Lian Erye in the Red Mansion

Chapter 534 HSBC Grain Store

In the days that followed, Jia Lian focused his main energy on the Shenji Battalion and on matters related to welcoming the Imperial Concubine's visit home.

August arrived in the blink of an eye, and on the third day of the month, it was Grandmother Jia's birthday again.

As is customary, the birthday celebrations for Grandmother Jia usually involve a three-day banquet.

This year, because they are busy with the family visit, which is the biggest joyous occasion for the Jia family, even the birthday celebration of Grandmother Jia has to take a backseat.

So, Mother Jia herself suggested that on the actual day, all the clan members and relatives should be invited to come and celebrate.

The day before Grandmother Jia's birthday banquet, the Divine Machine Battalion also received good news.

Wu Youquan sent someone to tell Jia Lian that the modification of the flintlock musket had been successful and invited him to the launch site to observe the test.

Upon receiving this news, Jia Lian was quite excited and immediately went to the firing range of the musket bureau.

By this time, there were already quite a few people around the site, most of whom were officials and craftsmen from the musket and artillery bureaus.

Since ancient times, it has been a case of "what the superiors like, the inferiors will follow." After Jia Lian took office and showed a unique emphasis on firearms, the officials and other personnel in the Shenji Battalion inevitably began to pay more attention to firearms as well.

Some people, envious of the excellent treatment that Wu Youquan and others received, turned around and devoted themselves to the in-depth study of firearms.

Wu Youquan and his assistants had already set up their formation in the field. Upon seeing Jia Lian approach, Wu Youquan immediately stepped forward to report: "Your Excellency, the flintlock muskets that I reported to you about last time have been cast."

And it really can launch!

Upon hearing this, Jia Lian's spirits lifted: "Let me see."

Upon receiving the order, Wu Youquan personally retrieved the musket from the table and presented it to Jia Lian with both hands.

Jia Lian took it and examined it. It was a brand new gun, double-barreled, and very heavy. It looked like it had good firepower.

After inspecting the chamber and barrel, Jia Lian asked with a smile, "How was the firing result?"

"How about I demonstrate it to Your Excellency myself?"

Jia Lian nodded, and Wu Youquan took the musket and returned to the table. He took a deep breath and then carefully began loading the ammunition.

After all, this was the first public appearance of the flintlock musket in the Great Wei, so Jia Lian did not urge him. He had the leisure to look at the distance from the firing point to the target, which he estimated to be about two hundred paces.

Two or three hundred paces was not an unusual effective range, even for muskets of that era.

This is also an advantage of muskets over bows and arrows. After all, even the strongest archers would find it difficult to inflict effective damage on the enemy at this distance.

Wu Youquan was ready in no time. He looked back at Jia Lian, and at Jia Lian's signal, he focused his energy and, under the watchful eyes of the crowd, raised his gun and pulled the trigger.

With a loud clang of metal striking metal, the people around exchanged glances and began to ask questions.

"Has it been fired?"

"Did you hit it?"

The target observers, who had been prepared in advance, also ran to the target with some doubt and checked it repeatedly.

However, those with keen eyes had already noticed that the bullet hadn't been fired at all. The others also noticed something amiss from Wu Youquan's expression, which shifted from excitement to regret.

Jia Lian sighed; clearly, this first attempt had failed.

However, he wasn't too surprised. Over the past three months, he had frequently gone down to the forge barracks to participate in and guide Wu Youquan and others in their modification work. Therefore, he clearly knew that even with his foresight, it wouldn't be an easy task for flintlock musket technology to go from nothing to maturity.

The transition from manual to automatic ignition is a leap forward in itself, and it's normal that it's challenging.

"Please give me another chance, my lord. It really was a successful launch at the small firing range behind the barracks. I really didn't lie. They can all testify for me."

Wu Youquan put down his musket and explained to Jia Lian with some unease. After all, he was the one who had excitedly sent someone to invite Jia Lian, but things had turned out this way, which made him very annoyed and remorseful.

Jia Lian waved his hand and said in a calm tone, "I'll give you two more chances."

If all three shots fail to fire, it means that this modification of the flintlock musket has failed.

Upon hearing Jia Lian's words, Wu Youquan bowed gratefully, then picked up the musket again, carefully recalled the reason for the previous failure, reloaded the ammunition, raised the musket once more, and pressed the trigger with bated breath.

"Bang!!"

The loud firing sound rang out again. Those with sharp ears and eyes could clearly feel that this sound was not only clearer than the previous one, but also that, as far as the eye could see, there was a violent flash of fire in the barrel of the long gun in Wu Youquan's hand.

At this moment, Wu Youquan was also looking down at the black smoke coming out of the gun barrel, his expression full of excitement.

From the immense recoil of the musket, he knew clearly that the shot had been fired successfully! But he wasn't in a hurry to show off; instead, he winked at the people next to him, signaling them to go up and check the target.

They didn't even need to go forward to check; the person guarding the target had already shouted in surprise, "Hit! Hit!!"

Upon hearing this voice, Wu Youquan dared to turn around and smile at Jia Lian.

Jia Lian nodded approvingly at him. Although it was only successful on the second shot, the fact that it was successful meant that the direction of the reform was correct.

In the future, it will only be a matter of increasing the chances of success.

With the advent of firearms that do not rely on manual ignition, the musket, or firearm, truly became capable of overwhelming and replacing bows and arrows on the battlefield!

Soon, officials from the arquebus bureau had a huge wooden rake brought over, and Jia Lian personally went forward to inspect it.

The power was quite impressive; the small but heavy lead bullets penetrated deep into the wood. This effect would have a very high chance of being fatal even to soldiers wearing ordinary armor.

After several test shots to confirm that the musket was not in danger of exploding, Wu Youquan and others also invited Jia Lian to test fire it himself.

After a series of experiments, Jia Lian discovered that the reason for the launch failures was that the flint inside sometimes failed to ignite. Without igniting the gunpowder, a successful launch was impossible. Therefore, Jia Lian instructed Wu Youquan to find a way to change the type of flint and improve the launching mechanism.

Wu Youquan scratched his head and said, "But this kind of flint is the easiest to start a fire with, the one I've searched the entire Shenji Camp for."

Jia Lian thought for a moment and said, "How about this, I'll have someone go to the Ministry of Works and the Ministry of War to ask if they can provide more flint for our experiments."

Upon hearing this, Wu Youquan thanked Jia Lian with delight. This was the benefit of having someone above him supporting him. He himself wouldn't have had the ability to get help from the Ministry of War and the Ministry of Works.

After the experiment ended, looking at the crowd gathered around, Jia Lian kept his promise and publicly announced a reward of one hundred taels of silver for Wu Youquan. The officials and craftsmen who assisted him in the research and development also received rewards.

Seeing that even the officials were congratulating and flattering Wu Youquan because he was appreciated by Jia Lian, the other craftsmen were extremely envious and jealous.

At the opportune moment, Jia Lian announced that any craftsman in the Shenji Battalion who was interested in firearms could apply to work in the Firearms Battalion. He also emphasized retaining the officials and craftsmen of the Artillery Bureau, promising that as long as they could improve upon the existing artillery, he would not hesitate to promote and reward them.

These words immediately boosted the morale of the artillery bureau personnel.

In particular, the officials in charge of the artillery bureau knew that since Jia Lian took office as deputy commander, he had specifically applied to the court for special funds in order to improve the research and development of firearms.

The Shenji Battalion was originally a quiet and unprofitable department, but now that Jia Lian has brought in a new life to the place, there are quite a few people who want to curry favor with him and gain benefits.

Seeing their reaction, Jia Lian smiled and suggested that they focus more on developing "explosive shells".

The exploding bullet is a groundbreaking attempt compared to solid shot, which relies solely on its powerful impact to cause damage after being fired.

It is a shell that is filled with gunpowder, ignited by a fuse, and can explode upon landing, causing damage with shrapnel.

This type of cannonball existed in the previous dynasty. Of course, it was very crude and had many drawbacks and shortcomings, so it was basically abandoned in both the previous and current dynasties.

Jia Lian naturally knew that truth only existed within the range of a cannon, and only cannons whose shells could land and explode were considered cannons in the true sense!

However, Jia Lian knew that modifying cannons would definitely be much slower than modifying firearms.

But he wasn't afraid. Once the cannon modifications were effective, he would have to consider persuading the emperor to establish a new type of navy.

After making inquiries and analyzing the situation, Jia Lian has determined that this is the time when the Age of Exploration is beginning!

Building a powerful naval fleet to compete with Western powers for dominance in the Age of Exploration is Jia Lian's biggest goal at present.

He was fairly confident about this. His research revealed that Western weaponry was more advanced than that of the Great Wei, but only to a limited extent.

Therefore, he still has plenty of time.

Another important point is that the current navy of the Great Wei is the very team built up by the Rongguo Mansion.

After founding the country and establishing peace, Emperor Taizu also built a navy to combat water pirates and sea bandits.

To build a navy, warships were naturally needed. At that time, the Duke of Rongguo was in charge of supervising the construction of warships and building naval bases for the navy.

(In the original novel, when Jia Lian's wet nurse, Granny Zhao, talked about the Emperor Taizu's southern tour, she mentioned that when she was just old enough to remember things, the Jia family was in the Suzhou-Yangzhou area, "supervising the construction of seagoing vessels and repairing sea dikes," which leads to further developments.)

It can be said that the foundation of the Great Wei Navy was laid by Duke Rong.

As the grandson of the Duke of Rongguo, it was naturally easier for him to get involved in naval affairs than for others.

However, no matter what, this matter is a long and arduous one.

When he got home, Jia Yun was waiting for him at the entrance of the east courtyard.

As a rare junior member of the Jia family who received Jia Lian's attention, Jia Yun was initially assigned by Jia Lian to work as a errand boy in the Bingmasi (military headquarters), which was equivalent to his work secretary.

There's nothing we can do about it. Although this guy is clever, he's not good at anything, so he can only do odd jobs.

Later, after the scholar, no, now we should say the successful candidate in the imperial examinations, Gu Danfeng, the third son of the Gu family, took up the position of "secretary" in the military headquarters, Jia Yun's role in the military headquarters diminished. Then Jia Lian recalled Jia Yun to help him manage the clan affairs.

Now, more than a year has passed, and the young boy from back then can now be considered mature and experienced.

This year, Jia Lian happened to have the idea of ​​starting a business, so he thought he'd let this kid give it a try.

Firstly, this young man is energetic and ambitious. Secondly, compared to Sun Zai Ren, the manager of Juxianlou, he is a member of the Jia family and it is reasonable for him to be in charge of managing the Jia family's businesses.

"Second Uncle, the grain deal is settled. The He family finally agreed to sell their He Family Grain Store, including the tens of thousands of shi of grain in stock, to us for a price of 30,000 taels of silver." As soon as they met, Jia Yun stepped forward to help Jia Lian and said with a happy smile.

Although Jia Lian didn't particularly like his obsequious manner, he knew that everyone had their own way of surviving, and at least this young man was of good character. In that case, being shrewd could be considered one of his strengths.

"Thirty thousand taels is a bit low. But did you use the Jia family's status to coerce us?"

Since returning from the banquet at the Xue family's residence, Jia Lian has been tasked with expanding the Juxianlou restaurant, building a winery, and establishing a grain store.

The first two things need to be done slowly, but regarding the establishment of the grain store, Jia Lian decided to take Baochai's suggestion and buy the entire grain store, regardless of its size, which would save him time and effort.

This He family grain store was the best option recommended to him by his subordinates after they inquired about it.

Jia Yun knew that Jia Lian was usually easy to talk to, but when it came to serious matters, he was as strict as a military commander. Therefore, upon hearing this, he quickly explained, "Second Uncle is wronged. How could we dare?"

We went to them because we found out that the He family was having financial problems.

Their grain store wasn't particularly large to begin with, and its business couldn't compare to the other big ones in Beijing. They only dared to ask for such a high price because we took the initiative to come to them.

Later, seeing that we weren't easily fooled, they gradually relented. Of course, we were also fortunate to have the help of the two managers from the Xue family; otherwise, we wouldn't have known the ins and outs and would have easily been taken advantage of.

However, the He family said that the 30,000 taels of silver must be paid in cash in one lump sum, and they would also assist us with all the handover and management.

Upon hearing this, Jia Lian immediately said, "Agree to their request."

For Jia Lian, who had no shortage of cash flow and was not afraid of the He family's trickery, he naturally did not need to consider things as much as an ordinary businessman.

Jia Yun also thought there was no problem, and then asked Jia Lian, "The new grain store will definitely need a name. Should it be named after the family like other families, such as 'Jia Family Grain Store'?"

Jia Lian thought for a moment and then shook his head.

Although the dynasty does not prohibit nobles from engaging in commerce, the vast majority of nobles still respect their status and do not participate in business, or at least do not personally get involved.

Therefore, they didn't need to let the grain merchants travel around with the name "Jia," as it would be too ostentatious and unfair to other businessmen, which would seem like bullying.

"Let's call it 'HSBC Grain Bank,' meaning that when the world is prosperous, we gather together to benefit the people."

Jia Lian casually suggested a name, and Jia Yun immediately exclaimed, "Great! Second Uncle's name is excellent! It sounds pleasant and has a good meaning. We'll have someone make a plaque with Second Uncle's words and use it as the signboard for our grain store!"

Jia Lian didn't even bother to look at the sycophant again. He turned to go home, but then thought for a moment, turned back, and headed towards the Ningguo Mansion.