Urban Sims

A few days later, Suoluo's grain-trading caravan, escorted by several thieves sent by Zhou Ming, left the Glen Territory and headed toward the Iron Castle Kingdom in the south.

Of course, Zhou Ming will not put all his eggs in one basket. In addition to Su Luo's large grain sales caravan, he has also reached a cooperation agreement with some small and medium-sized traveling merchants, asking them to help sell grain, and by the way, to Gran Ling, How full they can be after transporting some needed resources back depends on the abilities of these traveling merchants.

The food marketing problem was initially solved, and Zhou Ming's focus returned to troop training.

Yes, Zhou Ming had never relied on a group of gangsters who were evil-doing, greedy, cruel, and poorly disciplined for the security of Glenland.

Although these robbers, under his money bribes, servants' service and warm hospitality, live happily and unrestrainedly in the castle with facilities like paradise, but they are also like time bombs, which will bring infinite happiness to Grandland at any time. hidden dangers.

Even these robbers still listen to his words now.

For example, in April and May of this year, he asked the thief Roger to take a group of people to plunder and wreak havoc in several territories around the Gran Territory, set up traps and killed several knights, and let Earl Lausitz treat Edward After dying as a robber, he no longer had any doubts and recognized Downey's identity as Lord of Glenland.

Also, in July and August, Zhou Ming personally led a group of thieves in Nathan Territory to prevent Baron Sean of Nathan Territory from sending people to investigate the cause of Fanny's death after he noticed the changes here in Grand Territory. After wreaking havoc, burning farmland and houses, poisoning wells, and setting traps to kill three or four knights, it was determined that Nathanland had no ability to retaliate, and then returned to Granland with the unscathed thieves.

Zhou Ming's positioning for these thieves is that when the regular military force of Gran Territory has not yet been established, he is responsible for clearing the obstacles around Gran Territory and escorting the stable development of Gran Territory. If there is any sign of it happening, he will let the "Alibaba Thieves Group" go out and carry out activities to nip these threats in the cradle.

The thieves are naturally willing to accept such a "positioning". After all, their bounden duty is to burn, kill, loot, and do all kinds of evil. The Grand Land is their old nest, and the grass beside the nest cannot be chewed. Naturally, other territories are when they are extremely bored. Go somewhere to stretch your muscles.

However, such a chaotic and disorderly force like thieves cannot always serve as the defense army of Granland. Training a regular army with strict discipline and strong combat effectiveness has become Zhou Ming's top priority.

In fact, if quick results are desired, Zhou Ming can also ask Downey to recruit some knights and entrust them among the ten knight fiefs of Granland. Knights will even come to apply for jobs by themselves, and it won't take long to recruit some knights.

but--

If the knights are recruited, all the reforms that Zhou Ming made before are basically abolished. After the knights are sealed, the villages, population and farmland in the fief will be autonomous and managed by the knights. The lord's control over the territory will be Eighty or ninety percent was lost in one fell swoop.

What Zhou Ming wants to do now is to take all the resources of Granland into his own hands, reform agriculture, develop industry and commerce, strengthen the military, and then embark on a road of continuous external expansion. How could it be possible with a few knights?

October.

The busy farming season was over, and after the farmers in Glenland had rested for more than a month, Zhou Ming had someone issue a "Winter Training Announcement."

All able-bodied male farmers aged 12-40 must come to the castle to participate in the two-month "winter training."

As soon as the notice came out, the farmers talked a lot, and even caused a local commotion and panic.

"Is there going to be another war?"

"What should we do? Are 12-year-old children going to go? They haven't grown up yet. Aren't they going to die on the battlefield like this?"

"If you can't, just run away. In the big battle last year, two men died in the family. Now there are only two boys left. Do we still need to send them up?"

Seeing that these local panics tended to turn into rumors and spread rapidly, Zhou Ming had to ask someone to issue another explanatory announcement, saying that the "Winter Training Announcement" was just a two-month winter training called for farmers to come to the castle. After the period is over, the farmers will go home and they will not be taken to fight.

The panic of the farmers in the territory was finally calmed down, and they all gathered in the castle to participate in this winter training.

Training ground in front of the castle.

Looking at the 11 square formations gathered together in each village and town below, Zhou Ming asked the training instructors of each square formation to count the number of people.

"From a 12-year-old immature boy to a 40-year-old middle-aged man, there are a total of 1,067 men who can hold weapons in the entire Grand Land. If you want to select qualified soldiers who can go to the battlefield, I don't know how to choose How many?”

Yes, the purpose of Zhou Ming's collective winter training is to select a group of high-quality soldiers who can fight and dare to fight.

These soldiers, he will imitate the organization method of the tiger and wolf divisions of the Qin State, and train a group of crossbowmen, spearmen and light cavalry.

Crossbowmen are equipped with powerful giant crossbows, ballistae or longbows with a longer range, and are long-range attack arms against the enemy.

Pikemen are responsible for resisting the impact of heavy cavalry. During the training process, discipline requirements are extremely strict. Facing the impact of heavy cavalry, they can remain motionless and fearless of death.

The role of light cavalry is mainly to cover one's own flanks, harass the enemy's flanks, and annihilate the enemy's fleeing forces in the pursuit battle. In the later stage, a group of heavy cavalry can also be developed on the basis of light cavalry according to needs.

The military formation that combines these three arms, crossbowmen, pikemen, and light cavalry, has the best balance and cost-effectiveness among all the arms. Dressed cavalry is any single branch of arms, no matter how powerful it is, it can't get any benefit from this army formation.

However, the flaw of this military formation combination is also relatively obvious, that is, it requires a large number of soldiers. Without a large number of soldiers, forming a military formation with a standard thickness will not exert its due power on the battlefield.

Zhou Ming estimated that he would have to train at least an army of 300 elite light cavalry, 300 elite crossbowmen, and 600 elite spearmen, with a total number of 1,200 troops, in order to be able to defeat him within the Earl of Rhodes. Fight against all other military forces.

But now the potential soldiers standing in front of Zhou Ming range from young boys to middle-aged men. There are only over 1,000 people. After excluding a group of weak, timid and worried people, 200 people can be selected in the end. Zhou Ming thought it was very impressive.

"Let's train them for two months first, select all the good ones among them, and then promulgate the reward regulations for joining the army and the reward regulations for military merit. I don't believe that we can't recruit a group of qualified soldiers!"

So, in the next two months, under Zhou Ming's personal supervision, these ordinary farmers were trained according to the training outline he had prepared.

Zhou Ming trained them so that they were not tired. They ran two thousand meters in the morning and evening. They also conducted formation marching and standing training in the middle. They learned how to turn front and back, left and right, and simple bow and arrow and spear training. They also brought dozens of horses to train those who knew how to do it. For farmers who ride horses or want to learn to ride horses, simple riding training is carried out.

During the boring training intervals, Zhou Ming would also organize these farmers and carry out some interesting activities, such as drumming to spread flowers, folk song competitions, impromptu performances, unique skill demonstrations, etc., just like the military training he participated in in college, it was endlessly interesting, and many of them had originally Farmers who are not too interested in winter training gradually like this kind of training.

Not only that, Zhou Ming also set up a list of honors. After praising the top three fastest runners, the top three most accurate bow and crossbow shooters, and the best equestrian and spearmen, he praised them in public. There are material rewards, and for a while, among the farmers, there is a training atmosphere of chasing each other.

Nearly two months later, the weather was getting colder and colder, making it unsuitable to continue training. When the winter training was about to end, Zhou Ming released a blockbuster in front of the group of farmers.

Try to restore the third update. Please give more recommendation votes. The recent chapters have been relatively boring. I hope that the first experience of the second copy will be over in these two days. I still hope that readers will continue to support!