Three Kingdoms, I'm really not a general!

Chapter 104: Mo Dao Plan, target in advance!
Since Cui Yan said that he wanted to follow him for a few days, Xing Daorong had no reason to carry him to Jiangdong, so he let him stay with him.

Of course, he wrote a letter to Liu Bei and informed him of the matter immediately.

After all, Lao Cui has a special identity and a great reputation, so it would be better to let Liu Bei know about it as early as possible.

When Cui Yan came back, Xing Daorong had trouble assigning him any tasks, so he was really free and often followed him around.

Fortunately, Xing Daorong had quite some free time these days, so he started to study something that had always been on his mind.

In a small blacksmith shop in West City.

The stove was burning hot, and the discussion nearby was even more heated.

Cui Yan looked at Xing Daorong, who was shirtless and studying the blueprint in his hand with the blacksmith beside him.

It seemed that the objects in the blueprint were very difficult to make, which made the blacksmith sound very embarrassed.

"General, this thing of yours is really hard to make. Look at how long the blade is. It's really difficult to make it entirely out of iron!"

"It's too time-consuming and labor-intensive. It takes as much time and effort to make a knife like this as it does to make seven or eight weapons."

Listening to the blacksmith's words, Cui Yan was actually curious about what was drawn on the drawing, but seeing the heated discussion over there, he felt embarrassed to get involved.

But Xing Daorong said affirmatively: "Don't worry about whether these things are time-consuming and labor-intensive, just tell me whether you can do it!"

Upon hearing this, the blacksmith looked at the drawing carefully for a while, and without further ado, turned to the furnace and took out a piece of iron.

This piece of iron is made by smelting the iron ore into a spongy solid block in a furnace using charcoal as fuel, which can be taken out after the furnace cools down.

It is wrought iron smelted in the early days and can be kept in the furnace and taken out at any time.

However, this piece of iron has a low carbon content, is soft in texture, contains many impurities, is easily broken, and is not very hard, so it needs to be refined before it can be used.

This piece of iron is used as raw material, heated in a carbon fire to absorb carbon and increase the carbon content, and then it is forged to remove impurities and infiltrate carbon to obtain steel.

This is what is meant by "burning the essence of pig iron to make it heavy and soft, and it will become steel after a few nights".

Xing Daorong watched the blacksmith work and polish the piece repeatedly for several hours before he finally came up with a rough shape.

Even so, Xing Daorong was very satisfied. Even though he had waited for several hours, he was overjoyed when he saw the prototype and said, "Yes! It should be like this! But both sides need to be sharpened, and it should be longer."

Cui Yan, who had also been waiting for quite some time, finally looked over and found that it was an extremely long knife.

He had never seen anything longer than this, almost ten feet in length.

“Is this a knife?”

"It's hard enough to lift it up, right?"

Cui Yan felt his head full of question marks. He really didn't understand why Xing Daorong attached so much importance to such a rare long sword.

Just by looking at how excited General Zhengbei was, he could vaguely guess that this knife was very important.

The blacksmith was also making such a rare weapon for the first time. Hearing that Xing Daorong was not very satisfied, he felt helpless: "General, I have tried my best to make it this long. If it is longer, it will definitely break at the touch of a finger."

Hearing the blacksmith say this, Xing Daorong's excitement was instantly extinguished.

Yes, what he drew on the blueprint was the Mo Dao of the future Tang Dynasty.

Of course, he had never seen what the real Tang Dynasty Mo Dao looked like. But he had never seen the real thing, but he had seen imitations!

Now he was imitating the imitations seen in later generations, and directly drew a Mo Dao in shape.

The characteristics of the Mo Dao are that it is long and heavy enough, requires two hands to operate, has a center of gravity design that is very conducive to chopping, and has double-sided blades, and is mainly used to fight against cavalry.

The reason why Xing Daorong was so anxious about this weapon was naturally to prepare for dealing with Cao Cao in the future.

These days, horses are generally divided into three types.

First: Wuhuan horses. This kind of horse is a medium-sized breed, produced in Youzhou and Bingzhou. Gongsun Zan's "White Horse Volunteers" used this kind of horse.

Second, the Xiongnu horse. This horse is a large horse, and its origin is in the Dayuan and Xiayue areas of the Western Regions. After Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty, this horse breed was introduced from the Western Regions. It is generally produced in the Liangzhou area. The so-called "Xiliang Iron Cavalry" used this kind of horse.

The third type is the Southern Horse. This type of horse lived in the south of the Three Kingdoms period, and was distributed in Jingzhou, Yizhou, Ba County, and other places.

This kind of horse is short in stature and is not suitable for use as a war horse, but it is hard-working and is very suitable for use as a logistical pack horse.

Obviously, judging from the overall horse breeds, it is impossible for Shu Han and Jiangdong to form a strong cavalry relying on local resources.

You can't create something that doesn't exist, so the only thing you can think about is how to fight against the cavalry.

So what happened today happened, where Xing Daorong came to the blacksmith shop with the blueprint of the Mo Dao.

Hearing the blacksmith's embarrassment, Xing Daorong thought this was not going to work, and immediately asked, "Is there any famous blacksmith around here?"

The blacksmith thought about it seriously and sighed, "General, I'm not exaggerating. Your knife... no one can make it like this now."

Xing Daorong had no intention of giving up, and only asked: "Why? Is it because the material can't support it... or is it the limitation of forging technology?"

Seeing how persistent Xing Daorong was, the blacksmith knew that this weapon was probably very important.

After thinking it over carefully, he finally said, "Both. This iron is not hard enough to support such a long blade. As for the technique, it is complicated and needs further study."

After that, seeing Xing Daorong's frown, he tried again: "Maybe, if we ask more people to try together, there might be a way. If we only think about it alone, there really is no clue."

"Okay!" Xing Daorong immediately decided: "I will bring all the famous blacksmiths from Yizhou and Jingzhou here. Whoever can develop this knife will be rewarded handsomely!"

There will always be brave men when there is a big reward. Xing Daorong plans to pay for the knife out of his own pocket.

Sure enough, when the blacksmith heard Xing Daorong's emphasis on it and heard that there would be a huge reward, he immediately felt his strength return.

But he changed the subject and said, "General! I think this knife can be further studied. Call more people. Who knows, we may be able to figure it out in a few days."

Xing Daorong didn't care whether this guy was talking nonsense or not, he just nodded and said: "You know all the requirements, just fight according to this standard, don't fool me."

The blacksmith nodded repeatedly and said, "Of course, I would never fool anyone but you, General!"

Xing Daorong finally felt relieved and left the stuffy shop.

Cui Yan, who had been watching all the way, could not hide his curiosity. After finally leaving the shop, he asked Xing Daorong directly, "General Xing, what kind of sword did you make?"

Xing Daorong stopped and looked at Cui Yan, who was sweating profusely but still buttoning his coat and wearing tight clothes. After a while, he slowly said, "The Mo Dao is a knife specially used to kill cavalry!"

(End of this chapter)