Rise From the Humble

After seeing off Zhu Shouren, the pig teammate's uncle, and the three of them, a hidden danger was solved, and Zhu Pingan felt a lot more relaxed.

Not in vain, I used some tricks to "read" them a few carefully prepared stories. I thought I would show them a few more stories, but I didn't expect that their mental endurance was so poor, and I couldn't stand it anymore.

Seeing his uncle and the others disappear into the distance, Zhu Pingan returned to the school with a smile to check on the riding skills of the soldiers.

The Zhejiang Army has been practicing their riding skills intensively for two days, but the cavalry is not that easy to practice. The veterans of the Zhejiang Army have become proficient in riding horses due to their long exposure to horses, but that's all. To become a qualified cavalry, in Liu Mu's words, it will take at least two months.

Cavalry is not as simple as riding a horse and galloping. Riding and shooting requires at least three months to achieve a qualified level, not to mention the necessary skills for cavalry such as equestrianism, formation, and horse fighting. After a complete set, at least It takes about half a year to train a qualified cavalryman.

There is a shortage of horses in Jiangnan, and the new recruits in Yiwu are all from rural areas. They have almost never been exposed to horses before. After intensive training in the past two days, most of them can only ride on the back of a galloping horse without being thrown off.

However, this also met Zhu Pingan's expectations.

Zhu Ping'an didn't expect to be able to train a cavalry in such a short period of time. It was enough to be able to ride a horse. Riding a horse is much faster than walking, which can greatly improve the mobility and flexibility of the Zhejiang army.

In order to deal with the coming Japanese pirates, Zhu Pingan made slight adjustments to the Zhejiang army.

A group of veterans from the Zhejiang Army who are skilled in riding horses and a group of Yiwu recruits who are unfamiliar with riding horses form a ranger.

Zhu Ping'an sent fifteen such rangers to all directions in Suzhou. They returned to camp and rotated every two hours, allowing them to roam around Suzhou. On the one hand, he practiced equestrian skills, and on the other hand, he monitored Japanese pirates.

In addition, Zhu Ping'an also traveled around Suzhou on horseback and carefully selected fifteen highlands, all of which were Gaogang and Qiufu that were suitable for overlooking each other, and built simple beacon towers on them. A total of fifteen beacon towers were erected on the high ground.

The fifteen beacon towers are distributed in three rings with Suzhou City as the center. Each ring has ten beacon towers, and each ring is eight miles apart.

In ancient times, beacon towers were usually separated by ten miles. Zhu Pingan was worried that the distance was too far and difficult to observe, so he changed the distance to eight miles.

As for the materials for burning wolf smoke, wolf dung is hard to find. There is a lot of wolf dung in the horse dung camp. It is dried semi-dry and semi-wet horse dung, mixed with grease, dry firewood, wet firewood, reeds and mugwort, and dried grass for dry firewood. Mix grease to start a fire, then add half-dry and half-wet horse dung and wet firewood. Once it is ignited, thick black smoke billows upwards and can be clearly seen eight miles away.

Of course, the beacon tower relies on smoke during the day, and the thick smoke is billowing, so it is easy to see during the day; it relies on fire at night, and the fire is soaring into the sky, so it is easy to see at night. If a beacon fire is lit at night, reeds, mugwort, dry wood and grease will be used as fuel.

Each ranger who goes out to patrol is responsible for a beacon tower. When they are patrolling, they must leave five people at the beacon tower.

Once the whereabouts of Japanese pirates are discovered, a beacon warning will be lit as soon as possible.

When all the rangers traveling outside saw the beacon fire, they would gallop forward and beat gongs to warn the people in surrounding villages and towns that the Japanese pirates were coming.

Zhu Ping'an also specially told the soldiers that if they encounter rainy or foggy days, visibility is low and the smoke can't be seen clearly, after lighting the beacon, they must ride horses to the next beacon tower to warn them as soon as possible.

Zhu Ping'an was still in the Zhejiang Army camp and specially arranged two groups of soldiers to look at the direction of the beacon tower. When a beacon is lit, we must detect the beacon as soon as possible so that we can make arrangements to respond.

When Zhu Pingan sent the rangers, he specifically emphasized to them:

"Your mission is to give warning. I don't ask you to stop Japanese pirates, let alone kill or injure Japanese pirates. When encountering Japanese pirates, your first priority is to give warning. As long as you give warning in advance, I will give you a great credit."

"After the warning is completed, harass and block the Japanese pirates to buy time for the people to evacuate."

"We must take advantage of the mobility and flexibility of fire guns and horses to avoid close combat with Japanese pirates."

Zhu Pingan's orders to the rangers were mainly to warn, and supplemented by harassment and obstruction. The Japanese pirates were fierce, and their numbers were overwhelming. The rangers they sent out had poor riding skills and were few in number, so they were no match for the Japanese pirates.

After Zhu Ping'an gave careful instructions, he dispatched fifteen groups of rangers to all directions in Suzhou.

As the sun set in the evening, Zhu Ping'an went to Suzhou City to meet with Shang Wei, the prefect of Suzhou.

Although the government office has been released and all the officials have gone home, the prefect Shang is still working in the government office.

"I will pay my respects to Lord Shang." After Zhu Ping'an entered the Yamen, he was led to the study room of Magistrate Shang and bowed his hands to greet Magistrate Shang.

"No, no, Zihou, please don't do these false etiquette. I haven't congratulated Zihou for his great contribution to the sea ceremony. With this contribution, Zihou will get rid of the 'deputy' envoy's duties." It's not impossible to even go one step further. The above decree is probably just a few days' work. By then, I'm afraid I'll have to salute you." Magistrate Shang laughed and took Zhu Ping'an's arm. Invite him into the study affectionately.

Entering the study, Magistrate Shang asked Zhu Pingan to sit down and personally poured a cup of hot tea for Zhu Pingan, who took it with both hands.

"Zihou, your camp has enough food, grass, baggage, armor and weapons. If it's not enough, don't be polite. I'll send someone to deliver it to your camp."

Magistrate Shang asked with enthusiasm, his rich and wealthy attitude was immediately exposed.

"That's enough, that's enough. I haven't thanked Magistrate Shang for his full support, so that our Zhejiang Army has no worries. Ping An and the Zhejiang Army have nothing to repay. We can only shed our lives and blood to keep Suzhou safe."

Zhu Pingan stood up sincerely and bowed to Magistrate Shang to thank him.

The Zhejiang army has just arrived. In the past few days, the Suzhou government has given more support than the imperial court has given since the army was formed.

Although Suzhou Prefecture is the most wealthy in the world, the full support of the prefect is the most critical. Otherwise, other people's wealth belongs to them, so what does it have to do with you?

It is the Zhejiang Army's duty to garrison in Suzhou, and the Suzhou government has no obligation to provide food, grass and baggage for the Zhejiang Army.

Generally speaking, the place where they are garrisoned will provide certain support to the garrison as a favor in exchange for the garrison to be loyal to their duties, protect the safety of the place, and not harass the local people. Of course, their support is relatively limited. Places like Suzhou Prefecture that provide such strong support are rare.

"Zi Hou is too polite. To be honest, since he took office, he has been determined to do some achievements. Civil affairs are just some minor achievements that are not worth mentioning, but the military affairs are shameful. The local Arms and Arms Department is so depressed that it is difficult to describe it. He is not familiar with military affairs and interfered several times, which only made things worse."

"Zihou, your arrival makes me very happy. Zihou, you are young and promising, and you are also proficient in military affairs. Especially since your Zhejiang army was stationed in Suzhou, you have not done any harm to the people. This is very rare. I am not afraid of you poking my back. I have also sent people to conduct overt and covert inspections of your army many times. Your army's military discipline commander is very impressed. It turns out that no one has committed any crimes. Not a single sergeant has harassed or bullied the people. Since your army was stationed, all it has done is to train troops and An army that patrols and deploys defenses is the army that can truly protect Suzhou."

"I, Suzhou, don't support an army like yours, so who do I support?!"

Magistrate Shang said with a smile.