When the Ming Dynasty's administrative agency moved to Nanjing City and began to reorganize, the 50,000 vanguard army led by Shi Dakai and the 50,000 Pingbei Army led by Zuo Zongtang began to set out.

Some areas occupied by the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom chose to surrender directly when they received news that Nanjing was captured by the Ming Dynasty and Hong Xiuquan surrendered, and when Hong Xiuquan said that "China is not under the jurisdiction of God." Everyone should obey the rule of the Ming Dynasty.

There are also a small number of areas that are unwilling to surrender. In front of the vanguard army and the Pingbei Army, they finally realized the reality and chose to surrender or be captured.

During this process, the population and land area of ​​the Ming Dynasty continued to increase.

Although Wu Yan ordered the exemption of the Ming Dynasty agricultural tax for three years to collect only commercial tax, and continued to impose wars, the Ming Dynasty's financial resources became stronger and stronger.

Among them, there are also reasons why the wealth accumulated by Hong Xiuquan and Wei Changhui, such as the senior executives of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom, have been copied over the past few years.

With money, you will naturally have to support more soldiers.

The Pingnan Army, which originally had only more than 10,000 people, was able to become the third army in the Ming Dynasty with a 50,000 troops, and the expansion was completed in a very short time.

The Qing court, who originally wanted to take advantage of the absence of the vanguard army and the Pingbei army, became honest again after defeating the 50,000 Pingnan army led by Wu Yan, and Shengbao and Lei Yicheng were still lurking.

Because the land area increased too quickly, the original Taiping Army, the regular Qing army and the brave camp in these areas, although most of them were dismissed from the army after surrendering and became civilians, or military farms, mining, road construction, and entering factories, many elite troops were still selected.

Therefore, the original Jiangbei Army became the fourth army in the Ming Dynasty, with a 50,000-organized army, and was renamed Pingxi Army.

Feng Zicai, the major general of the Pingxi Army, was also a historical celebrity and famous general in the late Qing Dynasty, and was also known as a national hero.

He was originally Xiang Rong's subordinate of the Jiangnan Camp. His true success should be when the Jiangnan Camp was destroyed in 1856. He became the subordinate of Zhang Guoliang, the Qing court's military affairs assistant, and wiped out more than 70 camps in one day.

But because of the battle of Tokyo City, the Jiangnan Camp was broken by Shi Dakai in advance. He felt deeply corrupt in the Qing court. He did not go to the Jiangbei Camp to follow Xiang Rong, but instead ran to Tokyo City to vote for the Ming Kingdom and joined the Pingnan Army.

Later, when Wu Yan was in charge of the army, he made military achievements again when Wu Yan led the Pingnan Army to fight against the Qing court's army southward.

Combined with his historical reputation, Wu Yan directly promoted him to commander of the Pingxi Army.

At this point, Wu Yan's Ming Dynasty had four famous generals in the late Qing Dynasty, Zuo Zongtang, Shi Dakai, Feng Zicai, and Li Hongzhang. The Pingnan Army, Pingbei, Pingxi, and the Pioneer Army consisted of an elite navy of 200,000 elite army and 20,000 navy.

Among them, the Pingnan Army was led by Wu Yan and did not go out to fight. Instead, they jointly defended the front line of Tokyo and Nanjing with some of the top-level camps of the top-level camps of the top-level camps and the later Wugong Army of the former Wuying.

"Even a warship was unable to be built, this Li Hongzhang..."

Wu Yan's Ming Dynasty's military strength reached an unprecedented strength, but there was one very weak point, that is, the only regular Pacific Fleet in the Ming Navy.

There were only 20,000 naval troops, but there was not even a warship that Wu Yan could like. The daily training of the 20,000 navy was all made up of the original Hunan Navy, the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom Navy, and the former Qing Dynasty Navy occupied by Wu Yan, and the broken ships of these three Navy divisions.

It’s okay to transport troops, but going out to fight is simply useless.

However, Wu Yan also knew that Li Hongzhang cannot be blamed for this matter. If you want to blame, you can only blame him for his high requirements.

Although Li Hongzhang was given 50,000 people to build a shipyard, they were not allowed to build warships that could be built with existing technology, but to make them build ironclad ships.

Let’s not talk about the large amount of steel required for an iron-clad ship, but only talk about many key technical points, which took a lot of time to solve it.

For example, the steam engine is converted as a power source into the propulsion force for the ship's travel, such as the welding technology of the armored ship, etc.

You should know that nearly a hundred years ago, in 1765, Watt invented the twin-cylinder steam engine, and in 1768, he cooperated with the Birmingham Turbine Factory to manufacture a steam engine for ship propulsion, namely a steam ship.

Wu Yan has a high vision and high skills, so he will naturally not fall behind.

When his steam engine is used in ships, it should actually be called a steam turbine, which is one of the ship's power sources that modern ships are still using.

Although the internal combustion engine is better, even if it is built, there is no oil available.

The earliest welding technology should have occurred in the late 19th century, and it was still the mid-19th century. Shipbuilding used riveting technology or forging welding technology.

The so-called forging and welding technology is to heat the hammer and beat the metal to weld it together, which is laborious and not pleasing.

Wu Yan had to transform himself into a scientist again and developed manual arc welding technology.

To study this technology, electricity must be invented first.

It is actually not rigorous to say that inventions are actually because as early as 1800, someone invented the battery, which is also the first battery in human history, called the Voltapile.

In 1820, some people discovered electromagnetic phenomena.

Although Nikola Tesla was not born yet, Wu Yan was able to make a hand-crank generator and then let martial arts masters shake the hand-crank generator at a high speed and at a constant speed.

But the problem is that with electricity, Wu Yan cannot make welding rods.

The technical difficulty of welding rods lies in the medicine skin. The so-called welding rods are actually the steel wire wrapped in the medicine skin. The steel wire is easy to make, but the medicine skin with very complex composition requires chemical technology to reach a certain level before it can be made.

Seeing that the remnants of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom were getting smaller and smaller, Wu Yan could only give up temporarily and wait for the next time travel to talk about it.

What if you don’t have to invent it yourself?

But there is another thing that Wu Yan must invent. This was the last time he personally led the army to war.

Shi Dakai could even think of using iron shields to protect artillery, but the Qing court would definitely think of it. Moreover, the Qing court had too many resources than the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom. If it was really well prepared, it would be difficult for Wu Yan to fight even if he had a white horse.

Through the news from the two undercover agents, Shengbao and Lei Yicheng, the Qing court even took a step further and specially built defensive armor for artillery.

It can be understood as a "tank" that turns artillery into human and animal power.

So Wu Yan must develop a mortar.

Although the artillery also has a certain firing arc, its angle is far lower than that of the mortar.

Moreover, compared with the artillery used by the Ming Dynasty, Qing court, and even the great powers, mortars have great advantages in both range and portability.

A truly portable mortar, with a slightly stronger strength, can carry two or three people on the way.

During World War II, about seventy years later, the range of mortars could reach 400 to 5,000 meters.

What Wu Yan wanted to build was the mortar from the century of World War II. The gun rack was actually not difficult. It consisted of a bracket, a buffer machine, a screw aiming machine and a tripod. The technical difficulty lies in the buffer machine that improves shooting stability and a screw aiming machine that aims at the target.

However, Wu Yan was not prepared to build more, just create ten "laboratory samples" first. This epoch-making weapon only needs to be used at critical moments, which is enough to determine the entire victory.

Mortar shells can actually be regarded as large-sized 'bullets'.

The difference between it and the 7.62-caliber bullet that Wu Yan has been able to mass produce is that the bullets shot out of the White Horse Swordsman is solid, while the bullets shot out of the shells are bursting bombs.

This kind of bullet-like shell is also called fixed-loading shells. The projectile and the cartridge (fired medicine) are combined into one. There is also a saying that the projectile and the cartridge of the shell are separated.

Wu Yan has the technology.

But the production process is very troublesome.

"It exploded again?"

When he heard a roar, Wu Yan, who was debugging the artillery rack, picked up his telescope and looked at the artillery room more than 300 meters away.

A low bungalow had collapsed halfway, and someone had rushed in and carried out a worker covered in blood, not knowing whether it was life or death.

Wu Yan was in a worse mood.

In addition to a little unbearable, I also feel sad about the high accident rate.

Making shells is different from making bullets. Even if the bullet accidentally ignites gunpowder, there will be no big deal. As long as not all gunpowder is put together. Because the shells need to be filled with a large amount of gunpowder, if you accidentally, it will explode directly.

To this end, Wu Yan specially ordered people to build several artillery rooms, separated them one by one in the plains, to avoid gathering and manufacturing, and all of them were accidentally finished.

But even so, this was the second accident that occurred in the three days since the experiment was started to manufacture shells, and it was the first accident that Wu Yan saw with his own eyes.

Not only is the accident rate too high, but the yield rate is also relatively low.

There are only 43 qualified 72mm shells. As for how many of them are truly qualified, you will not know until you use them.

Even mortar shells made by modern craftsmanship can be directly exploded when put into the cannon rack, let alone the current craftsmanship level?

"Your Majesty, that worker is dead."

After hearing this report, Wu Yan was not in the mood to finish debugging the mortar, and he was even more afraid that the sudden explosion would blow himself to death, and wasting Zod character card was not good.

"The pension is 300 taels and 10,000 square meters of fertile land." Wu Yan asked again after saying that, "What's going on in his family?"

Ten thousand square meters sounds like a lot, but in fact it is only fifteen acres, which is not considered a big reward.

"Report to Your Majesty, he has one son and two daughters in his family, his son is nine years old, his eldest daughter is thirteen, and his second daughter is eleven."

"Ask his daughter if she wants to go to the palace to be a palace maid. Her son will be sent to Nanjing College, and the food, board and tuition fees are exempt."

Palace maids were definitely a good job in the feudal dynasty era. Nanjing College was also created by Wu Yan after he came to Nanjing. It is considered a new-style college that integrates primary and secondary universities. Although the current faculty is not new, the future is promising.

"Thank you for your grace."

Wu Yan waved his hand and asked, "Who would like to help me try this new firearm?"

Mortars must be tested, but since they are emperors, Wu Yan certainly cannot bear the risk of blowing up the chamber himself.

Originally he was going to fire the first shot, but the accident he saw with his own eyes turned him into a ruthless monarch.

"I'm willing."

"Your Majesty, this is my honor."

This is the best thing in this era. There are many people who are not afraid of death, and there are also many people who are foolish and loyal.

Wu Yan didn't even say that he was rewarded, but the brave man had already stood up.

"Get lots."

Wu Yan did not designate who to come, but let fate make a decision, and soon a guard stood up excitedly.

"Put the shell in and run directly, run as fast as possible." Wu Yan retreated and explained: "Do you understand?"

The guard stood next to the cannon stand that Wu Yan had debugged, and took a shell and placed it at the muzzle, then looked at Wu Yan, who had retreated twenty meters away.

Wu Yan, who retreated to a safe distance, said, "If you count three, you can let go, one, two, three."
To be continued...