Chapter 1201: Still not strong enough

Against the grassland alien tribes, the Firearm Battalion is not enough, let alone those elite troops. "Your Excellency, please rest assured. Regarding firearms, that kid Niu Jiao has actually already found a lead. It seems he has also developed a new type of firearm with greater power and even longer range."

Zhang Jiao did not get angry because of Su Fan's words.

He naturally understood that everything Su Fan said was true; although the Firearm Battalion was not bad, it was still far inferior when facing those veteran archers.

Archers who have trained for years each have a range exceeding that of the Firearm Battalion, and the power of their heavy arrows is not a bit inferior to firearms, and is even stronger.

The Taiping Cult also has archers, but not many, only about eight hundred. Many of these came from the imperial army, and most of them have trained for more than three years, although they have not yet entered the Transcendent Realm.

However, compared to those soldiers who have only trained for three years, their physical fitness is stronger.

They all use heavy bows of over eight shi; the range of these heavy bows reaches over two hundred paces, and their armor-piercing lethality is within a hundred paces, with extremely strong lethality against iron armor at fifty paces.

However, the construction of these archers consumes more resources, because the consumption required for these archers to train their bodies is terrifying.

The Firearm Battalion does not need such strong physical fitness to still exert the power of firearms, but these archers cannot.

If the strength is not enough to pull a heavy bow, how can there be power? Light bows are powerless against iron armor.

And the training of archers is at least three years, or even longer.

The development of the Taiping Cult cannot compare to other forces; the start was too short, and it requires a large amount of money to purchase grain.

Because Zhang Jiao knows the future, once the world is in chaos, if this chaos cannot be ended quickly, the people will be displaced, and then hundreds of millions of people will starve to death.

This is something he does not want to see.

Zhang Jiao does not fail to attach importance to the construction of the army; on the contrary, he attaches great importance to it, but the emergence of firearms has allowed him to see the power of firearms.

As long as firearms can be modified and more powerful firearms can be designed, the resources consumed by the army will be reduced.

Similarly, compared to the Firearm Battalion and archers, the latter consumes more.

The actual manufacturing cost of firearms themselves, for the Taiping Cult, is not much different from bows and arrows.

But the consumption between firearm soldiers and archers is very large.

The daily consumption of one archer might be that of three to five firearm soldiers.

Of course, Zhang Jiao is not short-sighted; if soldiers can train to enter the Transcendent Realm, he naturally supports it.

Zhang Jiao is not blind to the power erupted by those soldiers who have entered the Transcendent Realm; it is a great addition to the army.

But for ordinary people to enter the Transcendent Realm, even with martial arts techniques and resources, it is not something that can be done just by wanting to.

The Divine Strength Realm, a thousand catties of strength—martial arts do not require aptitude, but many have trained for ten years and consumed a large amount of resources without necessarily reaching this realm.

Otherwise, with so many imperial troops in the north, a million elites, those soldiers who can reach the Divine Strength Realm are barely one in a hundred, and these are still battle-hardened veterans who have gone through countless slaughters.

Among those ordinary second-line troops, there might not be one in a thousand who can advance.

This shows the difficulty of this improvement.

The Taiping Cult's fifty-thousand-strong army has been training for three years, and there are only about a hundred, some of whom were even imperial soldiers who had already undergone training.

So Zhang Jiao is very clear about the difficulties of building a Transcendent army; since that is the case, why not choose something simpler?

Whether it is the Firearm Battalion or the Artillery Battalion, especially the latter, even ordinary people can operate artillery, and the power of artillery is what shocked Zhang Jiao even more.

Zhang Jiao's inheritance naturally knows that in the Great Qin era, there were Rune Cannons; those Rune Cannons built jointly by the Mohist and Daoist schools could blast Immortals to death.

However, the Liu Han imperial court did not inherit them.

And the artillery of the Taiping Cult now naturally cannot compare to the Rune Cannons of Great Qin, but the power of that artillery, when bombarded head-on, can threaten Grandmasters.

And with the improvement of gunpowder, it can even threaten Grandmasters and Golden Core level cultivators.

This is not a rune; it is purely the power of mortals. The Artillery Battalion, formed by artillery built by mortals, now has hundreds of pieces.

Although the range is only eight hundred paces, it is enough to deal with cavalry.

That volley fire is extremely extraordinary in power.

And the key is that these firearms and artillery can be improved.

This is what excites Zhang Jiao.

The construction of artillery is not very difficult for the current Taiping Cult.

If they go all out, it would be enough to build one hundred pieces in a month.

However, the Taiping Cult does not need so many now; after all, it is still too far from the Taiping Cult's uprising.

In addition, although the power of this first generation of artillery is good, in their view, it is still relatively backward.

It can still be improved; whether it is the power of the artillery's explosion or the range, it can be improved.

The second generation of artillery has also been developed.

Therefore, the Artillery Battalion currently has hundreds of pieces, which is enough for the training of artillery soldiers; in the future, it might be the second generation or the third generation.

Su Fan sees the army's test firing in his eyes; the Firearm Battalion's fifteen thousand muskets and five thousand artillerymen have already formed combat effectiveness.

It can be said that it is absolutely the peak army of the Ming and Qing periods.

That artillery is comparable to the power of the Red Barbarian Cannons of the Ming and Qing dynasties.

However, it is still just a muzzle-loading cannon, and the gunpowder is still in the category of black powder, without a breakthrough.

Therefore, the power is just like that.

Of course, if there were thousands of cannons firing together, even Lv Bu's iron cavalry would likely suffer heavy losses when facing them.

After all, the power of explosive shells, even with the upper limit of black powder, is still enough to cause lethality to some martial arts Grandmasters.

Martial arts body refining, even for a Grandmaster, although the physical body is trained to be very strong, it is not invulnerable to swords and guns, let alone artillery.

It is just that the range and rate of fire of the Red Barbarian Cannons also have great limitations and cannot be compared to the artillery of the First and Second World Wars of later generations.

Once the iron cavalry charges over, these artillerymen will have no power to resist.

However, the generals in the Taiping Cult army are not incompetent; those thirty thousand heavy infantry are the iron walls for these artillerymen.

As long as they block them, then relying on the muskets and artillery of the Firearm Battalion, it is enough to annihilate the enemy.

Fifty thousand troops, dealing with an ordinary army, in terms of the same number, the Taiping Cult is still capable, but when truly facing the elite imperial troops of the north, they are still no match.

This is Su Fan's evaluation. Artillery is powerful, but the technology is not enough, and the elite of the imperial army, with military Qi, will have stronger defense at that time; muskets will not play a role, and the power of artillery will also be weakened.

"Your Excellency, please rest assured, we are constantly researching."

Zhang Jiao also nodded in acknowledgment.

"I still have confidence in you, Meng Ling." ===== CHAPTER 1202 =====