The Empress’s Gigolo

“Sir Ren, do you really think that this method will work?” Tao Jiyuan raised his doubts. Even though burning one piece of stone worked, he still felt that this method was too fantasy-like.

Not only him, Yu Qiong, Teng Ji and so on, who were by the side listening also had the same thoughts.

“We should test it out to see if it’s feasible or not. After all, there aren’t any better solutions presently, am I right?” Ren Baqian spread his arms and proposed.

“That’s true.” Tao Jiyuan nodded.

“Sir Gu, I will have to trouble you to arrange this.”

Following which, Gu Qiong assigned a hundred guards to keep the three hundred prisoners of war under control as they proceeded to fell timber.

Three prisoners of war were tied together using one rope. Three hundred of them nicely made up a hundred groups and the hundred guards were just enough to keep watch over them.

Mount Damo was an unusual mountain. There were many other mountains in the surrounding and they were all lush and green, but Mount Damo was the only exception whereby it was bare and not even a single blade of grass existed.

The distance for felling timber couldn’t be considered as near. After all, the timber that had been nearby had already been chopped down to be used as fuel for daily cooking and not much was left.

The whole day, a total of thirty tree trunks, which were more than twenty centimeters in diameter and longer than three meters were being transported back.

The prisoners in this mine stopped digging the mountain, dragged the thirty logs down to the platform at the bottom of Mount Damo and chopped them into smaller pieces.

After two full days of work, a total of fifty tree trunks were lugged back. Those that were delivered on the first day, were chopped into pieces as thick as an arm. Following which, the rest were kept for burning part of the mountain.

…

A group of more than hundred people, bringing along over twenty carts and over seventy fork-horned cows, headed in the direction of Mount Damo.

The fork-horned cow was one of the most commonly livestock used for meat in Dayao, it grew very quickly, about half the time when compared with the crooked cow. The crooked cow took five years to mature, whereas the horned cattle took just over three years.

The taste of this type of beef was average, quite lean, and generally consumed by the military personnel.

They were the people who sent supplies to the miners on Mount Damo once every twenty days. Besides food, some readymade pickaxes, spears, and other digging tools were delivered as the tools used for mining in Mount Damo wore out very quickly.

“Brigade commander, what are you looking at?” Someone shouted immediately as everyone turned in the direction of the foot of the mountain and saw smoke billowing from Mount Damo.

In Dayao, ten people formed a team with a team leader that was of Secondary class, Rank 9. Twelve teams formed a brigade, with a brigade commander that was of Secondary class, Rank 8. Five brigades formed a battalion, led by a military officer that was of Secondary class, Rank 6 to Secondary class, Rank 5.

On average, a battalion consisted of six hundred and fifty to seven hundred people, including logistics staff.

Five battalions formed an army troop of between three thousand three hundred to three thousand eight hundred soldiers.

Five army troops formed a division of about fifteen thousand soldiers.

One entire brigade was stationed at this place. The brigade commander, heard and raised his head with his expression changed. “There seems to be an incident on Mount Damo, two of you report to headquarters, one brigade will stay here to guard, and the rest put down your gear and follow me with your weapons.”

On the order, everyone put aside what they were carrying and thundered towards Mount Damo with a sword in hand.

The brigade commander frowned as he walked.

How is it possible for something to happen on Mount Damo?

Are the prisoners rioting?

Even if they are rioting, the three hundred guards over there are enough to suppress them.

Actually, there was no need for three hundred guards, two hundred should be enough to totally subdue them.

What was the thick smoke about? Somebody was clearly setting the fire.

The brigade commander was thinking and worrying about the situation in Mount Damo. He covered sixty kilometers in four hours with his soldiers and arrived in a hurry at the base of Mount Damo.

However, the situation was not as chaotic as he imagined, the guards at the base were standing by quietly, as if nothing had happened.

“What happened?” The company commander hastily asked. He looked at the thick columns of smoke and was able to detect the burning smell.

“Nothing happened, everything is normal,” the guard promptly answered.

The brigade commander was relieved. Soon after, he was dumbfounded.

If nothing happened, then what was happening above?

“Brigade commander Sheng, it should become clear if all of you go up to take a look.” The guard did not understand the specific details and briefly added, “They said it was to burn Mount Damo until it cracks.”

Burn Mount Damo till it cracks?

How is it possible? What kind of nonsense is this?

Upon hearing these words, and also recalling how he and the others had hastily rushed down because of this matter, he fumed with anger.

“All of you, go back and bring the supplies here. In addition, send someone to get the two who headed back to headquarters. I will go up to take a look.” The brigade commander Sheng snapped, wiped the sweat from his forehead, and went up the mountain in a hurry.

Meanwhile at the mountain, Ren Baqian and others stood in front of the wooden house to look at the fire in the distance. A great deal of firewood was burning and the blazing flame made it hard for anyone to get near.

“Sheng Kaishan pays his respects to the few sirs.” Sheng Kaishan saw a few people at the mountain top, and he was surprised. What shocked him the most was not Ren Baqian or Tao Jiyuan, but seeing the winged cavalry here was totally unexpected.

It was known that the winged cavalry were the empress’s personal guards and were rarely mobilized. What was the background of the visitor this time round?

“This is Imperial Deputy Prefect, Sir Ren from Lan City, Sir Tao from Department of Military Arms, and Sir Teng. Kaishan, you and your subordinates should be here by now. How come it is only you here? Where’s all the supplies?” Teng Ji stretched his neck to look into the distance, but save for Kaishan, there was no one else around.

Sheng Kaishan, not knowing whether to cry or laugh, explained, “Sir Gu, I saw the smoke and flame from far away, thought something was wrong and hurried here without bringing the supplies. They have gone back to bring the troops.”

Upon hearing these words, Gu Qiong laughed heartily.

Later on, Sheng Kaishan carefully asked again, “Sir, what is happening here?’

“That Deputy Prefect Ren said something about heating up and then splashing water to see whether the rocks would crack,” Gu Qiong stroked his beard and turned his head to speak.

“This iron mountain is full of iron, are you quenching the iron?” Sheng Kaishan was puzzled. He was not a blacksmith, but he had heard of the term quenching.

Wasn’t it the same as putting forged iron in water, what exactly was the difference between the two?

“You are right.” Gu Qiong hit his thigh in response. “Why didn’t I think of this?’

“Sir Ren, Sir Ren, isn’t this quenching?” Gu Qiong turned his head and shouted.

Ren Baqian heard him and nodded his head, “Quenching is a special process and has its own requirements. For normal quenching, the forged iron, with carbon and other materials, is quenched to form steel, and if done incorrectly, will also crack, not to mention iron. You do not have to worry about this point.”

After hearing this, they couldn’t comprehend what he said. In any case, it seemed that Sir Ren was more knowledgeable than them.

“Didn’t expect Sir Ren to know about forging,” Tao Jiyuan casually said.

“I know a little. Let the fire burn until noon. Once it has passed noon, do not add anymore firewood. I will return to my room to rest first.” Ren Baqian bade them goodbye and returned to his room.

At about three or four in the afternoon, Ren Baqian estimated it was about time and came out of the wooden house. At the same time, he shouted for Tao Jiyuan and Gu Qiong to come out.

After waiting for the blaze to get smaller, Ren Baqian ordered, “Fetch water and pour directly on Mount Damo.”

Upon hearing this, everyone instantly moved and the rest of the people began to keep their spirits up.

Only ten meters of land were burned this time. Along with the numerous pals of water poured onto the mountain wall, hissing sounds was continuously heard. Every pail of water generated a jet of white steam, and soon, it became unbearable for those standing nearby.

Seeing this, Ren Baqian retreated a little.

Only after an hour passed, Ren Baqian waved his hand to put a stop to everything. “It is almost there, wait for the steam to dissipate before we take a look.”

They waited until it was dark and the crowd brought their torches closer to the wall.

“Can it really crack open the rocks?” The few who knew of the idea did not have much confidence and focused their attention on Ren Baqian.

“Check it immediately to find out,” Ren Baqian said. He was a little nervous as all he knew was theoretical stuff. If he wasn’t successful, he would lose face. Moreover, the concave mirror

Following the light on the wall, everyone looked at the wall of the mountain as previously. They felt anguished, could it be that he didn’t succeed?

Ren Baqian kept quiet, walked to one meter in front of the mountain wall, stopped and carefully inspected the wall. Alas, he finally displayed a relaxed expression.

“Hairline cracks, it really cracked!” Gu Qiong walked to one side, carefully inspected the wall of the mountain and shouted loudly in surprise.

The torch lit up the stretch of wall on Mount Damo and small cracks could be seen all over the wall.

Although the cracks could not be considered big, mining along the cracks would be more than twice as fast.

“Sir Ren, this method really does work, I really admire you deeply, the contribution of Sir Ren is extremely huge.” Tao Jiyuan saw the cracks on the walls, was surprised and then offered his congratulations.

He never expected Ren Baqian to complete this mission successfully, moreover, using such a simple and unexpected method.