity that Sun Yuanhua was dealt with by the court during the Wuqiao Mutiny. To be fair, the Wuqiao Rebellion was so big that it had little to do with Kong Youde or whether the Dongjiang Army could fight. You must know that the three generals Kong Youde, Li Jiucheng, and Geng Zhongming each commanded 800 soldiers.
Moreover, at the beginning, only Li Jiucheng and Kong Youde were involved. Their combined troops were less than 2,000 people, while the Shandong Dudu Commandery Division could command more than 40,000 troops. As a result, Kong Youde's troops attacked more and more. In the final analysis, it was because the officials forced the people to rebel.
Shandong is currently in a raging fire situation. If you are not careful, the problem will become serious.
Song Kangnian was a little confused. There were already more than 10,000 people in Qianhu Station, so why did they bring back another four or five thousand people? Apart from having thousands more people to eat, what advantage can Cheng Shijie take advantage of?
When Cheng Shijie failed in his first competition for Zhengke, his leader judged him that the structure was not big enough. At that time, he did not quite understand why the structure was not big enough.
What is the big picture?
Later, he understood that as a person, you cannot just focus on the one-third of an acre of your own home. When considering problems, you should not only consider your own gains and losses. This is called pattern.
These impoverished military households in Dengzhou City had no choice but to eat one meal at a time. In order to survive, they would try their best to survive. When Kong Youde launched a rebellion, he raised his arms and these impoverished military households and refugees all came from A thief. It was because of the existence of these people that Kong Youde had sufficient sources of troops, and that allowed Kong Youde to fight more and more bravely.
Although taking away these four to five thousand people cannot fundamentally solve the destruction of Shandong by Kong Youde, it can weaken Kong Youde's power.
And these people can be Cheng Shijie's help.
"Master Guard, are you serious? Are you kidding?"
Cheng Shijie nodded and said: "I have said it many times. As long as you arrive in Ninghai Prefecture, I will allocate you a piece of land so that you can live a good life like a landlord."
"We take it seriously!"
"It must be taken seriously!"
Cheng Shijie smiled and said: "This defense will not only allocate land to you, our Ning Haijun will set up many factories in the future, and you will all receive dividends, so you will not have to worry about food and drink in the future!"
"real!"
"Don't worry, if you follow this guard, you guys will definitely not suffer any loss!"
"Cheng Shoubei, do you mean what you say?"
"Forget it, of course it will count! If this guard doesn't keep his word, I will let this guard never do it for the rest of his life!"
Everyone burst out laughing when they heard this.
These military households living at the bottom of society are the simplest. If you have the right appetite, they can even sell their lives to you. Cheng Shijie eats from the same pot and sleeps in the same tent as them, and has military achievements on display. Naturally, he is very popular. .
However, everyone did not believe his promise to allocate land and houses to everyone. Everyone was looking forward to getting to Ninghai Prefecture and Zuo Qianhu Station as soon as possible to see him make a fool of himself.
Marching with these military households, Cheng Shijie was in a very happy mood.
Ninghai Prefecture is now very desolate, with only more than 16,000 households and more than 60,000 people. In later generations, this place had a population of 6 to 7 million.
This made Cheng Shijie feel a little incredible. Not counting Mouping County and Wendeng County, Weihai City alone has a grain output of 590,000 tons, while Ninghai Prefecture's current grain output is less than 100,000 tons. From this, it can be seen that here The development is equivalent to only hundreds of thousands of acres of land. It is only equivalent to one six hundredth of the future generations.
When Cheng Shijie came to Zuo Qianhusuo, the four or five thousand people did not enter the city. They were only temporarily arranged outside the city.
"Lord Senhu!"
The enthusiastic military household saluted Cheng Shijie.
Cheng Shijie nodded slightly in response.
However, Cheng Shi and Cheng Hu immediately corrected themselves: "Now the foster father is no longer Lord Qianhu, but Lord Guard!"
"Lord Guard?"
The military households still didn't know that Cheng Shijie was no longer the guard of Zuo Qianhu in Dengzhou, but the guard of Ning Haijun.
Cheng Shijie didn't have time to rest. Deputy Qianhu Zhou Yandong reported to Cheng Shijie the development during this period.
"Congratulations, Mr. Chihu"
Cheng Shi corrected: "My foster father is no longer Qianhu, but Ning Haijun Guard!"
"Congratulations, Lord Guard, this is a double blessing!"
"Oh, what double happiness?"
"Ask your subordinates to lead the craftsmen to search for mineral veins. We found two iron mines and one copper mine in the territory!" Zhou Yandong waved his hand and said, "Bring them over."
Cheng Shijie watched two military households carrying a huge sack into the hall.
"Boom..."
The sack lay on the ground with a dull sound. After untying the sack, a sack of dark iron ore was revealed. Cheng Shijie picked up a piece of ore and looked over it. The tube ore is heavy, diamond-shaped, and slightly shiny in the dark color. It seems to be of good quality.
Cheng Shijie is a professional in metallurgical steelmaking. He can see that the quality of these iron ores is good, but of course it is much worse than the iron ore imported from Australia.
Zhou Yandong came over and said: "Master Guards, this ore is one of the best in the entire Dengzhou. The quality of the iron produced is excellent. It can be easily beaten into refined iron, which will be very popular."
Cheng Shijie now almost understands the prices in the late Ming Dynasty. The special prices in the Ming Dynasty were very strange. Things that were very cheap in later generations were ridiculously high in the Ming Dynasty. Just like this iron, iron is rarely used in later generations, most of which are alloy steel. However, in the late Ming Dynasty, a pound of iron cost one penny of silver.
Let's put it this way, the value of five kilograms of iron is equal to one hundred and fifty-three and five kilograms of rice. Who dares to imagine this? One kilogram of iron is equal to thirty kilograms and seven taels of rice. Even the cheapest rice costs 2 yuan and a half per catty, which is equivalent to 76.75 yuan. Almost thirty times that of later generations.
As a technician of Hansteel Group, Cheng Shijie has access to the distribution of mineral resources in later generations. Of course, he knows that there are quite good quality iron ore in Ninghai Prefecture.
"Has mining started in this iron mine?"
"opened!"
Zhou Yandong said: "At least five to six thousand stones of iron ore can be mined in a year!"
"What?"
Cheng Shijie's eyes widened: "Only so much in a year?"
"The mineral veins there are a bit complicated, and there are too many messy things!"
Zhou Yandong said: "With more miners in the future, the output can be increased even more!"
Five or six thousand shi is equivalent to about 800,000 to 900,000 kilograms. When converted into tons, it is about 450 tons, which is less than the output of a branch factory of Hansteel Group in one hour. You must know that Hansteel Group has a production capacity of 150 million tons, and 80% of its production capacity has been suspended because there are not so many quotas.
Cheng Shijie said: "These production capacities are too low. To increase production capacity, we must expand it at least ten times!"
Iron ore is not equal to iron, let alone steel. Four hundred and fifty tons of iron ore can only produce more than 200 tons of iron. According to the technological level of the Ming Dynasty, the output was even lower.
According to Zhou Yandong, steelmaking is too troublesome, so it is better to sell the iron ore directly.
Cheng Shijie firmly disagreed with this. It would be too wasteful.
"Zhou Yandong, this matter is completely left to you by Benjing Defense. You can select craftsmen from our Qianhu Institute, no, Ning Haijun. If you want Renben Guarding to give you people and money, you have only one request. Increase production capacity!”
"yes!"
"I'll give you a thousand more people!"
"What!"
"A thousand people?"
"That's right!"
Cheng Shijie said: "You use five hundred people to mine iron mines, three hundred people to make steel, and two hundred people to make weapons and armor. One thousand people may not be enough!"
"I'll do my best!"
“It’s not about trying your best, it’s about doing it for sure!”
Cheng Shijie stared at Zhou Yandong and said: "The miners' wages have been doubled, and we have to feed them. If there is not enough food, you can buy it!"
Nowadays, mining iron ore is a huge profit. If the miners are deducted from their rations and wages, it would be very inhumane. Of course, this would not be conducive to the development of iron ore.
Zhou Yandong also introduced to Cheng Shijie several newly opened factories and a kiln that can produce porcelain. By the way, Ning Haijun also has a large amount of kaolin resources, which is the raw material for firing porcelain. In later generations, Linyi, Zibo, Weifang and Weihai in Shandong were the main producing areas for the production of ceramic tiles and ceramics.
Unknowingly, Cheng Shijie established a furniture factory and seven kilns in Zuoqianhusuo to bake bricks, tiles and porcelain. There was also a military uniform factory, a salt factory, and now two small iron factories. mine and a copper mine.
Although the production capacity of these factories is seriously insufficient, production capacity can be increased by adding more manpower.
While Cheng Shijie was watching Zhou Yandong report to him the construction progress of thousands of houses and barracks, Yang Yunniang was holding a teapot and pouring tea for Cheng Shijie and Zhou Yandong.
Zhou Yandong bowed and said: "Thank you madam!"
Yang Yuniang was stunned for a moment, then blush suddenly appeared on her cheeks. She glanced at Cheng Shijie and felt even more embarrassed when she saw that he also had a smile on his face.
Although she was embarrassed and shy, she still lowered her head and reminded in a low voice: "Master Xie Shou... I am just a maid of the Cheng family."
"Well……"
Only then did Zhou Yandong realize that he had made a mistake, but the question was, wasn't this the first time? The last few times Cheng Shijie was away, he sent the accounts to Qianhuzhai, also known as Mrs. Yang Yuniang, but Yang Yuniang did not remind her.
Zhou Yandong smiled at Cheng Shijie: "Lord Guard, I am lowering my rank..."
“He who doesn’t know is not guilty, and besides, it’s nothing!”
"I wonder if Mr. Cheng is single?"
Cheng Shijie shook his head and said: "Cheng has already married a wife, but..."
It's a pity that he has a son and a daughter in later generations, but the problem is that they can't survive.
Zhou Yandong continued to report on his work, but Yang Yuniang felt Cheng Shijie's eyes looking at her. Her face turned redder and she didn't dare to look at Cheng Shijie anymore, so she turned and ran to the inner room.
By the way, Cheng Shijie is now serving as the garrison of Ning Haijun, and the Dengzhou Guard Zuo Qianhu Station must be renamed.
Cheng Shijie's opinion was to be direct, simple and trouble-free, and call it Ninghai City.
Although Ninghai Prefecture has a state government, it shares the same city with Muping County. There seems to be no problem in calling it Ninghai City.
After arranging the factory and development plans, Cheng Shijie began to recruit soldiers, and based on his more than 500 servants, he prepared to expand the army.
Zuo Qianhu has more than 14,000 military households, plus the newly recruited 4,000 to 5,000 people, which is almost 20,000 people. Selecting 2,000 people out of 20,000 people can be regarded as one out of ten.
The task of selecting troops was left to Shen Mingyu.
Shen Mingyu first used a bamboo pole to stand on the school field. If he was not tall enough, he would be brushed off at the first level. Then there was endurance. Cheng Shijie's servants were treated well and many people were willing to become his servants. The key is to want to be Cheng Shijie's servants. Soldier, it's really difficult.
Watching so many people being wiped out one after another.
A military householder lamented: "Is this recruiting soldiers? This is more difficult than choosing a son-in-law for a commander!"
"No, it's not that difficult for the commander to choose a son-in-law. I heard that the commander is the son-in-law. He's very good-looking..."
All the soldiers felt the same way. It was really difficult to become Cheng Shijie's servant.
Cheng Shijie's principle is that it is better to lack than to overdo.
