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Although Zhao Hongrun wanted to see the strength of the Qi Army, the "Qi Army" here refers to more than just the "Langxie Army". After all, the Langxie Army is just one of several Qi armies under the command of Tian Dan, the commander of the East Route Army.
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What's more, the Langxie army that attacked the city wall on the west side of Suxian County only had 10,000 people at full strength. It didn't look like they were responsible for the main attack. At most, they were responsible for the feint attack.
Therefore, while Zhao Hongrun was observing the siege battle of Qi State's Langye Army on the west side of Su County's city wall, he slowly steered the battlefield toward the south.
As for the destination, it was naturally the location of Tian Dan, the commander-in-chief of the East Route Army—the place where Tian Dan was located. That was the main force of the East Route Army's attack on Suxian.
However, while observing Langxie's army, Zhao Hongrun also felt frightened.
It wasn't that I was shocked by the combat quality of the Qi army, Langye Army, but I was shocked by their weapons and equipment.
The first thing that caught Zhao Hongrun's attention was the armor of Qi's soldiers.
Different from the thick armor commonly used by the Wei army, the armor of the Qi army reminds people of the word "light" at first glance.
Otherwise, how to explain the fact that the infantry of the Qi army could still walk like flying even though they were wearing armor?
Could it be said that the strength of Qi's infantry is still higher than that of Wei's infantry?
Zhao Hongrun scoffed at this speculation.
Because as far as he knew, the infantry of his Wei State was the most rigorously trained and arduous among all the countries in the Central Plains, especially the "six garrison battalions" such as the Dangshan Army, the Chunshui Army, the Chenggao Army, and the Fenxing Army.
A famous Wei infantryman could often face two or three enemy infantrymen without defeat.
Quite shocking strength!
It’s no wonder, after all, the Wei State relied on infantry and chariots to conquer the world. Although the chariots have been eliminated by the Korean cavalry, it is undeniable that the Wei State’s infantry is still a powerful force that causes headaches for all countries in the Central Plains.
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Compared with the infantry of Wei, the infantry of Qi, no, to be precise, it should be the army of Qi. There is nothing worthy of praise in itself.
There is only one thing, and that is the weapons and equipment of the Qi army.
The wealth of Yin in the Qi State is known to all the world.
When he learned that Brother Liu Wang had gone to Linzi of Qi State as a hostage, Zhao Hongrun once asked the Ministry of Rites about the situation of Qi State.
What he learned at that time left Zhao Hongrun quite stunned.
Qi State's Yin was rich. How rich was Yin?
The country is so prosperous that there seems to be no poor people in the whole country, let alone anyone dying of hunger or freezing to death in the cold winter. I have never heard of it.
"Every nation has a surplus of food." What a remarkable thing this is!
You must know that even in the Wei State, where Zhao Hongrun could not see, countless poor Wei people died of hunger and cold every winter. Needless to say, in the Chu State, every year, the whole country starved to death.
Far more than the 160,000 troops that Xiong Tuo, Lord of Chu Yangcheng, destroyed when he attacked Wei, much more.
But in Qi State, no one died of starvation.
According to Zhao Hongrun's understanding, there are many "charity homes" and "yizhuangs" in various places in Qi State. This kind of charity homes and yizhuangs are not the ones in Yangxia County of Wei State, but are really used to donate food.
place.
Zhao Hongrun once heard a story: There is no one guarding the righteous house or righteous village in Qi State. If passers-by are hungry, they can walk into the villa by themselves, take rice from the jar, and then use it to pile up rice.
Firewood in the corner of the yard was used to cook and fill the stomach.
The only thing these travelers have to do is to "guarantee a certain amount of firewood in the yard" to facilitate subsequent travelers.
If you have money, there is a wooden box in the house. You can throw some money into it as a thank you for taking the food. If you have no money, it doesn't matter. If you remember it in the future, return the corresponding food according to your ability. If
I have forgotten this, and it doesn't matter. The owners of the villas are often local famous families, rich and powerful, and they don't care at all.
As for whether anyone will steal the food in these charity houses, I believe that unless they are self-willed robbers and first-class thieves, the citizens of Qi will never steal.
This is not because Qi State has any corresponding cruel laws, but because the "wind of benevolence and righteousness" prevails in Qi State, and people's hearts tend to be kind. It can be said that people do not pick up things on the road and do not close their homes at night. Relatively speaking, people who have committed crimes are simply nothing in this country.
It is difficult to move even an inch, and no matter where you go, you will be looked down upon.
In addition, the social class contradictions in Qi State are also the weakest in the Central Plains, because almost every family is very wealthy: the common people are rich, the nobles are even richer, and the national style of Qi State also makes it possible for the nobles to oppress the common people.
This behavior is simply unprecedented in this country.
The most incredible thing is that the common people of Qi State actually have enough money to marry and take concubines.
Of course, the direct factor causing this phenomenon is that Qi State sacrifices some men every year in the war against Chu State and South Korea, so that there are fewer men and more women in the country. But in the final analysis, it can also be explained from the
The side reflects the Yin wealth of Qi State.
Because compared with Qi State, Chu State has also had constant wars over the years. It fought with Wei State, fought with Qi State, and fought with the rebels in its own territory. The number of men killed in the battle was not only several times that of Qi State, but Chu State’s
Are common people capable of marrying wives and concubines?
No, they can't even fill their stomachs.
However, as the saying goes, there are advantages and disadvantages. The wealth of Qi State is the highest among all the countries in the Central Plains, but the soldiers of Qi State are the weakest among all the countries.
This "weak" refers to the personal strength of the soldiers, not the strength of the Qi army - the combat effectiveness of the Qi army is reflected in their possession of the best weapons and equipment, as well as the best weapons of war.
But you ask those Qi soldiers to take off their weapons and equipment and fight alone with the equally unarmed Wei infantry?
If one fights three, Wei's infantry will feel extremely relaxed.
For example, the scene that appeared in front of Zhao Hongrun at this moment.
He discovered more than once that within the range of an arrow, the Chu army on the wall on the west side of Su County was unable to shoot through the armor of Langye soldiers with bows and arrows. This discovery made Zhao Hongrun finally realize that the armor of those Qi soldiers were actually
It's not just the advantage of being lightweight.
The Qi army's armor was light and strong.
This made Zhao Hongrun very curious about the material of those armors, and he wished he could go forward to ask Qi Jun for a set of armors and study them carefully.
"Is it the material? Or is it related to the design?"
Zhao Hongrun frowned and thought.
Out of curiosity, Zhao Hongrun rode his mount and slowly approached the main formation of Langxie Army. While the latter's soldiers and generals frowned and watched, he carefully observed the armor of Qi's soldiers.
After observing for a while, Zhao Hongrun finally saw the clues.
In his opinion, the armor of Wei State, including the Chu State and South Korea that he knew, generally used "Zha Armor".
The so-called "zhajia" is to make a set of leather armor from hard leather such as cowhide, which is called "inner armor". On this basis, large pieces of iron protection are sewn and inlaid.
For example, chest armor, back armor, arm armor, etc., these additional small pieces of iron armor will be fixed on the "inner armor", so that the soldiers wearing this type of armor can ensure the minimum mobility.
It can also maximize defense capabilities, especially for vital parts.
Although the armor used by the Qi army also belongs to the category of "zha armor", it is different - they no longer fix the entire piece of iron on the inner armor, but use a piece of about three knuckles to fix it.
Small iron pieces that are long and two knuckles wide are fixed on the inner armor one by one. This is already a partially scaly armor.
Is scale armor stronger than ordinary scale armor?
indeed!
Because the scale armor has a slight curvature, unless it is hit by an arrow from the front, or the arrow is very powerful and has strong penetrating power, otherwise, ordinary arrows will not hit this kind of curved armor.
If the arrow is broken, the angle will be shifted, causing the arrow to "pass by" the owner of the armor.
Of course, although arrows are used as an example here, in fact, scale armor has extremely strong protective capabilities against any long-range and melee weapons, and will "deflect" the enemy's attacks, thus improving defense capabilities in disguise.
The only drawback is that the production process of this type of armor is quite complicated, requiring almost ten times the manpower compared to ordinary armor.
Of course, this is only an advantage in armor design. As for the material of Qi ****'s armor, Zhao Hongrun doesn't look like an ordinary iron material.
Because ordinary iron is actually very brittle, an ordinary bow can easily penetrate the iron within the distance of an arrow. However, the three-stone bow used by some powerful generals can even
It can penetrate half a knuckle-thick iron armor (flat armor) at medium and short range.
As for the armor on the Qi soldiers, Zhao Hongrun didn't look like it was more than half a knuckle, but these armors not only "deviated" the bows and arrows of the Chu army in Suxian County, but even the crossbow arrows fired by the hand crossbows were missed.
Offset.
"That's definitely not iron!... Could it be steel?"
Zhao Hongrun's heart shrank slightly.
The so-called steel, in fact, the most accurate name should be alloy, that is, other metals are mixed into the iron during the smelting process. Therefore, depending on the proportion of each metal, the corresponding exact name is also different.
But no matter what, the armors on those Qi soldiers gave Zhao Hongrun the same message: Qi, no, Lu, may have more advanced iron-smelting (steel-making) technology than Wei!
"..."
Zhao Hongrun's face looked a little ugly.
After all, out of selfishness, he absolutely did not want to see any country other than Wei having excellent smelting technology. It would be best for every country to be like Chu, clinging to bronze smelting, a technology that was destined to be eliminated.
But unfortunately, the State of Lu, known as the "Land of Craftsmen", seems to have been studying smelting technology for a long time, and from the looks of it, it seems that it has reached the point of "smelting alloys", and is even very likely to be ahead of Wei.
country.
"This is not good..."
Zhao Hongrun secretly thought something was wrong.
Because from the general trend, Qi is about to end its era of dominating the Central Plains. Once Qi loses power, Lu, which is dependent on Qi, will inevitably be coveted by Chu and South Korea. After all, Lu itself is not very powerful.
If it loses the financial support of Qi State, even if Lu State has the best craftsmanship in the world, how can it stop the armies of South Korea and Chu State?
"It seems that before Qi loses power, I have to have a good talk with the leader of Lu..."
Zhao Hongrun said secretly.
At this moment, Wei Jiao, the chief of Zongwei, called out in a low voice: "Your Highness, Tian Dan is here."
"Huh?"
Zhao Hongrun raised his head in surprise, and happened to see Tian Dan, whom he had met once in Daliang, the capital of King Wei, slowly heading towards him with dozens of mounted guards.
"Hey, the person who came here is not a good person!"
Looking at Tian Tan's expressionless expression, who was still far away, Zhao Hongrun chuckled.