Half a month has passed since the edict of the third chapter of the covenant was issued.

The Inner History Mansion, where Xianyang is located, still posted the imperial list.

Nearly half of the world's wealthy businessmen were relocated to Xianyang by Qin Shi Huang, and almost all of these wealthy businessmen took refuge in some princes and ministers for their own safety, seeking a stable way of survival for themselves.

Therefore, before the imperial list was issued, the merchants of Xianyang already knew that the emperor was going to use the method of borrowing chickens and eggs to create 10,000 sets of new horse equipment, and many people had already begun to prepare in advance, and they had already put it into action after obtaining the manufacturing instructions through internal relations.

Therefore, Xianyang has also been very lively because of this incident recently, although it is also snowing heavily, but every day there are caravans in and out of the four city gates, and it seems that the whole Xianyang is active because of this incident.

And since the emperor list was issued, Chen Xu has been running between the Academy of Sciences and the Craftsman Shaofu every day, and at the same time he is anxiously waiting, although everything seems to be extremely well prepared, and it is also the first thing to say, drawing a big spicy cookcake for the emperor and the civil and military ministers of the Manchu Dynasty and the merchants of the world, but before the news from all over the world came back, every day was a pain and torment for Chen Xu.

The so-called easy to know is difficult to do, everything is beautiful to think, but when it comes to doing it, I'm afraid many of them will be greatly discounted.

If this matter is not handled properly, it will not only lose the trust of the First Emperor, but also worry about future development.

Therefore, Chen Xu can only hope that Fan Yan can fully understand his meaning, relying on Nanyang's large-scale copper and iron workshop and sufficient craftsmen and manpower with experience in smelting copper and iron to make copper and iron utensils, to support this matter.

According to Chen Xu's assumption, only by successfully completing this seemingly difficult but actually extremely difficult task can he have sufficient reasons to promote reform, and take this opportunity to change the current pattern of heavy agriculture and suppression of business in Daqin.

Only when commerce prospers can industry get initial development, with the support of industry, agriculture can also get strong support, all kinds of cheap new agricultural tools can be popularized and applied on a large scale, and the situation of national peace and security that he envisioned can be slowly realized.

In this anxiety, Chen Xu is a little restless every day, and he feels unable to calm down when he does anything, even the usual good food and drink have been boring recently.

"Master Hou, it's cold, you better eat more! Otherwise, we can't afford to starve. The kitchen worker who delivered the food looked at the carefully prepared dishes in the kitchen and the meal barely moved, and couldn't help but remind with a bitter face.

"Let's go, I can't eat it!" Chen Xu waved his hand with a sad face, looking at the snowflakes flying outside the window, he couldn't help but sigh slightly.

Watching the cook take the food away, Yu Wuya shook his head with the iron sword and said: "Engong, the so-called plan is in the people, and the success is in the sky, it is useless for you to be in a hurry, I will accompany you to kill two games of chess and scatter your heart!" ”

Chen Xu's face turned black in an instant, and he twitched a few times and resolutely refused.

Playing chess with Yu Wuya, let alone distracting, it was the perfect version of the sadistic growth manual, since the invention of chess, except for the first day, he basically never won.

"Hou Ye, Hou Ye~" Zhao Qing braved the heavy snow to rush into the gate of the Academy of Sciences from outside, lifted the hat full of snowflakes on his cloak, and hurried into the room with joy on his face.

"What?" Chen Xu hurriedly put down the weapon production manual in his hand and stood up.

"Master Hou, it's a happy event, news came from Hedong County, a newly built smelting workshop has smelted qualified steel, and the weapons created have reached the standard after testing, they have begun to smelt and process day and night, and the supervisor who listened to the report said that as long as there is no mistake, the daily output of weapons can reach five, and the horseshoes and stirrups have also reached ten pairs respectively!"

"Whew~" Chen Xu breathed a long sigh of relief, and his face became relaxed.

This is indeed a good sign, although the number is very small, but according to the news that came back before, there are seven or eight wealthy merchants in Hedong County who have begun to prepare steel workshops and foundry workshops, as long as someone succeeds, the rest will be slowly tested, plus the instructions for steelmaking and ironmaking have been written in great detail, as long as the smelting craftsmen can understand, a few more tests will inevitably get different quality steel, but as long as it is steel with few impurities, it can be used to make weapons and horse harness, and wrought iron with less carbon can be used to make horseshoes, The high carbon content can be used to build weapons, as long as the sharpness reaches the level of a bronze sword, and this requirement is not high, it can be said that it is almost the level of ordinary kitchen knives in later generations, the most important thing is that steel weapons are wear-resistant and not easy to break, and the ore reserves are rich and cheap, which is the advantage of steel.

Before the invention of steel weapons, the damage of weapons on the battlefield was quite severe, nearly half of the weapons in a big war will be damaged, and many will be directly broken and unusable, and it takes a skilled craftsman to cast a qualified military sword for several days, because in the casting process, the mold must be made first, and then the bronze juice is poured, and in the pouring process, because of uneven heating or other problems, there are quite a lot of defective wastes, and after the successful pouring of the forging will be damaged, plus Daqin's strict system standards, Therefore, it is not easy to get a successful military broadsword in the end.

But steel weapons are different, whether it is the frying steel method or the steel filling method or even the most primitive hundred refining method, the steel can be repeatedly smelted and hammered, and there is no need to open the mold, directly use the pouring steel bar to hammer and form and then polish it, as long as the steel is qualified, the probability of defective waste is very small, a qualified blacksmith plus a few helpers, a day can build a or even two or three out.

Therefore, as long as there is a successful beginning, there will definitely be people who will succeed one after another.

And Hedong is the Shanxi range of later generations, coal and iron reserves are extremely rich, there is a Hedong coalfield in Shanxi in later generations, that is, the coal mine that has been detected at present, not to mention the large reserves, and the burial is extremely shallow, the quality is extremely high, all of which are the kind of large pieces of refined coal that Zhao Qing used to transport to Qinghe Town, this coal mine is when Chen Xu used to look for coal, Zhao Qing arranged for people to inquire in Hedong County, and the local people dug out some black stones when they were plowing the fields and piled them up on the edge of the fields, Hedong County is everywhere, almost all the local villagers know.

And there are a lot of iron ore in Hedong County, the iron ore transported to Qinghe Town Chen Xu has seen, it is a yellow pyrite ore, many of which are excavated with copper ore, with a golden crystal luster, some look beautiful, but a large amount of sulfur dioxide is emitted when smelting, which is very pungent and very serious to air pollution.

Nowadays, there is also coal, iron ore, and the process of ironmaking is also clearly understood, plus iron has been used for hundreds of years, iron farm tools have begun to be used on a large scale during the Warring States Period, and iron weapons are not uncommon, so iron ore has long been mined and smelted on a large scale, otherwise those workshops will not be called copper and iron workshops, but the iron smelted is pig iron, and craftsmen are naturally not strangers to making iron tools, what they lack is only the burning temperature and smelting experience.

At present, everything is in place, although it is rushed, but under this mature metallurgical industry system, it only needs to be tested for a short time to be able to refine steel products that meet weapons-grade standards.

And this is Chen Xu's confidence, after all, he has already seen the dense copper and iron workshops in Nanyang, and he has also personally seen the victory in Qinghe Town to easily refine steel, and create a sharp sword that is no less than high-carbon steel in later generations.

Therefore, Zhao Qing's news made Chen Xu feel relaxed.

As long as Hedong County succeeds, Nanyang County, where copper and iron merchants are concentrated, should also be successful.

However, due to the cold and heavy snow blocking the road, it is estimated that it will take some time to reach Xianyang.

"Let's go, go back to eat hot pot, suddenly hungry!"

Chen Xu threw away the brush in his hand, pulled Zhao Qing and Yu Wuya to ride back to the Qinghe Marquis Mansion.

I heard that Hou Ye, who had been anorexic for half a month, suddenly had a great appetite and wanted to eat hot pot, and the cooks and helpers of the Hou Mansion immediately got busy.

Soon a specially made hot pot is placed in the center of the restaurant, the red charcoal fire in the stove is burning, the soup stock made from beef bones in the iron pot is boiling, and the smell of green onions, ginger and pepper mustard and secret miso exudes a strong aroma throughout the room.

More than a dozen little maids go in and out like wearing flowers, large plates of beef, mutton, dog meat, donkey meat, fat sausages, kidney flowers, mille-feuille tripe, scallion meatballs, bean sprouts, bean skin, dried tofu, frozen tofu, mushrooms, dried bamboo shoots, fungus, yam tablets, lotus root slices, fresh and tender Chinese cabbage, reed slices......

The two tables next to the hot pot were instantly filled with dozens of hot pot side dishes, and Qinghe Liquor also opened two bottles.

"Here, a toast first!" Chen Xu picked up the wine glass in his hand, and in the snow-white porcelain cup, the red Qinghe wine released a crisp fruity aroma, which was mixed with the fragrance of the hot pot, making Chen Xu instantly feel the atmosphere of the hot pot restaurant in the future.

"!" Yu Wuya and Zhao Qing raised their glasses at the same time, raised their heads and cooed, and a large glass of wine went down.

"Cool!" Chen Xu wiped his mouth, picked up a piece of dog meat with chopsticks and put it into the hot pot and gently swung it, and after three or five strokes, he put it in his mouth, and suddenly a rich fragrance spread out in his mouth, and a long-lost smile instantly appeared on his face.

And a piece of fragrant dog meat went down, Chen Xu felt even hungrier in an instant, so the chopsticks opened and closed, and the beef and mutton, tripe and kidney flowers were put into the hot pot and began to soak.

As a senior foodie, Yu Wuya naturally refuses to give up such a sumptuous hot pot meal, this kind of large full set of hot pot with complete meat dishes even Chen Xu has only eaten it once or twice, mainly because the cost is too high, and as a Hou Ye, he is not very consumer, and the second is that it is troublesome to make, just boiling a pot of beef bone soup takes a whole day, not to mention all kinds of frozen meat.

As for Zhao Qing, he couldn't wait to swallow his tongue even more, he had also eaten hot pot, after all, he was Chen Xu's staff officer and secretary general at the moment, and he was responsible for all external liaison matters of the Academy of Sciences, and he was also deeply valued by Chen Xu, he once invited him to eat a hot pot, but compared with today's dishes and taste, it was not a grade at all, that time it was dog meat hot pot, but dog meat is not rare, and he often eats it at home, but today's sumptuous hot pot, just the dishes opened his eyes, there are dozens of kinds, And they can all be eaten in hot pot, and the taste is indescribable.

Just when the three of them were drinking and eating in a strong atmosphere, the steward of the Hou Mansion, Huang Fu Que, hurriedly pushed the door in and said, "Master Hou, there are dozens of carriages from outside the Hou Mansion, and the flag of the Hou Mansion of Qinghe is still planted on the car, and the leading steward calls himself Hu Kuan......."