[{"data":1,"prerenderedAt":-1},["ShallowReactive",2],{"origin-stealing-ming":3,"chapter-stealing-ming-stealing-ming-chapter-193":6},{"origin":4,"title":5},"chinese","Stealing Ming",{"chapter":7,"nextChapterSlug":19,"prevChapterSlug":20,"totalChapters":21,"novelImage":22},{"id":8,"novel_id":9,"title":10,"slug":11,"index":12,"content":13,"wordcount":14,"created_at":15,"updated_at":15,"volume":16,"translator":17,"content_hash":18},1220810,1614,"Chapter 193: Section 10: War Preparations","stealing-ming-chapter-193",193,"\u003Cp>Zhang Feimao’s retainer, Little Monkey, is now an officer with the rank of Mobile Corps Commander — specifically, the current commander of the Vanguard Battalion. Li Chengfeng is understandably quite unhappy about this, but Huang Shi insists on the principle that the Vanguard Battalion’s command must pass to a veteran of the battalion itself. So Li Chengfeng and the other officers of Jinzhou Fortress have no way to interfere with this field battalion.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>When Huang Shi arrived at Pangu Fortress, he found the fortifications very well built, with the outer moat and abatis laid out in an orderly fashion. He could not help but praise them highly. Hong Antong, standing beside him, hurriedly reported: “The officer in charge of building the fortress and digging the moat is named Ouyang Xin. He is an officer from the artillery unit, but his gunnery skills are very poor. Instead, he designed many tools for digging trenches.”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“Hmm, I must find time to meet this man.” Huang Shi pondered briefly, then smiled and asked Hong Antong: “This Ouyang Xin was a tomb raider by trade, wasn’t he?”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Hong Antong also grinned and replied: “My lord sees clearly.”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Huang Shi had by now discovered many of Hong Antong’s talents, his memory being one of them. He could recall important personnel files almost after a single glance. While stationed at Pangu Fortress, Huang Shi was still anxiously awaiting a letter from Bao Jiusun on Changsheng Island. His small steel furnace had already proven capable of melting pig iron and wrought iron into liquid. The first time he saw the blue flames dancing atop the molten iron in the crucible, Huang Shi’s eyes turned red with excitement. If iron could be melted into liquid, then sand should be about the same. Fortunately, everyone around him at the time had their eyes scorched by the blinding red glare, and since they were all weeping, nothing showed. So-called steel is simply an alloy of iron and carbon. Impurities in the pig and wrought iron, such as phosphorus, absolutely had to be removed, but the first few slagging processes were far from ideal. Now that Huang Shi had left Changsheng Island, he could no longer oversee it personally…\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>In truth, he did not understand it either. Better to let the old blacksmiths follow the wrought iron refining method to make slag, or simply make a large ladle and skim the impurities floating on the surface the way one skims scum from meat broth. But before he could receive Bao Jiusun’s report of success, Little Monkey arrived at Pangu Fortress with the Vanguard Battalion to join forces with Huang Shi: “Your subordinate Zhang Minghe, reporting to Military Commander Huang.”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Huang Shi sized up the officer before him. The man appeared both humble and respectful, which inwardly pleased Huang Shi: “Rise.”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“Thank you, Military Commander Huang.” By rights, Zhang Minghe could have inherited Zhang Feimao’s set of half-plate armor, but he was now wearing the iron armor Huang Shi had bestowed upon him. When he looked at Huang Shi, gratitude could not help but show in his eyes.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Zhang Minghe stood ramrod straight like a telegraph pole. Huang Shi pointed to a chair and said: “Sit and speak.”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Zhang Minghe’s body twitched as if jolted by electricity. He hastily demurred: “In the presence of Military Commander Huang, how could your subordinate presume to take a seat?”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Seeing Zhang Minghe persistently decline, Huang Shi had his personal guard shove a stool toward him. Only then did Zhang Minghe perch himself on the very edge of the stool and sit.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Huang Shi chatted casually with him for a few moments about the internal affairs of the Vanguard Battalion, then smiled and made him a promise: “In this campaign to seize Fuzhou, I will certainly petition for recognition for Garrison Commander Zhang.”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“Your subordinate is deeply grateful to Military Commander Huang.” Zhang Minghe immediately sprang up from the chair and bowed deeply toward Huang Shi.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“Sit and speak.” After Zhang Minghe had settled back down, Huang Shi added: “This time you must strive to earn merit.”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Huang Shi cupped his hands in the direction of Beijing: “So that we may request an imperial favor from the court, allowing you to restore your original surname.”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Those retainers who had sworn themselves to a foster father all naturally hoped to one day restore their original surnames. Zhang Minghe instantly sprang up from the stool again: “Military Commander Huang’s teaching is correct. Your subordinate will certainly slay the rebels and serve the nation.”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>This Zhang Minghe, relying on Huang Shi’s support to take control of the Vanguard Battalion, was weeping with gratitude toward Huang Shi. At the same time, he realized that from then on he would be branded with the label of “Huang’s faction.” Today, seeing Huang Shi offer him a seat and encouragement, he understood that the other man intended to promote him, and he resolved to seize this opportunity to squeeze into the ranks of Huang Shi’s inner circle.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“Sit and speak. Sit and speak.” Huang Shi waved his hand repeatedly with a grin, telling Zhang Minghe there was no need to be so formal. This reaction from the Vanguard Battalion’s officer corps was, after all, within Huang Shi’s expectations.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>In many matters of the world, when you chase, they flee; when you flee, they chase. Huang Shi had openly made it clear he would not swallow up the Vanguard Battalion, and as a result, they instead felt excluded. Now, one and all, they were desperately trying to squeeze into Huang Shi’s system. Another topic Huang Shi cared about was the silver coinage. This time he had distributed back pay and reward silver all at once. The soldiers of Liaonan had not received their full military pay for many years. Huang Shi took this opportunity to probe Zhang Minghe about the effect of this pay distribution.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“Military Commander Huang observes the conditions of his subordinates and loves his soldiers like his own sons…” Zhang Minghe immediately launched into a torrent of extravagant flattery. Huang Shi was swept along and felt somewhat light-headed from it. In Zhang Minghe’s account, the situation was entirely excellent. Every soldier on the roster had received his full pay, and everyone was full of boundless praise for Huang Shi’s military scrip policy and his selfless impartiality.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>The old method of distributing silver ingots was not a very scientific one. The Ming treasury-standard silver ingot had a silver content of ninety-eight to ninety-nine percent, while civilian and commercial silver ingots were generally around eighty percent. Some individual merchants even used ingots with only sixty or seventy percent silver.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Therefore, even for the same nominal tael, the difference between treasury-standard silver and civilian silver was enormous, and the discrepancies among various civilian silver ingots were also vast. Silver taels remained a very crude form of general equivalent. If silver ingots were issued to officers, those officers would often exchange the official silver with merchants for civilian silver, then distribute the civilian silver as military pay, thereby pocketing the difference. Some officers even went so far as to privately mint silver ingots, adulterating them with large amounts of cheap metal.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>If they did not wish to issue full silver pay, these officers could also propagandize to the soldiers that their superiors had never provided the full amount. Zhang Minghe and Li Chengfeng had also planned to follow this practice. Their own foundations were currently unstable, so they dared not withhold pay outright, but they still had the nerve to swap official silver for civilian silver. Zhang Minghe had originally been counting on this money to form his own personal guard and retainer corps. When they first heard that Huang Shi was issuing military scrip, these two were not overly worried. They had originally planned either to go themselves or to use merchants to exchange the scrip for silver in Shandong, and then exchange that for civilian silver to ship back.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>But after the merchants they commissioned made several tentative inquiries, they all discovered that the Shandong Military Defense Circuit was utterly inflexible, refusing under any circumstances to use the silver of the Dongjiang Army’s Left Associate Division to redeem the military scrip in their hands. The officials of the Shandong Military Defense Circuit had long had a tacit understanding: for every ten thousand taels of silver transported to Changsheng Island, they could report an account of five thousand taels in wastage and surcharges to the treasury. This was money those merchants could never afford to pay. Besides, Huang Shi had also promised to spend twenty percent of the silver each year to buy the worthless, broken copper coins of Nanjing.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Those copper coins were utterly valueless on the outside market — no one would even take twenty strings for a single tael of silver. Yet Huang Shi was willing to exchange one tael for five strings of them. This was also a very large business deal, and many people in Nanjing counted on it. These local officials, of course, did not know that Huang Shi was shipping all the broken copper coins to Japan (the Nagato Domain provided the distribution channels, Changsheng Island provided the goods, and the two parties split the profits — Huang Shi never ate alone). They only knew that they owed Huang Shi no small favor and had profited greatly from it themselves. So they drove all those merchants away. A few officials even refused to recognize their own kin and had certain old merchant friends beaten with the plank. Those merchants, having been thoroughly rebuffed, could not fathom why the local officials would refuse to earn money, but they had no choice but to return and report the situation to Zhang Minghe and the others.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Under these circumstances, Li Chengfeng and his associates considered forging some military scrip, hoping to fool whichever merchant they could. But after the silver and copper coins forged by Huang Shi were issued as military scrip, Li Chengfeng and the others immediately discovered there was no possibility of forgery. Never mind the silver coins — even the copper coins were beyond their ability to produce. Anyone who was not blind could tell a cast copper cash from a forged copper coin at a single glance. Moreover, the merchants became enthusiastic after seeing this kind of scrip. The fineness of Huang Shi’s silver coins was only slightly inferior to ordinary civilian silver, but the value of each silver or copper coin was crystal clear — far clearer and far more convenient than the silver ingots they usually handled.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>These merchants, who had traveled far and wide, could also see at a glance that such silver and copper coins would be extremely difficult to counterfeit. The only thing they needed to worry about was whether Huang Shi would honor them. At first, a few Shandong merchants went to Changsheng Island to redeem the silver coins. Yang Zhiyuan, without a second word, exchanged them for full-weight official silver. Other colleagues who had been watching on tiptoe, seeing that Huang Shi’s credit seemed acceptable, decided to start using this currency for business. Most of the merchants trading with the Dongjiang Left Associate Division also came to accept the face value of the silver coins. What Zhang Minghe was now telling Huang Shi greatly pleased the latter. Zhang Minghe and the others had also discovered that using silver coins made it relatively easy to curb the problem of withholding military pay. Of course, if an officer was utterly shameless and forcibly exploited his soldiers, there was still no remedy. But at least they could no longer easily fool the soldiers with debased or underweight silver ingots.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>The value of each silver and copper coin was clearly inscribed upon it. Even illiterate soldiers, after looking at them a few more times, could understand what they meant. Yet amidst all this praise, Huang Shi did not realize that Zhang Minghe and the others still had a trick for cutting corners: they used a knife to shave slivers off the outer rim of the silver coins. Later, when pay was distributed again, Zhang Minghe’s personal guards would stay up all night scraping the silver coins, shaving a ring off each one. Officers across Liaonan — people like Zhang Pan and Shang Kexi — also sooner or later thought of this same trick. After they finished scraping, they issued the coins to the soldiers. The soldiers quickly learned the technique from the personal guards and began scraping too. When merchants received the silver coins in exchange for goods, they would naturally scrape them yet again. As the silver coins circulated among merchants, they grew smaller and smaller. In any case, once they shrank to a certain point, they could still be taken to Changsheng Island and exchanged for silver ingots. On the twenty-seventh day of the sixth month of the fifth year of the Tianqi reign, around Pangu Fortress, banners blotted out the fields and encampments stretched to the horizon. Zhang Pan and the Shang Keyi brothers all arrived with their own troops to offer their service. By now, six battalions and nine thousand fighting men of the Dongjiang Army’s Left Associate Division had assembled here, and with over ten thousand auxiliary soldiers, the Ming army numbered twenty-five thousand strong.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>The day before, the Dongjiang army had even brazenly built a pontoon bridge across the Fuzhou River. Scouts had also ridden up to the walls of Fuzhou to reconnoiter. According to reports, the Later Jin army kept the four gates tightly shut day and night and had withdrawn all scattered forces from the surrounding area back into Fuzhou city. Upon hearing this, the Ming army dispatched the Firefighting Battalion to cover a large number of auxiliary troops in constructing a bridgehead fortress. Once this simple fortification was completed, wounded soldiers from the Ming army during the battle for Fuzhou could be rapidly evacuated to the rear for treatment here, and the Ming army could also use this bridgehead to protect the auxiliary troops and the line of retreat.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Huang Shi, majestic and imposing, sat in the center of the command tent. To the side sat Wu Mu, his face full of solemnity, and behind him the clerk Chen Ruike. In the late Ming, communications, mobility, and command efficiency were all very poor. A Regional Commander simply could not synchronously control the entire army. Moreover, under the Ming system of “mutual restraint between senior and junior officers,” Huang Shi knew deeply that whether friendly forces shared his goals and loyalty could determine life or death, victory or defeat. Huang Shi took out a written operations plan — as military operations grew ever larger and more complex, he had begun to be unable to remember all the mission details. His personal guard subordinates had also printed many copies of this plan and distributed one to every general attending the meeting. Zhang Pan and the others had been startled when they were first ordered to sit around the table, and now they accepted the thick plan documents with bellies full of suspicion. Then, following the example of Huang Shi’s inner circle, they opened them and began to study them with great care. Hong Antong even assigned a personal guard to serve as a translator for the illiterate Zhang Minghe.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>The operations plan exhaustively described each unit’s mission, their neighboring units, and their routes of march. After Huang Shi finished the mission briefing, he began asking the various generals if they had any questions. This shocked the friendly-force generals even more. In the past, a superior’s orders were not to be questioned. Huang Shi’s main hope was that everyone would speak up now if they had something to say. If they felt a mission could not be accomplished, it was best to raise it beforehand. That was far better than reaching the battlefield, seeing the situation turn unfavorable, and then slipping away.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>After half a day of adjustment, the various officers of the Dongjiang Left Associate Division grew familiar with Huang Shi’s mode of military conference. After extensive discussion, they finally reached a consensus. Huang Shi also did his utmost to satisfy everyone’s requests. Through this exchange, he also gained a certain understanding of the combat effectiveness of the various units of Dongjiang Town.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“Are there any further questions?” Huang Shi asked the assembled generals one last time, as he swept his gaze over the expressions on their faces. “None.”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>The generals answered in unison, their voices ringing. After such a long exchange, they all fully understood the operations plan in their hands, and precisely because of this understanding, they were filled with confidence in the outcome of the war.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>The faces of these officers revealed excitement and a thirst for merit, which also greatly satisfied Huang Shi: “Good. Tonight, we feast the troops. Tomorrow morning, the army will set out and cross the Fuzhou River. The attack on Fuzhou must begin before noon.”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>After the meeting dispersed, Huang Shi called out for He Dingyuan to stay. He pulled him back to sit at the table: “Brother He, you did not speak a single word today.”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“I have no questions. None whatsoever.” He Dingyuan’s face had been taut and icy cold lately.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“Brother He, between brothers like us, what is there that truly cannot be said?” He Dingyuan studied Huang Shi’s eyes carefully for a moment, as if they were two strangers. Throughout, Huang Shi did his utmost to maintain the smile on his face. He Dingyuan sighed mournfully: “My lord, if I were that common soldier, if I had an enemy like that, it would be impossible for me not to seek revenge.” He Dingyuan shook his head sorrowfully: “Impossible not to seek revenge.”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>He suddenly lifted his face: “My lord, if the one who did such a thing were me, would you also not grant me pardon?”\u003C\u002Fp>",2982,"2026-06-04T07:54:30.907Z",1,"Novelzhen Translator","9d6cfce2ade1e26d1f7546a1b650ed4893088f1ee5d098e27b26786f7597cf74","stealing-ming-chapter-194","stealing-ming-chapter-192",323,"https:\u002F\u002Fnovelzhen.com\u002Fimages\u002Fcovers\u002Fstealing-ming-cover.jpg"]