"Reported to Qianhu, I have traveled all over Dengzhou, Laizhou, Huangxian and Zhaoyuan for a total of 1,260 qualified refugee soldiers and more than 2,300 family members. Finally, the task of Qianhu Lord has been completed! Damn, with so many soldiers now, our army's strength will be greatly enhanced." In the cold weather, a layer of sweat emerged from Tian Wei's face, which was covered with sand and dust. There was obvious joy and pride in his words.

"Sir, this place in Shandong is different from when we were in Jinzhou. There is no fixed place for refugees here. Sometimes there are hundreds of refugees, and sometimes it is difficult to find one for a long time. It is really not easy to find them. After searching for these days, we have to find all these refugees. In addition, the weather is very cold now, and most of these refugees, old and weak, have died of starvation, and the number of people is small." Wang Yishou also smiled and added from the side.

Li Xiao smiled and patted the two of them on the shoulders, saying, "Thank you for your hard work, let's take these refugees to rest and have a meal, so that they can rest for two days and recover some strength. Let's discuss future plans together."

The two took the order and left. Li Xiao thought to himself that fortunately he had built hundreds of straw houses, so he could arrange the refugees to live in one room so that they could all settle down.

The day after the refugees settled, they went to Laizhou, Dengzhou and other places. Chen Houzi and Hou Dao, who were selling fur ginseng and Dongzhu, also returned on the No. 2 lucky boat.

"Sir, I have been to Dengzhou and Laizhou these days, and have sold all the goods on the ship, and sold a total of 127,000 taels of silver!" Chen Houzi looked happy and respectfully handed over a bill in his hand, asking Li Xiao to look at it.

Li Xiao looked at the bill and calculated it carefully. It was almost the same number. So he praised the two of them for a few words, and then arranged for Wu Liang and others to put the gold and silver obtained from the sale into the warehouse.

After the money was put into the warehouse, Wu Liang quietly reported to Li Xiao the amount of gold and silver reserves in the warehouse. According to preliminary statistics, there were 14,000 taels of gold and 260,000 taels of silver.

Li Xiao was extremely happy when he heard this.

Now, with this huge sum of money, Li Xiao's entire army will never be as restricted in money as he did in Jinzhou.

However, Li Xiao still planned to go step by step. After all, he now has no source of income except this money, so it is better to plan carefully in everything.

That night, Li Xiao summoned Wu Liang, Tian Wei, Wang Yishou, Mo Changrong, Chen Houzi, Duan Shiqi and Zhao Jie to discuss Li Xiaojun's military expansion plan.

Entering Li Xiaojun's core circle, Zhao Jie, the head of firearms, was very excited and secretly vowed to do the best things Li Xiao told him.

Finally, everyone agreed that Li Xiaojun's plan was as follows:

First, there will be priority for cavalry. After the last coastal war, Li Xiaojun originally had 48 cavalrymen, and later received 12 cavalrymen from the guards of Wang Daoqi. There are currently 60 cavalrymen. Li Xiao decided to use the existing more than 70 vacant war horses to add 70 riders from the 1,260 migrant soldiers to enter, expanding the entire cavalry team to 130, of which the heavy armored black tiger cavalry was expanded to 70, and the light cavalry flying kite was expanded to 60.

Next, the infantry will be expanded. Li Xiao plans to plan. From now on, the smallest unit among the gun and shield soldiers is A, with two chiefs and deputy chiefs, including the chiefs and deputy chiefs, with 20 people per capita.

Each five-level team is one team, plus the chief and deputy captain, the number of people in each team is 122.

Li Xiao decided to form 3 shield soldiers and 6 gun soldiers. The total number of gun soldiers is 78, so 1,020 people should be added. The newly formed troops, the chief and deputy captains and commanders of the armor, are all selected from the original gun soldiers, and then the existing gun soldiers are separated into each team. Through the veterans leading new soldiers, the entire team can master combat skills and formation skills faster.

Li Xiao then arranged for the three teams of shield soldiers to form a sentry. The chief of the shield soldiers was Mo Changrong, and the deputy chief of the sentry was Bao Zhao, the former deputy captain of the shield soldiers.

The six teams of spearmen were also combined into one sentry. The spearmen sentry chief was Duan Shiqi, and the deputy sentry chief was Jiang Zun, the former captain of Team B.

After the infantry was arranged, Li Xiao picked out another 150 people to join the firearms unit, which was arranged specifically by the firearms chief Zhao Jie.

As a result, only 20 of the 1,260 refugee soldiers remained.

Li Xiao finally decided that because the total population in the fort has increased significantly, in order to strengthen management, these 20 people were listed as auxiliary soldiers and patrol the fort to maintain public order.

As for the navy, Li Xiao had no specific plans for the time being, so he temporarily let the Fu Ship fall temporarily in Longkou Bay. However, he asked dozens of sailors on the ship to go ashore, like those recruits, led by the head of the chief Chen Houzi and the deputy head of the chief Hou Dao, to receive the most basic military training.

After all the troops were arranged, everyone felt relieved, but they were full of longing for the future.

Only Wu Liang proposed that the armor and weapons that need to be supplemented are a big problem now.

Li Xiao also thought of this.

Because the current blacksmith Zhang Tongzhu and several blacksmiths had just set up a blacksmith shop in the straw hut, Li Xiao could not expect them to produce many armor and weapons quickly. Therefore, he decided to let Wu Liang and Wang Yishou go to the blacksmith shops in various places in Denglai to customize necessary military items such as armor, spears, large shields, knives, and rifles.

The armor worn by the army itself will be distributed to the twenty remaining pairs of armor in the warehouse and will not be supplemented for the time being. It is important to give ironsmiths from all over the country to make weapons first.

The military discussion ended late at night, and Li Xiao could clearly feel that after the military discussion arranged by the expansion of the army, everyone looked at themselves with a look of respect.

In the following days, the soldiers were led by famous generals to clear large chunks of flat land in the field, and then trained in different branches of the military.

Thousands of craftsmen and their families dug the foundation and put bluestones in a lively atmosphere. Everyone was enthusiastic, and hoes and picks flew together, and there were noises and dust everywhere.

High-intensity work requires a lot of physical energy, which requires eating more meat to supplement consumption, otherwise the body will not be able to support it and will easily urinate blood.

Li Xiao has financial support, and he ordered that all craftsmen and their families, like soldiers, should be fully equipped with meat for each person and their families at every meal, so that every craftsman and their families can be as strong as possible. Even the clinic that Chen Mazi has now built has been built, has also made a lot of warm-up soup and sent to the construction site to make the fortress more motivated to do things.

The construction team of nearly 2,500 people was willing to work hard, so the progress of the construction was much faster. In just one week, the foundation of the entire Chifeng Castle was dug and large pieces of long strips of bluestone were filled.

Next, we began to build the inner city wall with the loess dug out when excavating the foundation and the loess land dug from the wild with rammed earth as the basis.

During the ramming process, digging soil, removing the lump, and drying it also requires a large number of manpower.

Under Chang Dali's arrangement, a large number of men and women carrying dustpans and baskets were transporting soil and carrying mud along the wall of the fort. The old men and women sifted sand and adjusted mud, while the craftsmen were scattering ashes to set the lines and ramming the fort walls. The scene was busy and enthusiastic.

"Mr. Li, according to the Ming army system, the standard for building earth walls is 15 steps away and the arrows cannot be shot. However, if you want to meet this standard, you need to mix juice with yellow mud before you can use it."

Chang Dali's words made Li Xiao stunned.

"What, mixing juice?"

Seeing that Li Xiao from Qianhu was stunned, Chang Dali hurriedly explained that in the Ming Dynasty, when building the city walls, loess slurry, river sand, mud and glutinous rice slurry were mixed into a certain proportion to make mixed soil to build a city. Only then can the castle wall be built in such a long and solid and difficult to destroy. If it is more particular, it is necessary to pour boy urine and dog urine into the eight yang and eight yin positions respectively. The Ming Dynasty believed that after doing this, one could seek good luck and avoid evil and mix yin and yang, so that the city could be long-lasting and peaceful and safe.

Li Xiao suddenly remembered that he had read Wang Xiaobo's book in his previous life, which seemed to be "Wanshou Temple". It also wrote that in the big city or palace buildings of the Tang Dynasty, craftsmen built castle walls, in addition to adding a large amount of glutinous rice juice, they even had to add a large amount of yellow sugar, egg white, red beans, boy feces and urine to make adhesives. The money was even more expensive, and it was also a blessing that the Emperor of the Tang Dynasty was rich, so he was willing to pay such a big deal.

Li Xiao sighed in his heart that this ancient architecture really had a mixture of essence and dross, which opened his eyes to the future generations.

Now Chang Dali’s request is easy to say, loess and river sand. When Li Xiao thought of using a large amount of glutinous rice, he couldn’t help but feel heartbroken. Glutinous rice is much more expensive than ordinary rice. All the staff in the castle are reluctant to eat it, but they didn’t expect to build it into the wall of this castle.

Li Xiao thought to himself that this was also the helplessness of the ancients. After all, they could not make cement, and of course it was impossible to make concrete commonly used in modern society. Although this method was quite expensive, the construction effect was still good, and the strength and hardness were almost the same as those in later generations.

Li Xiao had no choice. He didn't study silicate projects in his previous life. Of course, he couldn't make cement. He could only come up with ideas in the future and let the craftsmen explore and develop it themselves.

Li Xiao finally agreed to Chang Dali's request, but emphasized to him that quality must be guaranteed and that the city walls built must be strong and durable.

Chang Dali patted his chest and promised Li Xiao.

At the same time, Chang Dali arranged to purchase a large amount of blue bricks from Huangxian, Dengzhou, Laizhou and other places, and at least more than 500,000 yuan was transported to ensure the use of city buildings.

These days, as Li Xiao’s army built Chifeng Castle here, his reputation began to spread widely. A week after rammed earth walls, a businessman came and proposed to build shops and open shops in Chifeng Castle.

Li Xiao readily agreed to their request.

However, before these merchants were happy, Li Xiao suggested that they could only build shops on both sides of the official road half a mile outside the fort, asking craftsmen to take their own expenses. At the same time, they had to take their own household stickers to Wu Liang and others in Chifeng Castle, apply for a guarantee letter of opening a city registration. After registration and approval, they obtained the right to live outside the fort. In addition, they would have to pay a certain amount of rent and tax in the future before they could establish shops outside the city and engage in commercial sales and other business operations.

The merchants were not happy to open a shop in the fort and had to pay taxes. After some discussion, the group gathered money and gave gifts to Li Xiao, hoping that this thousand-household official could make peace with them and let them build shops in the fort and reduce the commercial tax exemption.

Li Xiao refused them in one go.

Then, Li Xiaoyi said to them with a stern saying: "Everyone, you are willing to come to my Chifeng Castle to open a shop, and Li is welcome. However, I don't know anything about you. My Chifeng Castle was also first built. In order to ensure safety and strictly prevent thieves from doing it in detail, I have to do this bad strategy. After you have been operating outside the castle for a few months to half a year, after verification, it is a legal and decent businessman. I will issue you a license. At that time, you can enter my Chifeng Castle to open a shop."

Li Xiao was always wary of merchants in the late Ming Dynasty. In history, many merchants in the nine-sided towns were actually meticulous works by the Later Jin army. Even if they were not meticulous works, they often informed them and provided information. The fall of Tieling, Kaiyuan, Fushun, Guangning and other places in Liaodong was because these bastards who were secretly doing business and secretly doing business with Hou Jinli to open the city gate, so that these Ming cities that could have been strong and long-term guarded fell instantly.

The merchants whispered for a while, and although everyone was unhappy on their faces, they still reluctantly agreed with Li Xiao's point of view.

A businessman suddenly asked, "I heard that Lord Li intends to collect taxes on the shops, but I don't know how much the tax is?"

"The first month of opening a store is tax-free. In the next three months, one-tenth of the monthly sales will be collected every month. After three months, each store will be taxed one-eighth of the sales. From then on, it will be a regular rule and there will be no tax increase." Li Xiao replied with a smile.

"Sir!" After Li Xiaofang said, the businessman shouted in a trembling voice: "You have to register with the household guarantee, and the young are too busy to say that they are not alive. However, the commercial tax was really heavy. In the entire Ming Dynasty, there was a fear that there would be no place to collect such heavy commercial tax!"
Chapter completed!