After the crown prince's quarrel was over, King Su also made a fuss in the clan's mansion, insisting that the governor of Shandong had made a mistake and the body in the coffin was not his son at all.

The emperor let him go back to see his son for the last time, but Prince Su, like the princess, insisted that the soaked corpse was not Li Zhao at all. Like the princess, he took the fire to burn the body.

So Lord Zongling, who was already seventy years old, had no choice but to make another trip and send the third prince, His Highness Prince Su, to the imperial mausoleum to calm down.

It no longer mattered whether Li Zhao died or not. The emperor made it clear that he wanted to cut off King Su's arm, kill his most useful son, and shake those who followed King Su privately.

On the surface, everyone was convinced that Li Zhao was dead, but both the emperor and the Shenjun Palace were sending people to find Li Zhao's whereabouts.

The actions of His Royal Highness Prince Su and the Crown Princess in making a fuss in the mourning hall undoubtedly disturbed the emperor's plans. Those courtiers who planned to stay away from Prince Su had to ask a question in their hearts: Is Li Zhao dead?

If he really wasn't dead, where would he be?

~

Baoen Temple.

Song Qingyue, who was shaved bald, took a big mouthful of the Roujiamo that Zeng Maozhi had secretly bought, chewing it with great satisfaction.

I was forced to eat vegetarian food for three days by old nun Jingxuan. I really suffered an old sin.

Zeng Maozhi stared at the crown prince's bald forehead without saying anything, still looking leisurely and at ease, and asked: "Are you okay?"

"Can't you tell if I'm okay or not?" Song Qingyue looked at Zeng Maozhi and Qiu Shi funnyly, crossed her legs on the small stool, and said, "Okay, considering that I'm shaved bald, can you tell me

Where did my damn ghost go? Did he go south?"

The word "dead ghost" made Zeng Maozhi's eyebrows jump, but he felt it was quite appropriate. He wanted to laugh but didn't dare to laugh. His facial muscles were twitching and he didn't know how to reply. He stared at the Crown Princess and felt that even if her hair was shaved off, the beauty would still be...

Still beautiful!

Seeing that he still remained silent, Song Qingyue snorted, "Don't tell me! If you don't tell me honestly, I will pack up and run away, change my name, and marry someone else! He is buried anyway!"

Qiu Shi was an honest man and immediately said with a smile: "Prince Concubine, please don't make such a joke. His Highness misses you the most. You guessed right, His Highness went south. This is not the case. A few days ago, our family

There are also spies in the palace, but I won’t mention it for the sake of your and the Crown Prince’s safety!”

Song Qingyue snorted again, took a big bite of the meat bun, chewed it a few times, and asked: "What do you mean in the palace? Why did you send someone to monitor me? Could it be that the old man in the palace wants to see it too?"

Let’s see if our prince is really dead?”

Zeng Maozhi lowered his head and touched his nose, and said: "His Royal Highness Changsun did send several groups of people to look for His Highness's body. As for what's happening inside the palace, it's hard to tell."

"Ha! The old man must have acquiesced to this matter. He wanted to support the deposed prince to ascend to the throne, so he tried every means to weaken Prince Su's Palace and Duke Jing's Palace to pave the way for the crown prince, but he also didn't want the crown prince to become too powerful all at once.

, threatens himself, so he wants to keep us alive for a few more years. Huh, that's really cruel. Our Crown Prince is nothing but filial piety to that old man." Song Qingyue shook her head.

After the imperial concubine's analysis in a few words, the doubts in their hearts suddenly turned into convictions. Zeng Maozhi and Qiu Shishi were shocked. If this is true, His Majesty is too ruthless today!

Qiu Shi couldn't believe it and shook his head: "No! Your Highness is your Majesty's favorite grandson!"

Song Qingyue touched her belly and felt that she was already full, but looking at the half meaty steamed bun, she decided to take another bite. When Qiu Shi said this, Song Qingyue just smiled and swallowed what was in her mouth.

, handed the remaining half of the Roujiamo to Mo Ju, rinsed his mouth, wiped his mouth clean, and then said: "The good king is dead, our house has been tortured to death, and there is still one Prince Yu's house left, wait and see

Well, if something happens in Zhejiang, Your Majesty will definitely attack the Duke of Jing."

She touched her full belly and walked around the back hill of Baoen Temple.

Mo Ju carefully accompanied her and whispered: "Prince Princess, don't be too sad. We can keep our hair alive and it will grow back."

Song Qingyue touched her bald and round head. Ever since she came here, her scalp had never felt so refreshing. In this quiet temple, there was nothing to call her except the old nun Jingxuan who was causing trouble for her.

In a bad mood.

Halfway through the walk, scattered raindrops suddenly appeared in the sky. Song Qingyue had to go back to her meditation room to take a nap. When she woke up, she found Zeng Maozhi and Moju Molan and said: "Moju Molan, we are closed tonight."

Don’t let anyone in at the courtyard gate, just say I’m in a bad mood and don’t want to see anyone, Mr. Zeng!”

"My subordinate is here!" I don't know where Zeng Maozhi was hiding. When Song Qingyue called, he appeared immediately.

"Let's go to the cave tonight." Song Qingyue laughed.

After dark, Song Qingyue secretly went to the cave.

Masters have already explored some methods in the heat treatment of steel before.

That is to say, when annealing, do not anneal too fast, maintain a certain temperature for a period of time, and then slowly cool it down. The barrel produced in this way is more durable and can withstand more and more violent gunpowder, and thus can greatly reduce the explosiveness of the gunpowder.

chamber probability.

It's just that the masters are still figuring out the length of time to keep warm and how to control the temperature.

Sometimes technology updates are like this. Once you have the right direction, you can make breakthroughs very quickly.

Baoen Temple was not close to the cave. Every time, Zeng Maozhi had to carry her halfway up the mountain and then ride a fast horse over there. Counting the round trip time, she could not stay in the cave for more than an hour and a half.

Therefore, she always talks about everything in short sentences, and writes down her thoughts on paper in detail in advance for the reference of the masters.

For example, this time, she came here to help the masters improve the design of the musket.

The master looked at Song Qingyue's new drawing, stroking his increasingly sparse beard and asked: "Are you saying that carving such a spiral rifling into the rifle barrel can increase the range?"

Song Qingyue nodded: "I thought you couldn't make it before, so I didn't mention it, but I have been idle in the temple these past few days. I will tell you when I think of it."

"This thread can be made with a broaching machine, but it will take some effort. Can the angle of the thread be clever?"

Song Qingyue laughed: "I have to trouble you to adjust it slowly and try it slowly. You can also try to adjust the length of the gun barrel."

"No problem, we'll take care of it!" The blacksmith also laughed.

Song Qingyue suddenly felt like a mentor. She provided an idea and someone helped with the dirty work.

"There is also the design of the bullet. This cone is too straight. Try making the sides slightly curved. This streamlined shape can fly farther in the air than a straight cone." Song Qingyue drew a schematic diagram on the paper.

"And I think we can consider coating the lead bullet with copper. Otherwise, if the temperature is too high, the lead will melt and get stuck in the rifling, and the rifling will be meaningless."

"Why is the tip of this bullet changed to a curved shape?" The masters are puzzled, because the cost of creating a curved tip is much higher than the cost of a simple pointed tip.

"Same as a ship, the bow is also curved, right?" Song Qingyue said with a smile, "Bullets flying in the air will encounter resistance just like a ship sliding in the water. A streamlined shape will be more resistant than a pointed and straight shape.

There’s less resistance.”

"That's it! Why didn't we think of this before!" A young master shouted with bright eyes.

But the master craftsmen held their chins and considered using this "streamlined design" on large artillery shells.

The cost of using bullets is too high, and the range may not be increased much because the size of the bullet itself is very small.

But cannonballs are different. They are large in size and have a large cross-sectional area, so the "air resistance" they receive is greater. Changing the shape in this way may greatly increase the flight distance of the cannonball and extend its range.

Song Qingyue glanced at the huge and heavy mechanical clock in the cave, and then said: "I can't stay here for too long. Today, I want to talk to the masters about welding. Didn't you say before that aluminum has been successfully extracted?

?Give me a small aluminum bar, help me make it thinner, and I will do an experiment for you to see."

Aluminum has very little hardness and will turn into a flat piece after a few hits.

In fact, Song Qingyue wanted aluminum foil, but it didn't matter, she could try it with it first.

She found a rusty iron tool, scraped some rust powder off, put it together with an aluminum bar, and ignited it with red phosphorus. The result was no success.

Song Qingyue slapped her head. There was no magnesium bar on hand to ignite the fire, nor potassium chlorate to generate oxygen.

How to increase the flame temperature?

Increase oxygen levels?

So Song Qingyue asked the masters to bring the hand-operated generator, insert the cathode and anode into light salt water, use an inverted funnel to collect oxygen at the anode, and then leak it out through a conduit.

Another master made the aluminum sheet thinner at the same time, and then ground it into powder. Then, the aluminum powder, rust powder, and red phosphorus powder were mixed together.

Finally, the mixture is placed in a crucible, while oxygen is flowing and ignited.

Sure enough, after a few seconds, the powder burst out with astonishing light, lighting up the entire cave!

The masters who were doing other research all looked at it with inquiring eyes. Some of them were curious and even put down their work and came to see what was going on.

After the light faded, the cave was filled with choking smoke. Song Qingyue couldn't bear it and ran to the exit, coughing as she ran.

However, the curious blacksmiths did not appear to be affected at all and squatted down to observe the remaining contents of the crucible.

A black lump.

"What's this?"

A younger and more daring person actually grabbed it with his hand. Naturally, he was so hot that he screamed. The experienced master next to him immediately brought the small water tank over. After a period of chaos, a master blacksmith picked it up with iron tongs.

That thing, come closer and take a closer look.

"Isn't this iron?"

"iron?"

"Is it turning rust into iron?"

"Seems to be!"

"Hey! This is amazing!"

Song Qingyue ran to a place with fresh air to stop coughing, covered her mouth and nose with a handkerchief, and then returned.

"Prince Princess, is this lump iron?" the old master asked.

Song Qingyue said: "Yes, the remaining residue is alumina powder."
To be continued...