: It is better to select troops for army expansion than to spare them.

Chapter 042

People always grow unexpectedly.

The same is true for Cheng Shijie. When he was Zuo Qianhu, he always rode in a car. It wasn't that he didn't want to ride a horse, but his buttocks were too big and the saddle couldn't fit at all.

But over this period of time, Cheng Shijie has lost a lot of weight. Although he still has a belly, his double chin has disappeared and his weight has dropped to less than 200 pounds. However, he is tall and does not look so fat anymore.

The most important thing is that when he was fat in the past, he would feel very tired after traveling more than 200 miles from Dengzhou to Zuoqianhusuo, but now he no longer feels tired.

He led more than 2,000 military households, including their family members, a total of 4,000 to 5,000 people, and he felt like he was the king of the mountain. Speaking of Sun Yuanhua, the governor of Denglai, he was really courageous.

Speaking of the establishment of the Ning Navy, they did not send any supervisors or even an accountant, leaving it entirely to Cheng Shijie.

It's just a pity that Sun Yuanhua was dealt with by the court during the Wuqiao Mutiny. To be fair, the Wuqiao Mutiny was so big that it really had little to do with Kong Youde or whether the Dongjiang Army could fight. You must know that Kong Youde, Li Jiucheng, and Geng Zhongming were involved.

Generals, each command 800 soldiers.

Moreover, at the beginning, only Li Jiucheng and Kong Youde were involved. Their combined troops were less than 2,000, while the Shandong Commander-in-Chief could command more than 40,000 troops. As a result, Kong Youde's troops fought more and more

More, in the final analysis, it is because the government forced the people to rebel.

Today's Shandong is in a fierce situation. If you are not careful, the problem will become serious.

Song Kangnian was a little confused. There were already more than 10,000 people in Qianhu Station, so why did he bring back another four or five thousand people? Besides having a few thousand more people to eat, what advantage could Cheng Shijie take advantage of?

When Cheng Shijie failed in his first competition for Zhengke, his leader judged him that the pattern was not big enough. At that time, he did not quite understand why the pattern was not big enough.

What is the big picture?

Later, he understood that as a person, you cannot just focus on the one-third of an acre of your own home. When considering problems, you should not only consider your own gains and losses. This is called pattern.

These impoverished military households in Dengzhou City had no choice but to eat every meal. In order to survive, they would try their best to survive. When Kong Youde launched a rebellion, he raised his arms and these impoverished military households and refugees all came from

It was because of the existence of these people that Kong Youde had sufficient sources of soldiers, and Kong Youde became more and more courageous in fighting.

Although taking away these four to five thousand people would not fundamentally solve Kong Youde's destruction of Shandong, it could weaken Kong Youde's power.

And these people can be Cheng Shijie's help.

"Master Guard, are you serious? Are you kidding?"

Cheng Shijie nodded and said: "I have said it many times. As long as you arrive in Ninghai Prefecture, I will allocate you a piece of land so that you can live a good life like a landlord."

"We take it seriously!"

"It must be taken seriously!"

Cheng Shijie smiled and said: "This defense will not only allocate land to you, our Ning Haijun will run many factories in the future, and you will all receive dividends, so you will not have to worry about food and drink in the future!"

"real!"

"Don't worry, if you follow this guard, you will definitely not suffer any loss!"

"Cheng Shoubei, do you mean what you say?"

"Forget it, of course it will count! If this guard doesn't keep his word, I will let this guard never do it for the rest of his life!"

When everyone heard this, they burst into laughter.

These military households living at the bottom of society are the simplest. If you have the right appetite, they can even sell their lives to you. Cheng Shijie eats from the same pot and sleeps in the same tent as them, and has military merits on display. Naturally, he is very popular.

.

However, everyone did not believe his promise to allocate land and houses to everyone. Everyone was looking forward to getting to Ninghai Prefecture and Zuo Qianhu Station as soon as possible to see him make a fool of himself.

Marching with these military households, Cheng Shijie was in a very happy mood.

Ninghai Prefecture is now very desolate, with only more than 16,000 households and more than 60,000 people. In later generations, this place had a population of 6 to 7 million.

This makes Cheng Shijie feel a little incredible. Not counting Mouping County and Wendeng County, Weihai City alone has a grain output of 590,000 tons, while Ninghai Prefecture's current grain output is less than 100,000 tons. It can be seen that here

The development is only equivalent to hundreds of thousands of acres of land. It is only equivalent to one six hundredth of that of future generations.

When Cheng Shijie came to Zuo Qianhusuo, these four or five thousand people did not enter the city. They were only temporarily arranged outside the city.

"Lord Senhu!"

The enthusiastic military household saluted Cheng Shijie.

Cheng Shijie nodded slightly in response.

However, Cheng Shi and Cheng Hu immediately corrected themselves: "Now the foster father is no longer Lord Qianhu, but Lord Guard!"

"Lord Guard?"

The military households still didn't know that Cheng Shijie was no longer the guard of Zuo Qianhu in Dengzhou, but the guard of Ning Haijun.

Cheng Shijie didn't have time to rest, so Deputy Qianhu Zhou Yandong reported to Cheng Shijie the development during this period.

"Congratulations, Mr. Chihu"

Cheng Shi corrected him: "My foster father is no longer Qianhu, but Ning Haijun garrison!"

"Congratulations, Lord Guard, this is a double blessing!"

"Oh, what double happiness?"

"Ask your subordinates to lead the craftsmen to search for mineral veins. We found two iron mines and one copper mine in the territory!" Zhou Yandong waved his hand and said: "Bring them over."

Cheng Shijie watched two military households carrying a huge sack into the hall.

"Boom..."

The sack was placed on the ground, making a dull sound. When he untied the sack, a sack of dark iron ore was revealed. Cheng Shijie picked up a piece of ore and turned it over to look at it. The ore was heavy, diamond-shaped, and dark.

It's slightly shiny and seems to be of good taste.

Cheng Shijie is a professional in metallurgical steelmaking. He can see that the quality of these iron ores is good, but of course it is much worse than the iron ore imported from Australia.

Zhou Yandong came over and said: "Master Guards, this ore is one of the best in the entire Dengzhou. The quality of the iron produced is excellent. It can be easily beaten into fine iron, which will be very popular."

Cheng Shijie now almost understands the prices of goods in the late Ming Dynasty. The special prices in the Ming Dynasty were very strange. Things that were very cheap in later generations were ridiculously high in the Ming Dynasty. Just like this iron, iron was rarely used in later generations, and most of them were alloy steel.

However, in the late Ming Dynasty, a pound of iron cost one penny of silver.

Let’s put it this way, the value of five kilograms of iron is equal to one hundred and fifty-three and five kilograms of rice. Who dares to imagine this? One kilogram of iron is equivalent to thirty kilograms and seven taels of rice. Even the cheapest rice is two yuan and a half per kilogram.

It is also equivalent to seventy-six point seventy-five yuan. It is almost thirty times that of later generations.

As a technician of Hansteel Group, Cheng Shijie has access to the distribution of mineral resources in later generations. Of course, he knows that there are quite good quality iron ore in Ninghai Prefecture.

"Has mining started in this iron mine?"

"opened!"

Zhou Yandong said: "At least five to six thousand stones of iron ore can be mined in a year!"

"What?"

Cheng Shijie's eyes widened: "Only this much in a year?"

"The veins there are a bit complicated, and there are too many messy things!"

Zhou Yandong said: "In the future, with more miners, the output can be increased!"

Five or six thousand shi is almost 800,000 to 900,000 kilograms, which is about 450 tons when converted into tons, which is less than the output of a branch of Hansteel Group in one hour. You must know that Hansteel Group has 150 million tons of

Production capacity, 80% of production capacity has been stopped because there are not so many quotas.

Cheng Shijie said: "These production capacities are too low. To increase production capacity, we must expand it at least ten times!"

Iron ore is not equal to iron, let alone steel. Four hundred and fifty tons of iron ore can only produce more than two hundred tons of iron. According to the technological level of the Ming Dynasty, the output was even lower.

According to Zhou Yandong, steelmaking is too troublesome, so it is better to sell the iron ore directly.

Cheng Shijie firmly disagreed with this. It would be too wasteful.

"Zhou Yandong, this matter is completely left to you by Benjing Defense. You can choose craftsmen in our Qianhu Institute, no, Ning Haijun. If you want Renben Guarding to give you people and money, you have only one request.

Increase production capacity!”

"yes!"

"I'll give you a thousand more people!"

"What!"

"A thousand people?"

"That's right!"

Cheng Shijie said: "You use five hundred people to mine iron mines, three hundred people to make steel, and two hundred people to make weapons and armor. One thousand people may not be enough!"

"I'll do my best!"

"It's not about trying your best, it's about being sure!"

Cheng Shijie stared at Zhou Yandong and said: "The miners' wages have been doubled, and we have to feed them. If there is not enough food, you can buy it!"

Nowadays, mining iron ore is a huge profit. If the miners are deducted from their rations and wages, it would be very inhumane. Of course, this would not be conducive to the development of iron ore.

Zhou Yandong also introduced to Cheng Shijie several newly opened factories and a kiln that can produce porcelain. By the way, Ning Haijun also has a large amount of kaolin resources, which is the raw material for firing porcelain. In later generations, Linyi and Zibo in Shandong Province
To be continued...