Cutting over the end of the Ming Dynasty: a dog-leg knife at the beginning

Chapter 211 Tianxiong Army 3
Lu Xiangsheng was moved by Qi Hu's words, so he proposed to try it outside.Of course Qi Hu had no objection. The two of them took a small bag of lead bullets and granular gunpowder and walked out to the musketeer training ground.

In the musketeer training ground, the sound of gunfire was like bursting beans, and the smoke filled the air. Thousands of musketeers were being divided into three rows. They fired according to the orders of the officers, and the lead bullets poured out like water, hitting wooden targets dozens of steps away. Fly around.There are more than 1000 musketeers who are training bayonet stabbing skills by tying three-edged bayonets to muskets made of wood. With a loud shout from the instructor, more than 1000 bayonets are thrust out at the same time. The movements are sometimes simple and sharp, sometimes erratic, and sometimes murderous. Going forward indomitably, more than 1000 bayonets formed a daunting net, ruthlessly devouring the life of the imaginary enemy. The scene really made people shudder.

"There is not enough meat, and their physical strength can't keep up, otherwise they can do better." Qi Hu commented by the way.

Lu Xiangsheng's personal attendant could only smile wryly.As expected of the old man beside Yang Menglong, the standard is as high as Yang Menglong's!In order to ensure that the soldiers have rice and steamed buns for meals, and one meal of meat every week, Mr. Lu is a vegetarian, and more than half of his monthly salary is used to subsidize military expenses. What else do you want?
Lu Xiangsheng was deeply convinced: "Yes, there must be enough meat to have sufficient physical strength. I plan to follow the example of Wuyangwei after selling potatoes, and buy a batch of iron pot tea to go to Mongolia to trade cattle with the Mongols. Sheep and horses, and then bred by themselves, can replenish animal power, and also allow soldiers to eat more meat."

Qi Hu said: "Your Excellency is so considerate of the soldiers, why worry about the death of the whole army!" Beckoning, a waiter ran over, asked for two muskets from the musketeers who were training, and handed them to Lu Xiangsheng and Qi Hu.Lu Xiangsheng has been busy with the people's livelihood and military affairs for the past few months, and has no time to care about the improvement of equipment. Now he can finally take a good look at the sharp weapon he spent a lot of money to kill the enemy: this kind of musket has a caliber of [-] to [-] It is about [-]mm, which is exactly the thickness of several layers of nitrocellulose, and the barrel is made of extravagant steel—although this steel is not comparable to the fine steel produced in Wuyang, it is still very valuable.The barrel of the gun is polished extremely smooth, without any burrs. It is dark, thick and heavy, and feels very secure in the hand.There are two main improvements to the musket. The first is to install a bayonet holder under the barrel, instead of putting the bayonet into the barrel like Yang Menglong’s fake. With this bayonet holder, the bayonet is more reliable, and It does not affect the shooting and has many advantages; the second is that the buttstock is no longer bent back like an unstretched fern leaf, but is enlarged and aggravated into the shape of the buttstock of modern rifles, which better maintains the rifle's It is balanced, and at the same time, it can be fired on the shoulder blades, while ordinary firecrackers are held with both hands, and there is nowhere to rely on them. The heavier ones have to be placed on the fork, otherwise it is difficult to aim.With such a butt, the musketeer can stand, aim, and shoot without a fork, which is much more convenient, and a shot of the butt at the right time can also break the opponent's tendons and fractures.Needless to say, this was Yang Menglong's idea again, he didn't like the oddly shaped gun stock.

This kind of gun stock naturally uses more materials and takes more time, but Lu Xiangsheng thinks this price is worth it after he weighs it.

Qi Hu said to his attendants: "Go, get a pair of iron armor!"

The attendant was stunned for a moment, and asked, "Is it Zha Jia or Wuyang Iron Armor?"

Qi Hu said: "Just take a pair of Zhajia and come here. If I try this with Wuyang armor, it's hard to guarantee that you won't hit me with a black stick."

The attendant still had a pained expression on his face.The Wuyang Iron Armor is naturally the iron armor that Yang Menglong sold to the Tianxiong Army. Six steel plates that have been beaten into a proper shape are firmly nailed to the tanned cowhide with screws to protect the entire chest and abdomen. And it's quite light, you can run around like flying in it, and the Tianxiong Army can't put it down.As for Zhajia, it is a kind of armor commonly used by the Ming army. Iron leaves are worn layer by layer with beef tendons and fixed on cowhide. The defensive performance is quite good.However, this thing is generally only available to generals and servants, and ordinary soldiers are not blessed.The Tianxiong Army has [-] sets of Zhajia, and several sets were damaged during the gun test some time ago. Now everyone feels pain when they see the old man picking up the musket.But the pain was useless, he still had to run back to the warehouse honestly, fetched a set of Zhajia, placed it thirty steps away under Qi Hu's command, put it on a wooden figure, and tossed it. It took half a day to finish the calculation.Qi Hu checked it once, and after confirming that Zhajia was intact, he returned to Lu Xiangsheng and said, "My lord, you can test the gun now."

Lu Xiangsheng smiled wryly: "If this firecracker is really that powerful, a pair of armor will be destroyed after one shot. The price of this test is a bit high." Having said that, he still couldn't hold back his curiosity. , under the guidance of the musketeer, pour an appropriate amount of granular gunpowder into the barrel, compact it with a cleaning rod, then load the lead bullet, then light the match, and insert it.He slowly raised the musket, put the butt of the gun on his shoulder blades, aimed, his gaze, the front sight and the target were in line with the three points, and evenly exerted force with his index finger hooked on the trigger, "Bang!" Only a gunshot was heard, and the muzzle of the gun A cloud of gunpowder smoke was sprayed out, and the projectile shot out violently. The strong recoil hit Lu Xiangsheng's back slightly backward!Looking at Zhajia again, uh, nothing happened!
Qi Hu smiled, and also pulled the trigger. With a "bang", the wooden figurine shook violently, and shards of armor and sawdust flew out.Lu Xiangsheng was very impressed: "The old man is good at marksmanship!" Qi Hu said modestly, handed the musket to the attendant, asked him to clean the barrel, and took Lu Xiangsheng over to look at the armor.He found the hole of the gun at a glance, and pointed to the hole: "My lord, please look!" Lu Xiangsheng couldn't help taking a breath when he saw it: There was a gun hole in the wooden man's chest, and a piece of armor was smashed to pieces. Even the wooden man has a deep hole!It's not difficult to imagine the consequences of this shot hitting a person. Even if the egg is covered with double armor, it probably won't be able to stop it, right?Even if you don't die, you will be seriously injured!The most frightening thing is that the lead bullet is so fast that it is invisible to the naked eye, and there is no way to hide it. If one shot comes over, whether it can survive depends on the shooter's marksmanship. This is called this man who is both civil and military and brave How can Confucianism not be depressed!

"One shot, I'm afraid the tiger will die, right?" Lu Xiangsheng looked a little strange.

Qi Hu sighed, and said: "Theoretically, it is like this... But the accuracy of this gun is very poor, and there are very few people who can hit it accurately within fifty paces. A goal thirty paces away is a big deal."

Lu Xiangsheng said: "Hundreds of muskets fired in volley, there is no reason for it!"

Qi Hu said: "Having said that, even if hundreds of muskets are fired in volley, they must be fired within thirty or forty paces. The accuracy is high, otherwise it is a waste of ammunition. If you can approach twenty paces, three rounds of guns will pass by. , at least half of the opponent will be killed or injured, but it is too difficult to endure the dense rain of arrows and even the bombardment of the opponent's guns, and not to fire until they are twenty paces away, it is almost impossible for humans to do it!"

Lu Xiangsheng was silent.Yes, the time for a musketeer to shoot a shot is enough for an archer to shoot three or four arrows, and later Jin is famous for his angry horse and strong bow. The rain of arrows that came out kept going forward, even if there were dead and wounded all over the ground behind, they couldn't turn back, and they didn't fire until they were only 20 meters away from the arrow formation. Is this something people do?I shudder just thinking about it!But thinking of the lethality of muskets, he relaxed a little, and said with a smile: "Within 34 steps, unless Jiannu uses armor-piercing heavy arrows or just hits the vitals of our soldiers, the lethality of Jiannu's bows and arrows cannot match that of muskets." In comparison, if we shoot at each other within thirty or forty steps, we are not at a disadvantage."

Qi Hu said: "That's true."

After seeing Zhajia, the attendant who took Zhajia was very surprised: "It is considered good if the musket can penetrate [-] steps away from Zhajia. Big hole, how did the musket's lethality suddenly become so terrifying?"

Lu Xiangsheng said with a smile: "This is all thanks to the old man. Old man, take out all your stocks and let everyone try."

Qi Hu said: "Do you dare to disobey your orders?" He asked his attendants to go back to the warehouse, took out the batch of specially made gunpowder and lead bullets, called a group of musketeers to distribute the ammunition, and started a large-scale live ammunition test.First, let ten musketeers fire round lead bullets with powdered black powder. It took these ten well-trained musketeers more than a minute to fire three rounds of salvo. Tripping, which made Lu Xiangsheng worried, and the lethality was quite poor.Hitting an unarmored target from fifty steps away is okay, but hitting an armored target is definitely not good, at most it can break two ribs of the opponent.Then, Qi Hu asked them to change the gunpowder to fire round bullets.The launch process was still the same, slow and accident-prone. Although they had been training for nearly a year and had Qi Hu train for several months, they were still a little bit flustered.However, it is worth mentioning that the lethality is obviously much stronger than that of powdered gunpowder. Fifty steps away, even if the enemy is wearing iron armor, he will be seriously injured and fall to the ground after being shot.In the end, Qi Hu asked them to use granular gunpowder to launch column-shaped pointed-pointed concave-bottomed lead bullets. This time, everyone's movements were much smoother. While praising "this bullet is so convenient to load", they pulled the trigger, bang bang bang bang There was a burst of gunfire, and everyone fired three bullets in more than a minute, which can be described as unprecedented efficiency.

The result couldn’t be more obvious: the use of granular gunpowder to launch a columnar pointed lead bullet with a concave bottom is much more lethal than powdered gunpowder to launch a round lead bullet, and the speed is much faster!

Lu Xiangsheng was overjoyed, and said to Qi Hu: "I have decided that the whole army will switch to granular gunpowder and lead bullets with pointed and concave bottoms! No, from now on, the workshops that produce gunpowder and pellets will try their best to produce this new type of ammunition. Reserve as much as possible for emergencies! Old man, I have to be busy for a while, and the production of ammunition, you have bothered me so much!"

Qi Hu said: "You should try your best. But, my lord, the gunpowder and lead bullets are much more expensive than the original ammunition!"

Lu Xiangsheng did not hesitate: "It is expensive to make! This is a sharp weapon to defeat the enemy, and money can't buy it!"

(End of this chapter)