On April 2, with the assistance of the base camp, Friendship Town finally completed the construction of the city wall. Until the completion of the project, the nomadic tribes did not realize that a military fortress had been quietly built to the south of them.
In order to further strengthen the defense capability of Friendship Town, Ouyang Shuo sent an official letter to Zhou Haichen, asking him to start the moat project of Friendship Town immediately. The scale of the moat refers to the base camp, starting from the Friendship River in the west and ending at the Yushui River in the east, forming a large arc that wraps the Youyi Town.
In this way, Friendship Town is surrounded by water on all sides, relying on the support of the navy battalion, it can advance and retreat, and it will be invincible first. Before turning Friendship Town into a military fortress, Ouyang Shuo was not prepared to contact nomadic tribes.
After dealing with the affairs of Friendship Town, Ouyang Shuo, accompanied by Ge Hongliang and Tian Wenjing, set off for the Xuanniao tribe. Li Mingliang led the No. 1 Squadron of the Cavalry Battalion and was responsible for the security guards along the way.
When passing by Swimming Town, Ouyang Shuo stopped briefly for an hour to listen to Zhao Dexian's report on Swimming Town's recent work, and also took the time to inspect the newly formed Swimming Town Cavalry Squadron.
Seeing that the Ching Ming Festival is approaching, as the food base of the territory, Zhao Dexian is already making various preparations for spring sowing. The originally planned 20,000 mu of farmland has been reclaimed, and under the effect of the spring wind and rain amulet, all of it has become fertile farmland. The 20,000 mu of farmland will all be planted with rice.
In addition to reclaiming farmland, Shuishui Town also built a large logging camp in the forest area to the south. Compared with the base camp, the wood here is of higher quality, denser and more abundant in storage. Now the timber needed by the advanced shipyard across the river has been completely supplied by the lumberyard in Swimming Town.
Because the busy farming season is about to enter, the city wall project of Shuishui Town had to be put on hold temporarily. Wait until the spring sowing is over before starting construction. Fortunately, this area is still relatively calm, and it doesn't matter much if the construction is delayed.
At eleven o'clock in the morning, after two hours of trekking, Ouyang Shuo and his party finally arrived at the Xuanniao tribe. Different from the cold reception last time, this time the tribal leader Shi Xiong personally greeted Ouyang Shuo and his party outside the village.
"My lord, you are welcome to visit the Xuanniao Tribe!" Shi Xiong said enthusiastically.
This is the magic of food. Since the Xuanniao Tribe cooperated with Shanhai Town, food was abundant and no one in the tribe went hungry. The leader, Shi Xiong, naturally changed his attitude and no longer dared to put on airs to Ouyang Shuo.
However, if Shixiong knew that what they got was less than one-thirtieth of the output of the Wolf Mountain Mine, I don't know how it would feel.
Ouyang Shuo, a capitalist, smiled calmly and said, "The leader is well, the great wizard is well!"
"Everything is fine, please!" Shi Xiong led the way, and Ouyang Shuo walked into the village side by side with him.
After the meeting between the two parties in the Shanzhai Conference Hall, Ouyang Shuo left Tian Wenjing to discuss with Shi Xiong about the in-depth cooperation between Shanhai Town and the Xuanniao Tribe, and then got up and went to the Shanzhai Ancestral Temple to visit the Great Wizard.
The ancestral temple was built at the highest point of the village, with more than 200 steps. Climbing up the stairs, the great wizard greeted Ouyang Shuo at the gate of the ancestral temple. This is an old man in his dying years, his eyes are cloudy, and he is about to step into the grave. It is such an old man who serves as the spiritual leader of the Xuanniao tribe and is admired by the tribe.
"Guests from afar, welcome!" The great wizard said hoarsely.
Ouyang Shuo didn't dare to neglect, and said sincerely, "Meet the Grand Wizard. Last time, the gift from the Grand Wizard did Shanhai Town a great favor. To express my gratitude, I specially prepared a small gift, and I hope the Grand Wizard will accept it." Ouyang Shuo took out a night pearl from the storage bag and handed it to the young wizard beside the great wizard.
This night pearl was obtained when destroying a large bandit camp. The young wizard had never seen such a treasure before, and he was too surprised to catch it.
"My lord, you are too polite. I am truly ashamed to receive such an expensive gift." While signaling to the young wizard to accept it, the great wizard led Ouyang Shuo forward, and said, "Please follow me, my lord."
The ancestral temple of the Xuanniao tribe is completely made of stone masonry, and it is a relatively complete building complex. Outsiders like Ouyang Shuo couldn't enter the main hall of the ancestral temple, so they went to the reception room next to the ancestral temple.
"Great Wizard, Shanhai Town is willing to establish a friendly and cooperative relationship with all the tribes in the mountains. I wonder if you would like to coordinate with each other?" After exchanging pleasantries, Ouyang Shuo got straight to the point.
The great wizard opened his cloudy eyes, and with a flash of light, he said: "Our Xuanniao tribe has contacts with the four surrounding tribes. Since your lord has this idea, I will invite them here."
"So, thank you Great Wizard!" Ouyang Shuo was overjoyed.
When he left the Xuanniao tribe, Ouyang Shuo left Tian Wenjing behind, and he was in charge of negotiating with the representatives of the other tribes. For specific cooperation content, please refer to the Xuanniao tribe.
At the same time, in order to express his gratitude to Ouyang Shuo for presenting the Ye Mingzhu, the great wizard gave Ouyang Shuo a pair of hummingbirds from the mysterious bird tribe. This hummingbird is extremely psychic and can send messages over long distances.
…
On April 3rd, potatoes were harvested in Shanhai Township. Because the land is barren, the yield of potatoes per mu is only about 1,000 units. Two thousand mu of land, a total of 2.1 million units of potatoes were produced. The territory collected 70,000 units of potatoes in the form of agricultural taxes, all of which were allocated by Ouyang Shuo to the War Preparation Department as military rations.
With this batch of potatoes, together with some grain and meat, the food crisis in Shanhai Town has finally been resolved, and there is no need to purchase grain from the market on a large scale. After harvesting the potatoes, Ouyang Shuo did not plant rice on the two thousand acres of land, but ordered the Department of Agriculture to arrange for all the farmers to plant cotton.
As the saying goes, basic necessities of life are indispensable. In the present Shanhai Town, fabrics are still very dependent on purchasing from the market, and there is no self-sufficiency. As for the silkworm industry being cultivated by the Textile Association, one is that the industry has not yet taken shape, and the other is that silk is a precious fabric and is not suitable for large-scale promotion in the territory.
Cotton is different. With it, the territory can step over linen and use cotton directly. Therefore, it is imperative to grow cotton. It just so happens that the two thousand mu of farmland is not considered fertile. If you grow rice, your income will be limited. It is better to grow cotton, which requires less soil.
…
On April 4th, through the coordination of the great wizard of the Xuanniao tribe, three more mountain tribes agreed to cooperate with Shanhai Town. These three tribes are smaller than the Xuanniao tribe, with only two thousand people. Another tribe declined the invitation of the great wizard. That tribe is called the Gale Tribe, and the tribe is larger than the Xuanniao tribe, with more than 5,000 people. After learning that the Xuanniao tribe is attached to Shanhai Town, they seem to regard themselves as the spokesperson of Shanhai Town, and are very upset, so they refuse to cooperate with Shanhai Town.
The joining of the three tribes increased the number of miners in the Wolf Mountain Mine to 5,000. Basically, the capacity of the Langshan Mine has reached saturation, and adding more miners will create some redundancy.
Because the Haifeng Tribe refused to cooperate with Shanhai Town, Ouyang Shuo had to strengthen the defense force of the Wolf Mountain Mine. Three hundred young and middle-aged men were drawn from various ethnic groups, and together with the two previous squadrons, they were reorganized into the Langshan Defense Battalion, with Stone Wolf from the Xuanniao tribe as the battalion commander. Another squadron leader, Shi Bao, was transferred to the base camp of Shanhai Town.
In addition to participating in the operation of the Wolf Mountain Mine, the three tribes sent a total of 500 of the most elite mountain barbarian warriors to join the Shanhai Town headquarters army. For this reason, Ouyang Shuo selected another 200 soldiers from the residents of Shanhai Town, and combined them with the previous three infantry squadrons to form two infantry battalions at once.
In the meeting hall of the Shanhai Town Barracks, Ouyang Shuo announced the personnel adjustment of the infantry.
"Zhao Sihu!"
"arrive!"
"I order you to take the first squadron of the original infantry battalion as the core, add 200 soldiers from Shanhai Town, and select 200 people from the mountain barbarian soldiers supported by the tribe this time to form the Shanhai Town City Defense Battalion." Ouyang Shuo said.
"City defense battalion?" Zhao Sihu was a little puzzled.
"That's right. The main duty of the city defense battalion is to be responsible for the security of the base camp. The barracks are located inside the city. In order to meet the requirements of city defense operations, the city defense battalion includes two squadrons of archers, two squadrons of crossbowmen and one squadron of sword and shield soldiers. Originally The first infantry squadron is the Sword and Shield Squadron, the 200 people from Shanhai Town are trained as the Crossbowmen Squadron, and the mountain barbarian hunters are good at archery, so they are trained as the Archer Squadron." Ouyang Shuo explained.
"Understood, don't worry, my lord, I promise to complete the task!" Zhao Sihu said loudly.
Ouyang Shuo turned his head to look at Shi Wansui, and said, "General Shi!"
"The last general is here, my lord, please give me instructions!"
"I order you to take the second and third squadrons of the original infantry battalion as the core, plus the 300 elite soldiers supported by the tribe this time, to form a heavy infantry battalion composed of pure mountain barbarians."
"Heavy infantry? But we don't have heavy armor!" Shi Wansui also looked puzzled.
Ouyang Shuo shook his head and said, "Who said there is no? Jiafang Division is stepping up forging infantry armor, and the weapon workshop is also forging Tang swords. These two main battle equipment will be given priority to the heavy infantry battalion."
The other generals immediately looked at Shi Wansui with envy. Not to mention Burenjia, that thing weighs 29 kilograms, and only Shanman can hold it. But Tang Dao is the standard equipment, no matter it is cavalry battalion, city defense battalion or naval battalion, Tang Dao can be equipped with Tang Dao, but unexpectedly, it was taken out by the heavy infantry battalion.
Shi Wansui chuckled, and said excitedly: "Then it's no problem, thank you, Lord, for your support!"
"The barracks of the heavy infantry battalion are located outside the city. During this period of time, the general needs to strengthen their training, especially weight-bearing training. I don't want your soldiers to be unable to carry it after the infantry armor is built. Then it's a joke." Ouyang Shuo continued.
"My lord, don't worry, the general will definitely train them hard."
Ouyang Shuo nodded, and said, "Then I'll wait and see. When you really form a combat force, I will personally name the heavy infantry battalion."
This is a great honor. So far, no battalion in Shanhai Town has its own exclusive number. This shows that Ouyang Shuo attaches great importance to the heavy infantry battalion.
Soldiers regard honor as life, and Shi Wansui's blood boiled, and he said loudly: "I will live up to my lord's entrustment!"