“Your Majesty, Cao Zhengyang has confessed everything.”
Entering the imperial study, Li San handed a confession to Xiao Ming.
Ever since Cao Zhengyang was arrested, they had been interrogating him for a month. In the beginning, Cao Zhengyang was stubborn, refusing to admit that he deliberately caused damage under the Cao family’s instruction. Even after Li San used some interrogation methods, Cao Zhengyang still refused to speak.
Finally, Li San had no choice but to confine Cao Zhengyang to solitary confinement, and every time Cao Zhengyang was about to fall asleep, he would be woken up. After three days of this, Cao Zhengyang, unable to endure such mental torment, finally confessed everything.
“It was indeed Cao Kun’s order,” Xiao Ming said, glancing at the confession. Cao Zhengyang explicitly stated that Cao Kun had sent someone to deliver the message to him.
In addition, Cao Zhengyang also confessed some important information about the State of Chu.
“The merchants’ council was established a month ago. Now Cao Kun serves as its speaker, and Cao Zhengyang’s elder brother, Cao Zhengtong, is the Chief of Staff of the Prince of Wei’s residence. According to Cao Zhengyang, the merchants’ council is planning to seize military power. If they succeed, the Prince of Chu will become a mere puppet.” This news somewhat shocked Li San. In his opinion, a merchant seeking involvement in government affairs was already astonishing, and now they were even attempting to meddle with the army.
Xiao Ming was also somewhat surprised. “The Prince of Chu must be mad. Once they gain military power, the State of Chu will be dictated by the Cao family.”
“The State of Chu understands the West better than we do. The Cao family has also spoken to the Prince of Chu more than once about Western monarchs. Between life and death, perhaps he trusts the Cao family more,” Li San said cautiously.
Xiao Ming sighed. The problem lay precisely here: no matter how much goodwill he showed, the Prince of Chu refused to believe him. He now firmly believed that even if he surrendered, Xiao Ming would eventually kill him. One could only say that the Prince of Chu was too shrewd.
He said, “You are right. Now, the Prince of Chu will simply not believe me, so he will absolutely not surrender to me.”
Li San smiled upon hearing this. He said, “Your Majesty, this may not be a bad thing. We still have some scruples about acting against the Prince of Chu. If the Cao family controls the merchants’ council and then gains military power, Your Majesty will no longer have to worry about the Prince of Chu. Whether the Prince of Chu rebels or not, we will have ample reason to march south. If Your Majesty wishes to make the State of Chu show its true colors more quickly, perhaps Your Majesty can dispatch secret guards to assassinate the Prince of Chu.”
Xiao Ming also thought of this. Currently, the Prince of Chu’s heir, Li Chuyuan, was in Qingzhou Province. Once the Prince of Chu died, Li Chuyuan would have to return to succeed him. This was a rule of the Great Yu Empire.
The Prince of Chu might be willing to share power with others for the sake of survival, but Li Chuyuan would not agree, as he was the next Prince of Chu.
“I think so too. Since the Prince of Chu won’t let me live in peace, why should I let the Prince of Chu live in peace? As long as the Prince of Chu dies, I can send Li Chuyuan back to fight the Cao family. Perhaps then, Li Chuyuan will even request me to send troops to rescue him. What do you say?”
Xiao Ming made up his mind. As the saying goes, “War is a great affair of the nation, a place of life and death, a path to survival or destruction, which must not be left unexamined.” War can never be arbitrary. The failures of contemporary America in the Vietnam War and Korean War sufficiently illustrate this problem.
Advanced weapons do not necessarily guarantee victory in war, or even if victorious, the cost is often immense.
And these were not what Xiao Ming wanted to see. Therefore, even though the Great Yu Empire was equipped with advanced firearms, he still acted after careful deliberation in every war, trying every means to reduce losses, or simply subduing the enemy without fighting.
“Your Majesty is wise. This way, it gains time for deploying troops, reduces casualties, and at the same time, provides a just cause for war,” Li San said.
Xiao Ming continued to read the information revealed by Cao Zhengyang. Besides the council and the military, the Cao family and the French were also colluding, purchasing many Western firearms.
“It seems I need to have a serious talk with Li Chuyuan, and perhaps fan the flames a bit,” Xiao Ming said with a smile.
After a pause, he said, “Do you have the confidence to assassinate the Prince of Chu?”
Li San chuckled twice. He said, “Your Majesty, it is said that Song Changping is developing a firearm that loads ammunition from the breech. This firearm can be fired from any position, and its accuracy and firing rate are both superior to the Conqueror Musket. If Your Majesty can provide me with such a firearm, I believe it won’t be a big problem.”
Li San knowing this secret did not surprise him, because Song Changping and Lin Wentao were all under the surveillance of the secret guards. Getting some intelligence was very normal for Li San.
In fact, as soon as there was any movement from Song Changping’s side, Li San would know, even earlier than Song Changping himself.
As his words fell, a small eunuch arrived at the door and whispered a few words to Qian Dafu. Qian Dafu smiled, “Your Majesty, speaking of the devil, Song Changping requests an audience outside the palace.”
Xiao Ming squinted at Li San. He said, “It seems you already know.”
Li San smiled and scratched his head.
After a while, Song Changping arrived outside the imperial study. Seeing Song Changping holding a firearm, he asked in surprise, “Song Changping, this wouldn’t be the breech-loading gun, would it?”
Song Changping nodded. He said, “Precisely. I have already tested it on the training ground. This firearm can directly fire paper cartridges. However, due to the complexity of the breech-locking mechanism, it will be very difficult to mass-convert Conqueror Muskets. After all, there are sixty-three individual parts just in the breech-locking mechanism, and many parts have different shapes. To produce such parts, more precise machine tools are required.”
Xiao Ming understood. Song Changping was not here to claim credit this time but to express his difficulties. In fact, a breech-locking mechanism required very high processing precision. This precision could only be achieved with high-precision lathes. Otherwise, mass production would be impossible.
Due to variations in part dimensions, assembly would be impossible.
As if to explain the breech-loading gun in his hand, he said, “This gun’s parts were personally ground by me. It took a month to assemble, and even then, some parts don’t fit perfectly. But overall, it’s barely usable.”
Xiao Ming took the breech-loading gun. The breech-locking mechanism of this gun was provided by him to Song Changping. Overall, this gun was somewhat similar to a Sharps breech-loading gun, with a falling block breech mechanism. A thickened trigger guard acted as a lever to move a rising and falling breechblock to open and close the breech.
The most difficult part was a hinge structure, which had many components and was the processing bottleneck Song Changping mentioned.
“I was actually planning to look for you after I finished with this currency matter,” Xiao Ming said. “This gun will temporarily only be used as a sniper rifle in the army. Since it’s difficult, manually produce a small number to equip the army. I will have Lin Wentao think about the matter of precision machine tools.”
TN: changing the translation of Chief Clerk -> Chief of Staff
The novel has already been fully translated up to the final chapter. You can access it on my Patreon at https://www.patreon.com/c/caleredhair