Chapter 249 Eagle-beaked Gun (Thanks to book friend godsaveme!!! for the reward!)
"Yes!"

Ishihara Yasuo did not hesitate at all in response to Kobayakawa Takahide's order and directly led his men to run to the warehouse.

After making arrangements with Ishihara Yasuo, Kobayakawa Takahide immediately ran to the backyard. Although she didn't know why the people from the Inspection Department were able to find her very hidden hiding place...
But she was well aware of how strong Shen Jianzhong's murderous intention towards the Black Dragon Society was. His attack at this moment must have been planned for a long time. Now this house was probably surrounded, and it was unrealistic to break out.

Thinking of this, Kobayakawa Takahide couldn't help but feel a little more fortunate in her heart. She was fortunate that she had always had a sense of crisis and had always been a cunning rabbit with three burrows, always leaving a way out for herself!
When he chose this house as his hiding place, he ordered people to dig a secret passage underground in case of emergency!

In order to ensure that only he knew the existence of the secret passage, Kobayakawa Takahide deliberately poisoned all the craftsmen involved in the construction of the secret passage with poisoned wine at the celebration banquet after the completion of the secret passage.

And now is the time to activate this secret passage and escape from the encirclement of the Inspectorate. Kobayakawa Takahide came to the backyard and found a dry well in a very hidden location. Then she jumped, and with her lightness skills she landed steadily at the bottom of the dry well.

She lit a tinder, and under the light of the fire, Kobayakawa Takahide groped for a while at the bottom of the dark dry well, and found the switch of the secret passage. She pushed it lightly and the entrance to the secret passage appeared in front of her.

Looking at the secret passage in front of him and listening to the sound of firefighting coming from outside the dry well, a smile finally appeared on Kobayakawa Takahide's beautiful face. He then held up the fire starter and quickly walked into the secret passage...
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"I greet you, General!"

Looking at the young man in front of him who was full of style and majesty, the fifty-one-year-old craftsman Sun Changcheng bowed awkwardly and said:

Seeing this honest craftsman fidgeting, Ye Mingsheng smiled and comforted him with a few words. After letting him relax, he handed over the drawing that he had spent several nights drawing.

Although Dong Jiangchuan was not interested in Ye Mingsheng's idea of ​​making firearms, due to Ye Mingsheng's request, he still used his connections and went to great lengths to help Ye Mingsheng find Sun Changcheng, a firearms craftsman who had worked in the Ministry of Revenue's Artisan Manufacturing Institute for half his life.

Although he was very reserved in front of Ye Mingsheng's powerful aura and could hardly speak, as soon as he got the blueprint, Sun Changcheng seemed to have changed into a different person, and his expression immediately became very focused...
After looking at it for a whole cup of tea, Sun Changcheng put down the blueprint and introduced it to Ye Mingsheng:

"General, this is the first time I've seen a fire gun like yours. It's somewhat similar to a bird gun, but it's much larger and has some other structures added to it."

"But according to my experience, there should be no problem with the structure of this musket. It's just that the gun bed is a little difficult, but it's not too difficult. I should be able to figure it out after a few more attempts."

Listening to the result given by Sun Changcheng, Ye Mingsheng smiled. In his previous life, Ming Dynasty literature could be said to be the most popular dynasty in the online history category. At its peak, half of the historical bestsellers were Ming Dynasty literature!

So in order to catch the attention of the public, he also planned to write a novel about traveling back to the Ming Dynasty. Therefore, he looked up a lot of information, a large part of which was about firearms. He never thought that this information, which he did not use when writing the novel, is now used...

The drawing he showed Sun Changcheng was of the famous heavy matchlock gun in the late Ming Dynasty - the eagle-beak gun!

This eagle-beak gun weighs about 26 pounds, is 4 feet 2 inches long, and has a total length of 55 inches. The outer diameter of the muzzle is about 1 inch and 3 points, the caliber is over 6 points, and the outer diameter of the bottom of the gun is over 2 inches. It uses one tael and three cents of gunpowder and one tael and five cents of lead bullets.

According to the information Ye Mingsheng had found at the time, this eagle-beak gun had a long range and great power, with a maximum range of four hundred steps. It could penetrate iron armor within one hundred steps, and at a distance of two hundred steps, it could still penetrate cotton armor and wooden boards. It was a powerful weapon against heavily armored cavalry, and it could completely penetrate two heavily armored cavalry with one shot at close range!
Although this hawkbill gun is extremely powerful, it also has many disadvantages, such as large recoil, the need for a bracket, and a slow firing rate.
The reason why Ye Mingsheng chose to manufacture the eagle-beak gun first was also closely related to the situation he was facing now. The conflict between Lin Huaiwu's troops and the Khitans in Xinfa County some time ago also made Ye Mingsheng feel the threat from the Khitans...
The two enemies Ye Mingsheng is facing now are the Zhen Sanshan tribe who are attacking the caravan, although the situation is imminent.

But bandits are bandits after all, and they can't amount to anything big. Ye Mingsheng only regards them as minor problems. As long as he settles down and develops his farming for a while, the threat they pose will not be too great!

The existence of the Khitans was what made Ye Mingsheng feel like a thorn in his side.

He now fully understood what the deal was between An Zhirong and the Khitans!

Although An Zhirong's caravan transported a lot of daily necessities, the most critical supplies were strategic materials such as pig iron and salt, which the imperial court had expressly prohibited from being traded with the grassland people!

An Zhirong relied on these contraband items to obtain war horses from the Khitans and made huge profits!

Therefore, with the help of An Zhirong, the Khitan cavalry were not only equipped with armor, but also formed a heavy cavalry of thousands of people!
The existence of these Khitan cavalry can be said to pose a considerable threat to Ye Mingsheng's troops!
It is obvious that Ye Mingsheng cannot reach a balance with the Khitans at the cavalry level, so this requires Ye Mingsheng to make a breakthrough in firearms as soon as possible to restrain the Khitan cavalry. After much deliberation, Ye Mingsheng finally chose the eagle-beak gun!

Although the eagle-beak gun has been improved a lot compared to the bird gun currently equipped by the Great Zhou army, at least most of the principles are still the same, which is in line with the technological level of this era. Craftsmen can understand it, put it into practice, and produce it quickly.

If Ye Mingsheng took out the breech-loading rifle now, the craftsmen might not know how to make it after looking at the blueprint. After all, although Ye Mingsheng had looked up information in this regard and knew the principles and characteristics of muskets, he knew nothing about the specific manufacturing process and could only rely on the craftsmen to slowly explore!
(End of this chapter)