Chapter 35: The Black Panther Makes Its Move

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  The two returned to the village, and Yang Yinghua took the brocade box to find Huang Shi.

  Zhang Zhun turned around to find Yang Rui Feng and reported the decision he had just made with Yu Nan Ti.

  After listening to Zhang Zhun's account, Yang Rui Feng said with a smile: "No need to send it to Jimo County, that would be great. I'll personally deliver five loads of fine salt tomorrow and see what the situation is."

  Zhang said cautiously, "I'll have Yin Fengyi escort you. Remember, one hand for the money and the other for the goods. If anything goes wrong, immediately apprehend the other party and bring them back to Yangjia Village."

  Yang Rui Feng nodded and said: "I know, I won't be deceived by him."

  Zhang Zhun then turned around and went to find Yang Kaidi to discuss other matters.

  Yang Kaidi is now busy, leaning on his crutches and walking around the village to chat with the villagers and boost morale. Zhang Zhun finally found him and said straightforwardly: "Uncle Yang, I want to secretly forge a batch of weapons, do we have any blacksmiths in our village?"

  Yang Kaid smiled and said: "You asked the right person! Our village has a few blacksmiths, their craftsmanship is very good! It's just that they are too poor and have no money to buy raw materials, so they had to abandon it! As long as there are raw materials, they will start working immediately! I'll call them over now! What kind of weapon do you want to forge?"

  "Three-pronged spear."

  Immediately introduce the specifications, quantity, characteristics of the three-edged thorn, and give a brief explanation.

  Yang Kaidi, after all, was a military dependent and had some understanding of weapons. He said affirmatively: "There should be no problem as long as the blade is not opened. I'll call them over now, you can explain the details to them."

  "Good!" said Zhang Zhun.

  Yang Kaidao said, "You focus on training the guards, these trivial matters, let us old men handle them! Even if I can't do it, there are enough people in the village to help! No matter how urgent, it won't delay you!"

  He immediately called over Little Yang Daren and had him go invite a few fellow villagers.

  After a while, the villagers arrived, among whom several were acquaintances of Zhang Zhun, such as Yin Fengyi's father Yin Gensheng, Zou Mingjia's father Zou Huoming, and Li Jiaxi's uncle Li Fenglai. It turned out that these three were the blacksmiths of Yangjiatun. The others were their close friends and relatives, with very close relationships.

  "Yu Lin, what do you want us to do? Just speak up!"

  Zou Mingjia's father, Zou Huoming, was a very rough old man with a head full of disheveled white hair and a loud voice, completely unlike his son. The three brothers of the Zou family, one in the guard corps and two helping to smuggle private salt, had a much more relaxed life than before, and Zou Huoming's face also had a rosy glow.

  "Jade Lin wants you to ask the guards to forge some useful weapons."

  Yang Kai De said straightforwardly.

  Three people said that making weapons was no problem, but they lacked raw materials. In the past, their pig iron had been purchased from Ma Jiatun, and sometimes even from Fushan City. Now, due to the war, pig iron and wrought iron were controlled, and if you wanted to buy some, you could only buy a little at a time. Buying in bulk was impossible, firstly because there was no stock, and secondly because it would easily attract attention from people with ulterior motives.

  Li Fenglai also said: "Mainly because there is no stock, unless it's self-refining."

  It's too hard to smelt iron by ourselves, so we can only buy the raw materials for now. We'll buy a little from each village, and some from Fushan City, that should be enough. The guard team has only eighty people, so they won't need much material.

  Zhang Zhun first gave a detailed explanation of the three-pronged spear he was going to make to the three people. The three-pronged spear that Zhang Zhun was going to make did not require high-quality steel, and ordinary pig iron or wrought iron could meet the requirements. If the materials were really insufficient, they had to re-melt those waist knives, steel knives, long spears and so on that had been captured.

  All three of them said that there was no difficulty. Zhang Zhun's triple-edged spear, which did not require an open blade, was actually just a specially-made iron rod with a sharp tip at the end. The greatest difficulty was opening up three blood slots. However, these three blood slots did not need to be particularly flat and smooth, as long as they were three grooves.

  Yin Gen Sheng made a simple calculation and said, "Yu Lin, each three-pronged spear requires about five catties of wrought iron. The price of one catty of wrought iron is three mace of silver, so the raw materials for one three-pronged spear cost one tael and five mace of silver. For a hundred spears, it would be around 150 taels of silver."

  Zou Huoming suggested: "If you use pig iron, it will be much cheaper. The price of pig iron is only two silver coins per catty, and the total cost will not exceed one hundred taels of silver. Although the quality is not as good as wrought iron, it is easy to break."

  Li Fenglai further explained that pig iron is too hard and brittle, easy to break, very difficult to forge, and opening a blood groove is not even worth thinking about. Wrought iron is relatively soft, with high plasticity, forging and opening a blood groove are no problem. Of course, if there was steel, it would be even better. Unfortunately, steel is hard to come by, the entire Floating Mountain may not have any real steel. The operation of refining steel is still very cumbersome.

  Zhang Zhun said: "Just use malleable iron."

  Having said that, he took out the prepared silver and handed it over to Yin Gen Sheng.

  Yin Gen Sheng said with a smile: "It turns out that Yu Lin has already prepared the funds. Then there is no problem. I guarantee, within five days, I will deliver 100 three-edged awls to your hands."

  Zhang nodded and said, "Then thank you three uncles."

  The three of them bid farewell and left immediately.

  Yin Gen Sheng immediately led his men to Maojia Village to buy pig iron and charcoal. Zou Huo Ming took his men to other villages to visit and buy some iron materials. Li Feng Lai led his men to clean up their blacksmithing tools overnight, gathering them together so that they could start work early the next morning.

  The next morning, Yin Gen Sheng brought back a batch of raw materials from Maojiatun. By almost noon, Zou Huo Ming also returned with a full load. Li Feng Lai had already put away all the tools and built an iron furnace on the spot, busily working in an orderly manner.

  Zhang Zhun needed three-pronged thorns, and the craftsmanship requirements were not high, it was just a sharpened iron rod. The difficulty of forging wrought iron was not very great. With Zhang Zhun's guidance on the side, the sample came out quickly.

  A black iron rod, the thickest part is about two fingers wide (3 cm). One end is a sturdy handle, about four inches long (13 cm). The other end is pointed, about one foot five inches long (50 cm). This is the most primitive trident.

  To be honest, this iron rod is quite ugly on the outside, black and dull. However, its quality is not bad. Holding it in hand, it feels heavy and solid. In terms of penetration power, it's much better than a three-edged spear made of oil tea wood. Zhang tried using dozens of layers of cotton cloth for testing, and the result was satisfactory after all, this is an iron tool!

  Zhang Zhun put forward some improvement suggestions, and Yin Gensheng and others naturally accepted them with humility. After the improvement, the triangular thorn was finalized for mass production.

  Soon, each member of the guard was issued a trident. Some members with stronger combat capabilities were even issued two. With real weapons, everyone's training became much more spirited.

  Hongshitan has become a military training base, with slogans echoing every day. Every person in Yangjiatun knows that this is where their guardian deity resides and also knows that it is a military restricted area, which they will not easily approach.

  At the same time as Yin Gen Sheng and others started forging three-edged awls, Yang Rui Feng personally sent five loads of salt to Zhao Jia Tun, accompanied by Yin Feng Yi with twenty guards. Hao Zi also dispatched people along the way to closely monitor the movements of the salt bandits. As a result, there were no unexpected incidents on the road and they all returned in the afternoon.

  Yu Nan is indeed a man of his word. In Zhaojia Village, there is indeed an old Zhao Ba who has set up a salt warehouse and buys refined salt from Yangjia Village. However, private salt from other villages is not accepted. It seems that the warehouse was specifically set up for the refined salt of Yangjia Village.

  Yang Rui Feng delivered a total of five loads of fine salt, each load weighing one hundred catties, with a total weight of exactly five hundred catties. Calculated at the price of one hundred and sixty copper coins per catty, it came out to be eighty taels of silver. Zhao Lao Ba paid in full without withholding a single fen. The quality of the silver was also excellent, after being inspected by Yang Rui Feng and Yin Feng Yi, they were convinced that it was genuine and of good value.

  This is good news for Yangjia Village. The road from Yangjia Village to Zhaojia Village is basically safe, and when salt is transported every day, it's enough to arrange ten team members to escort it, so the team members have more time to receive training. If they encounter salt bandits who rob them, they only need to send a flying messenger back to report the news, and within two hours, Zhang Zhun and others will be able to rush to the scene. Even if the salt bandits steal private salt, they can't escape Zhang Zhun's pursuit.

  Generally speaking, with the acquisition of Zhaojiatun, the sales of Yangjiatun's refined salt will not be a problem. What Yang Rui needs to focus on is how to increase production and keep the secret safe. As long as this secret is kept, the refined salt will continue to generate huge profits. However, due to the huge profits, someone will definitely have designs on Yangjiatun.

  In the midst of busy and bustling days, time flew by quickly, and before I knew it, it was already April 4th of Chongzhen's seventh year.

  That afternoon, Haozi hastily arrived at Red Stone Beach and reported a piece of news to Zhang Zhun.

  "Perfect timing!"

  Zhang said coldly.

  The members of the guard heard it and looked at each other in dismay.

  Who's coming?

  Who made the captain so unhappy?

  Zhang Zuansheng gathered his men together and said in a low voice, "According to the latest intelligence, Hei Bao is leading more than sixty thugs towards Yangjia Village!"

  At the mention of Black Panther, the crowd of guards suddenly burst into anger.

  During this period, they repeatedly practiced assassination, just to eliminate this black leopard! Many warriors' imaginary enemies were this black leopard. Three thousand assassinations a day was no joke, the name "black leopard" almost merged into the warriors' blood.

  Hao Linyong shouted first: "Kill him!"

  Yang Zhiyuan simultaneously raised his arm and shouted: "Kill him!"

  The other team members also shouted: "Kill him!"

  For a time, public sentiment was stirred up, more violently than when Wang Shixian personally came.

  "Everyone be quiet."

  Zhang Jun made a gesture, letting the guards temporarily calm down, then gathered the officers to discuss how to deal with the Black Panther.