Chapter 165: Unseasonable Winds, Unfavorable Rains

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Evening fell, and the aroma of meat broth already drifted through the siege camp.

Outside the city, the support troops digging trenches set down their iron spades, wiped away sweat, and gazed westward — the setting sun cast boundless rays of light as it slowly sank into the mountains.

South of the city, soldiers were forming ranks, and the surrounding support troops watched with faces full of contentment.

Everyone knew: that was Chief Officer Cao's artillery.

It was time for the cannon to fire again.

On the east and west sides, over two hundred men on each side formed two small square formations facing one another — those in front sat cross-legged on the ground, those behind stood.

Cao Yao stood right in the middle, raising a hand to pat his precious red-barbarian cannon: "Come on, today it's the left squad of the left company's turn. The right squad, stand by and watch."

The two squads of support troops, long unable to contain their excitement, ran forward, one from the left and one from the right.

Then they were scolded by Cao Yao: "Your granny's — how many times have I said don't stand behind the cannon, and stay away from the wooden barrel with the powder charges, don't crowd up to it!"

Cao Yao absolutely loved yelling at soldiers.

It gave him a reassuring sense of satisfaction.

It was just like going back twelve years, when the sky hadn't fallen and the earth hadn't split, and he was still a lowly grunt getting chewed out in the capital army's firearms camp.

Times had changed, and now he had become an instructor teaching artillerymen.

"What are you afraid of, all timid and hesitant? It's no different from a gushing-pearl cannon. Come on, load the charge."

The powder charge was Liu Chengzong's idea — the gunpowder granules, wooden sabot, and cannonball were all wrapped up in fabric beforehand, then simply shoved straight into the barrel.

In the short term, this didn't mean much; the necessary condition for fixed ammunition to be meaningful was standardizing the cannon's specifications.

As things stood, they had only seventy-odd cannons, large and small, yet they were divided into four types — gushing-pearl, crouching-tiger, Frankish, and red-barbarian — and these four types further split into sixteen different calibers.

And that was only because they had always mixed and matched cannonballs from captured supplies; otherwise, they could have sorted out over thirty different loading methods for powder and shot.

Liu Chengzong thought it over — under these conditions, getting fixed ammunition right was utter nonsense, with side effects far outweighing any positive meaning.

This was also why he had the work sentries in Shanxi start by making a batch of cannons first: to lock down the specifications.

Once the calibers were unified, whether three types or four, they could then use fixed powder charges, reducing problems in powder transport and letting the artillerymen load faster.

The fixed charges the artillery brought out this time were made from the yellow gauze damask of Old Master Huo's curtains, with red cloth used on the cannonball end.

The red cloth looked good when fired — the fabric wrapping the cannonball wouldn't burn up completely, so with a bang, the cannonball smashed through the gunpowder smoke and shot out, then as the smoke slowly cleared, a piece of red cloth would drift down from the sky.

Actually, when Liu Chengzong designed this, he really missed Luo Rucai.

Luo Rucai loved collecting fabrics — everything on that guy's body could be used to wrap a cannonball.

Grab a Luo Rucai, press him down next to a powder barrel, and before long, the answer to which fabric worked best would come out.

The artillerymen smoothly completed the bore-inspection procedure, stuffed the yellow-gauze-damask powder charge into the barrel, then used an awl at the touchhole to pierce the charge; the igniter poured in priming powder and stood to the side.

The loaders and igniters were all support troops; the aimer was a combat soldier.

Cao Yao said from the side: "This cannon is excellent, the barrel is extremely level and extremely straight. The cannon formula I teach you must be memorized carefully — if you don't memorize it, how will you know how far it can shoot?"

He knew a set of formulas for various firearms, using fixed shot weights and adjusting range by varying the angle and powder charge.

But recently he had discovered that set of formulas was outdated, because this red-barbarian cannon was a long-barreled piece, while the cannon formulas he had memorized back in the capital garrison were all for short-barreled cannons.

After he brought this up with Liu Chengzong, the two of them decided to have the soldiers memorize this set for now; later, when they had time and new cannons, they would recalculate a new set of cannon formulas.

Something that looked so simple was, for them, a matter that required enormous manpower, material resources, and energy.

But right now it was perfect — this post city had to be bombarded no matter what, the distance was a fixed two hundred paces, and the cannon angle was close to level fire, making it ideal for testing fixed powder charges.

The aiming combat soldier had already withdrawn to the side of the cannon; at the command, the igniter used the small sickle tied to the match cord to ignite the priming powder.

Instantly the cannonball roared out, striking the post city's gate tower.

"Well shot!"

Cao Yao turned his head and tossed out a word of praise, not even glancing at the reaction atop the wall. Once the smoke cleared and the support troops finished cleaning the bore, he looked at the debris hooked out from inside the barrel and nodded to himself: "This one's not bad either. The price is about the same as brocaded silk, not as expensive as Pingluo silk or Lu silk."

These past few days he had tested many materials — damasks and gauzes, silks and satins, plain weaves and thin weaves, kudzu cloth and velvet, brocades and embroideries. There was almost nothing they couldn't loot.

The best and most expensive was Lu silk — fine and dense, and most importantly, highly flammable.

When burned, it left almost nothing in the cannon barrel; even if a little remained, it was like ash, wiped away with a single pass.

Cloth was cheap, but cloth didn't burn up completely. When cleaning the bore, if you weren't careful, residue would stay inside, and if the cleaning wasn't thorough, it could easily ignite the powder during the next loading.

Raw silk was actually not bad either, though it required secondary processing.

But they didn't have much of any of those materials on hand.

Of course, they didn't have much Lu silk either.

But Lu silk — well, it was silk satin made in Lu'an Prefecture.

During the Wanli era, overproduction was so extreme that every household in Shanxi, from gentry to commoner, had Lu silk.

The production center was right next door — very easy to get.

The firing drill complete, Cao Yao began lecturing the artillerymen again, expounding his understanding of firearms on the spot.

Put simply, all firearms were the same — whether a Yongle fire lance or a bird gun, a three-eyed gun or a five-eyed one, a short gun or a long gun, a small gun or a big cannon, in his eyes they were all the same.

Just a tube sealed at one end; the only difference was size.

If the tube was long and straight, it shot accurately; if the tube was thick, it hit hard.

The myriad changes never depart from the core principle.

Meanwhile, west of the siege camp, Liu Chengzong was holding a telescope, gazing deep into the river valley, where a column of troops was marching eastward.

The man at the front wore a "Courage" character helmet, black satin-faced narrow-crotch padded trousers, and an open sheepskin short jacket, with clean cloth wrapped from his neck all the way down to his navel, a waist saber slung at his side, swaggering along with an air of bullish arrogance.

From the walking posture and the way the clothes were put together, it was Luo Rucai, no mistake.

The guy's lofty, imposing manner gave no hint that just days ago he had been chased like a rabbit.

Full of spirit.

The men behind him were all on horseback; Liu Chengzong knew that among them were Shangtian Hou, Zhang Tianlin, and Song Shouzhen.

The Zuantianmao Academy has been open for half a year now. The gains from Shanxi were too many, and there will be even more in the future — without a few educated men, you really can't keep it all straight.

So he sent Heaven-Reaching Monkey home on a trip, to bring those eighty bandit students back.

Zhang Tianlin led troops to protect them. As for Luo Rucai, Luo Rucai was picked up along the road.

The guy had rotten luck too. He'd just recruited over a thousand new hands, and before they'd done a thing after setting out, they ran straight into Ai Mu's government troops. The moment the new recruits saw government soldiers, they all fled.

Only four hundred old bandits and hardened outlaws fought a running retreat the whole way — just managing to escape with their lives counts as skill.

When they neared the siege camp, Liu Chengzong came out to receive them. The moment they met, Luo Rucai prostrated himself on the ground: "General Liu above, my thanks for avenging your little brother. That Ai Mu beat me so viciously!"

Luo Rucai's prostration was utterly sincere — he really had been bullied too badly. Since he first rallied men to rise up, he had never experienced a battle like this.

Savage or reckless, no matter how he responded, he was utterly powerless to strike back.

Men — not as many as theirs; troops — not as elite as theirs; fight — couldn't win; flee — couldn't shake them.

He had been wounded and was sent by his men to a mountain village to recover, setting himself up as a mountain king. The moment he heard Liu Chengzong had Ai Mu surrounded at Wen'an Post Station, he was determined to come even if he had to walk.

Liu Chengzong was also intensely curious about this. He helped Luo Rucai up and asked, "You all had horses — how did you end up walking here?"

Luo Rucai took it in stride. He slowly rose, turned around, and patted his backside: "Took a government arrow. Can't sit."

Liu Chengzong smiled, cupped his hands to each man in turn, and only then ushered them into the siege camp.

Zhang Tianlin followed them in, looking left and right as he walked. He first studied Liu Chengzong's camp, then glanced at the post station town where Ai Mu was besieged, secretly clicking his tongue in amazement.

Liu Chengzong's camp could not be called exquisitely ingenious — it was standard and proper — only it had tremendous presence.

It spread in a crescent-moon shape, enveloping Wen'an Post Station from the west, south, and east. They were digging a second line of trenches and building an earthen mound as tall as the post station's walls. He actually meant to starve the government troops out.

Looking back at the post station town, the walls were packed so densely with soldiers there was no room to spare, yet they neither fired cannons nor attempted a breakout — Zhang Tianlin could make no sense of it.

He asked, "Lion, how many government troops are inside Wen'an Post Station?"

Liu Chengzong raised two fingers, eyes smiling: "Originally twelve hundred. Two days ago, we let another six hundred or so in."

"Let six hundred in?"

Liu Chengzong nodded and had Zhong Bao go arrange a campsite for Zhang Tianlin's men, then led the few of them toward his command tent.

Once inside the command tent, he explained in detail: "I haven't fought a battle since I got here. Ai Mu had three outposts of troops, all defending the west — one outpost in the hills to the south, one outpost in the hills to the north, and one outpost in the village west of town."

"I came fast. We bottled the village outpost up inside the town, then surrounded and struck the southern outpost. But by the time we went for the northern one, they'd already fortified their camp and weren't easy to break, so we just besieged this side first."

At this, a smile crept onto his face: "Two days ago, the government troops from the northern hills attacked. We pulled back on the west side. They wanted to get into town, so we only intercepted their baggage train and let the men go."

Zhang Tianlin asked, "You want to starve them to death?"

"Not that ruthless. Starve them into surrendering will do."

His casual tone made Zhang Tianlin secretly click his tongue.

The tactic was utterly ordinary, even a bit dull — just surround them and not let anyone run.

But in northern Shaanxi these days, no one could sustain a standoff with government troops like this.

"Two thousand government troops. And you've got, I'd say, four thousand here? Plus mules, horses, and livestock." Zhang Tianlin watched his relaxed expression, did a quick calculation, and said, "You're burning through more than twice his grain every day."

"Let them be surrounded. Where don't you eat grain?"

Liu Chengzong's Lion Camp had been deeply inspired by Zhang Tianlin. Even now, the framework of combat troops and support troops was something he had learned from Zhang Tianlin back then.

But he was Zhang Tianlin writ large. Zhang Tianlin had only a hundred or so veteran border soldiers; he had over a thousand.

And the biggest difference between Lion Camp and everyone else was that they had a logistics outpost dedicated solely to supply.

Speaking of provisions, Liu Chengzong could not hide his pride. He said, "I fought a few battles in Shanxi and routed four thousand government troops. Those men were all Shanxi natives with families in the garrisons, and not many were willing to follow me — pure profit."

In these times, the hardest thing to feed wasn't just mouths?

The banner troops of Fenzhou Garrison and Pingyang Garrison had all brought their own provisions when they came. They took a beating, left the provisions behind, and left their dead horses and dead mules behind too.

And precisely because they were unwilling to follow him, the number of mouths to feed didn't increase.

"So although we haven't really foraged for grain, the army's provisions are ample — enough to starve this bunch in town until they try to break out… oh, right."

Mid-sentence, Liu Chengzong quickly pointed south, then north: "These last few days, what we've been eating is actually the grain from Ai Mu's two outer outposts."

Ai Mu inside the town would die of rage if he heard that.

When those six hundred government troops from Fire Burn Gully had called at the gate, Ai Mu had been ten thousand times unwilling to open it.

Why did they have to come here, perfectly fine as they were?

Just stay obediently garrisoned in Fire Burn Gully. They had their own provisions anyway, and they'd built field fortifications — they wouldn't be overrun anytime soon. If they really needed to break out, all they had to do was fire a signal rocket into the sky.

And now, wonderful — six hundred more mouths to feed, adding frost to snow for provisions that were already far from plentiful.

Zhang Tianlin laughed aloud at that. He raised a hand toward Liu Chengzong and said, "You've got roving bandits figured out completely."

He felt Liu Chengzong truly was a roving bandit — and a more organized one than anyone else in northern Shaanxi.

The man bounced around drawing fire, and the more he bounced, the fatter he got.

And under his wing, he had cultivated a whole flock of sedentary bandits around Yan'an Prefecture.

Roving bandit leaders like them, with a few hundred men, would drift to Yan'an Prefecture and find their legs wouldn't carry them any further — they became sedentary bandits.

"How is Wang Village? Almost time to harvest the wheat, isn't it?" Liu Chengzong asked. "I saw wheat fields in Yanchuan — very short."

Zhang Tianlin nodded at this: "Right, harvest is next month. That freeze in early spring — along the Apricot Seed River, Coiling Dragon Stream, and the banks of the Yan River, this year's wheat won't need a sickle. You'll have to pull it by hand."

Pulling wheat — Liu Chengzong shook his head just hearing it.

As the saying goes, a wife's greatest dread is bearing children; a stout fellow's greatest dread is pulling wheat.

There are two reasons for pulling wheat: one, the wheat hasn't grown well and is too short to cut easily with a sickle; the other is that the wheat straw can be used for firewood.

It is the most backbreaking work of all.

"Oh, right — Lion, I need to tell you something. You and Chengzu once hit a manor belonging to the Prince of Qin way back." Zhang Tianlin spoke, and seeing Liu Chengzong nod, went on: "I heard from Chengzu that the land there is excellent. I want to take it over — what do you think?"

"Why stand on ceremony? By the West River, take it if you want. But check if that dam is still there. If you can open the dam, best to open it — keep a few more people alive… just hold on one more year."

Zhang Tianlin was delighted to hear he didn't mind, and immediately asked, "Hold on one more year — what do you plan to do next year?"

"Come July or August — I hit a fortified village in Shanxi. That village was planted entirely with corn. Once it ripens, I'll bring it back as seed and try planting some of that."

In Liu Chengzong's other set of memories, a single mu of wheat could yield seven or eight hundred jin — so absurdly high it was frightening. How he wished the man in his head had been a farmer.

The way they grew wheat here, if it lodged or suffered a disaster, getting thirty or forty jin per mu was perfectly normal.

Reaping eighty or ninety jin didn't just meet expectations — it meant the weather had been ideal.

Two hundred jin already went beyond simply describing it as a bumper harvest.

That would have to be called the ancestors manifesting their power.

Liu Chengzong scratched his neck. Worrying about it was useless. Even knowing the yield would be poor, they still had to plant — there was no way around it.

He shook his head and stopped thinking about agriculture. Military matters were still the most important. If the military problems weren't solved, they wouldn't even have the chance to plant crops.

Liu Chengzong drew a deep breath. "Right now I'm just taking a gamble, to see whether Ai Mu breaks out first, or Du Wenhuan's relief troops arrive first."

Author's note:

In 1952, China's average wheat yield per mu was 48.8 kilograms.

In 1950, a wheat field in North China achieved a yield of 250 jin per mu — a high yield among high yields — and was reported in the People's Daily.