Chapter 180: We’ll Build an Empire (Ⅱ)

“Suppress the bandits?”

Meng Hun found the idea incredible. The government would even put effort into assigning their military force to deal with the group of people that grew into a scourge of the area. It was unexpected that Langjun wanted to do it herself… But where did they get enough force to do so?

“Umm, you don’t have to worry about this. With the knowledge of how limited our own force is, I will be a hundred percent certain about it if I intend to do so.”

Jiang Pengji was not stupid. There was a high possibility that they would have many casualties, or even lose all their people, in trying to suppress the bandits. Since she brought it up, however, she had a reason, and an absolute certainty, of completing it. To be more frank, she was the kind of shrewd businesswoman who would avoid anything that was non beneficial to herself.

Meng Hun was still puzzled about why the Langjun was so confident about playing hardball with bandits. She must have some last minute cards up her sleeve.

It wasn’t too long before he knew why. Jiang Pengji took a folded piece of palm size bamboo paper out of her sleeve and passed it to him. “Open it up and you might have a clue as to why I dare to do it.”

Meng Hun followed her instructions and skimmed the paper up and down. Finally, he found the right angle to read it at.

The former County Military Chief who had worked for the Meng’s was so stunned that he nearly threw the paper out from his hands. He kept his sanity and succeeded in not doing it. Instead, he cautiously folded the paper as it used to be and acted like he was dealing with a precious treasure.

It was absolutely a priceless treasure to Meng Hun, even though it seemed like just a piece of paper.

“This… draft…” Meng Hun was a soldier who had played with knives and other weapons. He lacked literacy education, but he recognized enough characters and had read enough books to grasp what the draft was about. He had been in the position of being a County Military Chief; his perspective and experience was far beyond that of a normal soldier.

He wasn’t sure about what he was looking at until he scrutinized the tiny annotation on the border. He felt the beginnings of a great idea, which made his heart pump harder. After he was shown the draft, he felt sure that Jiang Pengji had trust and faith in him.

He was no longer the County Military Chief for Meng County. Everyone had ups and downs in their life; he was at the lowest time in his life and he even thought about suicide.

But who didn’t want to make a contribution and a mark in history?

What Jiang Pengji had mentioned was directed right at Meng Hun’s weak and itchy spot inside of him.

He wasn’t as aloof as the others and felt shame about the fact that he had been demoted from a County Military Chief to working for a kid. He never believed that someone as overqualified as himself would ever need to compromise so much just to do such a petty job. Jing Pengji was betting on her future by trusting him, but he was also betting on the master he swore loyalty to.

Meng Hun was such a brave, ambitious, and broad-minded man. He was worth a thousand times more than some people in high positions with his merits, even though he was powerless.

Who could be sure if an unknown guy would mark his name all over the country…

Meng Hun was singularly focused on the draft from Jiang Pengji, which was the crossbow design draft she had shown to Xu Ke earlier. Even an amateur like Xu Ke could see the value of the draft, so it would be weird if a professional military soldier like Meng Hun couldn’t.

“We have… made it?” He tried to restrain his excitement to avoid showing his embarrassment.

Jiang Pengji shook her head with pity. “The craftsmen are still working on it. The crossbow is workable, but the material of making it is extremely particular. The ones with weak ductility wouldn’t have enough force and would have less range than we expected.”

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Meng Hun felt sorry about the fact, but he was not disappointed.

“The size of the crossbow is only half that of the usual ones. It is light and portable, which is a great match for a melee style battle.” Meng Hun started to feel excited about the incredible possibilities after he learned about the content of the draft. He saw why she was very positive about taking the bandits down.

It would take a quantity of time and energy to train a soldier to become a marksman who was able to take crack shots. The training would have a number of requirements on the person’s visibility, arm strength, and their awareness of their surroundings. Every single aspect was critical.

A soldier, who had been through all the painstaking training, that got an injury that caused issues with their arms or visibility on the battlefield would normally be abandoned. That also meant the all the cost of training him would be cast to the wind.

But if the crossbow in the draft could be made, any ordinary soldier with slight training could become a marksman––or not a lot worse than a marksman––without using the same effort, energy, and cost.

What’s more, how many marksmen could pierce a willow leaf with an arrow from the distance of a hundred paces in the world?

As long as they had the crossbows, there would be an equivalent amount of marksmen proportional to the crossbows the craftsmen could make in a very short time.

Considering the portability, the soldiers could easily carry it with enough food and arrows while shuttling back and forth in the jungle.

The bandit members would be shot like grilles, even if they were not close.

That explained why Langjun was so confident. Who knew how much they would need to pay just to suppress the bandits if it was someone else.

But there was one thing he didn’t understand… The government couldn’t care less about the bandits––or it was more like they didn’t have the energy. Why did Langjun want to be involved in that?

Jiang Pengji thought about it and said to him, “I could tell you I’m a god in human form and it’s my obligation to clear out sinners if you want me to lie to you. But the truth is nothing close…”

Meng Hun didn’t know how he should respond to that.

“The truth is, it costs too much to establish your own army and I’m utterly destitute with not a penny in my wallet. How could I afford to pay the young men to work for me?” Meng Hun looked calm but there was something growing in his heart. She continued, “Those people who turn to being bandits are mainly young men with issues. It would be unacceptable to deny all of them. There’s a good chance that at least some of them have good will.”

Meng Hun kept quiet. He bought the reason she gave him.

Jiang Pengji had a face like she was joking, but all of a sudden she put her serious face on. “The other critical reason is what I told you earlier. It would be stupid to wait for the bandits to gather and grow bigger. When messages of the chaos in Meng County, Cang Prefecture spread here, the bandit members will become restless. I would rather grasp the opportunity to alienate the bandits and break any common interest the different bandit groups have before we have to deal with unified and uncontrollable bandits.”

Meng Hun became solemn. “Thanks to you for being insightful, Langjun.”

Jiang Pengji added, “But it is true that I’m poor.”

Meng Hun had a feeling he was on board with the wrong people. Meng Hun, the serious County Military Chief, scratched his head with a sense of confusion.

Quickly, the sense of confusion dissipated as he suppressed it. He had to prove himself useful by doing something of merit after he began working for a new boss.

He shouldn’t question her; that was why he suppressed the weird feeling of confusion.