A Journey Through the Worlds of Film and Television.

Chapter 155 Minié Rifle

12

On New Year's Eve, Lu Cheng ate the mutton dumplings made by Zhang Yan, looking at the snow outside the window, and felt a greater sense of belonging to this world.

After spending several months together, Zhang Yan had obviously accepted Lu Cheng as her future husband and began to take the initiative to put herself in the role of a little wife.

Love in this era is actually very simple. Women don’t have much right to choose, let alone free love. Women marrying is just a blind choice.

Many women have never seen their husbands before their wedding night, and don't know whether their husbands are tall or short, fat or thin, handsome or ugly.

If you can marry the right person, you can live a peaceful life. If you marry the wrong person, you can only blame yourself for your bad luck.

Compared to many ordinary women, Zhang Yan was already very lucky. At least during their time together, she had already fallen in love with her future husband.

What's more, Lu Cheng's status and position are there. Even if an ordinary woman wants to marry him, she doesn't have the opportunity.

Just after the New Year, the firearms workshop gave Lu Cheng a big gift.

Lu Cheng stood at the shooting range, watching a craftsman assemble a new flintlock rifle. He then walked up to check the barrel and the rifling inside the barrel, and nodded with satisfaction.

Afterwards, Lu Cheng handed the new flintlock rifle to a musketeer standing beside him.

The musketeer opened a paper shell filled with gunpowder and bullets, bit open the bottom of the paper shell, poured a small amount of gunpowder at the ignition position, then poured the rest of the gunpowder into the barrel, stuffed the bullet into the barrel, pushed the bullet to the bottom with a push rod, and compacted the gunpowder.

After doing all this, the soldier walked to the shooting position nearby, raised his rifle, aimed at a target a hundred meters away, and fired.

In an instant, accompanied by a puff of white smoke and a bang, the bullet successfully hit the target in the distance.

Lu Cheng nodded in satisfaction, and then ordered: "Keep shooting, try a target at a longer distance."

"Yes, General."

If it is a smoothbore flintlock rifle without rifling, it is not easy to hit a human-shaped target within a hundred meters.

But what the soldier was holding now was a rifle with rifling and using conical Minié bullets.

Although the craftsmanship of this gun is still a bit rough due to the limitations of the current industrial level, its range and power are definitely far superior to the previous matchlock guns.

Moreover, with the pre-loaded paper shell bullets, a skilled soldier can shoot two to three times per minute.

"Bang bang bang" the sounds of shooting continued. After many attempts, the soldier was able to hit a target 300 meters away. The lethality and range were far beyond those of bows and crossbows.

If there were a team of four or five thousand people equipped with such rifles, Lu Cheng would dare to lead them to attack the city of Hetuala directly.

Lu Cheng then looked at the craftsman beside him and said, "Master Liu, how many guns of this kind can we produce every month?"

"Your Excellency, if all the people in our factory did nothing else but produce such guns, we could produce about 60 guns per month."

Hearing this, Lu Cheng shook his head: "It's still too slow."

"Sir, the main problem is that the rifling in the barrel is really hard to drill. Even if you improve the processing technology, a skilled worker can only drill more than an inch a day, and it takes more than half a month to complete a barrel."

Lu Cheng also knew this problem. In the absence of a machine, drilling the gun barrel manually was indeed too slow.

This is limited by the industrial foundation. We must first improve the foundation and develop steam engines and other things.

"How about this, Master Liu? Recruit 200 apprentice craftsmen and train them specifically on how to drill gun barrels. Try to train a group of suitable craftsmen first."

"Yes, my lord."

"In addition, in the next two or three months, in addition to the necessary production tasks, we will focus on producing new flintlock rifles, and strive to produce 100 new flintlock rifles by the end of March."

"Yes, my lord."

A seamless steel pipe from later generations is a mountain that cannot be overcome by technology in this era.

But now that we have the first new flintlock rifle, production efficiency can be gradually improved in the future.

In fact, the craftsmen of the Ming Dynasty were very reliable and learned things quickly.

Of course, the prerequisite is to be able to provide adequate remuneration and bonuses to motivate their enthusiasm and potential.

Afterwards, Lu Cheng visited other workshops and also looked at the seeds of sweet potatoes, corn, peanuts and other crops stored in the warehouse.

After the spring, these seeds can be planted in the land in southern Liaoning.

Relying on the high yields of crops such as sweet potatoes, corn, and potatoes, not only can the food problem of the Liaodong military and civilians be solved, but also the food problem of war horses can be solved.

Before corn was available, war horses had to eat black beans, soybeans, wheat, oats and other foods to ensure nutrition.

But with corn, the high yield of corn can greatly alleviate the food crisis. By then, southern Liaoning will gradually achieve self-sufficiency and can greatly reduce the money spent on purchasing food from the south.

Just after the New Year, production was stepped up everywhere in southern Liaoning. Merchants from the south and north also braved the severe cold in Liaodong and gathered near Haizhou City to trade goods.

Lu Cheng specially set up a large commercial market outside Haizhou City to facilitate merchants to gather and distribute supplies.

While busy with development, Lu Cheng also keeps a close eye on the current situation in the capital.

After the New Year, Zhu Youxiao changed the reign title to Tianqi and began a nationwide beauty contest to select a suitable queen.

At this time, an old friend also came to Lu Cheng's house.

"Miss Ding, why did you come here suddenly? You didn't even notify me."

"What? General Lu, do you not welcome me?"

"Welcome, welcome. You are welcome anytime. If I had known you were coming, I would have sent someone to pick you up. No, I will go out of town to greet you personally."

"General Lu is a very busy man. I heard that he is busy picking up a little girl from Kaifeng Prefecture. I dare not let General Lu go out of the city to welcome her."

Lu Cheng clearly heard the jealousy in the other person's tone, and instead of being surprised, he was happy. This also indirectly demonstrated Ding Baiying's affection for him.

If you don't care, why would you be jealous?

"Isn't this what Ding Xian told you? This kid."

"If it weren't for Ding Xian, I wouldn't have known this. Lu Cheng, I came here this time just to ask you, you said in the letter before that you would think about me often, is that true?"

"Of course it is true. It is absolutely true. The heavens and the earth can see my heart, and the sun and the moon can bear witness to it."

"Then...then will you marry me?"

Ding Baiying was a woman of the world, not shy like ordinary women. She had already made up her mind on the way here. As long as Lu Cheng agreed to marry her, she would stay with Lu Cheng. If Lu Cheng didn't agree, she would turn around and leave, never coming to Liaodong again.

"As long as Miss Ding agrees, I will find someone to calculate an auspicious date, write three letters and six engagement letters, arrange a sedan chair with eight bearers, and a red wedding dress, and I will promise you a prosperous life."

Hearing Lu Cheng's decisive agreement, the jealousy in Ding Baiying's heart disappeared immediately. Then she thought that as a woman, she actually took the initiative to propose marriage, so she couldn't help feeling a little shy.

"I... since I'm here... naturally I agree."

Lu Cheng laughed and said, "Okay, I'll go find someone to calculate the date."

"There's no need to be so anxious. I still need to inform my senior brothers."

"Okay, I'll listen to you."

"Yeah. Lu Cheng, is that girl surnamed Zhang pretty? Is she as pretty as me?"

"Well... how should I put it? You two are not of the same style. You are a heroic beauty, like Hua Mulan in ancient times. As for Zhang Yan... you will know when you see her."

"Then I want to go see what she looks like."

"No problem, if you want to see her, I can take you there now."

"Not really. I'll just take a night's rest."

All women have a competitive spirit. Ding Baiying had just traveled such a long distance and was exhausted. Naturally, she needed to take a good rest and dress up before going to meet the girl named Zhang.

Lu Cheng didn't shy away from anything. In this era, which man with a little wealth and power didn't have three wives and four concubines?

As a general of the imperial court guarding a region, it was normal for Lu Cheng to marry several women.

Even Ding Baiying came all the way here just to let Lu Cheng marry her first, and she didn't think of having him all to herself, which was unrealistic.