Chapter 566

Others didn't know what had happened, and Xu Shiba couldn't be comforted no matter how they tried, so Xu Wenwu could only take her back, while Wei Yuan and Yu Zhizhuo went to see the latest artillery.

There were two types of artillery in this batch: one was huge, weighing tens of thousands of catties, and could fire 15 miles away with one shot. Yu Zhizhuo also handed Wei Yuan a piece of jade paper and said, "The range and landing points are all on it."

The jade paper listed the angle of the muzzle and how much the range would be, and then starting from 5 miles away, it additionally marked what the landing point deviation would be. When reaching the limit of 15 miles, the deviation could reach 1 mile.

"Have they all been tested?" Wei Yuan asked.

"Those beyond 5 miles have all been tested; within 5 miles, the deviation is not large, and you can just follow the calculated trajectory."

This cannon was extremely powerful and could fire a 200-catty cannonball, but shooting and loading were exceptionally troublesome, taking a quarter of an hour to fire one shot.

The other type of new cannon took the exact opposite path; it was exceptionally light, weighing only over a thousand catties, and for short distances, Dao Foundation cultivators could hold it and fly. It was also equipped with two wheels, and for long distances, a Dao Foundation-perfected cultivator could drag it for half a day.

This cannon fired 5-catty cannonballs and was the first to use rear-loading, with a firing speed that was quite fast, firing one shot every few seconds.

Yu Zhizhuo personally took action, pushed this cannon into the target range position, aimed at a target 1 mile away, and fired a shot, hitting it accurately.

A flash of fire in the distance, the explosion was deafening, the war beast-shaped target was blasted to pieces, and it also sent all the human-shaped steel targets within ten feet around flying!

The power of this shot far exceeded Wei Yuan's expectations; his figure flashed and he appeared at the landing point of the cannonball, inspecting it carefully.

The war beast target imitated the most ordinary war beast of the Shaman tribe, made of hard wood covered with iron skin, with defensive power similar to a real war beast.

The human-shaped targets beside it were all imitating Shaman tribe heavy armored warriors, most of their bodies were pierced by shrapnel, but there was one special target made of steel plates three fingers thick, imitating the defense of a Shaman tribe Dao Foundation warrior. At this moment, a piece of shrapnel was embedded in the chest of this target, still a little bit away from piercing through.

After looking at the targets, Wei Yuan had an estimate of the power: within ten feet, it could kill ordinary Body Forging warriors and cause light injuries to Dao Foundation experts; within three feet, Dao Foundation experts would also be seriously injured. Although war beasts were thick-skinned and fleshy, their huge size meant they would take the full power of the cannon blast, and their survival ability was not as good as Dao Foundation experts.

This cannon was extremely powerful, had a fast firing speed, and a long range; in terms of firepower, it was more than twice as good as the existing city defense cannons, and it could also move with the main army.

Besides, although one shot couldn't blast a Dao Foundation expert to death, a few more shots would do the trick.

Wei Yuan looked at the cannonball carefully again, his nose moved slightly, and he asked, "Used new gunpowder?"

Yu Zhizhuo said, "Just researched it. The main inspiration still came from brother Wenwu; he actually remembered that there is a type of gunpowder made from nitric acid and cotton.

After Sun Yu, Henshui, and I understood the physical principles, we improved it, using Lei Chi water to soak spiritual wood silk, and using Thunder Sand as an auxiliary material; the new gunpowder made can already be listed as a Dao Foundation magic treasure."

The Lei Chi was in Qingming, and a small pond had already appeared around those few lightning-struck trees in the north, which was the Lei Chi water. Wanting more Lei Chi water was also very simple; just plant a few more lightning trees; this kind of sapling could be exchanged for many in the Merit Hall.

Yu Zhizhuo added, "We named this gunpowder 'Thunder Medicine,' but now there are two plans that need a decision. The main difference between the two plans is the quality of the spiritual wood silk. One plan uses spiritual wood silk over fifty years old, which can significantly increase the power. The other plan uses only twenty-year-old spiritual wood silk; the power will be 70% of the former, but twenty-year-old spiritual wood is everywhere, while the production of fifty-year-old spiritual wood is much less."

After hearing this, Wei Yuan's "Human Realm Renjian Yanhuo" had already given an estimate; according to current information, the supply of twenty-year-old spiritual wood was dozens of times that of the fifty-year-old variety.

Wei Yuan immediately said, "Do both; make as many fifty-year-old ones as possible first, and then store them. All cannonballs will use twenty-year-old spiritual wood Thunder Medicine."

"Okay." Yu Zhizhuo nodded.

Wei Yuan asked again, "How is the production of cannonballs?"

Yu Zhizhuo said, "The initial design of the production process has been done, of course, it still needs to be optimized and perfected in 'Human Realm Renjian Yanhuo' before initial use. I'll take you to see the new forging machine first."

Wei Yuan's strange feeling came again; this wasn't the first time someone had said in front of him how to do something in "Human Realm Renjian Yanhuo."

The problem was that Yu Zhizhuo's tone was so natural, as if "Human Realm Renjian Yanhuo" was "Human Realm Renjian Yanhuo," Wei Yuan was Wei Yuan, and there was no connection between the two.

Suppressing the strange feeling, Wei Yuan followed Yu Zhizhuo to a corner of the Forging Workshop. This was a newly opened venue, with arrays set up around it. Although it was only the most basic array, it was enough to block Body Forging cultivators. If a Dao Foundation cultivator trespassed, they would be marked by the array, and then the alert cultivators would quickly arrive.

In the large new venue, there was only one huge machine standing, with two counterweight boxes that were very eye-catching, and what was inside was actually Nether Iron Ore. Now Qingming had more Nether Iron Ore than it could use; under the same volume, it was several times heavier than ordinary iron, so Yu Zhizhuo simply used it as counterweight blocks, greatly reducing the volume.

This was a forging machine specially improved by Yu Zhizhuo for manufacturing cannonballs, with a hanging hammer counterweight of 100,000 catties. Assisted by the magic array, it required ten Dao Foundation or fifty Body Forging cultivators to operate.

One hammer drop of this forging machine could produce a cannonball shell, and then after fine grinding by craftsmen and loading with gunpowder and adding the bottom shell, it was a cannonball. This forging machine could manufacture 50 cannonball shells in one hour, and with 50 fine-grinding craftsmen and 10 assembly craftsmen, it could ensure that 50 cannonballs were completed every hour, which was 600 a day.

If one wanted to manufacture without stopping, the personnel allocation would have to be increased by one time, changing shifts once a day. If Dao Foundation cultivators were used, the number of craftsmen could be reduced by one zero.

In the future, Yu Zhizhuo intended to build more large forging machines, and then concentrate the fine-grinding craftsmen in one venue and the assembly craftsmen in another. After a batch of products was completed, they would be sent to the next process, which could significantly improve production efficiency.

But how the specific venue was distributed and how the internal craftsmen were laid out was the optimization content of "Human Realm Renjian Yanhuo."

To be honest, Wei Yuan was still somewhat dissatisfied with the production of cannonballs.

However, if the production of cannonball shells increased, the production of gunpowder would easily fail to keep up, and they would have to purchase raw materials on a large scale to produce gunpowder. If the gunpowder production kept up, the shells would not be enough.

By the time both were enough, the number of enemies might not be enough.

Finally, Wei Yuan decided to fully produce light small cannons, because they could fight alongside the infantry, so they were named infantry cannons.

Having determined this major matter, someone came to report that the refugees from the Zhao State had arrived. Wei Yuan immediately flew to the southern border, and then saw the Zhao army escorting a large group of refugees entering Qingming territory, with the line of people simply unable to see the end.

Wei Yuan had already prepared brand-new facilities for these refugees. When the refugees arrived, they first had porridge to eat, and then while queuing for porridge, someone would preliminarily screen and distinguish them, separating the strong, those with special skills, and young women.

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

At this time, some small twists and turns occurred; every young woman in the refugee line had an owner, and there was no such thing as being single and traveling alone. When they were separated, it naturally caused strong opposition from their men. At this time, the domain cultivators would ask for the women's wishes, whether they were willing to maintain their original relationship or wanted to separate and live separately.

Almost all the women chose to separate.

The strong and those with excellent roots, if they were willing to join the army, their status could skip the criminal status and start directly as soldiers. Young women and those with special skills were all the same.

If these single young women were checked and had no physical problems, they would be given to single civilian men as wives in the future. This was an important measure that Wei Yuan and the Tai Chu Palace cultivators discussed and believed could maintain Qingming's stability.

All those selected would be taken to bathe and change clothes, all old clothes would be burned, and soldiers would be issued military uniforms. Craftsmen and women would each be issued two sets of coarse cloth clothes.

After eating and drinking their fill, cleaning up, and changing into new clothes, the over 10,000 people selected contributed over 2,000 green Qi to Wei Yuan.

The remaining tens of thousands were concentrated, and Dao Foundation cultivators cast Daoist techniques to bring down spiritual rain. They bathed in the spiritual rain, which could dispel illness and enhance vitality. But now Qingming didn't have so many clothes to issue to them, so they could only wear tattered clothes first.

All the new refugees were sent to reclaim new fields; now Qingming had over 4 million mu of fields, which could produce 800 million catties of grain every two months, so there was no shortage of grain at all, so their speed of reclaiming fields could be determined according to their physical condition. At first, they did less work, and as their bodies became stronger, they would gradually increase their workload.

Now Wei Yuan already had considerable experience in how to govern the people. If you want to settle the hearts of refugees, the first is to feed them, and the second is to give them work, letting them feel that they are useful, and they will naturally settle down.

And the fact that refugees who have been hungry for a long time can reclaim grain fields can make them feel that what they are doing is meaningful.

Sure enough, on the day the large group of refugees was sent to reclaim grain fields, Wei Yuan began to have green Qi credited, and within three days, there was more and more, and it wasn't until he harvested over 8,000 that the speed of green Qi production began to slow down.

After receiving Cui Shutong's 200,000 refugees, Wei Yuan entered the Ghost Cold Realm again to see the progress here.

During this period, a space 6 feet long and 2 feet wide and high had already been opened in the Nether Mountain, and nearly 100 million catties of Nether Iron had been dug out.

Because there was too much Nether Iron, Wei Yuan had long since contributed 100,000 catties of Nether Iron to the Tai Chu Palace, successfully closing the channel for exchanging Nether Iron for immortal silver. Although Wei Yuan donated it, the elders in the palace, considering Wei Yuan's consistent contributions, finally decided to waive a debt of 1 million taels of immortal silver.

Subsequently, the Merit Hall opened a channel for exchanging immortal silver for Nether Iron, where 1 tael of immortal silver could be exchanged for 1 tael of Nether Iron. Nether Iron had a wide range of uses, and seeing it was so cheap, many Tai Chu Palace disciples were eager to exchange it.

Before Wei Yuan left, he checked other rare materials that might be produced in the Ghost Cold Realm, and then found that behind the purchase price of all materials, there was an extra item: how much could be exchanged at this price.

Seeing this patch, Wei Yuan felt offended.

(End of chapter)