Volume 4: Hot! The whole world is a warring state Chapter 764 This is the heart of millions
July of the 29th year of the Tianqi reign, Zhejiang, Zhoushan Islands, evening.
As the sea breeze blew, the afterglow of the setting sun shone on an old man lying on a soft chair, giving his body a layer of golden color.
"Students greet the teacher, teacher~"
"Hmm? Oh, you're here. Alas, I'm old and useless. I just fall asleep while lying down."
"Teacher, the scenery here is really nice. No wonder you didn't stay in your hometown of Wucheng, but moved here to live permanently. The students are really envious when they see it."
" Hahaha, it's still a long way from you to live a life like this. Well, it won't be long before you go out to sea, right? Have you arranged everything at home?"
"It's almost done. The court advanced me a year's salary, and I left it all. I left a piece of my hair, the clothes I used to wear, and the watch I wore for many years. I also wrote a suicide note for my youngest son. If he really dies in battle, his mother or eldest brother will read it to him when he grows up. The elders of the family have also said that if I can't return from this war, the clan will be responsible for raising all the children to adulthood."
"Alas... this battle has to be fought. But if it really is won, I don't know how many Ming men will die in a foreign land. I don't know how long God will allow me to live, and whether I can see you return victorious."
"Hahaha, teacher must live a long life. No matter how long this battle lasts, it can't last more than fifteen years, right?"
Wen Tiren was already 84 years old this year. In the July weather, after the sun went down, he had to wear a thin sweater before he dared to lie on the soft chair outside. Next to him at this moment were three students he accepted in his later years, Feng Jingdi, Wang Yi, and Dong Zhining, all wearing white naval officer uniforms.
"I'm old, and my memory isn't very good. As far as I can remember, you three seem to be captains, right?"
"Teacher, you still say that I have a bad memory? That's right, the three of us are captains. Brother Wanxun (Wang Yi) has the highest rank, Colonel. He is now the captain of the heavy cruiser Wei Zhongxian. Youan (Dong Zhining) and I are both lieutenant colonels. We are the captain of the destroyer Foshan and the leader of the 3rd Destroyer Squadron. And Youan is the captain of the light cruiser Qiongzhou."
"Wei Zhongxian? Hey, this guy is dead, but he actually got a heavy cruiser named after him. Oh, what good luck."
"Teacher, when the country didn't issue paper money, wasn't there an urgent need for precious metals to enter the market? The emperor had no choice but to sell the naming rights of the warship. Moreover, with the contribution you have made to the country, I'm afraid that a battleship will be named after you a hundred years later."
"Hahaha, I'll rely on your good words. But Wanxun, although Lao Wei is a eunuch, he has never framed a minister in all the years he has been the director of the East Factory. So, don't do anything wrong on this warship named after him."
"Teacher, rest assured. I have no discrimination against eunuchs. A quiet and non -troubling is much better than Liu Jin and Wang Zhi. Wei's family followed his last wish and put a lock of his hair in a box on the ship. I asked the orderly to clean the box every day."
"Well, that's good." The old man let out a long sigh of relief: "Ji Zhong, the destroyer you are in charge of, as far as I know, should be the type of ship that sees blood in naval battles, right?"
"That's right, teacher. A destroyer is small and has weak firepower. It can't fight against the enemy's large ships, and its ability to fire from the opposite shore is almost non-existent. But it's fast . The Foshan that I brought with me is a new ship that was launched in the 27th year of Tianqi, and its maximum speed reaches 27 knots. At such a speed, in the fierce battle, braving the sky of artillery fire, after dodging left and right, it approaches the enemy's large ship at high speed, and then releases torpedoes. Bang bang~ the masts and oars are reduced to ashes!"
Although Feng Jingdi said it very lightly, Old Wen was a former Prime Minister after all. After retiring for so many years, he had never missed a single issue of the internal reference materials prepared by the court for senior officials. So after listening to his student's story, he couldn't hide the worry in his eyes: "Hey, if it were those high-pressure air torpedoes that were slower than a turtle in the past, you, the captain of a destroyer, would most likely die before you could accomplish your mission. But now..."
"Teacher, be careful. According to confidentiality, there are things about Youan and Wanxun that they don't know, and they can't know for the time being."
Yes, after the final push in the development of the internal combustion engine was blocked by an illiterate blacksmith, Zhu Youdong, who received the report, immediately asked Zhu Kuiyou to make a basic internal combustion engine: preliminary tests showed that the thermal efficiency ratio was nearly 10% - this is almost the same as the current top steam engine in the Ming Dynasty.
Then Zhu Youdong gave the following instruction: There is no rush to develop a higher-powered internal combustion engine. The first thing to do is to miniaturize the internal combustion engine and install it on the torpedo as soon as possible.
It is really difficult to achieve this - it is difficult to miniaturize the engine and to mass produce it. But if you just want to solve the problem of whether there is one or not, it is not difficult: there are too many skilled craftsmen in the Ming Dynasty, or in other words, in the Chinese court. In the historical plane, the top royal craftsmen can even write the entire Diamond Sutra on the inner wall of a snuff bottle - in terms of micromanipulation, Chinese craftsmen at this time are the best in the world.
Therefore, after having a basic prototype internal combustion engine, if they did not seek mass production but only handmade it, the skilled craftsmen of the Ming Dynasty could have scaled down the internal combustion engine and made it exactly the same.
Of course, the quality of a purely handmade small internal combustion engine is good, but the efficiency and cost are extremely high. However, Zhu Youdong did not care: this is an epoch-making thermal power torpedo, with an underwater speed of more than 25 knots and a maximum stealth distance of more than 3,000 meters. Such a torpedo is a super killer in this era. Although a large number of royal craftsmen worked hard for four months to produce only 30 torpedoes of this kind of handmade torpedoes, what if these 30 torpedoes suddenly appeared at the critical moment of the naval battle and sank one or two enemy battleships?
The destroyer Foshan was young and had a capable captain. So, together with the other four destroyers, they shared the thirty special torpedoes. As the captain, Feng Jingdi certainly knew how powerful these torpedoes were. Wen Tiren, as a retired prime minister, could also learn about this from the top-secret internal reference. But the other two really didn't know.
Of course, people like Wang Yi and Dong Zhining would never leak the secret. But since the level of secrecy of the new torpedo was not something they could know for the time being, Wen Tiren immediately stopped talking.
But after this commotion, the atmosphere became a little awkward.
Old Wen had no choice but to quickly bring up a new topic: "By the way, how is Zheng Zhilong's son, who was given the name Chenggong by the emperor himself, doing now?"
"Teacher, this kid is only 23 years old this year. However, he is a navy kid after all, and he has many uncles in the army, so his military rank is not low. He is now a major. As for his duties, Commander Inukai originally wanted him to be a staff officer on the flagship Lianpo. But he refused and insisted on being the captain of a destroyer. In order to achieve his goal, he even sent the application report directly to the emperor... In short, this brat is now a special destroyer captain just like the students."
"Foolish child, but it is precisely because there are countless good children like this that the emperor has the confidence to fight this battle!"
…
The Ming Dynasty is a huge ship. Because of its huge size, once it is fully launched, its explosive power is extremely amazing. But because of its huge size, it is also very difficult to turn around and adjust the route. After the entire country has been operating according to the national policy of fighting a war for more than three years, even if it is known at this moment that the other side has new technology, and our war preparations still have certain defects. However, the date of the war is no longer something that Zhu Youdong can stop.
In July of the 29th year of the Tianqi reign, Zhu Youdong took the lead, and the Crown Prince, Prince of Song, various vassal kings, and more than 2,000 clan members who would participate in the war in various positions gathered in front of the Xiaoling Mausoleum for a large-scale ancestor worship ceremony.
"It is the 279th year since the founding of the Ming Dynasty. I, the unworthy descendant Zhu Youdong, led more than 2,000 clan members to worship in front of the spirit of Taizu. I hereby declare: Restore China and start a new era. In terms of the righteousness of the country, our Ming Dynasty is the best. Hongwu laid the foundation, Yongle opened up the territory. Five expeditions to the north of the desert, seven voyages to the West. During the prosperous Renxuan era, the people were safe. The orthodox civil engineering was always strong when faced with changes. Jingtai Tianshun, Chenghua Hongzhi, Zhengde Jiajing, Longqing Wanli. The inheritance continued, and the country was forever glorious. When Tianqi came, the world situation changed. The Western bandits repeatedly invaded our territory, and they were rampant. Hundreds of millions of people were all indignant. Three years of teaching, five years of population growth. One million soldiers, thousands of ships set sail. We swear to destroy this beast and report to the ancestral temple. The spirit of Taizu is above the Haotian. Watch and bless the Chinese warriors, who will defeat the enemy and are unstoppable. When we win, we will report to the ancestral temple again. The prosperity of the Ming Dynasty is unparalleled in the world! Enjoy~"
…
Following the example set by the royal family, throughout the summer of the 29th year of Tianqi, every province, state capital, county, township, and village in the Ming Dynasty were doing the same thing without any prior agreement.
In the homes of officials and wealthy people where large families lived together, the ancestral halls of each family were opened at any time other than the Qingming Festival or the Spring Festival. Some of the more open-minded family elders even allowed all the women and children in the family to enter the ancestral hall for the first time.
"Ancestors, today our Ming Dynasty is launching a national war against the tyrannical Western bandits. Liu Da (Sun Er, Zhang San, Li Si, Wang Wu, Zhao Liu...) is about to go to the battlefield. I hope that our ancestors will bless him so that the guns on the battlefield can't find him... If anything happens to him, I hope he can kill the enemy for our Ming Dynasty and not disgrace the family name accumulated by our ancestors..."
In ordinary farmers' or workers' families, new recruits would either go to the graves of their parents and grandparents in the fields accompanied by their families, or set up the spirit tablets of their elders at home and pray to their ancestors in a language similar to that of the elders of the large family.
When it was the turn of the strong men who had enlisted and were about to set out to speak, some spoke passionately, some were homesick, and some even burst into tears. But without exception, they all solemnly stated in front of their ancestors' spirit tablets or graves: no matter whether they lived or died, they would never disgrace the reputation of their ancestors!
Afterwards, these soldiers cut their hair, left their nails, or put some of their personal belongings in a box and solemnly handed it over to their closest family members, relatives and friends. Then they walked out of their homes without hesitation, boarded various means of transportation, and started heading towards their garrisons!
…
It can be said that at this moment, the core strength of all Chinese people for thousands of years is concentrated: family and country. Family is country, and country is family.
As a Chinese, facing such a battle that would determine the fate of the nation, Zhu Youdong did not organize any signature pledges or rallies of tens of thousands or even hundreds of thousands of people. The Chinese people, who are generally introverted, do not need those things. The determination of all Chinese people to this war was fully demonstrated in countless ancestor worship activities.
