Chang Wei shook his head and said, "You have won the prize, the extermination of the White Lotus Sect is the credit of all the adults and soldiers, I just did a little insignificant!"

"What a gentleman you are, humble sir!"

Time was pressing, Chang Wei didn't talk nonsense, he set his eyes on the gun carriage that the soldiers moved, "Mr. Cromwell, I heard that your artillery has a long firing distance and high accuracy, what is its secret?

The rifled gun is a gun barrel with several rifling lines determined according to the calculation, the projectile is launched out through the rifling to achieve spin, the main role is to increase the stability of the projectile during the flight, conducive to improving the flight distance, through the different angles of the gun to implement different range and impact point strikes. Pen Fun Pavilion wWw. ｂiquge。 ｉｎfo

Cromwell exclaimed again, "God, you know rifled guns? That's great! In Europe there were people who invented rifled guns, but no one wanted to equip them on a large scale; in China rifled guns were still a novelty, and I only made five." ”

The disadvantage of rifling is that the rifling will wear out after firing a certain number of shells, which is not only not suitable for maintenance, but also very expensive.

Chang Wei took a closer look at Cromwell's rifled gun, and found that the cast steel pipe of the gun body was wound into two layers of sleeves in a spiral shape with wrought iron bars, and the direction of the upper layer was the opposite of that of the lower layer, like the structure of the wire-wound barrel. Artillery of this construction, although it costs a lot of money, is very strong.

The chamber is engraved with six closely adjacent thin rifling lines, which circle the length of the chamber. The cylindrical pointed long shell was made of cast iron, but covered with a layer of lead, which made the diameter of the shell slightly larger than the diameter of the chamber, and the shell, together with the charge, was loaded from the tail into a chamber large enough to hold it, and the force of the charge explosion pushed the shell into the narrow chamber, and the soft lead was embedded in the rifling, thus completely blocking all voids and giving the shell a rotational motion determined by the angle of the rifling. This method of pressing the shell into the rifling wire, and the method of coating the shell with a layer of soft metal for this purpose, is characteristic of rifled guns.

Chang Wei nodded secretly, the principle of this rifled cannon is completely correct. And because the diameter of the shell is larger than the breech, then the gun must be rear-loaded, which is another characteristic of rifled guns.

Cromwell proudly said: "The range and accuracy of this new gun is very amazing. It is capable of firing shells to a distance of five miles, oh, about eighteen miles. Moreover, its firing accuracy at a distance of ten miles far exceeds the firing accuracy that the old artillery can achieve at a distance of three miles. ”

"It is indeed a very powerful weapon!" Chang Wei praised and said: "My laboratory is developing rifled guns and rifled guns, and it must not be long before they can be equipped with troops." ”

"Oh my God, you have a laboratory? And you have to put rifling in the barrel? It's amazing. Cromwell exclaimed a few times and immediately asked, "Honorable lord, can I join your laboratory? ”

"Oh?" Chang Wei was stunned, shook his head regretfully, and said, "You are Lord Sun Yuanhua's advisor, I can't compete with him for talents." ”

Although the British's cannon casting technology in this era was the most advanced in the world, Chang Wei could not snatch people from Sun Yuanhua, which was a very immoral act, and would be pointed at and scolded, and the talents he needed could be recruited with the help of the Portuguese Gomez, and there was no need to do such a thing.

Cromwell changed his English and said, "Lord Sun has offended the most powerful eunuch in the Ming Dynasty, and this official will not last long." ”

"Is there such a thing?" Chang Wei was surprised, and asked in English instead, "Why?"

"Lord Sun and a Lord Yuan offended the eunuch, and the two should have shared the responsibility, but unfortunately, the Lord surnamed Yuan was not only afraid, but also put the responsibility on Lord Sun. I heard that the adult surnamed Yuan has a good reputation? With all due respect, his character is really not very good. ”

Yuan Chonghuan cheated Sun Yuanhua? Chang Wei was in his heart, and said busily: "Don't talk nonsense about this matter, otherwise you will also be in trouble." ”

"Of course, how else would I speak English to you. ”

"Okay, if Lord Sun is really removed, you can go to Zhenjiang to find me. ”

"Zhenjiang? I've heard of it, it seems to be near Nanjing, right?"

"Yes, taking a boat from the canal all the way south into the Yangtze River is Zhenjiang. ”

"Master, the road is open, can you pursue?" Yan Ruyu asked while the two were talking.

"Okay, let's go!"

Chang Wei waved goodbye to Cromwell, and rode away, only to hear Cromwell shouting behind him amid the rumbling of horses' hooves, "Your Excellency, you haven't left an address yet." The city of Daming is huge, where can I find you?"

"Hahaha!" Cromwell's words caused the knights to laugh loudly, and when he was confused, Ma Yuan said loudly: "My family is a big celebrity, whether it is Zhenjiang or Nanjing City, as long as you report the name of Lord Jinyi Wei Chang, everyone on the street will tell you the address." ”

Although this sentence is a little exaggerated, it is definitely true, and Cromwell said to himself with some suspicion and expectation: "Is it? Such a famous adult? Maybe this time I can realize my dream." ”

People are like tigers, horses are like dragons, and the cry is like thunder, Chang Wei led a hundred and ten knights all the way along the bank of the White Horse River to the southeast, the road was full of mountains and wilderness full of White Lotus Sect believers fleeing in embarrassment, and countless official and military squads were chasing and killing, in this dense crowd, unless Xu Hongru stood up and shouted, he would never be able to find his trace.

Chang Wei didn't look closely, and ordered the scouts of the official army to report Xu Hongru's whereabouts, and after getting the news with Yuan Keli's talent, he would definitely lead the army to Nanyang Lake immediately. Chang Wei went directly to the mouth of the White Horse River eighty miles away, anyway, he knew that Xu Hongru would definitely go to Nanyang Town.

If there were replacement horses, the eighty-mile journey would have been reached in an hour's gallop at most, but each of them had only one horse, and it took them two or three hours to reach the mouth of the White Horse.

At this time, the sun is in the middle of the day, the intersection of rivers and lakes is quiet, and there is only an abandoned dead village on the shore. Inside and outside the village, there are obvious traces of artillery fire and flooding, natural and man-made disasters have destroyed nearly half of the houses and courtyards in the village, half-walled and roofless houses can be seen everywhere, broken fishing nets are wrapped around dry branches, floating in the wind, and the broken walls are littered with rotting corpses and white bones.

"Dismounted, went around the beach into the village, and the people behind wiped out their steps. ”

Tang Jinyi asked, "Do you think Xu Hongru and they are hiding in the village? It seems that no one has been here." ”

Chang Wei said: "We rode horses all the way on a rampage, except for raising horsepower, Xu Hongru needs to avoid the search of the official army, he must be behind us, I estimate that they will take more than half a day to come, let's wait for him here, if he doesn't wait for anyone tomorrow morning, even if he is lucky!"

Having said that, my intuition told Chang Wei that Xu Hongru would definitely enter Nanyang Lake from here, because this was the closest route, and other places were not only farther away, but now most of them were under the control of the official army.

After picking a resting house and cleaning it up briefly, one hundred and ten people unloaded the weapons, dry food and other supplies from the horses, and then hid the horses.

Chang Wei looked at the lake from the house, although there were remnants of the broken wall that blocked some of his vision, but the large lake and the mouth of the White Horse River in the west were in full view, and now it was the middle of the moon, even at night, he could see far away with the help of the bright moonlight.

Nervously and anxiously waited for a long time, not only did he not wait for Xu Hongru's trace, but he didn't even see the follow-up officers and soldiers, and Huang Chongwu's fleet probably only left Taiping Town at this moment, at least in the middle of the night.

In desperation, Chang Wei could only send Ma Yuan and others out to inquire about the news, and when the sun set, Ma Yuan came back, "The official army found Xu Hongru's traces in the east of Zoucheng, and the tens of thousands of remnants of the White Lotus Sect fled with him, and it seemed that they wanted to flee along the Yishui into the Yimeng Mountains, and most of the officers and troops chased after them; ”

As soon as they heard the news, the hundred and ten people were immediately a little flustered, and Cheng Laohu shouted angrily: "Damn, we were tricked by Wei Qi." ”

Looking at Chang Wei's uncertain face, Yan Ruyu cautiously asked, "Master, are we still waiting?"

Chang Wei looked at Nanyang Lake in the west, and then at Zhaoyang Lake in the south for a while, Huo Ran got up and said: "Wait, when the fleet arrives at night, we will kill Nanyang Town, even if we can't catch Xu Hongru, we must catch Xu Heyu! Except for the rotating sentry, everyone will go to bed immediately after they have eaten enough!"

At night, an inaudible sound of horses' hooves woke Chang Wei from his sleep, and he knelt on the ground and listened carefully, expecting that the horse team was still a few miles away, not fast but with a lot of people, and was heading straight for the mouth of the White Horse River.

As soon as Chang Wei got up, Ma Yuan, who was on duty outside, rushed into the house, "My lord, there are more than 500 people riding horses towards this side. ”

"But Xu Hongru?"

Chang Wei asked anxiously, walked to the window and looked out, the moonlight on Nanyang Lake was bright, and there was not a single boat in sight on the surface of the lake, and there was no human figure at the mouth of the White Horse River at the end of the line of sight.

Ma Yuan replied: "These people are all wearing cloaks, and they don't have the symbol of the White Lotus Sect on their bodies, so I don't know what their identity is for the time being. ”

"Tell everyone to be on guard and ready to do anything. ”

Chang Wei took a deep breath to calm down his overly excited mood due to anxiety. His men gave their horses a good name, and hid in several courtyards with muskets, all pointing at the only avenue in the village that could be ridden.

Soon, the more than 500 knights arrived at the mouth of the river, and some of them went down to the beach and released fireworks flags into the sky, and after a while, the fireworks on the distant lake lit up one after another, and spread farther and farther, until they disappeared from sight.

Yan Ruyu said excitedly: "Master, it's the fireworks banner of the White Lotus Sect, these people are contacting the companions of Nanyang Lake!"

After the signal came, the knights said a few words and turned around and ran towards the village. As soon as he entered the village, the man in the middle of the caravan lifted his cloak to reveal his iconic face.

Chang Wei whispered excitedly: "Xu Hongru, it's really him!" (To be continued.) )