Chapter 104 – City Defense Camp
Translator: TeamTWO
Editor: Jun
2nd of April.
Friendship Town, under the help of the main camp, had finally finished construction on the city walls. From start to finish, the nomadic tribes didn't notice that a military fortress was secretly built up north of them.
To further increase the defensive strength of Friendship Town, Ouyang Shuo sent Zhou Haichen a letter to order him to start working on the city-protecting river. The city-protecting river would follow that of the main camp’s. West of it would be the Friendship river and east would be the Qiushui river, forming a huge sac and boxing Friendship Town in it.
This way, Friendship Town would be surrounded by water, and using the water camp, they could attack and defend, getting into an undefeatable position. Before he built Friendship Town into an impenetrable fortress, Ouyang Shuo wasn't prepared to contact the nomadic tribes.
After dealing with Friendship Town, under the company of Ge Hongliang and Tian Wenjing, they set out for the Xuanniao tribe. Li Mingliang led the first cavalry squadron to protect their safety on the way there.
When they passed Qiushui Town, Ouyang Shuo took an hour-long break there to listen to Zhao Dexian report on the recent projects and situations in the town. Additionally, he took time to test and inspect the newly-built Qiushui Town cavalry protection squadron.
The Qingming festival was right around the corner, and as the food production base of the territory, Zhao Dexian had already begun to prepare for the festival. The planned 20,000 mus of farmland had been reclaimed, and under the effect of the weathering change token, became fertile farmland. The full 20,000 mus were used to plant rice.
Apart from reclaiming farmland, Qiushui Town had also built a large-scale logging camp in the southern woods. The wood supplies here were of higher quality than that of the main camp, sturdier and easier to store. All the resources needed by the shipyard were solely provided by the logging camp.
Because they were reaching into the busy farmer's period, Qiushui Town's city wall project had no choice but to be postponed. Only after the spring sowing would construction continue. Luckily, this region was calm, and building the city walls earlier or later wouldn't make much of a difference.
Between 11 AM and noon, after 2 hours of walking, Ouyang Shuo and his men arrived at the Xuanniao tribe. This time, their treatment was totally different from the cold one they had received last time. The tribe leader, Shi Xiong, personally received them outside of the stronghold.
"Lord, welcome to Xuanniao Tribe!" Shi Xiong said warmly.
This was the magic of food and grain. Ever since Xuanniao tribe started working with Shanhai Town, they were well-fed and never had to go hungry. Naturally, Shi Xiong's attitude would change and he wouldn’t dare to be arrogant towards Ouyang Shuo.
However, if Shi Xiong knew that what they were getting wasn't even a third of what Langshan mining field was producing, what would his reaction be?
Ouyang Shuo smiled and said, "Hello leader, is the shaman okay?"
"Everything is okay! Please enter!" Shi Xiong walked in front to lead the way as Ouyang Shuo walked side by side with him.
After both sides gathered and sat down in the meeting hall, Ouyang Shuo left Tian Wenjing to discuss with Shi Xiong about further cooperation, while he got up and went towards the mountain stronghold temple to greet the shaman.
The temple was built at the highest point of the mountain stronghold, having over 200 steps. Upon climbing all the way up, the shaman was standing at the mouth of the temple and welcoming Ouyang Shuo. This was a very battered elder. Her eyes looked cloudy and she looked like she was about to die. This elder was the spiritual leader and the pride of the Xuanniao tribe.
"Guest from afar, I welcome you!" The shaman said with a hoarse voice.
Ouyang Shuo did not dare to be negligent and said sincerely, "Greetings, shaman. The gift you gave us last time was of great help to our town. To thank you, I prepared a gift of my own." Ouyang Shuo took out a night pearl from his storage bag and passed it to the young shaman standing next to her.
The night pearl was obtained after destroying a large raider camp. As the young shaman had never seen such a treasure, she was so shocked that she didn't take it.
"Lord is too courteous, such an expensive gift. It's hard for me to accept." The shaman signaled for the young shaman to accept it while walking towards Ouyang Shuo and said, "Lord, please follow me."
Xuanniao tribe's temple was made entirely of stone and was a relatively intact structure.
Ouyang Shuo was an outsider, so he couldn't enter the main ancestral hall of the temple. They went to the guest chamber beside it.
"Shaman, Shanhai Town is willing to work with the various tribes in the mountain. We don't know if you could help us with it?" Ouyang Shuo dove right into the question.
The shaman opened her cloudy eyes and said, "Our Xuanniao Tribe keeps in contact with the neighboring 4 tribes. Since sire has such an intention, I'll invite them here."
"If that is so, many thanks to shaman!" Ouyang Shuo was ecstatic.
When he left the tribe, he left Tian Wenjing behind and placed him in charge of negotiating with the other tribes. The detailed cooperation contents could be similar to the one with the Xuanniao tribe.
At the same time, to thank Ouyang Shuo for the night pearl, the shaman gave Ouyang Shuo a pair of Xuanniao tribe's Feng birds. These birds were very smart and could travel long distances to pass news.
……
3rd of April, Shanhai Town’s potato harvest
As the soil was barren, there were only 1000 odd mus of potato land, out of which 2.1 million units of potatoes were produced. The territory followed the agriculture tax and received 70,000 units of potatoes, which Ouyang Shuo passed to the Combat Logistics Division to act as military rations.
With this batch of potatoes, and together with some grain and meat, Shanhai Town's food crisis was over and there was no need to buy grain large-scale from the market. After harvesting the potatoes, Ouyang Shuo did not ask the farmers to plant rice, but cotton instead.
As they say, clothing and food go together, and you cannot lack either one. In the current Shanhai Town, cloth materials still relied heavily on the market. It didn't have its own ability. As for the colored silk from the silkworms, the industrial chain hadn't been set up, and it was considered an expensive and high-class good, not suitable for large-scale use.
Cotton was different. With it, the territory could skip linen and go straight to using cotton. Luckily, the 2,000 mus weren't considered fertile, so you wouldn't have gotten much of a yield from planting rice, and thus planting cotton was a better decision.
……
4th of April
After the shaman from the Xuanniao tribe helped coordinate it, 3 more mountain barbarian tribes agreed to work together with Shanhai Town. The 3 tribes were of a smaller scale than Xuanniao tribe, having 2000 odd people each. One other tribe rejected the shaman's invitation. The tribe was called Jifeng tribe, and it was much bigger than Xuanniao tribe, having 5000 people. When they found out that the Xuanniao tribe relied on Shanhai Town and even acted as their spokespeople, they were furious and thus refused cooperation.
The 3 tribes joining the alliance made the number of miners In Langshan mining field swell to 5000 people. Basically, with the size of the mine, this was the maximum, and any more would’ve been useless.
Because the Jifeng tribe refused cooperation, Ouyang Shuo had no choice but to increase the defense of the mine. He gathered 300 men from the various tribes and added the 2 squadrons that he had sent there, making a Langshan defense camp. Shilang was the manager of the camp. The other captain, Shibao, was sent back to Shanhai Town.
Apart from joining the operation in the mines, the 3 tribes sent 500 of their finest soldiers to join Shanhai Town's main army. Hence, Ouyang Shuo chose 200 more men from Shanhai Town and joined them with the 3 infantry squadrons to form 2 infantry camps.
In the Shanhai Town barracks meeting hall, Ouyang Shuo started to reorganize personnel.
"Zhao Sihu!"
"Present!"
"I order you to use the original 1st squadron in the infantry camp as the core, adding 200 soldiers from Shanhai Town and 200 from the mountain barbarians to build the Shanhai Town city defense camp." Ouyang Shuo said.
"City defense camp?" Sihu was confused.
"That's right. The duty of the camp is to protect the main territory. The barracks will be within the city. To adapt to the requirements of protecting the city, the camp will have two archer squadrons, two crossbowmen squadrons and one sword shield squadron. The original infantry first squadron will become the sword shield squadron, the 200 will be trained as crossbowmen, and the mountain barbarians will form the bowmen squadrons." Ouyang Shuo explained.
"I understand sire, don't worry. I will complete the task!" Zhao Sihu said loudly.
Ouyang Shuo turned to General Shi and said, "General Shi!"
"General is here! Ready for your orders!"
"I order you to use the infantry camp’s 2nd and 3rd squadrons as the core, and add 300 elites from the various tribes to form a purely mountain barbarian heavy-armored infantry camp."
"Heavy-armored infantry? But we don't have any heavy armor!" General Shi was confused too.
Ouyang Shuo shook his head and said, "Who says we don't? The Armory Division is rushing production of infantry armor, the weapons division is forging Tang daggers, and these two items will be the equipment of the heavy-armored infantry camp.
All the other generals looked at General Shi jealously. The armor was 29 kg, so only the mountain barbarians could carry it. The Tang knife was a forged weapon, so every soldier type could use it. No one expected the heavy-armored infantry to be the first to be given it.
General Shi laughed brightly. "Thank you sire, for your support."
"The heavy-armored infantry camp will be built outside the city and general must increase their training, especially weight training. I don't wish that when the armor is built, your soldiers aren't able to use it. That would be a joke." Ouyang Shuo continued.
"Sire don't worry, I will train them well."
Ouyang Shuo nodded and said, "Then I'll wait and see. After you guys are formed up and become a proper camp, I will personally give the armored infantry camp its name."
That was a great honor. To date, no camp in Shanhai Town had its own personal designation, hence one could see how much importance Ouyang Shuo placed on this.
General Shi's blood boiled and he shouted, "I won't let sire down!"