After Zhao Xingde resigned, Wang Yan's enlightening reminder was still swirling in his mind. The night outside was as dark as ink, and the Liao people still drove the Han army and civilians to attack the city. The sound of fire and cannons continued, and the soldiers on the city head were busy shooting arrows and throwing stones, and sometimes they heard several tragic sounds.

Call

Cutting through the night sky, injured soldiers were sitting and lying all over the city, moaning incessantly, as if they were in Shura hell. Zhao Xingde felt chest tightness and breathlessness. He returned to the barracks and could not sleep. He simply got up and wrote a letter to vent his anger.

Trouble in the chest.

"Minghuan, princes of Shaoyang, I have heard the words of wise men. Sages make laws, and ordinary people accept them. Sages and emperors are all within the etiquette, justice and state laws. This man is different from the beasts. The people are just like beasts and barbarians when they are born.

However, the weak is flesh and the strong is food. The Dharma hangs above, as stable as the stars.

, when people live under it, their bodies will be safe and their spirits will be calm, and they will be able to wander around in life and death. As Ming Huan said in the past, there is great power and the country's legal system. Even if there are people who are as respected as emperors and virtuous as saints, they will still be under the law. It's good.

This is what he said! Those who are better than animals can only be matched by humans. False power and strength hang on the

In terms of the law, those who are superior will eat the weak, while those who are inferior will be alienated from morality. Each of them will live in a deep place and rarely come out, fearing that others will harm themselves. In this way, etiquette will collapse and music will be destroyed, morality and justice will not exist, and people will return home after leaving etiquette and justice.

Animals. In addition to human ethics, righteousness, etiquette, music, punishment, and government, it is the way of animals.

Those who are superior do not obey etiquette and do not obey laws and orders. Is this the so-called handsome beast that cannibalizes people? There is no way greater than benevolence and righteousness, and no teaching is true to etiquette, music, punishment, and government. Man is the spirit of all things and is loved by nature. If we follow the law of the weak, the strong eats the strong.

, Isn’t it sad to leave China’s defense and return to the same place as the beasts?”

Zhao Xingde wrote a lot of paper in a daze, until he vented all his untimely thoughts, then he put a pile of letter paper into the book of scriptures and fell asleep. After writing the reply letter insulting the Khitan court and royal family, the Liao army issued a letter the next day.

The cavalry cut off the traffic outside Hejian City, and even military messages could not be sent out in the city. The military reports from Hejian that the court now receives are still one from Tong Guan every day from the sea ship.

At dawn the next day, Su Wenyu asked Zhao Xingde to go to the archery range to organize the army. When Zhao Xingde put on his dagger and came out of the barracks, Su Wenyu almost thought he was a different person and looked at him in surprise. He was full of joy and anger.

Zhao Xing, who has a poor upbringing and is full of anxiety and boredom, has many worries.

Virtue now is to stay away from strangers. The gentle Confucian scholar in the past seemed to have transformed overnight, adding a sinister aura, and became a dignified and self-respecting military commander. Even Zhu Houwu, who had just been executed, was still there.

Looking at Zhao Xingde's appearance at this time, he did not dare to provoke anyone.

"What's wrong?" Zhao Xingde asked confusedly because Su Wenyu was a little abnormal.

"Nothing," Su Wenyu put away his somewhat casual demeanor and said solemnly, "the six commanders have already lined up at the archery range, waiting for General Zhao's instructions."

"There is nothing to teach," Zhao Xingde handed Su Wenyu a manuscript of the military order that he had rushed overnight, "Let the ten people who practiced yesterday do the demonstration, and then command first, and practice one action according to the military order. The progress is slow.

They will be served with military sticks, but those who still cannot practice well will be beaten with fifty sticks and then driven out. Anyone who dares to resist military orders will be beheaded."

"Yes. General."

He walked into the arena with a calm face. For a moment, the archery range, which was still noisy, fell silent. The three thousand soldiers looked at Zhao Xingde with fear in their eyes. Last night, Zhu Houwu, who had received a military stick, disappeared.

See, the governor's office announced that Zhu Dutou was hit by an arrow and fell off the city wall when he was patrolling the city. Everyone knew it, but no one dared to say otherwise.

Originally, Zhao Xingde punished Zhu Houwu by holding him high and putting him down gently. Although it frightened some new soldiers, the officers and old soldiers were somewhat disdainful of him. However, after experiencing Zhu Houwu's unclear death,

Later, the two thousand people who heard and witnessed the conflict between Zhu Houwu and Zhao Xingde yesterday

He suddenly got to know the newly appointed commander of the Firearms Battalion again. The thousand soldiers transferred by Wang Yanxin were widely circulated. Wang Tongzhi said, "If the firearms battalion does not obey the orders of Commander Zhao, he will kill as many as he can and replace them."

"No one wants to put their neck on the guillotine used to kill chickens.

"The blacksmith workshop received five hundred fire blunderbuss to make iron spearheads, and the number of fire blunderbuss was not enough." Su Wenyu Bing said. This group of students from the Gongma Disciple Institute has the least involvement with the factions in the Hebei army. In order to facilitate the command,

Wang Yan sent them all to Zhao Xingde's command.

"Then use a seven-foot spear instead. Let's practice marching in formation first." Zhao Xingde said solemnly. The contradiction between reality and ideals, power and system was forcibly suppressed by him. However, during the training of the fire gun camp, Zhao Xingde's aversion to power was revealed.

, but turned into an almost paranoid pickiness about the system and unity. He used the fire gun soldiers to

There are twenty-four basic commands for soldiers. From the basic commands such as starting and marching, to the important ones such as raising the lance and stabbing, lowering the lance and stabbing, raising the blunderbuss, lighting the fire, collecting the blunderbuss, and raising the lance and stabbing, to the trivial ones of sitting, lying, standing, and walking, they are all

They are required to complete the tasks under command. Even when standing and sitting down, the posture must be the same.

Zhao Xingde did not hesitate to kick out the governors and military envoys who could not satisfy him and promoted more useful ones to replace them. More than a dozen people from the Gongma Disciples Institute were promoted, Wu Jian became the governor, and Su Wenyu became the Yu

Hou. In addition, Zhao Xingde also used military orders to rebel in large numbers.

The original corps commanders and team commanders should be replaced by flexible soldiers. The replaced people also quit the fire gun camp. The commanding yamen almost doubled the number of personnel for him to choose from as quickly as possible. Zhao Xingde always gave priority to those who

He was a soldier who had served in the Yixue School and was a kind-hearted soldier.

Zhao Xingde asked Wu Jian to go to the warehouse to select iron helmets for the fire gun battalion that could protect the head without blocking the sight. Finally, after replacement, the three thousand soldiers replaced the iron helmets with the same standard. Because the effective range of fire gun is longer than that of bows and arrows.

Short, Zhao Xingde imagines that the future will be popular

The gun battalion may march under the rain of arrows for a long time to attack, and all battalion soldiers are issued with light infantry armor, which is the most effective in avoiding arrows.

The design allowed the blacksmith workshop to hang a whole piece of iron armor on the chest.

The distribution and replacement of military supplies in the Song Dynasty have always been loose and haphazard. It has become a habit for the same soldiers to have different old and new styles of armor and uniforms. The three thousand soldiers in the Huo Gun Camp finally achieved uniformity. This alone made the soldiers in the Fire Gun Camp uniform.

military

The soldier further realized that Commander Zhao had the full support of the commanding yamen, and even this apparently unreasonable thing could be accomplished. In this way, no one would dare to go against the command system of the Huo Gun Camp.

Every day, a batch of firecrackers equipped with spears are delivered to the archery range. Zhao Xingde is still working hard to train the soldiers of the firecracker battalion to fire the firecrackers. In order to avoid unnecessary losses of firecrackers, before finally going to the battlefield

, he only planned to let the soldiers fire one round with a single live ammunition of gunpowder. Even the normal action of lighting a gun was to light the powder primer inserted into the empty barrel.

However, when training soldiers to load gunpowder and load iron muskets, they still encountered trouble. Most of them could hardly maintain a military posture and load the ammunition properly at the same time. Some of the soldiers who were in a hurry were almost anxious.

When I started to cry, someone actually packed a double dose of medicine into a quadruple dose. Someone nervously inserted seven or eight iron marbles, which almost hit the mouth of the gun.

"The soldiers are all rough people, and the training time is short. I'm afraid..." Su Wenyu saw several people being dragged down to beat them with military sticks, and he couldn't help but feel a little anxious. These people didn't deliberately violate military laws, they were really at a loss.

It was an unintentional mistake. He was a little worried that beating him with military sticks too much would delay the training of the Fire Gun Camp. You must know that these bow and horse disciples have no roots in Hebei. Wang Yan transferred them

After entering the Huo Gun Camp, Zhao Xingde quickly assigned them actual tasks. In the eyes of other Hebei soldiers, these officers who were born in Gongma were probably all marked with the word "Zhao". Wang Yan gave Huo

With so many preferential treatment from the Gun Battalion, it was natural that they had high expectations. If the training of the Gun Battalion could not be completed within fifteen days, or the battle was defeated, the consequences that would follow would be quite serious.

"Then cancel the charging and reloading actions." Zhao Xingde had already noticed this problem. He was playing with a blunderbuss in his hand, thoughtfully. This one was specially picked out for him by Han Tiedan, saying that it was

There is a secret mark of the workshop on it. It is one of the first batch of high-quality products produced and passed the inspection by the department. Even if three parts of the medicine are used, it will never explode.

"What?" Su Wenyu asked in shock.

"Wrap the medicine powder and gun with silk, and place it in the chamber of the fire gun in advance." Zhao Xingde gently twisted the thin belt. The Song Dynasty was rich in this kind of extremely light fabric. After burning, there was almost no trace.

Ashes, "The wooden stick behind the spear just reached the barrel of the gun, and could almost fix the position of the gun and the medicine bag." He picked up the spear and stabbed,

Han Tietan's bizarre design was an unintentional one. It serves the purpose of fixing pre-set guns and medicine packs. "Just use cotton to plug this small position between the wooden stick and the gun." Zhao Xingde Shen said.

He said, he just tried firing a round and found that if a little cotton was stuffed outside the gun, not only would it not affect the firing, but it would also be more powerful.

In this case, the first action of the fire gun battalion when approaching the enemy is to squat down in the front row and thrust out the spears to prevent the enemy from approaching. The rear row removes the spears, supports the fire guns, ignites them, fires the guns, and then mounts the spears to complete the firing.

Firefight

Give it to the people at the back, take the firecrackers that have been handed over by the back row with the spears removed, and repeat the action of igniting and firing the cannons. When the enemy's formation is on the verge of collapse under the bombardment of the firecrackers, the whole battalion launches an attack, using long spears to fire.

Start fighting.

"Each fire gun only needs to be fired once," Zhao Xingde muttered, "it is the soldiers who fight to kill the enemy that determine the outcome!"

Su Wenyu nodded in agreement. No one has tried the fire gun very much, and no one can tell the effect. Fortunately, after being stabbed with a spear, it is slightly easier to use than an ordinary spear, especially the three hundred handles.

Axes, spears, and three hundred iron halberds are both sharp weapons for close combat, and are assigned to soldiers who are tall, strong, and agile. No matter how bad the Fire Gun Battalion is, they are no worse than ordinary Song Army infantry.

Zhao Xingde had the Fire Cannon Battalion concentrate on practicing the process of firing cannons in accordance with military orders, almost to the point of being very familiar with it. Later, when eating and sleeping, he suddenly beat drums to assemble, and asked the soldiers to line up and fire cannons in the shortest time, and there were very few people.

Eat the army

As for the art of hand-to-hand combat with spears, which is crucial for decisive victory, the Fire Gun Battalion did not spend time on training, because spears and clubs were originally the specialty of the Song Army. No matter which battalion leader it was, they would not use two pistols and clubs.

I'm too embarrassed to drink and spend money with others.

This year's cold winter seems to have lingered for a long time. On the third day of March, Wang Yan, the commander of the Hejian armies, decided to attack the city and invite the Liao army to fight. Zhao Xingde's Fire Gun Battalion, as a surprise force, was hidden in the Chinese infantry formation.
Chapter completed!