Chapter 565

Beside the training ground stood rows of wooden racks, on which hung naked soldiers, all covered in whip marks, on the verge of death.

Suddenly, someone in the ranks couldn't hold on, and the musket drooped. The captain patrolling back and forth immediately rushed over, dragged the soldier out, hung him on the wooden rack, and gave him a fierce whipping, a full twenty lashes.

The captain didn't dare to show any mercy in his strikes; if he dared to show even a little softness, the Colonel would take action and hang him on the wooden rack. If the Colonel was soft, the Dharma Form General would hang him up, and so on, layer by layer, until the Dharma Form expert was hung up.

The woman's requirement was that one could faint, but one could not waver.

This training lasted for a full hour before it ended, and only when the woman on the high platform disappeared did everyone breathe a sigh of relief, immediately collapsing on the ground.

At the same moment, the woman had already appeared in the workshop. Rows of brand-new muskets were already placed on the shelves, with gleaming barrels.

As soon as the woman appeared, everyone in the workshop stood up instantly, and a clumsy shop assistant bumped into a rack, causing parts to fall to the ground with a clatter.

But the woman, who was notorious, just looked at the assistant faintly and didn't say much. The assistant's face was pale, still unable to believe that he had escaped death.

She came to the gun rack and picked up a musket at random; the craftsmen's faces immediately showed relief, but she suddenly put the gun back in its place and turned to pick up the gun at the very edge.

The craftsmen's faces instantly turned pale.

The woman skillfully loaded the gunpowder and bullet, then aimed at a swaying tree branch not far away and fired a shot.

The branch remained intact; this shot had missed.

The craftsmen's faces were pale, and one simply fainted. The woman weighed the gun in her hand, scanned the craftsmen, and said faintly, "Although this shot didn't hit, the trajectory was not bad. This kind of firearm is not very precise to begin with, so you can be considered to have put in effort to achieve this level of accuracy.

However, in the future, remember not to use gun barrels produced in Qingming to pass off as self-produced. Those gun barrels have been used; even if the exterior can be polished, the vibration marks and tiny damages inside cannot be erased. The guns you make are also not bad; there's no need to belittle yourselves."

Several craftsmen were as if granted amnesty, hurriedly thanking her profusely.

"How many can you produce every day now?" the woman asked.

Several people who followed her behind hurriedly winked secretly, and a craftsman hurriedly said, "Five... every day."

The woman said faintly, "For the sake of you being craftsmen, I'll give you another chance."

The craftsman was sweating profusely and said truthfully, "Our skills are low; it takes each person at least five days to make one musket."

The woman looked around and said, "That is to say, your workshop can produce three muskets a day."

"My lord is wise."

There were currently fifteen such workshops in the entire city.

The woman didn't say anything, just said, "Let's go."

Just as she stepped out of the workshop door, she saw a dozen people waiting outside, with a middle-aged man in gorgeous clothes and a meticulously trimmed mustache in the center. As soon as he saw the woman, he greeted her and smiled, "Aunt Lanshan, I've finally waited for you to return!"

When the woman saw him, she seemed to recall something, then revealed a trace of a smile and said, "It's Rong, you've become so mature."

The middle-aged man sighed, "Actually, I'm already over seventy; my cultivation hasn't gone up, so I've slowly started to look old. Second Aunt, I know you're busy, so if you have something to say, just say it directly."

This action clearly suited Xu Lanshan's temper, and her smile became more obvious as she said, "You speak."

"It's like this, the Fifth Elder has two merchant caravans that have been blocked in Hanyang Pass. He found me here, wanting two road passes."

The smile on Xu Lanshan's face disappeared, and after a moment, she said, "Two, okay."

The middle-aged man hurriedly said, "The Fifth Elder means two long-term road passes."

This time, not only was there no smile on the woman's face, but it was also covered in frost as she said one word: "Get out!"

The middle-aged man was stunned, and before he could speak, he suddenly felt the world spinning, and in the blink of an eye, he was already on the lake hundreds of feet away, falling into it with a splash.

The woman waved her hand and slapped everyone away; except for the middle-aged man, everyone else was seriously injured. She acted as if nothing had happened and asked the person in charge of the workshop affairs, "When can this kind of workshop be expanded to 100?"

The person in charge looked troubled: "The number of workshops is easy to handle, but there are not enough craftsmen! This kind of craftsman needs three years of apprenticeship, three years of being a helper, and three years of hammering before they can independently build things; it's impossible to train them without a few years."

"Then find Dao Foundation cultivators," Xu Lanshan said.

The person in charge smiled bitterly: "Those Dao Foundation cultivators are all arrogant; how is that possible? If we recruit with money, we don't have this budget."

"I don't care about this; give me a plan within three days. I'll go ask for resources. In short, the monthly production of muskets must reach 10,000."

At this time, a figure appeared in the sky ahead, which others didn't notice, but Xu Lanshan moved and appeared in front of that figure, saluting: "I have met Fenhai Zhenjun Qinniu." Qinniu waved his hand and said, "No need for such courtesy; I came to ask you, when will you open the pass?"

Xu Lanshan said, "How could such a small matter alarm Fenhai Zhenjun Qinniu? Could it be that the Fenhai Zhenjun also has interests in it?"

Fenhai Zhenjun Qinniu snorted and said, "I won't argue with you; follow me."

The two figures flickered, and in a moment, they were already above Hanyang Pass. They saw many merchant caravans staying in the open space inside the pass, with hundreds of cargo carts. What was even more unexpected was that there were refugees covering the mountains and plains, looking at them, there were at least over 100,000 people.

Fenhai Zhenjun Qinniu pointed to those refugees and said, "There is not enough surplus grain here to feed them, and now hundreds of people die every day. Goods don't matter, but these people are all dying because of your order."

Xu Lanshan was silent for a moment before saying, "They..."

Fenhai Zhenjun Qinniu said, "They are all considered Wei Yuan's people now; Wei Yuan paid the taxes and has the permission of the Prince of Jin."

"If we let them pass, wouldn't that be aiding the enemy?"

Fenhai Zhenjun Qinniu shrugged and said, "The final decision is in your hands; if you don't want to let people go, then don't. I just want you to see clearly how many people will die because of your order. A light sentence in your study is thousands of lives here. And these lives all have to be counted on your head."

Xu Lanshan's face turned cold as she said, "Fenhai Zhenjun Qinniu, if you have something to say, just say it directly."

"I've already said it very clearly; it's your decision, you bear the infamy, don't think about being a whore and setting up a memorial arch at the same time. I've already warned the clan historians." After saying this, Fenhai Zhenjun Qinniu turned and flew away, disappearing in an instant.

No errors, first release, internal content, take a look!

Xu Lanshan stood still in the air, looking at the refugees below, and didn't leave for a long time.

Qingming.

Wei Yuan opened an official document, glanced at it, was stunned, and then asked, "Has our merchant caravan in the Jin State returned?"

A young female cultivator standing in attendance said, "Yes, they arrived at Hanyang Pass ten days ago, and now they are stuck there and can't get out."

Wei Yuan read the official document carefully and knew that this merchant caravan had already traveled a large circle within the Jin State, covering 30% of the country's territory, establishing several transit stations, and had brought back nearly 100,000 refugees on this trip, having already paid off the taxes along the way.

Wei Yuan pondered for a moment, then immediately picked up his pen and submitted a memorial to the Prince of Jin, in which he fiercely impeached the garrison commander of Hanyang Pass, saying that he was lawless, closed the pass at will, did not recognize the Prince of Jin's transit permit, and even boasted that he was the boss in this area, and that even if the Prince of Jin himself came, it wouldn't work.

The last paragraph was naturally added by Wei Yuan himself, but what the Xu family at Hanyang Pass did was roughly what it meant, and Wei Yuan just added a little bit of embellishment.

This memorial would certainly have no effect; Wei Yuan was just burying another thorn between the Prince of Jin and the Xu family. To open the pass, he had to think of other ways.

Hanyang Pass now had a full 500,000 garrison troops; the past events of the Maofei Zhan Tian Gang entering the city to seize the pass could no longer be replicated. However, the eight heavy crossbows of Hanyang Pass had been dismantled, and now there were no long-range weapons with sufficient power, so Wei Yuan felt there was still a chance.

Wei Yuan immediately went to find Yu Zhizhuo to ask about the progress of the latest artillery.

Unexpectedly, there were also Xu Wenwu and a little girl who looked like she was eight or nine years old in Yu Zhizhuo's room. At this time, Xu Wenwu was talking eloquently, and the little girl and Yu Zhizhuo were listening with fascination.

"... RPG is the artifact for civilians, simple, practical, and cheap. Originally, you wouldn't know where it would fly after it was fired, but we can guide it with spiritual sense...

Artillery is slightly more troublesome, mainly because one needs to calculate the trajectory, which is actually very simple; I remembered it back then, but on the way to this world, it was polluted by the local soul..."

Seeing Wei Yuan arrive, Xu Wenwu immediately stopped talking sheepishly. In Xu Wenwu's eyes, Wei Yuan was different from other natives; he was a figure who could fight him in the forum of the outer world.

Wei Yuan's gaze fell on the little girl, and the little girl immediately jumped into Wei Yuan's arms. This little one was Xu Shiba, who was actually just over a year old. Wei Yuan finally managed to peel Xu Shiba off his body and asked, "Have you started Body Forging yet?"

Xu Shiba nodded: "I cultivate the same as Dad, both are the Jade Toad Gazing at the Moon Diagram."

For some reason, Wei Yuan felt a bit unhappy. Wei Yuan hoped that the more ordinary cultivators who cultivated the Jade Toad Gazing at the Moon Diagram, the better, and the fewer genius cultivators, the better; otherwise, looking at those flowery toads of theirs, Wei Yuan's Dao heart was prone to losing its guard.

But Yu Zhizhuo and Xu Wenwu were right there, so Wei Yuan still had to maintain his demeanor and asked, "How is the effect of the cultivation? Manifest it and let me see."

Xu Shiba only looked big, but her actual age was very small, and she hadn't been cultivating for many days. Wei Yuan was just saying it casually, but he didn't expect her to actually manifest a Jade Toad!

This toad, how should one put it, was very ordinary in itself, but it wasn't ordinary with that stone tablet on its back. That stone tablet was ancient and vicissitudinous, shaped like a giant sword, with five large characters written on it: "Wan Shi Sword of Wan Shi!"

In an instant, the three people's gazes were all attracted by the characters "Wan Shi Sword of Wan Shi." And in Wei Yuan's eyes, those strokes seemed to come alive, flying into the air and turning into the image of Xu Shiqi. He smiled and waved at Wei Yuan, saying, "Watch this move, 'Sweeping Away the Four Barbarians'."

He dragged the sword, stepped, shouldered the sword, turned, and then swung the sword, pausing in the air, and then slashed down heavily. In an instant, everything around was extinguished, and vitality was cut off!

This move was slightly different from what Wei Yuan had seen before, more perfect, and the power was simply strong and domineering; it was clear that this was the true transmission.

As the sword fell, Xu Shiqi left with a smile.

Wei Yuan came back to his senses and saw that the ancient tablet on the Jade Toad's back was nowhere to be found, leaving only a bare toad. Xu Shiba suddenly pouted her little mouth and burst into tears.

Xu Wenwu and Yu Zhizhuo didn't know where the change came from, so they hurriedly stepped forward to comfort her.

And Wei Yuan looked at that bald toad, and for some reason, his mood improved.

(End of chapter)