Traveling through the sword to engage in military industry

"Hello, Mr. Ren, long time no see." Ma Shuhan, on the other end of the phone, recognized Ren Zhong's accent as soon as he spoke and immediately called out his name.

It seems that the painting worth over 300 million yuan had indeed left a significant impact on Ma Shuhan.

"Hello, Ms. Ma. I've acquired two new paintings, both masterpieces. I'll send you the pictures. Could you assess their approximate value for a private sale? If the price is right, I'd like to proceed with a private transaction." Ren Zhong didn't mince words and went straight to the point.

He had researched Ma Shuhan's company and confirmed it was a reputable art company with considerable resources.

"Really, Mr. Ren? Thank you for your trust. Just add my WeChat using this phone number." Ma Shuhan hadn't expected such a pleasant surprise. She had left her contact information with Ren Zhong, thinking that even a slim chance of getting firsthand information on new paintings would be a huge advantage.

Today, it seemed her gamble had paid off. He had indeed managed to acquire new works.

Sure enough, less than half an hour after sending the pictures, she had apparently completed a preliminary expert review.

Ma Shuhan called back.

"Hello, Mr. Ren. Our internal experts have reviewed the two images and believe they are newly discovered masterpieces. However, we need to see the actual paintings to confirm. If they are genuine, our company's internal acquisition price for both paintings will be no less than 180 million yuan!"

Ma Shuhan, knowing Ren Zhong's straightforward nature, didn't beat around the bush and got straight to business.

"The 'Six Steeds' by Master Beihong is similar to the previously auctioned 'Heavenly Horses,' but the style of the horses is completely different. The former previously fetched 89.7 million at auction. We estimate the auction price of yours could exceed 110 million. We value it at 105 million yuan, and the other one at 75 million yuan."

After listening to Ma Shuhan's offer, Ren Zhong pondered for a moment. The price of these two paintings far exceeded the previous auction prices, indicating Ma Shuhan's sincerity.

"Alright, I agree to have your experts examine these two paintings in Jincheng. If there are no issues, we'll proceed with the transaction at 180 million yuan. Let's make this a friendly deal. I'd prefer to receive the payment offshore," Ren Zhong said decisively.

"Mr. Ren, you're straightforward. No problem. We also have branches overseas." Ma Shuhan hadn't expected to reach an agreement so quickly and happily agreed to Ren Zhong's conditions. She didn't bother considering why he wanted to do this; this kind of arrangement was common in the art market.

After finalizing the details, they scheduled a time for Ren Zhong to bring the paintings to a five-star hotel in Jincheng to meet Ma Shuhan and the appraisers she would bring.

Another windfall of 180 million yuan naturally put Ren Zhong in a very cheerful mood.

This time, upon returning to the "Bright Sword" dimension, he brought back twenty-four tubes, large and small.

"Boss Ren, where did you get these gun barrels and cannon barrels?" Gao Kaiming was somewhat beside himself when he saw the tubes.

Having just successfully debugged the machine tool, Gao Kaiming was eager to start producing firearms. His first imitation target was the Chiang Kai-shek rifle, but processing the gun barrel with only one machine tool was too slow.

Unexpectedly, Ren Zhong had brought back 20 gun barrels and 4 cannon barrels. Based on Gao Kaiming's experience, the 4 cannon barrels were clearly for 82mm mortars, with the caliber and length almost identical to the Type 20 mortar.

However, the length of the gun barrels made it difficult for Gao Kaiming to determine which rifle they were for.

They seemed shorter than the 600mm barrel of the Chiang Kai-shek rifle but longer than the 442mm barrel of the Hanyang 88.

Gao Kaiming naturally didn't know that these were 56-type semi-automatic rifle barrels, currently cut to a length of 522mm. Ren Zhong had left 1mm for grinding, so the final length would be 521mm.

"Engineer Gao, I want to use these gun barrels to produce a semi-automatic rifle, imitating the Soviet SKS semi-automatic rifle. I'll give you the detailed exploded drawings later. After these gun barrels are ground and rifled, they can be assembled into a semi-automatic rifle with the other parts I give you." Ren Zhong didn't hide anything from Gao Kaiming and explained it directly.

"As for these 4 tubes, they are naturally mortar barrels. I saw that the Independent Regiment doesn't even have mortars, so I asked the organization to transport a batch of tubes over. We'll start by manufacturing a mortar company's worth of mortars."

The Type 20 mortar weighed 69 kg, had a barrel length of 1190 mm (14.5 caliber), a caliber of 82 mm, an elevation range of 45°~85°, a traverse range of 8°~22°, a shell weight of 3.8 kg, a white phosphorus shell weight of 4.05 kg, a muzzle velocity of 196 m/s, a maximum rate of fire of 20 rounds/min, and a maximum range of 2850 meters. It was transported by a single horse or carried by three men.

This was the most important heavy firepower of the Kuomintang's direct line troops. A normal elite unit had a mortar platoon in each infantry battalion, equipped with 2 Type 20 82mm mortars. The regiment had a mortar company, equipped with 6 Type 20 82mm mortars. The regiment's heavy firepower relied on these 12 mortars for support.

In comparison, a Japanese battalion's artillery firepower, in addition to 2 infantry guns, had a total of 36 grenade launchers distributed among the companies. Grenade launchers were the Japanese army's infantry support firepower for frontline attacks, posing a great threat to our army's machine gun positions and other targets.

Compared to this, our artillery support on the front lines was significantly inferior to the Japanese, which is why we suffered so much in positional warfare.

Needless to say about the Eighth Route Army, Li Yunlong of the New First Regiment would hoard resources, and when he left, he would only have one 60mm mortar left without any shells.

The Independent Regiment led by Kong Jie was even worse; they didn't even have a single mortar and relied on the gasoline barrel mortars that Ren Zhong had created to hold the line.

If these 4 tubes were successfully modified, the artillery strength of the Independent Regiment would suddenly expand greatly.

For Kong Jie, this was more than satisfying!

Taking out the tubes, Ren Zhong also took out the manufacturing process diagrams for the 56-type semi-automatic components and the Type 20 mortar components. Some parts, such as the sighting system, couldn't be produced in the "Bright Sword" world at the moment, so Ren Zhong temporarily used related parts he had obtained from the main plane.

Soon after Ren Zhong had finished explaining, Li Yunlong rushed over in a hurry.

"Old Brother Ren, I heard you got cannon barrels. How is it? When will you get the cannons ready for me? I really want to have a few real cannons!"

Li Yunlong looked at Ren Zhong, so anxious as if he would get the cannons tomorrow.

"Old Li, calm down, calm down a bit. These are just tubes," Ren Zhong shook his head and said.

The third update is here!