Black Iron’s Glory

Chapter 439 Doing Business Before the War

Claude stepped into the front command, took off his hat, and handed the horse whip to his deputy, Lieutenant Colonel Anders, as he dislodged the cape and greeted General Albert: "What has happened to those three Hicks standing regiments in the Rodex Bay colony for the past half month? ”

Something happened at the Blackstone Firearms Manufacturing Workshop some time ago, and Claude was required to come to the main slate. In addition, the projectiles developed by sister Anna and Mrs. Sonia have advanced considerably, and Claude is on her way to fill the gap, so Claude left Frontline Command for almost half a month at the firearms factory and arrived back today.

General Albert was on duty at Front Line Command during this period in response to an emergency. He shook his head: “No big move, or as before, most of the officers and soldiers of the three Hicks Standing Army conducted daily operational exercises and pre-war training in the Rodex Bay colony. At the same time, they also sent troops to set up a very rudimentary defensive vigilance front along the northern and eastern mountain borders, with a separate regiment of troops.

Beyond that, the hawks sent letters from the agents saying that their barley business was very good and very popular with these Hicks veterans. The second batch of 50,000 barrels of wheat they shipped to was already half-drinking, and they offered 100,000 barrels of wheat to these Hicks over the next six months in the name of the bison dealership, or a hundred kilograms of large barrels, for a total of more than 40,000 gold crowns. Our war zone alone can earn an extra 10,000 gold from the Hicks. ”

Wheat is a low-alcohol wine, somewhat like Claude's previous beer. In a tavern in the war zone, a glass of wheat is about a kilo, or five Finneys. The barrel contains fifty kilos of wheat wine, one hundred kilos, and the market price of one barrel of wheat wine is five riazos, or half a silver tall.

But the barley prices sold to the Hicks by the Buffalo Shop are double the market price. One barrel sells two silver tallers, 20 riazos, plus shipping costs. A hundred thousand barrels of single battlefield can profit ten thousand gold kroner. No wonder General Albert is rich and generous for the Hicks...

A 100-person wheat mill can produce 23,000 kilos of wheat wine a day as soon as the ingredients are picked up, and 100,000 barrels of wheat can find several more mills to complete this order within three months. The two direct jurisdictions of Cromwell and Bering Ghana, which have become two major food-producing provinces under the jurisdiction of the theatre, have worked hard over the past two years in the reclaimed wasteland of more than two million Royal Army immigrants to harvest distressing amounts of food.

I had no idea that the Hicks' order for wine had found a new way out of the excess food in the direct administration. The first three standing legions alone would consume so much wine. It was conceivable that the order would continue to increase after the next seven standing legions arrived. If you sell food to the enemy, nobody in the war zone will agree, but if you sell wheat wine to the enemy at a high price, then nobody cares. It just feels strange to make enemy money like this.

Claude laughed dumbly and it was ridiculous to make a little money from the enemy before the war even started. After receiving a pile of falcon messages from General Albert, Claude looked closely at the appearance. The first was intelligence from the colonies of the Gulf of Rodex. In fact, they registered the Hicks' three standing regiments on a daily basis. Indeed, as General Albert said, the enemy behaved in a mediocre manner, and nothing unusual happened.

This was followed by a report sent back by General Bitchklin, who was responsible for surveying the terrain in the eastern and northern mountainous areas of the Nikancha nation and supervising the implementation of the firm wall clearing decision by the Nikancha settlement. In a message from Hawk, he said that the eastern mountains had been surveyed and that a defensive front was being constructed. And one of the leading fielders of the Rock Corps he took with him was also on a mission to train the Nikans to arm themselves and supervise the Nikans in building defensive positions.

Then came a joint Hawk message from Colonel Berklin and Colonel Muried, each carrying two regiments of Legion Thunder, who were sweeping the hinterland colonies of the Kingdom of the Hicks with autumn winds, supported by Nikancha's lead and logistical supplies. Progress is well under way, with extremely minor casualties and very rich seizures. It's just that this inland colony of the Kingdom of Hicks is a little too big, mostly mountainous, and they've only taken half of its territory so far, and it's probably going to take two months to complete their mission back...

Finally, the routine briefings from General Bolognick and General Skerry, General Bolognick mainly asked Claude if a reserve army was to be formed in the theatre to prevent the front line from engaging the Hicks, who had suffered too many casualties in the army, leading to a loss of life... It would appear that the Hicks were still putting some pressure on General Bolognick, after all, this time it was a solid 10 standing regiment with more than 600,000 troops.

The Eagle Message from General Skerry was a briefing on the readiness of various logistical materiel and the ongoing arms deal with the Nikanchas. The Nikancas also spent a lot of money bleeding this time, packing up almost as much guns and artillery from the war zone warehouses that had been captured in the first three colonial wars, all of the Kingdom of Hicks. A further request was made in the hope that they would be sold Obash type III flaring rifles in theatre.

At present, the Thunder Corps and the Rock Corps, as well as eighteen local guard regiments composed of late veterans of the two corps, are equipped with Obash type 3 flare rope guns. If Claude hadn't guided the development of the Sonia 591, the Obash 3 would have been one of the most advanced fireline guns in the French world today, or the top three, at least.

The most important feature of the Obash III is that it has a range of about 100 metres for precise shooting, thanks mainly to the special customization and processing of its barrel material. When the bullet is fired from the barrel, it keeps the ballistics stable for a straight distance of 100 metres, which provides the strongest guarantee for precise targeting within 100 metres.

And the countries of the Farea continent, no matter how they imitate the Obash 3 type fireline guns, are within seventy or eighty meters of their precise target range. Fire rope guns, like those equipped by the Standing Army of the Kingdom of Hicks, aim precisely at a distance of 70 meters. This means that the two are 30 meters apart, and when the soldiers of the Kingdom of Hicks can accurately target troops in the direct territorial battle zone, they need to endure a distance of nearly 30 meters from the precise targets of the soldiers of the Kingdom of Ovilas before they can strike back at the enemy...

Until this colonial war broke out, the Kingdom of Ovilas paid little attention to the armed armaments situation in the seven overseas territories. Because local guards were equipped with Obash Type I and Type II firearms that were sufficient to suppress the Nikancha riots and to collect taxes from Nikancha colonies. Until the Rangers came to the mainland of Nubian in response to the invasion of the Overseas Territories by the Kingdom of Hicks.

The Rangers are fully staffed with 32,000 men, equipped with Obash 3 type firerope guns and 3,000 spare guns. Later, the Rangers expanded into regiments, and two overseas field regiments were restructured to serve as descendants, bringing in another 100,000 Obash type 3 firearms. In order to compensate for the loss and destruction of firearms on the battlefield, a firearms repair workshop and ammunition production workshop were established in the area of direct jurisdiction.

When the Second Colonial War was won, Marshal Michel was ordered to return to the kingdom itself. In order to appease him and to express support for the strategic vision put forward by Marshal Michel in response to the colonial war. Once again, the Kingdom has transported 100,000 Obash type III firearms to form five reinforced second-line divisions and reinforce the local armed forces in the Territory.

The Third Colonial War wiped out three major regiments of the Kingdom of Hicks under Claude's command, although the war was brutal, with nearly 20,000 casualties and thousands of damaged firearms. Later, however, General Algers led the guard regiment to fight for merit, and despite the assassinations, the Port Vibato colonial county was occupied by General Bolognick's army, making it the eighth overseas direct jurisdiction of the theatre.

Upon their return to the mainland of the kingdom, the military-style materiel, such as firearms and ammunition, were left behind in theatre, carrying a wealth of trophies and local specialities from overseas jurisdictions. General Skerry has organized a total of around 240,000 Obash type 3 firearms in the immediate area of operations. This is due to the fact that when the Rangers returned to the mainland of the Kingdom, Marshal Michel ordered that all weapons and equipment be left behind and boarded empty-handed, so that an additional regiment of weapons and equipment could be added to the area of direct command...

The Legion of Thunder and Rock, together with 18 local guard regiments, have a total of 220,000 troops. So there are about 20,000 spare Obash Type III firearms in the Ward Logistics Department, and, of course, half of them are second-hand guns that have been repaired by a firearms repair workshop. It was these second-hand guns that General Skerry wanted to sell to the Nikancas.

Without Claude's new Sonia 591 rifle, the war zone would never have had the idea of an Obash 3. But now that we have a new type of rifle in contrast, General Bolognick and General Skerry can no longer see this seemingly backward and primitive fireline gun. General Skerry means to subsidize the high cost of equipping new rifles for troops in theatre by selling Obash type III firearms at a high price.

One of the firearms seized from the Kingdom of Hicks was sold to hardware kroner in the war zone, and the manufactured light field artillery produced by the Kingdom of Hicks was sold to the Nikansas at a high price of 150 gold kroner. Of course, the war zone also needed to provide instructors to teach those Nikansas to fire artillery. Only now have the Nikanchas caught sight of the Obash Type III flare gun, equipped with troops belonging to the theatre, saying that General Claude agreed to sell it to them. General Skerry was prepared to sell them the repaired second-hand guns and quoted a price of 20 gold kroner.

Claude felt a little dizzy and had to slow down first. Not that there's going to be a war. Why is everyone so busy doing business? The agents sent out were busy doing the barley business with the Hicks, and even General Skerry had a knife for the Dhanikantha. Fortunately, there is now a firearm factory in theatre that can produce new rifles to replace the Obash 3. Otherwise, after a big war, the warehouse doesn't even have a spare gun, so it's over...

So Claude was also unambiguous, and wrote a direct and consensual reply asking Deputy Anders to send it to General Skerry in a hawk letter, only to emphasize the price of one twenty gold kroner and not to allow the Nikancas to bargain. It's a good business to sell a new rifle to the Nikancas with only ten gold kroners, and to replace two new rifles with an Obash 3.

As for another hawk message sent to Claude by General Bolognick, Claude left his mouth open and was prepared to ignore it. The letter states that General Bolognick, in the name of the theatre, intends to order 10,000 revolvers from Claude, distribute them to all officers of the force and form several assault teams equipped with revolvers to enhance the offensive capability of the night assault.

That's a good idea, Claude also has this intention, just that General Bolognick offered a somewhat disrespectful price, that he was willing to offer the price of a revolver for a hardware krone, and hopefully Claude would understand the financial strain and difficulty of the war zone... Claude said that I understand you who understood me, the last time I ordered a thousand revolvers for the war zone, the market price of twelve gold kroner once I gave you a discount of just ten gold kroner and spared you thirty bullets.

Because the quantity is too small, there is no need to build any production lines. Sisters Anna and Lady Sonia spent seven or eight days building all the spare parts directly in the Alchemy Charm Array and completed the order, earning two or three thousand gold kroner in hard work.

The war zone is now ordering 10,000 revolvers at a price of only KK hardware, and Claude is under financial strain in the war zone. This is a joke, the 50,000 gold kroner may not even be enough to assemble a mechanized production line for the production of revolvers. Needless to say, the riches squeezed out of the Nikans this time amounted to over two million gold and silver ingots, and the Legion of Thunder helped the Nikans seize property seized from the hinterland colonies of the Kingdom of Hicks, with an estimated millions of gold kroner...

Not to mention that the cost of replacing all units in theatre with new rifles plus training is more than enough to pay for the rewards and pensions after the war and to recruit another 100,000 recruits to form two reserves. It can be said that after two months of waiting for Berklin and Muriel to come back with the capture, the war zone will be rich...

A revolver bids hardware kroner, and Claude decides to ignore General Bolognick's hawk message. Besides, the Blackstone Firearms Manufacturing Workshop has just reached the standard of full-load production, (that's what I went to deal with this time), all my energy is invested in the production of new rifles, where people can assemble a mechanized production line for the production of revolvers, and I don't even have time to train technicians.

Moreover, Claude defined revolvers as self-defense and defensive defensive weapons, with little lethality over short ranges being his biggest drawback. With new rifles, revolvers have a very limited role to play on the battlefield.

Besides, sisters Anna and Lady Sonia are still busy working on ideas and concepts for several new types of weapons that Claude has to offer, which, if successfully developed, are much more powerful on the battlefield than revolvers. So there's no need to discuss the production of revolvers at this emergency juncture, Claude has always been less of a bargainer...

After reading these falcon messages, Claude said to General Albert, "It seems that our previous arrangement did not make the Hicks nervous, nor did they know if they were absolutely confident or whether they had given a death order on it or not to allow them to move lightly. It seems that only in a couple of months will the Hicks attack the Nikanca nation after the next two standing legions have been transported..."

Actually, Claude didn't have an idea for the three Hicks standing regiments that had just arrived in the Rhodex Bay colony, but Claude was not sure that the Thunder Corps had just replaced the veterans and taken the recruits to complete this attack with one enemy, three weak and strong.

That is why he entrusted newspapers under the direct jurisdiction of the theatre with vigorously claiming military assistance from the theatre to the Nykansas, including the sale of seized guns and artillery produced by the Kingdom of Hicks to the Nykansas, the dispatch of instructors to guide the Nykansas in their armed training and operations.

The only thing that has not been mentioned is that the forces of the theatre have entered the northern and eastern mountainous areas of the Nikanca Nation, but that the theatre has deployed heavy troops along the border with the Nikanca Nation, confident that Royal Immigrants with the capacity to defend the Overseas Territories will continue to live in peace and happiness.

Claude was confident that agents in the Hicks Kingdom would pass on newspapers and information from overseas territories to the commanders of those three standing regiments, and Claude would be happy to harvest the net if anyone could not afford the lure to carry out an unarmed raid on the Nikansas without training.

He even intends to surround the enemy and neutralize the three new Hicks standing regiments in the mountains. At that time, I wanted to see the look on the face of the Hicks, and the subsequent two regiments arrived and found themselves alone, building barriers to self-defense in the colony of the Gulf of Rodex, which would make the Kingdom of Hicks a big joke for all the countries of the Farea continent.

It is unfortunate that the three Hicks Standing Army Corps were not appropriated, not even sending squad scouts into the border mountains to conduct reconnaissance operations. Claude was very disappointed that the military barracks in the Rodex Bay colony were also laid loose inside out, leaving no opportunity to be found...