Chapter 6 Replicating Ordnance

While Zaitao’s troops were being equipped with his own rifles, up on Gulu Mountain, Mr. Robert was counting banknotes bundle by bundle. His eyes were bloodshot, and despite the freezing cold, he had stripped off his padded jacket and was sweating profusely. The rogue who had just become a gentleman now discovered for the first time just how wonderful it felt to be tired from counting money.

As for the firearms, Yang Xiaolin was quite satisfied. Over three thousand Colt revolvers—the characteristics of this pistol were rapid fire, extremely low recoil, and an almost negligible chance of a jammed bullet. Yang Xiaolin did not want the handguns for mere show; they would appear on the battlefield as close-combat weapons more vital than bayonets, which made rate of fire and stability override everything else.

There were also over six thousand Type 98 Mauser rifles, the performance of which was equally stable. The most crucial factor was that these rifles, with only slight modifications, could be converted into semi-automatic rifles, and many of their internal parts could be directly utilized.

Neither the rifles nor the pistols had cost much money. The one thousand carbines were slightly more expensive, but not outrageously so. What cost Yang Xiaolin a massive fortune were the two hundred Maxim heavy machine guns, along with five of the latest Madsen light machine guns.

The Madsen light machine gun had just gone into production in Denmark that very year. Upon its debut, its lightweight profile won the favor of military forces across various nations. Its price was already exorbitantly high, and coupled with the fact that Yang Xiaolin's procurement channels were limited, by the time these five light machine guns were delivered to Gulu Mountain, Yang Xiaolin had shelled out forty thousand British pounds for them!

Looking at the stacks of banknotes being loaded into his carriage by Robert one after another, Yang Xiaolin genuinely felt a sudden impulse to eliminate Robert and perform a black-market double-cross.

"Robert, can't you lower the price even a little bit?"

Robert, right in the middle of the excitement of counting money, shrugged. "Mr. Yang, I went to a tremendous amount of effort to acquire these guns. You know that no country is willing to sell weapons to you right now; I bought all of these off the black market, and the price is already quite fair."

Yang Xiaolin picked up a light machine gun, loaded it with ammunition, and aimed the muzzle directly at Robert, who was busy counting cash. Terrified, Robert dropped the money in his hands and scrambled away in a clumsy panic. "Hey! Hey! Stop joking around! Watch out for accidental discharges!"

Even with Yang Xiaolin pointing the weapon straight at his face, Robert refused to budge on the price because he knew very well in his heart what kind of business was the most lucrative: a monopoly. Gulu Mountain was precisely that right now; apart from Robert himself, Yang Xiaolin had no second choice.

Sure enough, after taking aim for a moment, Yang Xiaolin smiled and lowered the muzzle of his gun. "You scoundrel are truly ruthless. I am considering whether to change business partners for our next transaction."

Only then did Robert let out a sigh of relief. "Mr. Yang, please believe that there is no one more suited to cooperate with you than me. Please don't make such jokes next time. By the way, what else do you need?"

Yang Xiaolin glanced at him. "I don't need anything right now. I will contact you when I do."

A flattering smile crept across Robert's face. "I opened a trading firm in Fengtian called The Greater Britain. It operates under the guise of handling transits, but in reality, it exists to serve you. If Mr. Yang has any needs, you can find me there."

With that, he finished packing all the money. Yang Xiaolin’s British pounds had not been enough to cover the bill, so this time he had paid with a large amount of Japanese yen and Russian rubles. It did not matter; Robert would take any kind of currency. Various banknotes filled two large chests entirely. Robert said, "Alright, Mr. Yang, I must be leaving now. I hope our next cooperation will be just as pleasant."

Yang Xiaolin shook his hand. "Doesn't Mr. Robert plan to stay here for a few days?"

Robert looked around and then said with a hint of dissatisfaction, "To be honest, this place of yours is hardly a suitable place to host guests, and I really must return to England immediately. I've met the daughter of a Member of Parliament, and I'm going back to pursue her. If I succeed, who knows, perhaps I might become a politician in the future."

Hearing this, Yang Xiaolin smiled. "Very well, I wish you success, Mr. Robert."

Robert offered his final parting words to Yang Xiaolin. "I also wish you all the best at Gulu Mountain. Let me mention this beforehand—I have partnered with Gasly to open a factory in Britain specializing in the manufacture of agricultural machinery. That is a legitimate business, and if you ever need anything, I can offer you an absolute discount."

An idea suddenly struck Yang Xiaolin, and he immediately asked, "Do you manufacture tractor tracks?"

Robert paid no heed to the implication behind the question. "We are currently in the process of importing that technology, and I believe production will begin next year."

Yang Xiaolin nodded. "I suppose we will definitely cooperate again next time."

After Robert went down the mountain, Yang Xiaolin brought all of those light machine guns directly into his own arsenal. The person in charge here now was named Gao Tong.

Gao Tong was an American citizen and a senior technician at the Ford Motor Company in the United States. He originally had a home and a stable life in America, but his wife and child were killed in a traffic accident. Gao Tong took the drunk driver to court in an American court of law, but in the end, the American judge merely ordered the responsible driver to pay Gao Tong some financial compensation to settle the matter, and the driver bore no criminal responsibility whatsoever.

In the courtroom, Gao Tong loudly expressed his dissatisfaction with the verdict, but the judge instead accused him of contempt of court and fined him fifty dollars. Fifty dollars was a trivial matter; Gao Tong did not care about the money. What he cared about was what the judge said at the very end. The judge had declared, "Enough! Isn't it just running over and killing a Chinaman? It's no big deal!"

Those words were what brought Gao Tong and Sun Yat-sen together.

When Gao Tong arrived at Yang Xiaolin's place, Yang Xiaolin asked him what salary he desired. Gao Tong replied that as long as the work he did was for the salvation of China, he did not want a single cent of pay, and Yang Xiaolin only needed to provide his meals. Most of the other technicians felt the same way. They might not have asked for it, but Yang Xiaolin could not simply give them nothing. Technical talent deserved generous treatment—they needed to be well-fed, comfortably housed, and free from financial stress so that they could wholly dedicate themselves to scientific research.

Therefore, Yang Xiaolin still paid them a salary of fifty taels of fine silver per month, an amount even higher than what Gao Tong had earned in the United States.

In front of these technicians, Yang Xiaolin skillfully disassembled a Madsen light machine gun and laid out the parts one by one on the table. "How about it, brothers? Can you replicate this?"

The technicians crowded around, picking up the parts and examining them carefully one by one.

Yang Xiaolin explained in a soft voice from the side, "The automatic operating system is a short-recoil barrel design, and the locking mechanism is a pivoting bolt. The curved magazine is mounted on the upper right of the receiver. When firing, the barrel recoils, causing the feed mechanism to rotate and shift the cartridge leftward to the loading port, where the feeding rod then pushes it into the chamber. The extraction mechanism is of the extractor-lever type; the rearward movement of the barrel causes the lower end of the extractor rod to strike the receiver's ejection face, generating a rotation that extracts the cartridge case out of the chamber from the upper end and slides it out of the bottom of the gun."

Hearing this, Gao Tong nodded. "It is not overly complex. We can give it a try."

Yang Xiaolin looked into Gao Tong's eyes and noticed numerous bloodshot veins. Over the past few days, Gao Tong had been helping him develop that semi-automatic rifle, and he had heard that sometimes the man worked day and night without rest.

"Gao Tong, take care of your health."

Gao Tong nodded indifferently. "By the way, Commander, the gas-operated system for the rifle you mentioned has already taken shape. Is there really no issue with mounting it directly beneath the barrel? Will the automatically ejected cartridge cases injure the shooter? Furthermore, I remain worried about the possibility of extraction failures—issues like the jams we see with automatic pistols nowadays."

Yang Xiaolin said, "Injuries to the shooter should not occur. As for jams, they are unavoidable; do not let this problem bog you down. Just tinker with the ejection port so that when a jam does happen, soldiers on the battlefield can easily handle it."

Yang Xiaolin's greatest advantage was that while he could not manufacture individual gun parts, he had the answers for how to resolve the issues that baffled people of various nations. Gao Tong thought for a moment and finally stated with great certainty, "Very well. In that case, we can have the gun built in another five or six days."

Yang Xiaolin spoke to Gao Tong once more. "Do not push yourselves too hard. You came back from foreign lands to help me, and every single one of you is more precious to me than gold. I hope we can walk together to the very end and witness the changes that will take place in China! Gentlemen, by that time you will feel that everything you did today was entirely worthwhile. But if you exhaust your health and we cannot make it to that day together, I will feel profound regret."

The technicians were somewhat moved. Yang Xiaolin continued, "There is no need to rush too much with this machine gun. Seven days from now, Gulu Mountain will hold a three-day martial arts and skills competition. It will be the day I inspect how well our brothers have been training their military skills over this past period, and you all will be granted a three-day holiday."

Just as Gao Tong was about to say something, Yang Xiaolin raised a finger to signal him to remain silent. "No matter how busy work is, you will rest for three days. This is also so you can see whether the troops under my command are truly worth you risking your lives like this. Gulu Mountain is under my command, and you will listen to me."

Gao Tong's chest heaved slightly. "Very well, then. We will work a bit of overtime these next few days and finish the work at hand."

A grand military competition across the entire army was a prime opportunity to boost morale and unite the troops. When Officer Yang had been in the People's Liberation Army, he had participated in a military region-wide competition; aside from taking fifth place in running, he had failed to place in any of the other events.

Back then, the competition was quite different from the present. Officer Yang had competed in communication signal interference and anti-interference, automotive troubleshooting, tactical mapping, and so forth. Those things were clearly unsuited for the current battlefield.

Aside from the overlapping events of marksmanship and the four-hundred-meter sprint, Yang Xiaolin added bayonet combat, grenade throwing, firearm malfunction clearing, mountain climbing, traversing ravines, concealment and reconnaissance, demolition raids, and live-fire artillery drills.

Ten events in total, scheduled to be completed within two and a half days, with awards presented on the third afternoon. He had already informed the brothers down the mountain of the competition contents and schedule, declaring that the unit with the best overall performance would be rewarded with one hundred taels of gold, and the equipment newly purchased this time would also be prioritized for allocation to that unit.

At the same time, for the individual with the highest score, Yang Xiaolin had specially commissioned a medal inscribed with the words "Top Scholar of the Entire Army," which that brother would be entitled to wear. (Seeking recommendation votes!!)