Guide to traveling through the Northern Song Dynasty

Slowly closing the book, Zhu Ming finally took the time to finish reading "Wuzong Zongyao".

To be honest, I learned a lot.

Marching, camping, command flags, drum bugles... are written clearly and clearly, it can be called a nanny-style tutorial.

What was most useful to Ju Ming was the military information on the northern and southern borders of the Song Dynasty and the foreign barbarians. Where there is a delivery shop, where there is a fortress, where there are mountains and rivers, the directions and distances are all clearly marked.

Including the mountains, rivers, forts, villages, towns and shops throughout Shaanxi!

Ju Ming also studied the famous "Pingrong and Ten Thousand Formations" carefully. Based on his poor military literacy, he came to a fair evaluation: the formation is good, but not practical.

Among the formations recorded in this book, the "Eight Formations Diagram" is quite useful.

The Eight Formation is also called the Li Jing Formation. According to different terrains and enemy situations, corresponding battle formations are set up. The size of the army is about 10,000 people.

The name of each formation is also quite vivid. "Female formation", as the name suggests, is like a female's genitals. The two wings are protruding and the middle is sunken. It surrounds and devours the enemy's front troops on three sides. The "Wu Jing Zong Yao" classifies the Queyue Formation as a variant of the Female Formation.

The "Male Formation" resembles a male's genitals, also called a sharp formation, which is used to break through enemy formations.

The Eight Formation Diagram is not that mysterious. It just uses geometric principles to make changes and create local battlefields with opportunities for more enemies to defeat fewer enemies.

The last part of "Wu Jing Zong Yao" is particularly nonsense, specifically describing the method of "Liu Ren Divination".

When to send troops and when to fight, these all require divination.

Even if the enemy sends a messenger, you can use divination to determine whether the messenger is telling the truth or a lie...

The book also records three types of gunpowder formulas, namely artillery powder, poison smoke ball gunpowder, and tribulus fireball gunpowder.

The first two are launched from catapults and cannot produce explosive effects. They can only cause damage through high-temperature combustion or poisonous smoke. The instantaneous temperature of the fireball can reach 1,300 degrees.

Tribulus fireball is a defensive weapon. It is thrown by a rope, a bit like a grenade. But it also cannot explode. It relies on the raised iron caltrops and high-temperature combustion to kill the siege enemies.

…

On the back hill of the iron smelting yard, three squatting tiger cannons are arranged neatly.

There is a large pit dug behind each artillery piece. The gunner immediately jumps into the pit after igniting it. Because Ju Ming didn't know how much gunpowder to fill, if too much gunpowder was filled, the chamber would easily explode.

"Bai Sheng, go get some medicine. After lighting it, jump into the pit immediately." Ju Ming said.

Bai Sheng stepped forward carelessly, holding a torch.

After lighting the gunpowder, he glanced twice before jumping into the pit.

"boom!"

There was a muffled sound in the barrel of the gun, and the stone bullet flew a few meters before falling to the ground, and then rolled some distance away.

For this launch, gunpowder purchased on the market was used.

The gunpowder formula used in war in the Northern Song Dynasty added too many combustion-supporting substances, and the highest nitrate ratio was only 50.19%. This gunpowder ratio could not explode at all.

On the contrary, the folk firecracker gunpowder has a higher nitrate ratio.

Ju Ming scratched his head and ordered: "Clean the barrel of the cannon, reload it, and add more gunpowder."

Soon, the second launch was launched, with a range of less than ten meters...

Ju Ming muttered: "It seems that the gunpowder formula is not working. Please use my granular gunpowder instead."

The powdered gunpowder before was purchased from the market.

The granular gunpowder this time was homemade by Ju Ming.

The production process is very simple. First grind the charcoal, then add sulfur, and then add saltpeter. Then add water, the water content is about 5%, more or less is fine. Then grind it with a wooden stick, wrap it in linen cloth after grinding it evenly, squeeze it with a heavy object, and then crush it to the required particle size.

The above process contains a lot of water, so it is extremely safe and will not explode. Then just blow it dry with warm air. It can be used if the moisture content drops below 1%. The combustion efficiency is twice that of powdered gunpowder.

Zhang Boring and Li Bao stood beside Ju Ming and saw Bai Sheng jumping into the pit again, but they didn't take it seriously.

"boom!"

There was a loud noise, and both of them were shocked and stared at the stone bullets flying out.

The Tiger Crouching Cannon was too light in weight. Even though there was a bracket inserted into the soil, the cannon body was still overturned by the back force.

Ju Ming shouted: "Measure the distance."

Liu Shiren took people to measure the impact point of the cannonball, and quickly ran back and said: "Twenty feet four feet (about 63 meters)."

"Add more gunpowder and try again." Ju Ming said.

The three squatting tiger cannons come in rotation.

The amount of gunpowder filling was continuously increased, and the distance from the impact point soon exceeded 100 meters. This is still a stone bullet. If it is replaced by a lead bullet, the range should be longer.

However, the usual method of using the Tiger Crouching Cannon is to first load many small shotgun shells, and then press a large shell to increase the air tightness.

Ju Ming tried this several times. Recently, small stone shotshells only hit more than 40 meters, and the longest distance was more than 60 meters. The impact point of large stone bullets dropped to more than 80 meters.

The above are all just firing stone projectiles.

The long-range output of Qi Jiguang's triple array is as follows:

Waiting for orders at 160 meters, about a little over 100 meters away, the gunner fired a salvo, and then went back to reload ammunition.

Within 96 meters, sixty tiger crouching cannons were waiting to fire, instantly firing 60 large stone bullets and 1,800 to 6,000 small shotshells (the size and quantity of the shotshells were different, and instead of using stones, iron bullets or lead bullets were used).

Depending on the enemy's situation, rocket vehicles and general artillery will supplement the firepower. The rocket car fires hundreds of rockets instantly, and the general cannon fires thousands of canisters.

The gunner who returned has almost finished loading his ammunition and can make up for the second round of shooting.

This is only the firepower of the forward. If the enemy attacks the flanks, there will be firecrackers and archers behind. At that time, the forward and rear row infantry in triple formations will form a crossfire to attack the enemy on the flanks.

The complete version of the triple formation has more than 40,000 troops and is 10 miles wide when lined up.

It is extremely difficult to complete this formation. In addition to a large number of muskets and artillery, it also needs to be equipped with enough grassroots officers. They are the team leaders of the Yuanyang Formation. They are the core of the Triple Formation. They can deal with various emergencies. Even if they are rushed in front of the cavalry, they can still fight in close combat.

Ju Ming experimented with more than twenty cannons and used up all the granular gunpowder he made.

Zhang Bor was already stunned: "Such a sharp weapon should be presented to the imperial court!"

Ju Ming pretended to sigh: "I'm afraid that after dedicating it to the imperial court, it will turn out to be a disaster."

"How do you say that?" Li Bao asked.

Ju Ming explained: "The danger of the Song Dynasty is not outside but inside. Corruption is rampant inside and outside the court, and the people are brutally abused. If the cannon is presented to the official temperament, he will be ecstatic. He will order more cannons to be built, and the treacherous ministers will take advantage of the opportunity. Fishing for profit. Especially in the iron smelting yard on Jingdong Road, the treacherous officials will definitely collect a large amount of wrought iron to make cannon bodies and shells under the guise of making cannons. Gunpowder will also be listed as a monopoly, and the tax will be greatly increased."

Zhang Boring said: "It's not that serious, right?"

"It's more serious than this," Ju Ming said. "I have a sharp weapon and a murderous intention. If I can defeat Xixia by chance, I will attack the Liao Kingdom again. Regardless of whether we win or not, can the people of the world hold on?"

This is not alarmist, Song Huizong would really do this.

After the officers and soldiers destroyed Fang La, the country was already riddled with holes, and logically it should be recuperating.

With the finances at that time, it was simply impossible to fight a major war.

But Song Huizong was so happy about his success that he forcibly raised taxes and gathered troops, and went to recapture Yanyun without stopping.

That tax increase was like opening Pandora's box.

They are called Jing Zhi Qian and Zong Zhi Qian, collectively known as "Jing Zong Zhi Qian". In fact, it is an excessive collection of surcharges, which all walks of life have to pay, resulting in a collective price increase for all goods on the market.

At first, it was only the economic and general envoys who ordered tax increases, and gradually spread to all levels of government departments.

Even the envoys came out to raise taxes. The entire country's taxation was in complete chaos. The prices of daily necessities such as grain, wine, vinegar, salt, tea, and cloth increased to the point where the common people could not afford it.

Let alone Ju Ming offer a few squatting tiger cannons, even if he offers howitzers, he will still lose.

Quoting Tong Guan's own memorial: Seeing that it is too rough to eat, you have to pound it to get only half of it, and more is far away...

It probably means that the food the soldiers eat is so poor that it is difficult to swallow. The army rations are only half enough and have not yet arrived. Ordnance is also insufficient and must be recruited from Taiyuan, Daming, Kaide and other places. Armor and military uniforms are not enough. Construction of fortifications and defense supplies, but nothing has been obtained for the time being.

It was under such circumstances that Tong Guan led his army to recapture Yanyun.

Let's just say that he won the battle by luck. How to deal with the new territory?

There was already a famine in the Liao Kingdom, bandits and bandits were everywhere, and refugees were everywhere. Tong Guan doesn't even have enough military rations, how can he recruit bandits and resettle refugees?

To defeat Yan Yun is simply to take over the mess, and you have to continue to throw money into it.

Historically, the Song Dynasty bought Yanjing and threw the refugees into Shanxi and ignored them. Those refugees didn't have enough to eat, so they all fled to the Jin Kingdom and helped the Jin soldiers capture the city of Shanxi.

In order to appease the newly occupied territory, he frantically sucked the blood of Hebei and Shandong, causing uprisings all over Hebei and Shandong. Zhang Wanxian was even able to gather hundreds of thousands of people to rebel.

Song Huizong and Tong Guan were so happy that people all over the country paid for them.

After the Jin soldiers went south for the first time, why didn't Song Qinzong build a defense line? Because he has no money at all!

Ju Ming said: "Last spring, the imperial court had planned to attack Liao, but gave up because of the opposition of the ministers."

"Last year when we attacked Liao, what will happen to Xixia?" Zhang Bor thought he heard wrongly.

Ju Ming said amusedly: "How do I know?"

Tong Guan really planned to attack Liao last spring, and even started to mobilize troops, completely ignoring that the Xixia War was not over yet.

Even Song Huizong found this matter unreliable, saying that he would first send people to find out the truth before making a decision.

Li Bao asked: "The world is like this, how can we save the world? Does Mr. Xian have a way?"

Ju Ming shook his head and whispered: "We can't save him unless we change the emperor."

Zhang Boring and Li Bao were shocked and quickly looked to the left and right.

Ju Ming added: "I heard that the prince is calm and frugal, and he listens to advice. He may be able to turn things around."

Zhang Boring immediately relaxed his nervousness. He thought Ju Ming was going to rebel.

As long as there is no rebellion, just change the emperor, and the people of the world have already had enough of the current one.

Li Bao muttered: "I don't know how long this Taojun Emperor can live. If he can live another twenty years, the people of the world will suffer."

Ju Ming smiled and said, "Who knows?"

(Some readers said that you can cast the cannon body and then punch out the air holes, saying that Lao Wang doesn’t understand anything. Brother, that chapter said that the furnace temperature is too low, wrought iron cannot be cast, and what is forged is wrought iron. Pig iron cannons can Casting, but it is too heavy and inconvenient for field use. In addition, the Huang Shang in the previous chapter is wrong. Jianzhou Huang Shang is not the one who compiled Daozang.)