Top-notch Little Horseman

"Swish, swish!..."

It shot out like the wind, the small steel ball flying out and landing on the big tree in front.

"boom!……"

The trunk of the large tree snapped in response and collapsed with a crash, leaving everyone present, except for Ye Chen, gaping in astonishment.

In that instant, their minds went blank, and they forgot how to express themselves using human language.

At this moment, all the words in the world can be summed up in two words: awesome!

With a deafening roar, the first shotgun of this era was born.

According to Er Gouzi, the bullet gun, which weighs half a pound, still has an astonishing impact force despite the reduced gunpowder content.

Ye Chen felt a sharp pain in his hand from the impact, and the gun almost slipped from his grasp. It seemed that this body was still too weak and needed to be properly tempered.

The tree was stuffed with 50 steel balls, so tightly packed that it resembled a barrage of needles. It seemed the tree, snapped in half, was beyond saving.

"This, could this be the legendary... Rain of Pear Blossom Needles?" The corner of the Smoker's mouth twitched.

"What nonsense about 'Rain of Pear Blossom Needles'? That's just storytellers spouting nonsense! What we've made is the 'Rain of Pear Blossom Gun'!" Er Gouzi said proudly.

"Within 10 steps, even a large insect can be killed instantly with a single shot!"

Er Gouzi was even more excited than Yan Gui. He quickly took the modified shotgun from Ye Chen's hand. In this era, Ye Chen gave it a new name: Shotgun!

The short-barreled shotgun was still smoking. I carefully examined how much the firing steel balls affected the barrel and the bolt mechanism.

"The power is good, but the gunpowder equivalent can be reduced by another 1%, and 20 more steel balls can be added." Ye Chen suggested improvements while rubbing his sore wrist.

"The muzzle can be ground to form an outward-spreading slope, so that the bullets are more likely to disperse after leaving the muzzle, and the kill area is also wider."

"Okay, I'll go back and change it. I'll send it to you later." Er Gouzi has a strong sense of service.

"Oh, right, there are too few muskets. If we really need to use them, 12 won't be enough. We need to prepare more," Ye Chen said after thinking for a moment.

He didn't want to go to the battlefield and have to repeatedly reload gunpowder and press bullets halfway through the fighting, as that could kill people.

"I've already thought of this for you, brother. I can modify the shortened barrel and make four more guns. But if you want more, it will definitely take time to make them separately." Er Gouzi said, looking a bit troubled.

"In that case, the time for agreeing to draw the lightning bolt gun will have to be postponed."

"Then let's just add four more for now. Brother Er Gouzi, thank you so much," Ye Chen said sincerely.

"Don't thank me, it was all Big Brother's idea, and he also gave me the roast chicken, which gave me motivation," Er Gouzi said with a smile.

"These are all things I should do. If you have any other requests in the future, feel free to ask. I've learned a lot from modifying your gun."

Er Gouzi has made up his mind that even if Ye Chen stops providing roast chicken in the future, he will still continue to do so.

Only by continuing to help Ye Chen modify guns can he become a top-notch musket expert.

Just as Ye Chen was witnessing the birth of the world's first shotgun, in a small grove of trees about 30 miles away...

An elderly, white-haired general, a few years older than the smoker, led five border soldiers in a careful search of the forest.

The veteran crawled on the ground, sniffing the earth like a dog, and advanced inch by inch.

The nameplate hanging from his waist indicated that he was Jiang Haobai, a centurion in the Border Army's First Battalion.

Jiang Haobai was an unknown veteran who had been stationed in the garrison for nearly thirty years. He had participated in many battles, but no one had ever heard of him achieving any merits, and no soldier had ever seen him kill the enemy.

Some people secretly mocked him, calling him a coward and a cunning old soldier who only knew how to protect himself.

A border soldier like him would definitely just wait to retire and return to his hometown; he'd be a coward who'd rather enjoy his old age.

But no one knew that he and Commander Gou of the Right Guard of Beiping City were once comrades-in-arms in the same battalion, and the two had a life-or-death bond.

Commander Gou arranged for his own son to serve in the border army, and with Jiang Haobai's support, he was promoted to the position of commander of a thousand men, and had his own private guard.

For Gou Qianhu, Jiang Haobai was an uncle, a teacher, and also the reins around his father's neck.

What Commander Gou didn't expect was that, without realizing it, his son had grown into a wild horse, no longer easily restrained by the reins.

For example, this time, when the Northern Barbarian cavalry circled the border, Commander Gou clearly ordered him to end his military career and return to Beiping City immediately with his elite private guards.

However, Commander Gou insisted on completing his border patrol mission before returning to Beiping, saying that he still had his own troops to gather and could not be rushed.

For this matter, Commander Gou had a big argument with his eldest son... but what was the result?

His eldest son, Gou Chenghu, actually chatted with a few lowly pawns about the plans the family had made, and to make matters worse, someone overheard them.

To cover up the secret, Gou Chenghu directly killed someone and went out to patrol the border the next day, instructing those good-for-nothings to handle the aftermath.

Are they capable people?

Sure enough, those good-for-nothings disappeared, while Ye Chen, the squad leader of the horse herders, was now lively and energetic, showing his face in the household office.

These past few days, Jiang Haobai has been sending people to keep an eye on Ye Chen's movements, to see if he has gone to Beiping City to report him.

Although they weren't afraid, it would be troublesome, so they arranged for people to come to the city lord's mansion, but Ye Chen never showed up.

Meanwhile, he led his men to search for the whereabouts of those idiots, following the road Qin Mengyao had taken from the household registration office all the way here. There were still some traces of a fight at the scene, and even though the smell of blood had faded over time, it couldn't escape his nose.

Jiang Haobai had a special skill, and he also had a nickname in the border army: the hunting dog.

His ability to find and trace clues is unmatched.

After searching for a while, he suddenly stopped in front of an open space, grabbed a handful of soil, and sniffed it.

He pinched some soil with his fingers, chewed it a couple of times, and then spat it out.

"Right here, dig it open!"

Jiang Haobai stood up, pointed, and gave an order.

Five of his men immediately stepped forward, wielding shovels and spades, and began the civil engineering work.

In no time at all, they had dug it open.

Five people—no, they should be called five corpses, corpses that had already begun to decompose, but with their eyes open.

Four of them had ferocious expressions, which showed how terrified they were when they died.

The other person was so disfigured that it was almost unbearable to look at.

All of Jiang Haobai's henchmen couldn't help but cover their noses, feeling quite uncomfortable.

Jiang Haobai, however, paid no attention and stepped forward to begin the on-site autopsy.

"This!...How could this be!"