Chongzhen's domineering

Chapter 332 A Cover-Up to a Plot to Conceal One's True Intentions Beyond the Great Wall (Part 2)

Amidst the great migration of the two capitals and thirteen provinces of the Ming Dynasty, Zhu Jue suddenly issued an edict promoting Cui Yingyuan to the position of Commander-in-Chief of Xuanfu and Datong.

Immediately afterwards, Cui Yingyuan began to conscript border troops from Xuanfu Town and Datong Town, frantically piling them up in Datong Town.

Emperor's father-in-law Tian Hongyu and Emperor Wei Zhongxian also came to requisition land and recruit people, and began laying tracks towards Datong Town.

Bricks produced in the densely packed brick kilns west of the capital began to be transported to Xuanfu Town.

Cui Yingyuan even went to Datong Town to begin building a defense line from Yanghekou to Hunyuan Prefecture.

This is clearly intended to strengthen the defenses of Datong Town and block the Jurchen cavalry's path into the pass.

The three powerful clans and eight imperial merchants of Puzhou were truly taken aback.

If the Jurchen cavalry are blocked outside the Great Wall and cannot enter, how can they withstand the fierce attack of the Hanzhong army?

If the young emperor keeps doing this, their base will be in danger sooner or later.

If their stronghold is lost, let alone providing food for the Jurchens, even their own food supply will be a problem, and business will be impossible.

In this situation, they have no time to worry about other places; protecting their home base is the most important thing.

With the route from Yanghekou to Hunyuanzhou blocked, they had no choice but to find another way to open up a path for the Jurchens to enter the pass.

Cui Yingyuan seems to still be sending people to patrol the border wall of Datong Town, making them extremely careful when clearing the road.

The two sides seemed to be secretly competing in Datong Town, but in reality, Zhu Jue was just sending Cui Yingyuan, Tian Hongyu, and Wei Zhongxian to put on a show for the three powerful clans and eight imperial merchants of Puzhou.

His goal was still to launch a counterattack beyond the Great Wall and first recover the former territory of the Northern Pacification Commandery.

As for the so-called frantic relocation of civilians and the strengthening of defenses in Datong Town, those were just smokescreens he released.

His intention was to attract the attention of the three powerful clans and eight imperial merchants of Puzhou, thereby making the Jurchens complacent and negligent in their defenses.

Originally, he was focused on launching a counterattack beyond the Great Wall and didn't care about other issues. Unexpectedly, these problems came knocking on his door.

Around 9 a.m. that morning, just as he finished reviewing the memorials and was about to go to the brick kiln in the west of the capital, Song Yingxing suddenly strode in, cupped his hands and bowed, saying, "Your humble servant greets Your Majesty."

Why did you suddenly come here?

Seeing the hint of anxiety on the man's face, Zhu Jue asked curiously, "Chang Geng, what's wrong?"

Song Yingxing hurriedly explained, "Your Majesty, please forgive us, but we are afraid we cannot produce enough cooling fans. The number of people being relocated is simply too large. The first batch alone involved more than three million people, and our stock of cooling fans is almost depleted."

This is indeed a problem; without cooling fans, such a large-scale migration is impossible.

He genuinely wanted ordinary people to live a prosperous and comfortable life in Southeast Asia and the Americas, not for them to suffer.

Without enough cooling fans, let alone a good life, you'd be lucky not to die from the heat.

He meant well but did something wrong. If people really died from the heat, things would be in chaos overseas. The civilians who had migrated there would probably complain bitterly, and those who hadn't started migrating yet would be filled with fear and anxiety.

This cannot be done.

He couldn't help but frown and said, "Chang Geng, the production volume of the cooling fans seems to be quite high, right? We haven't been using much of them lately, so how come the inventory is depleted so quickly?"

It depends on how much you need.

Song Yingxing said with some helplessness, "Your Majesty, these more than three million people need at least thirty thousand sets of cooling fans. Moreover, Nanyang is not far away. Our Zhiyuan merchant ships can make a round trip to Luzon in less than half a month. Even if we include the time for them to pick up the people, it will not take more than twenty days."

In other words, such a frantic migration, with two round trips taking about forty days, would require more than six sets of refrigeration fans. While our usage of refrigeration fans during this period was indeed not high, the problem is that our inventory is less than 50,000 sets.

After they returned from their trip, I'm not sure if we'll be able to gather another 30,000 sets of cooling fans.

Uh, that's a really scary amount.

He hadn't really considered this problem either.

Zhu Jue nodded slowly, then asked, "How many sets of cooling fans can we produce per month now?"

How do you say this?

Song Yingxing estimated, "Your Majesty, if we don't manufacture anything else and only produce cooling fans, we can probably produce about 30,000 sets a month. The problem is, we can't just stop manufacturing everything else. Right now, our monthly output is only about 10,000 sets."

Is the output really that low? This is the entire nation's effort, and it can only produce 10,000 sets of cooling fans per month?

Are you kidding me?

If this were in later generations, it would be utterly unbelievable; even a moderately large wind turbine factory could produce more than ten thousand wind turbines a month.

Upon hearing this, Zhu Jue frowned again and said, "Chang Geng, cooling fans don't seem that difficult to manufacture, so why is the output so low?"

I only have that many factories.

Song Yingxing carefully explained, "Your Majesty, the cooling fan is indeed not difficult to manufacture. If it's just the blades, guard plates, gears, connecting rods, etc., even if we just ask the factories that cast cannons or even boilers to help make some, it wouldn't be a problem to produce 100,000 sets a month."

The problem is that these refrigeration fans also need to be powered by steam engines. We only have ten factories that manufacture steam engines right now. Even if the steam engines that power the refrigeration fans are easy to manufacture, we can only manufacture a thousand units a day at most.

We can't just build steam engines to power refrigerated fans. Machine factories, shipyards, artillery factories, cement plants, and so on—they all need steam engines.

Are we running out of factory space again?
The steam engine is currently a core secret of the Ming Dynasty. Not only must the factory be kept absolutely secret, but even the craftsmen who manufacture steam engines must be kept absolutely secret. Where can we build a new factory to manufacture them with peace of mind?

This must be done with great care; he can't just randomly find a place to build a new factory.

Besides, it's too late to build a new factory now.

Zhu Jue frowned and pondered for a while, then asked, "Chang Geng, how is the development of the equipment for making a thousand-jin cannon progressing?"

Uh, why are you suddenly asking about artillery again?
Song Yingxing said with some helplessness, "Your Majesty, the equipment for making a thousand-jin cannon has already taken up a factory for research and development. And after it is developed, at least another factory will be needed to mass-produce the extra-large steam engines. Right now, that factory is really not enough."

I wasn't asking about the factory.

Zhu Jue bluntly asked, "When do you estimate that the equipment for manufacturing a thousand-pound cannon will be developed?"

Uh, why are you still asking this question?
Song Yingxing said cautiously, "Your Majesty, this equipment is too big, and we do not have such large machine tools to process oversized parts. The parts are very difficult to manufacture. At first, we can only rely on manual polishing. I estimate that the earliest we can develop it is next year when the ice and snow melt."

Well, that's fast enough.

Zhu Jue nodded slightly and then asked, "Have we made enough cannons weighing 500 jin each now?"

You're interested in artillery, right?
Okay, let's talk about artillery then.

Song Yingxing nodded repeatedly and said, "Yes, nowadays there are more than a hundred factories manufacturing cannons. We can produce more than 600 cannons weighing 500 jin a day, and nearly 20,000 cannons a month."

The Haihe Shipyard doesn't need that many cannons yet. Even if these two batches are both Zhenyuan warships, the total demand will only be around 120,000 cannons. The artillery factory has already produced over 100,000 cannons, and it's estimated that there will still be 50,000 to 60,000 cannons remaining by the end of the year.

There's no need to build too many of these 500-pound cannons. With over two thousand Zhenyuan warships, we already have a significant advantage. Besides, we're going to build the super-large Zhiyuan merchant ships next year, so the Zhenyuan warship project will have to be put on hold.

Zhu Jue thought about it carefully, and then decisively said, "Then you should convert the workshops of those ten artillery factories in Tongzhou City into steam engine factories. That way, producing more than 40,000 sets of cooling fans a month shouldn't be a problem, right?"

How do you say this?

Song Yingxing pondered, "It wouldn't be difficult to convert the workshops of those ten artillery factories into workshops for manufacturing steam engines, but we would still need to acquire a lot of equipment."

The acquisition of equipment will take time. This month, using the equipment in the artillery factory, we can probably only produce 10,000 to 20,000 steam engines at most. That should be enough to gather the cooling fans needed by the civilians who will be relocated to Southeast Asia for the second time.

The problem is, it will take at least a month or two to procure all the equipment, and we probably won't be able to gather enough cooling fans for the next group of ordinary people migrating to Southeast Asia.”

This one is simple.

Zhu Jue pondered and said, “Nanyang is not just one place. What you said about a round trip in about twenty days refers to relocating ordinary people to Luzon. A batch of ordinary people has already been relocated to Luzon, and it will take time to settle them down. For the second batch, we can relocate them to Java instead of Luzon.”

Java is more than twice as far as Luzon; it takes them over a month to travel there and back. That should give you enough time to gather your third batch of cooling fans, right?

Yes, we can let them relocate the second batch of civilians to Java.

Upon hearing this, Song Yingxing nodded repeatedly and said, "Your Majesty is wise; this will provide enough time."

This is just the issue of relocating ordinary people, and such a huge blunder has already occurred. Will the issue of counterattacking beyond the Great Wall also encounter such a blunder?

Upon careful consideration, Zhu Jue indeed discovered a flaw.

He simply said, "Alright, you organize the artisans to renovate the factory first, and we'll discuss the counterattack beyond the Great Wall in a few days."

(End of this chapter)