We have fought to the Arctic Circle, and you want me to inherit the throne?

Chaoyang City has experienced war mobilization more than once or twice, and the people are already familiar with it.

Weapons were shipped out of the warehouse, grain was loaded onto trucks, and the female workers in the clothing factory stayed up late and worked overtime to sew more warm clothes.

In the Qihuo Cave, barbarians and foreigners rushed to sign up to join the labor team, hoping to improve their civilian rank by several levels and become true Feng people as soon as possible.

Li Che directly handed these simple pre-war mobilizations over to Zhuge Zhe.

He himself went to the Gunpowder Department outside the city to test Chen Gui's latest achievements.

After the Gunpowder Bureau moved out of the city, it built a factory covering an area of ​​three hectares, equivalent to the size of five football fields.

It includes buildings such as test sites, warehouses, workshops, dormitories, canteens, and a five-meter-high wall, which is equivalent to a small fortress.

Officials and craftsmen of the Gunpowder Bureau ate, drank, defecated, urinated and slept in the factory and were not allowed to enter or leave at will unless in special circumstances.

The purpose is naturally to keep it secret. After all, the secrets in this factory are too important and enough to subvert the entire world.

Li Che, protected by Hu Qiang and Qiu Bai, arrived at the gate of the Gunpowder Department. In an instant, dozens of fully armored soldiers holding bows and crossbows emerged from all directions and vigilantly surrounded the group.

After seeing Li Che's face clearly, the soldiers finally breathed a sigh of relief and saluted respectfully.

"See Your Highness!"

"Hu San'er." Li Che looked at the leading soldier and said in a gentler tone, "How is it? Is your duty at the Gunpowder Department comfortable?"

Hu San is also a veteran from the Royal Guard Battalion and Li Che's confidant.

He was injured in the battle of Xiangping and broke two fingers. He could not stay on the front line to fight, so he was transferred by Li Che to the Gunpowder Bureau to be responsible for security work.

"Your Highness is here." Hu Sanhan laughed twice. "It's comfortable, but I still want to go back to Your Highness and follow him into battle."

Li Che comforted him, "After all, you are injured. If you go to the front line to fight, I am worried that you might make another mistake."

"Besides, the Gunpowder Department is a confidential place. I will only feel at ease if it is guarded by loyal people."

Although Hu San was a little depressed, he still straightened his back and assured Li Che:

"I will definitely live up to your highness's expectations!"

Li Che nodded: "Okay, lead the way, I want to go in and see Chen Gui."

Hu San hurriedly led his men to push open the gate. After entering the first gate, there was a small city wall, and they had to pass through another gate.

Behind this gate, there is still a low wall. You have to pass through a corridor of more than ten meters before you can actually enter the Gunpowder Department.

After passing through the small door at the end of the corridor, Li Che first saw a vast testing ground.

The sunlight shone on the field, illuminating more than a dozen neatly arranged short-barreled cannons.

These short-barreled cannons are huge in size, with thick bodies and short and heavy barrels, like sleeping giant beasts.

The barrel of the gun was cast from pure iron, its surface shimmering with a faint metallic sheen. The muzzle was wide and trumpet-shaped, like a gaping mouth.

There was a heavy trunnion on each side of the gun barrel for fixing it to the gun carriage, which was made of solid wood and painted with a moisture-proof black paint.

Mortar! A type of smoothbore cannon, similar in shape to a mortar, and excellent for both siege and defense.

The advantages of this type of cannon are large shooting angle, high ballistic arc, and easy casting. The disadvantages are that it cannot shoot horizontally, has a short range, and a slow firing rate.

Mortars have difficulty hitting moving enemies; city walls and slow-moving warships are their main targets.

Just as Li Che was about to move closer to take a closer look, he saw Chen Gui running towards him from the other end of the test site.

It seemed that he was running too fast. When he ran to Li Che's side, he braked suddenly but failed to stop. It was Li Che who reached out and helped him up, so that he did not fall to the ground.

Li Che teased, "Chen Gui, Chen Gui, you used to be quite calm, but since you took charge of the Gunpowder Department, how come your temper has become so hot-tempered and irritable?"

Chen Gui smiled sheepishly: "Your Highness, I really like gunpowder."

“Just like it. Only when you truly love what you are doing can you succeed.”

Li Che raised his head and pointed his chin at the mortars: "Didn't they say there were fifty? Why are there only about ten?"

Chen Gui said seriously, "Your Highness, these ten are all mortars of the largest caliber, capable of firing stone bullets, iron bullets, and explosive packs."

"There are also medium-caliber mortars, which are easier to transport. Small-caliber mortars are the most flexible, but their stone shells are very ineffective and are only used to launch grenades."

Li Che smiled and replied, "Not bad, the models are all sorted out."

Chen Gui looked proud as he pointed to the other side of the testing ground. "Over there are copper long-barreled cannons. They have a longer range and can fire directly. Unfortunately, they use too much copper, so there are only fifteen of them."

Li Che nodded and said, "That's not a problem. This expedition to Liaodong will mostly involve siege warfare, so mortars will be more useful."

"As for the copper shortage, try to overcome it first. I'll find a solution."

Li Che remembered that there were copper mines in the Northeast, but most of Liaoning Province's copper mines were distributed in Liaodong. This was one of the reasons why he was determined to take over Liaodong.

"Oh right." Chen Gui suddenly thought of something, "Your Highness, the musket you mentioned earlier has also made some progress."

"Oh?" Li Che immediately became interested. "Have you made a musket?"

Chen Gui nodded. "You told me before that the flintlock rifle was too difficult. The barrel was substandard, and the elastic components were not strong enough. It was really full of difficulties."

"On the contrary, there has been great progress in the matchlock gun, but the core problem is still the difficulty of making the barrel. It can only be hammered out by a blacksmith, and it takes a month to drill the holes by hand to make a barrel, and the pass rate is also very low."

Hearing Chen Gui's words, Li Che nodded slightly.

Rubbing the barrel by hand is not reliable, not to mention that the future development of muskets cannot avoid things like rifling, which is more precise.

We still need to develop a lathe, even the simplest mechanical lathe, which will make making gun barrels much easier.

"How many matchlock guns have you made?" Li Che asked.

"We made dozens of them, but only twenty of them were qualified." Chen Gui replied truthfully.

"On the contrary, the matchlock gun you mentioned is simple to make and has low requirements for the barrel. It is already ready for mass production."

The matchlock gun is a Chinese firearm that was introduced to the West via the Silk Road and was upgraded in Europe.

That thing has no trigger, cannot be aimed, and has poor airtightness. It is just a handle connected to an iron pipe, and looks more like a hand cannon.

But the advantage is that it is low cost. The most expensive part is a metal tube, which is much cheaper than bows and crossbows.

It can also be used on a large scale. Any ordinary person with normal IQ can shoot smoothly after fiddling with it for a few hours.

"Come on, take me to see it!"

Chen Gui took the order and quickly took Li Che to the production workshop.

Although it was freezing outside, the temperature inside the workshop was very high, and the sound of blacksmithing could be heard constantly.

The craftsmen were all shirtless, rolling the fine iron into two iron sheets, one large and one small, and then rolling the iron sheets around iron rods and forging them repeatedly until they were forged into a rough iron pipe.

Another craftsman took the rough iron pipe and drilled it to remove the burrs inside.

Li Che looked at it for a long time and sighed slightly.

From a modern perspective, the craftsmanship of ancient workers is truly admirable.

Repeating an action mechanically over and over again for ten days or half a month just to create a qualified component, you can imagine how boring and tedious it is.

It is worthwhile to improve the status and treatment of workers, as they deserve it.

"Your Highness, put the gun here."

Chen Gui took Li Che to a large empty room.

On the shelves at the edge of the room, there was a row of matchlock rifles neatly arranged. At a glance, there were at least a hundred of them.

In the middle of the room stood a wooden stake covered with a Fengtian Army uniform.

Li Che beckoned, and someone picked up a matchlock gun and handed it to him.

Sure enough, it looked similar to the matchlock gun I had seen in a book in my previous life. It was just a wooden stick with an iron tube inserted on it. There was a matchlock at the bottom of the launching tube, which was used to ignite the gunpowder.

"Bring me a tinderbox." Li Che said with interest.

Chen Gui was startled and quickly dissuaded him, "Your Highness, absolutely not! Although this matchlock gun is simple to make, it has poor airtightness and is very easy to explode."

"You're not very skilled. If you accidentally injure yourself, your colleagues will eat you alive. It's better to let a skilled craftsman demonstrate."

Li Che reluctantly put down the matchlock gun and handed it to the craftsman beside him.

The craftsman turned and walked out of the room, and when he came back he was wearing a set of soft armor.

But he picked up the matchlock gun, held it horizontally in one hand, picked up a red-hot iron rod in the other hand, and lit the thin rope dipped in kerosene on the matchlock.

bump!

After a muffled sound, the black powder in the vent and the black powder in the barrel were ignited, and a lead bullet was shot out from the muzzle, emitting a large amount of white smoke.

"Let's go! Let's see the power!"

Li Che walked forward quickly and searched the armor for a long time, but couldn't find any holes.

Chen Gui, standing by, said awkwardly, "I'm afraid it flew away again. This matchlock gun has too low accuracy. Only two or three out of ten shots will hit the target."

Sure enough, Qiu Bai found the lead bullet on the wall of the room.

Li Che smiled and said, "It doesn't matter if the accuracy is a little off, as long as the bullet can be fired."

A matchlock rifle is not a sniper rifle. It is designed to be used on a large scale.

One person with one gun may not be able to shoot accurately, but what if hundreds of people with hundreds of guns go to fight a group of enemies?

That is a range attack of gunfire and rain of bullets, which can kill a lot of unlucky people.

"Go, get the arquebus."

Several craftsmen immediately turned around and left, and soon came back with two sticks that were more than two feet long.

Li Che took a closer look and his eyes suddenly lit up.

The matchlock gun looks like a fire stick, but the arquebus is completely different and already looks a bit like a modern gun.

A long, straight metal tube with a slightly flared front end to form a trumpet-shaped muzzle, fixed to a wooden stock.

The buttstock is curved and the firing mechanism is located on the right side of the gun body, including an 'S'-shaped metal trigger and a clip for holding the fuse.

Li Che took the matchlock gun from the craftsman and weighed it in his hand.

It is still quite heavy, weighing about six kilograms, mainly due to the added weight of the longer and thicker barrel and hardwood gun body.

"Come! Fire one for me to see." Li Che handed the matchlock gun to the craftsman beside him.