On the fifth day of February, it was the day of court meeting as usual, but Zhao Yang was still missing in the Daqing Hall.
Zhao Zhen even asked specifically: "Zhao Yang... is today still the future court meeting?"
A palace attendant replied: "Yes, Zhao Zhengyan will not come to court today."
Damn it!
Zhao Zhen cursed secretly, and his face darkened visibly, which made the officials who were going to report something later feel uneasy, especially the remonstrance officer who had originally planned to impeach the official.
During the report, Zhang Yaozuo, as the powerful official in Kaifeng Prefecture, also reported the "chaos" caused by Zhao Yang's purchase of land for the Technical Department to the government: "...Zhao Yuanwailang led the officials of the Ministry of Industry and Finance to purchase land for construction in the south of the outer city. On the occasion of the new government office, some local gangsters took away the land and houses of the people nearby and bought them at low prices, intending to sell them to the Technology Department for ten or twenty times the price. Zhao Yuanwai heard about this chaos and sent someone to report it to our Kaifeng Mansion. The minister immediately Several military patrol stations were set up outside his office, and hundreds of sergeants were sent to patrol day and night..."
"The imperial court has newly built a government office, but some people actually dare to cause trouble?" Zhao Zhen found it quite incredible: "Does anyone know why?"
Seeing that no one answered, Zhang Yaozuo gave an explanation for Zhao Yang: "... It should be Zhao Yuanwailang who paid twice the market price for the land and attracted those arrogant people."
He presented the plan to relocate the Technology Department to the palace. Because the treatment was too generous, not only the officials secretly nodded, but even Liu Shi, Wu Shi, Liu Yuanyu and other Taiwanese admonishers who had had grudges with Zhao Yang could not find fault. Even Chen Zhizhong even spoke out. Praise: "Zhao Zhengyan treats the people with kindness, and I think they are all influenced by officials."
Zhao Zhen was very happy to hear this. He smiled and raised his hand to stroke his beard. Suddenly he thought that the boy didn't even come to the morning court. He couldn't help but feel annoyed. He said seriously to Zhang Yaozuo: "We will double the number of patrol sergeants. If the technology is What happened to Si Xin Ya, you are the only one I want to ask!"
"Uh...yes." Zhang Yaozuo said obediently.
Later, when various officials were impeached, many people also impeached Zhang Yaozuo. Before his impeachment, he detained Feng Jing, Xie Jingwen, Liu Gu and other students, and sent Kaifeng soldiers to force the Fan Tower to close for three days, causing thousands of deaths in the Fan Tower. All the losses were due to Zhang Yaozuo's act of using his power for personal gain and taking revenge with his own machine.
It is undeniable that Zhang Yaozuo did have elements of revenge, but naturally he would not be stupid enough to admit it, so he argued with Tai Jian in front of the palace. Not only did the officials become extremely annoyed, but all the officials in the court also secretly shook their heads: Far less than a certain young man. It’s wonderful when Lang Jun is here!
In the end, the matter came to nothing, which made Zhang Yaozuo secretly proud, but also made many Taiwanese admonishers in the court hate him even more.
After the dynasty was dismissed, the officials returned to Funing Palace for dinner and casually asked Wang Shougui: "What has that boy been doing recently?"
Wang Shougui replied: "On the third day of the Lunar New Year, Mr. Zhao went to the palace. Other than that, he went back and forth between the main office of the Ministry of Industry and the new office of the Technology Department..."
"The reason you entered the palace that day was to find some books, right?" Zhao Zhen had already heard Wang Shougui mention this matter, so he wasn't surprised.
"Yes." Wang Shougui nodded and reported again: "The firearms chapter of the "Martial Classics General Essentials" compiled by Zeng Gongliang and Ding Du was copied by the library and sent to the Ministry of Industry yesterday."
"Now that he has entered the palace, he didn't come to visit me..." Zhao Zhen snorted coldly and asked: "What is he doing in the rest of his free time?"
"According to Wang Zhongzheng's private disclosure to his ministers, in his spare time, Xiao Zhao Langjun mostly practiced calligraphy and painting in the Yamen of the Ministry of Industry. For this purpose, he sought advice from two beauties who were friends with him. One of them was named Shen Yu and the other It's called Wen Tong. Especially when it comes to calligraphy practice, I heard that Xiao Langjun was particularly careful. Wang Zhongzheng guessed that it was probably because Fan Lou was teased that time..."
"Is it Li Wei, the sixth son of the Li family?" Zhao Zhen looked complicated and suddenly asked, "What has Li Wei been doing at home recently?"
Wang Shougui lowered his head and said: "It's basically the same as before. He still interacts with the children of the wealthy family. However, since the second day of the lunar month, he heard that Li Shizhong had confined him to the room. Then he also heard that Li's mother felt sorry for Liu Lang and secretly violated Li Shizhong's order to send him to his house. The servants secretly sent wine and food to Liu Lang's room for Liu Lang and the people around him to have fun..."
What he calls Li Shizhong refers to the positions given to Li Yonghe after he resigned to beg for his elders, including the positions of Jiedushi and Tongping Zhangshi, which are basically empty positions rather than real power.
Zhao Zhen frowned frequently when he heard this, and looked at Wang Shougui suspiciously: "Why does the king know so much in detail?"
Wang Shougui lowered his head and said, "I heard this from hearsay, and officials just said it casually when asked. It is difficult to confirm... But there is one thing I can be sure of, that is, Liulang of the Li family has not cut off all contacts with those lucky people."
Zhao Zhen glanced at Wang Shougui for a few times and then ordered: "Tell my uncle later that Liu Lang will no longer associate with those lucky people."
"yes."
At the same time, in the Yamen of the Ministry of Industry, Zhao Yang casually had some breakfast in the cafeteria, and then went back to the office to read the firearms chapter of "General Martial Arts" compiled by Zeng Gongliang and Ding Du.
This volume of firearms, which was copied by a bachelor from the Imperial Palace Library, was only delivered to him yesterday. After studying it carefully, he found that the harvest was not huge, but it was indeed not much. Among them, the most valuable ones were the three included There are gunpowder formulas with different proportions, which are not found in Shen Tao's privately engraved fragments.
The so-called different ratios refer to the sulfur and nitrate content of gunpowder. The gunpowder formula originated from the Tang Dynasty was one to one. After improvement in the Song Dynasty, it was one to two, and the other one was close to one to three, which was very close to Zhao Yang’s impression of the ratio of sulfur and nitrate content in black gunpowder.
But even so, these gunpowder formulas still have little effect. The reason is very simple, because the fireworks currently circulating on the market in the Song Dynasty, commonly known as "shelf fireworks", use one-to-two or one-to-three gunpowder formulas, both for military and civilian use. There is no difference. In fact, the fireworks circulated among the people have color differences, but the gunpowder used by the imperial court for military purposes does not.
What is more valuable in comparison is the in-depth research and test results of these three gunpowder formulas in "Firearms".
For example, adding a small amount of auxiliary ingredients makes gunpowder more flammable or explosive, or it can produce a larger amount of smoke and poisonous smoke - poisoning and smoking are based on the same principle.
Isn't this just three completely different improvements to gunpowder? Combustion direction, explosion direction, and smoke screen direction.
Although Zhao Yang believes that the development of gunpowder should focus more on explosion, it is undeniable that the combustion direction and the smoke screen direction are also very important. Even combined with the current gunpowder level of the Song, Liao and Xia Dynasties, the combustion direction and the smoke screen direction are more effective. ——The former can be used to burn enemy camps and various wooden equipment, while the latter can achieve large-scale destruction. Although most of them are not fatal, they are especially effective on the battlefield.
So last night, Zhao Yang had a discussion with Song Yang, the foreman of the gunpowder case, and asked him to continue recruiting gunpowder craftsmen from Bianjing. While expanding the population, he would continue to improve gunpowder from three directions. He must develop the finished product as soon as possible. " Fireball” – that is, a cannonball.
Although Song Yang and other craftsmen in the gunpowder case are basically civilian pyrotechnics craftsmen, given that there is basically no difference between official and civilian gunpowder, the shells handmade by these people are enough to be regarded as the best in the country.
In just one day, Song Yang and others followed Zhao Yang's instructions and hand-made five of each of the three types of cannonballs.
Zhao Yang excitedly took these craftsmen to test outside the city. Fan Chunren, Lu Dafang, Shen Yu, Wen Ting and others also went to watch the excitement.
After arriving at an empty and deserted place outside the city, Zhao Yang and others began to test.
The first test was a cannonball that focused on burning, that is, the fireball contained in the "Wu Jing Zong Lue".
In order to test the power, Zhao Yang and others specially brought an old dilapidated carriage from the Yamen of the Ministry of Industry, lit the fireball and threw it into the carriage.
Just hearing a bang, the inside of the carriage suddenly ignited, and soon spread to the entire carriage.
As everyone cheered, Shen Tuo was even more excited and couldn't help but discuss the application of this thing with Fan Chunren, Wen Tong, Lu Dafang and others, such as burning enemy camp fences and grain trucks.
Seeing that several people were too excited, Fan Chunren couldn't help but poured cold water on them and said, "Do you know the cost of this thing? I'm telling you, wait, this fireball alone is worth the price of one stone of rice."
"A thousand dollars?" Lu Dafang exclaimed, and then looked at the burning carriage in disbelief.
With a bang, a thousand dollars was gone?
One thousand dollars is enough for them to have a meal at Fan's Restaurant in Xiaotianshui Lane.
"It's too expensive." Qian Gongfu also shook his head repeatedly, and then looked at the remaining twenty-nine cannonballs on one side - those were not twenty-nine cannonballs, they were clearly twenty-nine thousand dollars.
Zhao Yang listened to the discussion of several people with great interest while instructing Song Yang to continue the test.
The test object of the second cannonball was the armor commonly made by the Forbidden Army. However, it was not the infantry armor that is the pinnacle of contemporary armor, but the old-style armor that was made about twenty or thirty years ago. The price of making it was at least ten thousand dollars. Nowadays, given that armor is a prohibited item and difficult to circulate, apart from being equipped in the army, it can only eat dust in the countless arsenals under the control of the Privy Council until it completely rots away.
The set of armor used for testing today was one that Zhao Yang asked Cao Yi for help and asked the latter to dig out from the military camp in front of the palace. It is an old thing but has not been completely scrapped. Cao Yi sent people to send dozens of armors. The sets were piled in the Yamen of the Ministry of Industry for Zhao Yang to test the power of the gunpowder bombs.
Under Zhao Yang's instructions, Song Yang and others erected a wooden stake dummy on the ground, put armor on the dummy, and then placed an incendiary bomb in front of them. Since they were testing the gunpowder bomb's ability to damage the armor, They deliberately placed the incendiary bomb on a bench so that it would not explode and ignite the bottom of the stake first, burning the armor from the inside.
"ignition."
As Zhao Yang ordered the fuse to be lit, the fire bomb sizzled and then stopped.
While Shen Tuo, Fan Chunren and other students looked at each other, Song Yang and other craftsmen looked red in the face.
"Maybe... maybe the lead is broken internally..." Song Yang looked embarrassed and was about to step forward to see what was going on, but was stopped by Zhao Yang: "Don't go there."
As soon as he finished speaking, there was just a bang, and the fire bomb exploded immediately. Under the beautiful scenery of flames, the armor on the wooden dummy also burned.
"Thank you, Commander, for saving my life..." Song Yang said to Zhao Yang with a grateful face.
In fact, he was also a craftsman who had been dealing with gunpowder for many years. How could he not know that the situation at that time was actually very dangerous? It's just that because Zhao Yang is around, he can't lose face as a craftsman, so he has to do something.
Zhao Yang also knew this and warned: "Gunpowder is a dangerous thing. Remember to put safety first. No matter who tests it in the future, no one is allowed to take risks. ... If you fail, you fail. It's not a big deal, even if you fail by hundreds. Yes, as long as you succeed once, it is not without gain. But if you operate in violation of regulations and take risks alone...that will be the result."
He pointed at the burning armor.
All the craftsmen looked solemn and said yes one after another.
From the side, Lu Dafang asked curiously: "As far as I know, armor is mostly made of iron. Why can it be burned?"
Song Yang explained the confusion: "When the fireball exploded, the Chinese medicinal powder inside touched the armor, so it could burn. In fact, it was not the iron cast part of the armor that burned, but only the medicinal powder... Of course, these medicinal powders would also ignite. Leather lining on armor."
After about half a cup of tea, when the flames on the wooden stake dummy were extinguished, Zhao Yang led everyone forward to inspect. Sure enough, they found that most of the upper and lower cortical parts of the armor had been burned, leaving only the iron cast parts. As for the fake wooden stake inside the armor. People, the ground was burned to black.
Shen Tuo shook his head and said: "If you are a living person, you will probably not survive if you get infected..."
"Either death or disability, it's not too fatal." Zhao Yang commented succinctly.
Having seen the power of cloudbursts and gasoline bombs in later generations, in his opinion, incendiary bombs of this level are not very powerful, but as long as experienced soldiers roll on the spot, grab a few handfuls of sand and pat them, it is almost It can also be shot out.
He turned to Song Yang and said, "Try adding some oil later and seal it with wax balls or bamboo cans."
"I'm afraid it will leak out..." Song Yang touched his chin and felt that the risk was a bit high, but it was undeniable that it was a good idea.
From the side, Qian Gongfu looked at the armor on the wooden stake dummy and shook his head slightly - just this time, at least a dozen dollars were gone again.
Zhao Yang used the remaining three incendiary bombs to test different situations. Two were detonated on the ground to test its range of action, and one was buried in the soil to test its effect. Although Zhao Yang was not satisfied in his heart, he could not deny that it was not without damage. Powerful enough to equip the army immediately.
Next came the test of smoke bombs.
The principle of smoke screen bombs is the same as that of poison smoke bombs. Just like the smoke bombs of later generations, the projectile ignites and starts to release a large amount of smoke. If ingredients that can produce poisonous smoke are added, then this kind of smoke screen will be harmful to the human body, and even make people dizzy. It is dazzling and can make it difficult to breathe. If it is used on the battlefield, unless all your own soldiers are upwind, it will have too many limitations.
Therefore, Zhao Yang was not too concerned about this type of "cigarette bomb". He just asked Song Yang and others to continue improving it based on the idea of "something is better than nothing". What if it would be used in the future?
For the test of this type of cigarette cartridge, Zhao Yang only asked people to record the speed, range, concentration and duration of the smoke release, so that he could continue to improve it later.
The last test was the explosive bomb. Unlike the other two gunpowder formulas, its full power lies in the moment of explosion. Although Zhao Yang has the most opinion about this gunpowder formula, the indisputable fact is that it is the most powerful of the three gunpowder formulas currently. The least lethal among them. If there is a forbidden soldier wearing infantry armor and fully armed, he can completely withstand the impact of such explosive bombs by relying on the strong defense of the armor. The impact he endures is not necessarily higher than being hit with a heavy hammer. Where to go.
The Song Dynasty also noticed its weaknesses when using this gunpowder formula, so they came up with the tribulus bomb, which is to put iron pieces, iron pellets, and iron tribulus into the explosive ball bomb, and rely on these things to kill the enemy.
However, Zhao Yang only wanted to test the power of such explosive bombs today, so he did not ask Song Yang and others to put in such auxiliary killing devices.
The first explosive bomb detonated on the ground, and there was only a loud bang. Except for a small amount of flames splashing around, there was no visible power.
So when testing the second ammunition, Zhao Yang ordered someone to detonate it next to the wooden stake dummy.
This time it was much more intuitive. After the bang, it was obvious that the wooden stake dummy was overturned, but it was only overturned, and there was almost no follow-up damage.
For the third explosive bomb, Zhao Yang asked people to bury it half in the soil. This time it was more intuitive. When a loud bang sounded, the soil was also blown away, making Shen Dun, Lu Dafang and others secretly stunned.
The fourth one was three-quarters buried in the soil. The test results were better than those of the third one. Not only was the hole made bigger, but the scene when it exploded was also more amazing.
As for the fifth one, Zhao Yang ordered people to bury it deeply and completely in the soil, and also ordered people to step on it back and forth.
After igniting the fuse, there was a muffled bang and the soil where the bomb was buried was obviously bulging, but it did not explode, which made Song Yang and other craftsmen very embarrassed.
Zhao Yang didn't think it was anything, it was just that the gunpowder equivalent was not enough.
From that day on, Zhao Yang took everyone outside the city every other day to test gunpowder bombs, especially explosive bombs. At his request, the explosive bombs became bigger and bigger, starting from the size of a melon. All the way to the size of a millstone, the gunpowder equivalent also increased several times or even dozens of times.
It wasn't until mid-February that Zhao Yang and others tested five explosive bombs the size of millstones outside the city. The power was even more astonishing, especially when they were half buried in the soil. But after hearing a thunderous explosion, the ground rose and overturned, and mud and rocks flew. Even though Zhao Yang and others were more than twenty feet apart, they could still feel an invisible impact coming, which was really shocking.
Later, it was said that even the people in the Fanta area of the outer city could hear the noise clearly and mistook it for thunder in the sky. Every household put away the things hanging outside the house, but there was no rain for a long time, which was quite puzzling.
Of course, while the power of this explosive bomb is astonishing, what is even more astonishing is its cost. One bomb costs dozens of gunpowder money. Officials will probably tremble in their hearts when they see the account books in the future.
In this way, the 100,000 yuan he advanced was not enough.
