On December 30, 1629, at the Xishan Airport of the Oriental Port, the runway of the airport was docked at the moment with the airship marking the highest technological level of the Oriental Port.

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The cargo hatch at the stern of the airship is now open downward, and the cargo hatch is directly connected to the ground from the belly of the airship's cargo hold, and many ground crews are carrying boxes towards the cargo hold, and stacking them in the corresponding places according to the command of several officers in the cargo hold.

Several Navy non-commissioned officers were inspecting the spring cannons fixed to the firing windows on either side of the airship, and next to them was an ammunition box that had been fixed to the floor of the cargo hold, and in the box was a shell without a fuse, and the fuse was neatly placed in another small box next to them. Since the airship is a special fireproof unit, and the entire airship is full of flammable and explosive materials, not to mention that the airbags on their heads are full of hydrogen, so the spring shells must not be equipped with fuses before they are loaded into the barrel and fired.

To say that the weapons of the airship are also quite heartbreaking for the veterans of the technical group, saying that such a stable flying platform can hover in the air from 500 meters to 1,000 meters at will, and they can't wait to pile up all the weapons that the Senate is currently equipped with. However, almost all of the Senate's weapons and equipment were hot weapons, and in the case that even a single Mars could turn the entire airship into a huge torch in the air, Yuan Zhenli directly vetoed most of the weapon allocation plans, leaving only the spring cannon. Even spring shells are not allowed to be fused before they are fired, so as to prevent all potential fire or explosion as much as possible.

Of course, there can never be only a single weapon such as a spring cannon on the airship, and there must still be short- and medium-distance self-defense weapons, but what weapon to choose has become an embarrassing problem for the senators - don't think about the machine gun, the airship is not even allowed to go up with a rifle, this machine gun that spits out tongues of fire at every turn is loaded on it, isn't it that the old birthday star eats arsenic and thinks it will be long? However, it was not possible to equip the people on the airship with bows and arrows - the shooting distance was too short, and the firing was too physically demanding on the shooter. After discussing for a long time, the veterans of the weapons and equipment department put forward two options for Yuan Zhenli to choose.

The first was the reactivation of the Scorpion crossbow, which was originally installed on the 8154 cruiser, which was mothballed after the first naval battle because of its slow reloading speed and inferior firing accuracy to artillery and machine guns. However, now, because the airship is in urgent need of this long-range weapon that can be fired without burning, it has been specially moved out of the "weapons graveyard" where the weapons are mothballed, and installed in the belly of the airship, which is listed on both sides of the central axis downward.

The second weapon is the repeating bed crossbow known as the Zhuge crossbow, which is said to have been invented by Zhuge Liang The repeating crossbow first appeared in the Shu Kingdom during the Three Kingdoms period, but there are also legends that this kind of crossbow was used in the late Warring States period and the early years of the Qin Dynasty. But whether it is the Qin Dynasty's repeater or Zhuge repeater, it is not as good as the repeating bed crossbow equipped by the Senate at this moment. This kind of repeating bed crossbow is 2.5 meters long, the crossbow arm is three meters wide on both sides, the crossbow body has a slide rail about one centimeter deep, and there is a special loader on one side. When firing, the shooter takes aim at the target and then turns the crank on the right-hand side, which is connected to a gear that pulls the crossbow backwards. When it reaches the reload position, the loader will automatically insert a crossbow arrow into the slide of the crossbow body under the mechanical action, and once the crossbow arrow is in place, it will automatically unhook the fixture behind the string and launch the crossbow arrow, while the continuous crank will start the second autoreloading action. The Department of Armament and Equipment used this repeating bed crossbow to conduct a test launch at the Sandbank range, and the data obtained after the test launch was shocking. It can fire 20 to 30 bolts a minute, and if a loader is reloaded, it can achieve a rate of up to 50 bolts per minute. The range of the bed crossbow is also quite unexpected, it can accurately hit human-sized targets at a distance of 100 meters, with a maximum range of 150 meters, and can cause effective damage to group targets at a distance of 160 meters when firing rapidly.

Although this kind of repeating bed crossbow is large and can only be installed in a fixed position for shooting, it is deeply loved by Yuan Zhenli. You must know that although this kind of repeater occupies a large area, it can suppress and fire at cluster targets like a heavy machine gun, and the crossbow arrows used can also be recycled and reused. In the history of the Old World, there was no large-scale equipment because of the need for special and easy damage to such crossbow arrows, but mass production was not a problem for the Eastern Port at all, and the important mechanical parts such as the crossbow machine of the repeater were basically made of wood in history, and even if they were made of iron, the quality was quite low. In front of the parts processed by the machine tools provided by the hardware factory, the durability of the main components of the crossbow is more than ten streets away from the friends of the old world, and the parts made in Dongfang Port correspond to the concept of the gun family, which requires them to be able to replace each other, so the maintenance difficulty of the crossbow is also reduced accordingly.

The weapons design department even designed a miniature version of the repeater, which could be fired by a single hand, and the data obtained after trial production and test firing was that this small repeater could guarantee accurate firing at 50 to 70 meters, and could cover targets at 90 to 100 meters. And this kind of single-person repeater crossbow shooting operation is simple, the weight is only the weight of a 1628 rifle, in addition to the larger size, quite popular with the soldiers who test fire.

At this moment, there are six such single-person crossbows on the airship, the crossbow arrows of these crossbows are universal, and many of the mechanical parts can also be replaced, in order to ensure a certain intensity of combat needs, the airship is loaded with six thousand crossbow arrows, in Lin Shenhe's words, it is enough to ensure the ammunition consumption of a battle. The loading of these crossbow arrows is very simple, as long as the direction is probably right, just put it flat through the reloading port, and the absolutely excellent foolproof design, even if it is deliberately reversed, will automatically bounce it to the ground while the bowstring is swept away without interfering with the next shot.

Due to the limited carrying capacity of the airship, it cannot carry too much weight, so there are not many personnel to carry the operation of the northbound detachment this time, except for the members of the airship itself, only an attack group and a fire team of the special reconnaissance team are carried, they are equipped with hot weapons, but they are strictly required to never shoot on the airship to prevent accidents.

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Even the personnel and materials of the northbound detachment that were ready to be picked up were divided into three batches and transported separately at this moment. The bodies of those who have already died will be temporarily buried in the camp at the bottom of the mountain, and then a convoy will be sent to pick them up when they finally go north again by land.

The non-commissioned officer in charge of counting the materials checked the list of materials on his noteboard again, and after recomparing the materials on the airship, he quickly ran to Yuan Zhenli who was standing next to the cargo hold, "Report to the chief, all the materials are loaded and counted!" ”

"Okay!" Yuan Zhenli nodded and replied, "Okay, hard work, you can get busy." Seeing the non-commissioned officer running off the airship, he shouted to the people on the airship, "Unrelated personnel get off the boat immediately, we are about to leave!" ”

Many Air Force soldiers got off the airship through the hatch of the airship, ran to the runway, and stood on the ground looking up at the huge airship - even though they could see this thing taking off and landing on the airport every day, they were still speechless with shock every time they saw this huge equipment.

"Ready to take off!" "Ready to take off! Release the cable! "Ground crew! Ready to release the cable! The sound of the command immediately rose and fell on the runway.

The ground crew slowly let go of the tow rope in their hands, and the huge body of the airship began to slowly shake, gradually swinging in the breeze.

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"Add hydrogen!" Yuan Zhenli gave an order, and the hydrogen in the hydrogen tank was controlled by the valve and poured into multiple air bags.

The earliest airbags were wrapped in small intestine skin, but some time ago the test flight found that this material is easy to perish, even after anti-corrosion measures are taken, it is still easy to damage, resulting in air leakage and other situations. Therefore, a layer of gum has to be added to the airbag to ensure the airtightness of the airbag, and after testing, the effect of gum and small intestine skin is much better than that of only using small intestine skin.

The airship slowly rose in the eyes of the crowd near the airport, then the bow of the airship turned to the north, and then the propellers in the middle and tail of the airship began to turn.

The airship's altitude and speed slowly increased, and it flew towards the north, leaving behind almost all the people in the entire Oriental Harbor who were waiting for it.

"Alas! It's finally time to go! Du Yande sighed, and Yang Minghuan next to him glanced at him, "What are you doing?" Lao Du, isn't this already set off? Do you want to call them back? ”

"Nope!" Du Yande smiled bitterly, "How long has it been?" It's been a few months, and the entire northbound detachment has been lost in the interior of the Wu Dynasty, almost forgotten. ”

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"yes!" Guo Hao leaned over and said, "Lu Qi has said it several times, the symptoms of inflammation of the wound are more obvious, and he is still feverish, if he is not brought back quickly, I am afraid that he will be burned to death due to fever." ”

"Don't mess with your hat!" Du Yande hurriedly said, "It's not that we don't take them back, but we really can't pull them out, and the airship has been training all this time." ”

Guo Hao hurriedly waved his hand, "Don't get me wrong, don't get me wrong!" I'm not saying we're going to kill Lucci, I'm saying it's more urgent. If you don't deal with it quickly, there may be a veteran whose life is in danger. ”

"I said, what is the health check after the northbound detachment comes back, how are you prepared?" Du Yande ignored Guo Hao, and directly asked Tian Feihu, who was still looking up at the airship next to him, Tian Feihu glanced down at him, and continued to look up at the airship, just touched his beard and said, "It's been prepared for a long time, the report they sent back said that fleas and lice were all found on their bodies, and when they come back, they will all be isolated and treated, I'm afraid they will all have to shave their heads and take a bath." ”

"It's nothing," Yu Sha on the side laughed, "Our patriarchs have the habit of bathing frequently, and the naturalized people have already gone through the 'purification' process, so they know in their hearts, and there won't be too much resistance, but the women in it will be more troublesome, it seems that there are several." ”

"It's light," Tian Feihu no longer looked up at the sky, but just looked at Yu Sha and said, "You just said light!" How do you think that Ruchi should be purified? He has injuries on his body, and he still has symptoms of inflammation at the moment, and he can't wash it in a shower, so he can only apply insecticide to the top layer of the skin. And I dare to guarantee that they will definitely have parasites in their stomachs when they come back from the northbound detachment, and how to treat and purify them will have to discuss with the medical department to come up with a plan. ”

"The airship flight attitude is normal, direction 015" The helmsman firmly grasped the rudder wheel, stared at the front of the airship, and reported loudly, Yuan Zhenli nodded, and asked the non-commissioned officer in charge of the thruster next to him, "What is the speed?" ”

"Report! The speed is thirty-five kilometers per hour and is improving. The non-commissioned officer stared at the dashboard and reported loudly. Another non-commissioned officer next to him reported loudly, "Report to the chief!" A navigation signal has been received! Orientation 017! ”

"Good! The helmsman turns to 017 and the speed increases! Yuan Zhenli secretly rejoiced in his heart while issuing orders loudly, in fact, now the airship can reach a speed of thirty-five kilometers per hour is quite good, you must know that this is already the highest speed of the large transport aircraft in this time and space, although it has also reached fifty-five kilometers per hour in the previous test, but it is flying out in the case of a tailwind, and it is quite good to be able to reach this speed in the case of a crosswind now.

After comparing the latitude and longitude data sent back by the northbound detachment with the latitude and longitude data of Dongfang Port, Yuan Zhenli knew that the straight-line distance of this flight was within 1,500 kilometers, and according to the current speed of 35 kilometers per hour, it would only take a maximum of 50 hours to reach the location of the northbound detachment.

However, although the airship is huge and the steel structure is quite strong, it still has a natural enemy such as a strong wind, and once it encounters a strong wind approaching, it is likely to cause structural damage, thus puncturing the airbag and causing the airship to be in distress, so this senate airship is very careful on its journey north. In order to be able to observe the weather conditions in advance, a raised observation position was installed at the top of the airship, and a frame made of steel was covered with glass. The observation point, which juts out from the tip of the airship about a meter high, is staffed by three observers, each equipped with three telescopes, whose responsibility is to keep an eye on the clouds in their respective directions. If bad weather is detected, issue a warning in advance to prevent danger.