Chapter 72 Making Gunpowder
No one knew why the emperor became happy after meeting Wen Yongwang, nor did they know what the "potatoes" the emperor was talking about were.
A few days later, the people sent by Yan Xuanyu, led by Wen Yongwang, discovered potatoes that had already sprouted in Taiyi City.
But it is impossible to achieve large-scale planting now relying solely on these potatoes.
Fortunately, the potato growth cycle only takes three months at the latest, but I don’t know whether this batch of potatoes is an early-maturing or late-maturing variety.
Potatoes, corn, sweet potatoes.
Because potatoes appeared so timely, Yan Xuanyu began to look for two other crops.
...
In the past few days, Yan Xuanyu was happy one after another. After the foreigners brought potatoes to Da Zhou, Su An sent someone to report that the gunpowder that Yan Xuanyu asked them to develop was finally produced.
The next day, Yan Xuanyu couldn't wait to go to the place where gunpowder was secretly developed.
Making gunpowder is not an easy task. The proportion of the mixture, too much or too little of something, the rope being too short...all kinds of problems require their utmost attention.
Yan Xuanyu said at the beginning that we must pay attention to protection and never let any accidents happen due to carelessness.
"Is anyone injured?" Yan Xuanyu asked.
"Yes, but it's not serious." Su An replied.
Yan Xuanyu sighed. It was a dangerous thing in the first place, and the current protective conditions were really poor, so injuries were inevitable.
"Do you remember what I told you about what to do if you have a work-related injury?" Yan Xuanyu asked again.
Su An nodded and took an account book from the person behind him: "Your Majesty, the names of those injured during the development of 'gunpowder', the types of injuries they suffered, and the compensation they received are all listed on it."
As they were talking, the group had already arrived at the testing site.
The group of people were covered in dust, but their faces showed uncontrollable excitement.
They have been in this state for a long time from yesterday to today. After hearing that His Majesty would come to see their manufacturing results, they hurriedly tidied themselves up and remade them according to the proportions recorded last time so that they could demonstrate it again when His Majesty came.
But the result of their cleaning themselves.....their clothes were torn, their hair was messy, and their hair and bodies were covered with dust due to various failures.
This was the scene Yan Xuanyu saw when he arrived. Although everyone was covered in dust and dirt, their eyes were particularly bright.
Su An waved his hand: "Come here."
"Your Majesty, I am Wei Yan." A man came forward and clasped his fists in an awkward salute.
Yan Xuanyu suppressed a smile and said, "Don't worry about these things outside the palace. Just call me Master. Okay, let's get started."
"Yes!" Wei Yan said loudly.
"Yes! Young Master!" Not only Wei Yan, but the others also responded sporadically, imitating Wei Yan's way of saluting.
There are interesting people here.
"Young Master, please come this way." Wei Yan led Yan Xuanyu to the back of a piled-up "bunker".
After Yan Xuanyu and others stood still, Wei Yan checked again to make sure everything was fine before returning. He took the gunpowder from someone and placed it on the ground to prepare to ignite it.
This place is deserted and is perfect for use as a testing ground.
...
"Bang!!"
After a burst of flames shot up into the sky, the stones originally placed around the gunpowder were instantly blown into rubble!
The huge noise made everyone present tremble in their hearts. Even if they had seen gunpowder explosions countless times before, they would still be shocked, not to mention Li Zhongxian and others who saw the power of gunpowder for the first time. They were all shocked!
Yan Xuanyu was mentally prepared, but he was still shocked when he saw the extremely shocking scene in front of him.
The power of the homemade gunpowder developed nowadays is certainly not as strong as that of later generations, but it is enough for use nowadays!
"Good! All those who participated in the production of gunpowder will be rewarded handsomely!" Yan Xuanyu was very happy.
This is definitely great news.
"Thank you, Master!"
Wei Yan looked at Yan Xuanyu gratefully, thinking to himself, "You are indeed a young master!" When they first saw the true power of gunpowder, they were so frightened that they couldn't recover for a long time, but the young master was so calm and composed!
Yan Xuanyu certainly didn't miss the gratitude in Wei Yan's eyes. He continued, "No need to thank me. This is what you deserve. You've put a lot of effort into developing gunpowder, and many people have been injured. You can rest for a while now."
Yan Xuanyu originally wanted them to stop thanking him, but he didn't expect that the gratitude in their eyes would be even stronger after hearing what he said.
If a war breaks out, gunpowder will definitely catch the enemy off guard. What Yan Xuanyu needs to study next is how to transport the gunpowder safely.
...
"I didn't expect that the 'gunpowder' you mentioned a while ago would be so powerful." Su An sighed, "If I hadn't seen with my own eyes that they made the gunpowder, I would probably have thought it was a miracle."
Yan Xuanyu said, "We want to catch the Turks off guard and minimize the losses suffered by Yuan Kang and his men."
Su An nodded in agreement.
Then Yan Xuanyu remembered something: "There are more spies in the capital than before. We need to be on guard. Let our people in other places pay attention too."
After developing gunpowder, Yan Xuanyu felt relieved and everything was moving in a good direction.
In fact, he hesitated for a moment, wondering whether he should take out the gunpowder.
But it was only for a moment. With gunpowder, the casualties of the Zhou soldiers would be greatly reduced. Even if he did not develop gunpowder now, gunpowder would slowly appear over time. Why not make it now for his use?
Yan Xuanyu never wanted to kill all the Turks, Rongdi and other tribes. The Turks and other tribes were the western gateway. All he wanted to do was to get rid of the current Turkic king's lineage, and then defeat them until they were subdued, so that they would never dare to invade the Great Zhou again - no, by then, that land would also become the land of the Great Zhou.
After returning to the palace, Yan Xuanyu was still lost in thought. He thought about a lot, including the problems he had neglected before. Perhaps from now on he would start some actions in the Turks to slowly immerse himself. As far as he knew, the ordinary Turks and Rongdi people did not have a good life on the grassland and had always been oppressed. Moreover, their hierarchy was more strict and more barbaric.
In fact, in Yan Xuanyu's opinion, even the upper-class royal families of the Turks and Rongdi might not live as comfortably as the wealthy families in the capital today.
Many thoughts raced through his mind, and a lot of fragmented words were already written on the paper.
It was not until Lin Fu asked him to see how to arrange for Yan Xuanyu after the military academy students returned to Beijing that he came to his senses.
Yes, the students have been released long enough.
Han Shidong and Lin Fu have been in charge of this matter. They are the ones who exchange secret letters with the assessors, and then record everyone's performance and calculate the ranking based on the assessors' reports.
This practice is generally an all-round assessment of the students. Even Lin Fu and Han Shidong don’t know how the emperor wants to arrange these people in the end.
As a close minister to the Emperor, Lin Fu already knew that the Great Zhou's implementation of the "Imperial Examination System" wasn't just a rumor, but a definite reality. He'd privately wondered if it meant allowing students to take the examination. But the Emperor had mentioned "fairness" when he spoke of this matter. The selection of officials for the Great Zhou court must be fair, and the Imperial Examination was meant to select talent from across the Great Zhou. The students had already been educated for a long time in the military academy. Wouldn't allowing them to take the examination contradict the Emperor's stance on the examination?
So he guessed that the emperor must have other arrangements for these students.
...
Yan Xuanyu looked at a thick stack of records about the military academy students over the past few months.
The three people currently ranked highest are Ming Chengyu, Kong Yan, and An Yuliang who are heading to Hanyun City.
Yan Xuanyu looked at the detailed records about them with amusement and said to himself, "These two people were really led by the academic masters."
First, with the help of the local prefect, Ming Chengyu held a buffet banquet throughout the city during the autumn harvest. He issued a notice to the government that the buffet would be held on the main street. Those who wanted to participate had to register with the government and were required to provide a specialty dish on that day. The banquet lasted from afternoon to evening.
Yan Xuanyu laughed. This was really an idea that only young people could come up with.
When he first saw it, his subconscious thought was, "Is this even possible? This is so unconventional of ancient behavior! The local governor actually let them do this?"
Then he was stunned again. In his eyes, what was the ancient people's thinking? In fact, after coming to this world, he could see that they had many ideas, even more than Yan Xuanyu's most of the time. Yan Xuanyu just had an advantage.
This is an event that ordinary people can also participate in, just like lantern festivals and temple fairs.
Some people serve a single dish, while others collaborate to serve a dish. From the streets to the end of the alleys, all the participants organize a buffet together.
Hanyun City was not well-developed, and there were few entertainment activities for the people to participate in, so this lively buffet was firmly imprinted in their minds. After seeing the situation in Hanyun City, Yan Xuanyu finally understood where Ming Chengyu and the others came from.
Hanyun City is located at the junction. During the war, many people from different places came here to settle down, and thus developed into today's Hanyun City. However, the mixed population also made conflicts very easy to arise, such as "you" and "us".
Yan Xuanyu thought of an activity he had once carried out at the Beijing Military Academy.
At that time, the students had just entered the military academy and it was easy for them to conflict with each other. Yan Xuanyu thought of a way to suspend classes for one afternoon and let the instructors tell them that there would be a banquet in the evening. At first, the students were very happy to hear this, after all, they had no classes in the afternoon and could have a banquet. But then the instructor told them that they needed to prepare the banquet by themselves, and each dormitory had to contribute a dish. If it was not done well, everyone would be punished the next day.
This was of course a trick to fool them. Even if they made a mess, the instructors would not punish them. Yan Xuanyu's original idea was to let the students gradually integrate into the place. The students were all young masters of the mansion before, and even if they were not favored, they had never lacked food and drink, let alone cooking by themselves.
But contrary to Yan Xuanyu's expectations, they actually did quite well, after all, they all showed their special talents...
There was chaos that day, but the amazing thing was that from then on they gradually stopped having obvious conflicts like they did at the beginning.
The same was true of the buffet in Hanyun City. According to the secret letter, the people in the city were discussing the lively occasion of that day for several days in a row. Although it was impossible for a buffet to make them become like a family, the atmosphere in the city had become much more harmonious. Ming Chengyu and others chose the right time. After the autumn harvest, there was a short period of slack in farming, and the people in the city also had some free time.
Then, Ming Chengyu and others discovered that there were mountain reds all over the mountains outside Hanyun City.
According to local people, many mountain rhododendrons grow here at this time every year, but most of them are pecked by birds and rot on the mountain. They cannot be eaten as food, they cannot fill the stomach and taste sour and astringent.
Yan Xuanyu knew that Da Zhou already had candied haws. Ming Chengyu and others found that this kind of mountain red was too sour and astringent to be made into candied haws, so they began to study mountain red.
There is a hawthorn cake in Beijing. They hired people to pick hawthorns and tried to make them into cakes. In the process, they found that the hawthorns were also delicious after being flattened and dried, so they made it into a snack.
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