It was much faster than Wu Zheng's estimate. The skilled craftsmen used wood to make various components according to Wu Zheng's intentions in just one hour, and even the cylinders were made of wooden.

Wu Zheng was really impressed. A wooden cylinder, craftsmen could make the barrel body smooth without leaking with just wooden wedges. How could the craftsmen of the Ming Dynasty allow foreigners to occupy the peak of their technology?

The entire half-person-high device is all wood except the bucket that holds water.

When the furnace fire starts, the device automatically operates by storing and discharging the steam, and the lubricated components slowly drive the crankshaft and lever.

All the craftsmen's eyes showed amazed, it turned out that things could be done like this.

This is actually the prototype of an industrial revolution, replacing manpower with mechanical force.

When Wu Zheng ordered to use materials to scale the device to be used to forge steel, almost everyone suddenly realized it.

Chen Shoujie was the most excited. As the supervisor of the military workshop, he was under constant urging and pressure from the General's Mansion, but the backward technology made the output impossible to significantly increase. The biggest difficulty among them was the casting of steel.

Now, this problem is no longer a difficult problem. Everyone understands that forged steel is far tougher than cast steel. Since ancient times, a sword made of 100-forged steel has been used as a treasure of the generals, but how many days and nights do craftsmen need for forging?

In the eyes of everyone's almost admiration, Wu Zheng announced three things. First, from today, the military workshop will implement new measurement standards, redesign each product, produce it in the form of spare parts, and guide the implementation of assembly line operations. Second, keep it confidential, the military workshop will immediately station the army, and third, encourage. If craftsmen make breakthroughs and improvements to steam equipment, the government will reward them with a special contribution of one to five hundred taels.

When he left the military workshop, Wu Zheng was in a happy mood. He seemed to have put down a heavy burden. Because the seeds had been planted, he had no reason to doubt the creativity and craftsmanship of the Chinese people, let alone the future gains.

....

Fang Guoan, he did not expect Wu Zheng to make such a request.

This is probably something he has never encountered in his decades of military service.

After seeing Fang Guoan's training for the new recruits, Wu Zheng proposed a plan, which was to select the top 100 strongest recruits from the 30,000 recruits, divided into two, and lead the troops to train at the same time as Fang Guoan, for a period of 30 days, and then fight drills to determine the future training outline for the musketeers.

Wu Zheng had no choice. After reviewing Fang Guoan's three-month training for recruits, Wu Zheng found many problems.

It’s not that Fang Guoan’s training level is not high enough, and his training methods, courage, ears, hands, and camps are all over the place, without any mistakes. Indeed, Fang Guoan is one of the few professionals among the remaining Ming generals. His training methods can be said to be extremely rigorous, which is not unrelated to Fang Guoan’s desire to enter the core level of Wu Zheng’s power.

With the support of the general's manpower and material resources, these 30,000 new recruits were trained very well. Let's put it this way, when Wu Zheng was inspecting, Fang Guoan gave the order, the new recruits on the parade put all their energy into their efforts, yelling and rushing forward with a rainbow of momentum.

Is it wrong?

That's right. At least Wu Zheng was satisfied.

But Wu Zheng always felt that something was missing, which made him feel uneasy and uneasy.

Fang Guoan was also very depressed. He was looking forward to letting this review give him the opportunity to lead his troops to the battlefield again. His three thousand soldiers fought well in this battle and received awards after the war. His highest military position had been promoted to General Secretary Thousand, which gave him hope.

But now, after hearing what Wu Zheng said, he naturally could realize that Wu Zheng was not satisfied with his training, otherwise why would he have to train troops personally and then fight against military exercises a month later?

But he did not dare to refuse, so he could only ask: "Does the prince have any objections to the training method of humble officials?"

Wu Zheng looked at him and said, "Mr. Fang has misunderstood. I don't deny your training method. I just think that musketeers shouldn't be practicing like this."

Fang Guoan heard Wu Zheng deny it, felt a little comforted in his heart and said, "The method of training military is similar, brave, fierce, not afraid of death, obeying military orders, and strictly abideing military discipline. He can be called an elite tiger. He doesn't think there is anything wrong with his humble position, so he asks the prince to correct it."

Wu Zheng shook his head and said, "Although I am also from a military corps and fought all the way from the battlefield, in terms of battlefield experience, it is obvious that Lord Fang is much better than me."

"I dare not, I dare not take the position of humble position."

"But the Musket Army is a new military branch that has never been found before. Although there was a Shenji Battalion in the previous dynasty and a new army trained by Qi Shaobao, at least in the information I have mastered, the organization and combat ideas of these troops still lie in the muskets as the auxiliary of swords, shields, spears, and crossbows. Just like the new army trained by Qi Shaobao eighty years ago, the twelve teams are composed of one team, one standing shield soldiers, one vine shield soldiers, two wolf horn soldiers, four spear soldiers, one palladium soldiers, and only one firearm soldiers. This is obviously completely different from our Musket Army. The composition is different, and the tactics are naturally different."

Fang Guoan frowned slightly and said, "But how can the prince judge the inappropriate training method of the humble position? How can he prove that the prince's statement must be correct?"

Fang Guoan is indeed a little unwilling to lead troops. This is his strength, but now that Wu Zheng said this, his strength has become useless.

Wu Zheng said: "Don't be anxious, Lord Fang, I did not assert that he was right. I just learned from General Qi Jin and Qi's handbook that in the Battle of Sarhu, the elite Ming army lost nearly 50,000 people and more than 20,000 artillery and guns were seized. However, Kong Youde and Geng Jingzhong, the firearms army of the Ming army who received Portugal training, collectively surrendered to the Qing Dynasty. As a result, the Qing Dynasty actually gained an overwhelming advantage over any unit of the Ming army in the subsequent war. One example of the battle is very telling. In the Battle of Liaoyang, one thousand musket soldiers of the Ming army fought against the Qing army (submitted to the Qing Ming army). The Ming army fired firearms a hundred steps away. Seeing that the Qing army was still moving, they set up a brave charge against the Qing army. However, when it was approaching twenty steps, seven hundred Qing troops suddenly shot together, and only seven of the Ming army survived.

At that time, the two armies had almost the same muskets. The two divisions split from the same camp received the same training, but in a battle, the superiority and inferiority immediately appeared. What does this mean? It shows that the command error of the Ming munitions soldiers was too rigid and they did not know how to adapt. Muskets were only used as auxiliary troops for other military branches and did not attract enough attention... Fortunately, there is no war now, and we have time to conduct a competition, learn from strengths and avoid weaknesses, and decide how to train the musket army in the future... Why, is Lord Fang afraid to fight?"
Chapter completed!