Gou was a member of the imperial family in the late Ming Dynasty

Chapter 154 From Ming Dynasty to Mongolia
These things have been arranged, but whether a fireworks craftsman can be invited and whether the research and development of the percussion cap can be successful are still unknown. However, Zhu Shenzhu is full of confidence. He will see if it works after he finds someone. No matter what, the fireworks craftsman's ability in gunpowder production is far from what he can match, so the possibility of success in the future is very high.

But these things take time. The journey from Shanxi to Nanzhili is long, and it takes several months to go back and forth. Even if Zhou Anmin has made arrangements now, it will take the earliest until the end of this year to find the person and find a way to bring him back, and it may take even longer.

After a night's rest, Zhu Shenzhui woke up the next morning. After getting up, he did some boxing in the yard, stretched his muscles, and had breakfast with Zhao Da. After breakfast, Zhu Shenzhui asked Hu Yisheng to take him to the mine for a walk.

Mining at the mine had actually started a long time ago, even earlier than the establishment of the Hundred Households Office in Zhaowuling.

In those days, many villagers of Zhaowu Village went there secretly to mine and get some coal for fire and heating. As for the iron ore, it was not unmined, but it was all on a small scale. After all, the private mining of minerals was strictly investigated by the imperial court. In addition, Emperor Wanli also sent mining supervisors and tax supervisors to various places at that time. Although these eunuchs were greedy, they still cared about the emperor's instructions. In order to make more money for the emperor, they strictly investigated local private mines. Although it could not be completely eliminated, it did limit the phenomenon of private mining to a large extent.

Now that the mining and tax supervisors have been abolished, without these people above them, the mines have naturally become a pie to be divided up by the civil servants of the court and local interest groups, especially the gentry groups. More importantly, they do not need to pay taxes to the court when they mine these mines privately, or pay less taxes, and all the profits they get are divided up by themselves.

At the same time, under such circumstances, private mining gradually increased. Fortunately, Zhu Shenzhu acted quickly and asked Zhou Anmin to use Wei Zhongxian's connections to get Wang Rong the title of the commander of the garrison. He then directly set up a 100-household garrison in Zhaowuling through the garrison, and attributed the mineral resources here to the garrison, eliminating the possibility of the local government reaching out to this area.

If this were not the case, once the news of the mine in Zhaowuling got out, this place might not be able to be defended at all. At that time, local officials and businessmen would pounce on it like hungry wolves smelling blood and directly take over the mine for themselves.

The mine is small and the mining method is very primitive.

The area to the north is a coal mine. Shanxi has been a coal-producing area since ancient times, and the storage and quality of coal are excellent. The coal mines here can be mined directly in the open air, and the mining operation is relatively simple. The reserves are not yet clear, but according to Hu Yisheng, the reserves are definitely not small. Judging from the current mining situation, it is not certain that it can be mined for hundreds of years, but decades are more than enough.

The iron mine is on the south side of the coal mine. There is a small red hill over there. This small hill is where the iron mine is located. The iron content of this iron mine is not low. It is a rare rich mine. The ore used for iron smelting in the workshop now comes from this, and the quality is excellent.

Compared with coal mining, iron mining is much more difficult. Moreover, mining now relies on manpower. One person can mine several hundred kilograms a day. In addition, the ore needs to be transported to the workshop. The road is not easy to walk on. It depends on wheelbarrows and manpower. Although the distance is not too far, the transportation volume is still limited. The coal mining and iron ore mining and transportation every day add up to about 3,500 kilograms. Although it can meet the needs of the current workshop, it is far from enough for Zhu Shenzhui.

After a round, Zhu Shenzhui told Hu Yisheng that after recruiting the later miners, they should first build a road from the two mines to the workshop. The road does not need to be too good, as long as it can transport the ore in the early stage. When the road is built, it will be used as such for the time being. Later, when the output of the workshop increases, perhaps two straight roads can be built to speed up transportation.

As for the output, it must be increased as soon as possible. More than 3,500 kilograms may seem like a lot, but a single iron ore is only less than 2,000 kilograms. The ironmaking efficiency of the workshop will increase in the later stage. According to Zhu Shenzhu's estimation, even if it cannot reach 6,000 kilograms a day, half of it will be 3,000 kilograms.

Three thousand catties of pig iron, the ratio of pig iron to iron ore is about 1:1.7-1.8, so at least catties of iron ore is needed, not including the demand for coal. If we continue to refine wrought iron and steel, we can calculate the ratio of catties of pig iron to catties of wrought iron, which means we can produce catties of wrought iron. If we refine it into steel, the ratio will drop a lot.

This is still the most basic algorithm. As the output of the workshop continues to increase in the later stage, the amount of mining at the mine will continue to rise, and it cannot be met without sufficient manpower.

The conditions at the mine were very poor, and the miners were all unkempt. Zhu Shenzhui gave Hu Yisheng some instructions, asking him to pay attention to the environment and safety of the mine, and to take safety measures while ensuring production. He was a miner himself, so he knew better than Zhu Shenzhui how to deal with the situation.

In addition, the treatment of miners must also be improved. These are all produced by human labor. How can they work well if they don't eat well and wear warm clothes? Zhu Shenzhui is not like those civil servants and gentry. There is still a necessary bottom line. Besides, these people will be of great use in the future. If they can't even manage two mines, how can they do other things? After staying in Zhaowuling for three days, Zhu Shenzhui left. Then he went to Yangtou Mountain to meet Li Hu. When he returned to Pingyang from Yangtou Mountain, the second caravan to the grassland was about to set off. Zhu Shenzhui arrived on time and set off for the grassland again.

In early May, Zhu Shenzui's caravan returned to the grassland. This time, they found that the atmosphere on the grassland was a bit solemn. The news from the east said that the war between Lindan Khan and Khorchin was not going well, and the situation seemed a bit bad.

Lin Danhan, the leader of Mongolia, had great ambitions but little talent. Although he had the ambition to unify the grassland, he had no ability to get things done. Without mentioning other things, let's just talk about his two military expeditions. Whether it was the target or the timing of the military expedition, they were all wrong. Moreover, he looked smart in doing things, but in fact he was extremely stupid.

The last time they attacked Inner Khalkha, they could have sent troops immediately when Nurhaci first attacked Chaohua. If they had sent troops at that time, Inner Khalkha would not have surrendered to Later Jin, and Chaohua would not have been forced into an alliance with Later Jin.

Lin Danhan originally wanted to use the power of the Later Jin to weaken the strength of Inner Khalkha, but he did not expect the impact and consequences of doing so as the overlord of Mongolia.

Lin Dan Khan watched Inner Khalkha being attacked by the Later Jin, and when Chaohua was beaten up by Nurhaci and forced to surrender and form an alliance with the Later Jin, Lin Dan Khan became unhappy again. He wanted to teach Chaohua a lesson under the banner of the Mongolian Khan and gathered troops to attack Inner Khalkha in an attempt to swallow up this territory. For many Mongolian tribes, this was a bit like the death of the rabbit and the grief of the fox.

However, when he sent troops to Inner Khalkha that time, Ligdan Khan did not achieve his goal. On the contrary, because of the reasons of Later Jin and Khorchin, Ligdan Khan's army not only failed to take advantage of the situation to capture Inner Khalkha, but was attacked by Inner Khalkha, Later Jin and Khorchin and lost the battle. He came with high hopes but returned in disappointment.

After the defeat of Inner Khalkha, Ligdan Khan was very angry, but instead of reflecting on himself, he hated Khorchin.

In the eyes of Lin Danhan, if it were not for Khorchin's mischief, Inner Khalkha would have fallen into his hands long ago. It was because of Khorchin that the Later Jin used Khorchin as a transit point, and the two armies jointly attacked Lin Danhan from the flank, catching him off guard, which led to the failure of this battle.

Because of this, Lin Danhan was angry with Khorchin and had been thinking about teaching Khorchin a lesson. So when he learned that the Later Jin and Ming in Liaodong were at war again, Lin Danhan suddenly realized that the opportunity had come. He excitedly issued an order to gather troops again, and wanted to take this opportunity to attack Khorchin and let Khorchin know who was the real master of the grassland.

Zhu Shenzhui simply couldn't understand Lindan Khan's bold move. Not to mention him, even Ashitemur, a Mongolian, was the same.

All along, Lin Danhan did whatever he wanted, just like a child playing house, doing whatever he wanted.

In name, as the leader of Mongolia, he was the Great Khan of the Mongols, but many of the things he did caused the Mongolian tribes to become alienated. To unify the grasslands, it takes not only military force, but also political wisdom and means, but the latter is exactly what Lindan Khan lacks.

Even in terms of military strength, although Lindan Khan had an advantage, he was far from being strong enough to sweep across the grasslands on his own. In this case, Lindan Khan would either first target a tribe and severely punish it, completely subdue one of the tribes, and then annex the territory and digest it before moving on to the next tribe. In addition, he would try his best to win over and appease other tribes. Even if he could not get the support of other tribes, he would at least make them not help each other.

But what did Lindan Khan do now? Without resolving the Inner Khalkha issue, Lindan Khan couldn't wait to attack Khorchin again. And the reason for attacking Khorchin was that Khorchin was close to the Later Jin Dynasty and helped the Inner Khalkha in the last war, which offended him, the Khan?
How could such a reason convince the public? Moreover, whether it was Inner Khalkha or Khorchin, the reason why they fought against Ligdan Khan was not because of Ligdan Khan's own coercion and the Later Jin Dynasty?
The root cause was not the Mongols themselves, but the rise of the Later Jin. The geographical location of Inner Khalkha and Khorchin meant that they could not make many choices, because they were sandwiched between the Mongolian headquarters and the Later Jin. Facing two fierce beasts, they could only survive in the cracks. This was not a problem for the tribes themselves. If Lin Danhan could provide some help and extend a friendly hand in this situation, as fellow Mongols, Inner Khalkha and Khorchin would naturally be more inclined to Lin Danhan psychologically and emotionally.

(End of this chapter)