Crisis is the best mobilization order! The news that the Wanjiaping bandits were coming to "tax" spread like wildfire, making the whole Liuliba excited. Early the next morning, Ouyang Xuan was woken up by bursts of noisy sounds.

. He walked out and took a look and found that there was a bustling flow of people near the gate of the cottage. Everyone was busy and busy. There were

Those who were making molds and carrying soil to prepare the wall, some were carrying wood, stones, and some were chiseling and grinding stones. A new forge that the industrial team had just built nearby was also in operation. Farther away, Cao Ergou and his people were training.

Militia, because building, building walls, and mining now require a lot of labor, so the teaching team only summoned a hundred people to carry out military training.

Ouyang Xuan first walked to the entrance of the village to inspect the construction of the wall. According to the introduction of Lu Dezhi, who was in charge of building the wall, there were more than 200 minzhuang people participating in building the wall. A soldier from Cao Ergou's camp was in charge of the technology. This soldier

Participated in the destruction of Chongqing Mansion

The construction of the city wall. The newly built wall is only about 300 feet long. It is planned to be 6 feet wide and 10 feet high. It has loess rammed inside and covered with stones. The technical requirements are not high, and the soil, wood, stone and other raw materials from the mountains are not high.

If it is lacking, it is estimated that it can be built within five days.

During the conversation, Huang Dagen led more than ten people from outside back to the entrance of the village. He was taking people to inspect the ambush location. In order to prevent the Wanjiaping bandits from raiding, Huang Dagen also placed hidden sentries along the way.

If an attack comes, he will be warned in advance. Ouyang Xuan knows that as an ambush, although he can catch the bandits off guard, the bandits will not be able to catch him off guard.

Once the bandits reacted, they launched a violent counterattack. In close combat with the bandits, the situation of Huang Dagen and others, who were small in number, would be extremely dangerous. A sneak attack from behind with grenades would be more effective. Thinking of this, Ouyang Xuan couldn't help but feel anxious, so he

Thinking of making grenades as soon as possible to minimize the casualties of our own personnel.

He first asked about the production situation of gunpowder, and the news he got was that charcoal powder and sulfur powder were ready, but the purity of the fire salt was not up to the requirements and needed to be further purified. He went to Hu Tiejiang's house again and saw

Li San'er was the only one busy, pouring the water requested three days ago

The molds for casting grenade shells have been made and can be mass-produced within three days. However, due to the recent huge demand for iron materials, the remaining iron materials have been used by Blacksmith Hu and his son to make spearheads. If more grenades are needed,

The only way to increase production is to wait for the mine to produce more pig iron.

In the next two days, in addition to focusing on the raw materials of gunpowder, Ouyang Xuan took time to inspect the construction of the wall and the mining of iron ore. After constant and repeated trials, the mining team has initially mastered the purification technology of gunpowder.

A batch of qualified products has been used to prepare black powder, and will be mass-produced next.

Production is no longer a problem. The trial production of more than ten kilograms of black powder is now being granulated and will be ready for use in two days. However, increasing iron ore production capacity has encountered bottlenecks, mainly because the working surface of the mine is too narrow.

, mining relies entirely on manual excavation, even when personnel are working in shifts.

, the increase in output is still limited. And the opening of new mines will not be possible for a while. It seems that in order to achieve a large-scale increase in ore production, blasting technology must be used, but this will have to wait until the black powder is mass-produced. As for the construction of the wall, it is

It went very smoothly, and according to Rude's estimation, it could be completed on schedule. However, Rude

He also told Ouyang Xuan some bad news: Liuliba sent people to contact other villages to fight against the bandits, which had been known to the Wanjiaping bandits. Although none of the villages agreed to form an alliance with Liuliba to advance and retreat together, Liuliba's behavior

It has angered the bandit leader Xiong Ben, who vows to severely punish Liuliba's "rebellious" behavior.

The day when the village wall was built was also the day when the grenade trial was successful, which was a double blessing for Ouyang Xuan. The grenade test site was chosen in a secluded place on the mountainside away from the village. The participants were Chen Hu, Hu Tiejiang and Li Saner.

outside, europe

Yang Xuan also asked Huang Dagen to pick a few guards with strong arms to come with him. For the first test, Ouyang Xuan did it himself without any hesitation. After all, he was the one who knew the characteristics of grenades best. After asking everyone to retreat to a safe distance, he

Got a small grenade

, lit the fuse and threw it forward with force, and quickly fell to the ground before the grenade hit the ground. Two or three seconds later, a huge explosion sounded, and the grass within a few meters around was blown up in all directions, and the scattered soil fell on more than ten people.

Meters away, there was a loud thunder-like noise, which frightened Huang Dagen and others who were watching from a distance and stood there with horrified expressions. Ouyang Xuan called on everyone to come closer and take a look. A shallow pit appeared in the explosive mud, and the air was full of shock.

It was filled with the choking smell of fire and salt.

The explosion of the improved black powder was indeed amazing. Three more tests were conducted. After Ouyang Xuan explained the key points in detail, he asked the guards to throw them one by one. Among them, a medium-sized grenade was thrown, and its power was even more amazing.

There was a clump of small trees near the explosion point. The huge explosion broke a small tree as big as a bowl, and other small trees were also blown up and down. The explosion's damage range reached

More than ten meters. There were twenty-seven grenades in the first batch of production. Excluding four used for testing, there were still twenty-three. Among them, there were nineteen small grenades weighing two kilograms, each containing half a kilogram of black powder and broken iron.

Half a kilogram; there are three four-kilogram grenades, each containing one kilogram of black powder and broken iron; the largest grenade weighs eight kilograms, with one and a half kilograms of black powder and broken iron each. This weight should not be called a grenade.

And called a bomb.

Due to the recent shortage of iron materials, the scraps of iron used to fill the inside of the grenades are all scraps from the blacksmith shop. The big ones are like index fingers and the small ones are like soybeans. Based on the test results, Ouyang Xuan told Blacksmith Hu and Li Saner to focus on improving the small iron in the next step.

The grenade is powerful enough and light and easy to carry. As for the medium and large grenades, they are too heavy to carry and are suitable for throwing from high places.

It is a sharp weapon used in city defense battles. Through this field test, it not only verified the quality of the fuze, gunpowder and cartridge cases, so as to facilitate the next step of improving the manufacturing process, but also trained grenadiers, and more importantly, allowed everyone to see Ouyang Xuan's

The new ability proves that what he said about making powerful weapons is true, and lays a good foundation for the next step of cooperation with Liuliba.

All preparations for the battle went smoothly, especially the construction of the new wall, which made everyone in the village feel at ease. The only thing that made Ouyang Xuan anxious was Yu Zhu's condition. In the past few days, Ouyang Xuan asked people to bring the captured people to the village.

Pheasant, rabbit and other meats were stewed until soft and fed to Yu Zhu, but his

His condition only improved slightly. Although he no longer slept frequently and his energy level was slightly better, he was still losing weight day by day. The turning point in Yu Zhu's condition occurred when Dong Hu and others returned. Not only did they explore the road outside the mountain
Chapter completed!