Chapter 2418 2133: Knocked Out with One Punch

At this moment, Gan Ning's legs were somewhat weak, relying on one hand to support Lul Jun's shoulder to barely stand up, but he felt incredibly uncertain inside.

"Um, well, shouldn't we just give up on these big warships?" Gan Ning slowly began to speak, struggling, after calming his heart for a while.

"How can we give up?" Lul Jun didn't know where he mustered the strength, pulling at Gan Ning's collar and roaring, "These are big warships, they're a labor of love, they are tied to being almost invincible once built!"

"The problem is, with all you said, do you have that much money? Five hundred billion! Although I'm quite wealthy, five hundred billion—does our Han Dynasty have that much revenue annually?" Gan Ning turned his head, pushing Lul Jun who was pulling at his collar and roaring. He's a goof, but his mind is reliable. This battleship is less about lacking construction funds and more about lacking construction materials!

"We should calm down; if the ship were only a hundred billion, I would grit my teeth and fork it out." Gan Ning persuaded, the material costs of five hundred billion are simply insane, even with the navy's support, it's basically unlikely to settle.

"Then give me a hundred billion first, let me start building it," Lul Jun said shamelessly with no bottom line, his eyes glowing when Gan Ning mentioned a hundred billion.

"I said I'd grit my teeth, it doesn't mean I currently have it!" Gan Ning almost touched the ground with his head; though he plundered the Indian Ocean pirates and the city port of Kabe Bay, a hundred billion is still quite far off, though it's already within reach.

"You don't understand this country's situation as deeply as I do." Seeing Lul Jun insist on money, Gan Ning fell silent for a while, preparing to share some truths with him, "Because of the recognition of Marquis Chen, I know many deeper aspects of this country. This battleship, just by my estimate, if purely steel structured would need millions of pounds of iron, and we simply don't have that much steel."

"No, under the new measurement just thirty thousand tons," Lul Jun said with a pout, "As for steel, Lub Central Steel Plant probably still has reserves of several thousand tons."

"There's a production limit," Gan Ning sighed, "Jir Cai, give up, this ship can't be built even if you pour yourself into it. Although I'm unsure how this thirty thousand tons is measured, from my impression, just producing this steel alone would take two to three years, and even if manufactured it can't be all handed over to you for this."

Gan Ning's explanation made Lul Jun's face pale, he'd considered many aspects but not the production capacity. Though the mines in the Central Plains are numerous and iron ore production is high, the ore quality there is too poor, always mixed with other substances.

This results in very low output of quality steel, which is why China, since the Han Dynasty, has always possessed the highest level of iron smelting technology in the feudal era, yet the steel produced can only be said to suffice.

Even by the Tang Dynasty, along with places like Central Asia and nations like Arabia or Europe like the Byzantine, the weapons used had caught up with the Central Plains, and by the Song Dynasty, foreign ironware began to surpass that of the Central Plains.

It's not that the steelmaking technology in Europe and Central Asia was particularly good—in fact, their technology barely reached Three Kingdoms standards, but they benefited from high-quality ore.

Ore like high-grade magnetite with iron content directly over seventy percent, where ten pounds yield seven pounds of iron; even the highest technology can't compete with such resources, directly forging iron with such material is irresistible.

This is why Europe, after the fifth century, developed oddities like iron-plated cans for knights, simply because their ore quality was high, low in impurities, casually usable without sophisticated smelting; direct forging method could also yield results.

As for China, the iron ore reserves are substantial but high-grade ores are scarce, which leaves few that could be directly thrown into a blast furnace, thus leading to a hyper-focus on technical enhancement, but technical progress isn't achieved in a day and it's often constrained by the environment, sometimes unable to outpace their primitive iron forging approach.

By the way, speaking of the Celtic People, one of the world's earliest groups mastering iron smelting—yet their iron smelting wasn't truly technical, it was purely because their ore was high-grade, relying on incompletely burned carbon reactions to produce iron—insane and devoid of technical sophistication in casting...

"I can't turn back anymore," Lul Jun hesitated for a long time before sharing the truth with Gan Ning, viewing him as a trustworthy and must-trust brother, some things can't remain unsaid.

Gan Ning was dumbfounded, is this really the timid and scared guy named Lul Jun I knew, why do I feel like you've completely overturned your previous image!

"That's roughly it. I think I can't possibly turn back now, but that's good too. This way, I don't have to consider those things anymore. I want to build it!" Lul Jun said with a sudden laugh after seeing Gan Ning completely stunned. "Didn't expect that even I, Lul Jun, could do something that shocks Xingba to the point of speechlessness!"

"You idiot!" Gan Ning punched the back of Lul Jun's head, knocking him out. "Do you even know what you're doing? Let me take you to surrender now; I can still save you. If you're any later, no one can save you!"

Gan Ning punched Lul Jun unconscious and then carried him over his shoulder head down. Before the incident happens, he must find someone who can cover it up, otherwise, all the people involved in Lul Jun's current actions could bankrupt the entire Lul Family. If this mess continues, Lul Jun will offend too many people, far more than Gan Ning can protect.

More importantly, Gan Ning vaguely sensed the hidden dangers behind this; there are simply too many people and too much involved in this affair.

While Gan Ning knocked out Lul Jun with a punch, Jia Mu was bringing an audit checklist to Lul Family Shipyard for inspection. After all, even though the shipyard is nominally owned by the Lul Family, it has strong official backing behind it, making it a semi state-owned asset, hence the need for an audit.

Originally, the Lul Family Shipyard wasn't on the audit list. However, Jia Mu found many strange material flows to the shipyard during his investigation. Although these directives are all legitimate and some even involve high-level figures like Lub Su and Chen Xi, the quantities don't seem justified to Jia Mu!

Which shipyard needs two thousand tons of high-quality steel for armor and weapons? Even if there are official documents, this amount is simply too large.

Moreover, since Jia Mu was sent from the Central Government for auditing, he could access many things. Unbeknownst to him, he found out that Lul Jun recently engaged in numerous large-currency transactions. Mann Chong had been particularly focused on big currency flows, prompting Jia Mu to habitually monitor them.

Looking at the involved parties, the Five Great Merchants include the Zhen Family, Wu Family, and Central Plains tycoons like Zhang Shiping, Su Shuang, and Sunx Min—all came up. Additionally, figures like Liu Zhang, Yuan Shu, and Zhou Yu, accompanied by moneyed individuals like Gongsun Gong and Shixie—considering the large and small aristocratic families involved, compelled Jia Mu to think twice.

After Jia Mu's preliminary investigation, he realized he couldn't remain calm; the amount and various materials Lul Jun was involved in totaled over a billion. What's the endgame here?

Besides Jia Mu, the Cao Cao faction also had people contacting to secure hundreds of tons of quality steel from Lul Jun. Naturally, this was just a thought; Lul Jun wouldn't sell the steel—a shortage even for his own use.

Indeed, someone from Cao Cao's side officially contacted Liu Bei, aiming to purchase quality steel. This person, Lyu Qian, was the liaison for this matter. However, aside from official channels, there were private routes involved too. Whether they could buy steel from Chen Xi was uncertain for the Cao Cao side.

Nonetheless, the person assigned to contact Lul Jun still hadn't connected with him until now.

As for Jia Mu, after confirming the issues, while he felt like he was meddling a bit, he still couldn't suppress his curiosity, sneaking over to see what the Lul Family wanted. But before he entered, he saw Gan Ning rushing out carrying Lul Jun.

"Uh. General Gan!" Jia Mu startled, immediately inclined and saluted.

"You—oh, right, you're Strategist Jia's son, Jia Suzhi. What are you doing here?" Gan Ning looked at Jia Mu, feeling familiar. It took him a while to realize this was Jia Xu's eldest son, though he seemed much more heroic compared to previous years.

"Audit." Jia Mu paused, his sharp eyes scanning everyone, cold and ruthless as he spoke—a transformation after recent arrests. "Here to audit Lul Family Shipyard; issues exist in steel and funds' flow!"

Throughout this time, the biggest change for Jia Mu was becoming calm and learning how to leverage his position in chaotic situations. Regardless of problems, he first defined his position to avoid acting without reason!

"Audit?" Gan Ning fell silent for a moment, nodding. With Jia Xu as the core of the Civil Official System, dispatching his eldest son for this matter suggested many implications Gan Ning already suspected. Though he wasn't sure if Jia Mu came for this or happened to encounter it.

If he came for this, then surely higher-ups were trying to challenge positions. Someone might be using Jia Mu to involve Jia Xu and suppress Chen Xi in this round. The ones involved, be they merchants or aristocratic families, shipyard or marines—all were backed by Chen Xi!