She Came to Heal, Stayed to Conquer

At this moment, Li Erniu heard the news and hurried over.

His face was beaming with joy, and even before he reached them, his excited voice had already carried over.

”Everyone, stop calling her Miss Han; call her Princess Consort from now on.”

Upon hearing this, everyone changed to calling her Princess Consort, which made Han Lei feel quite embarrassed.

Li Erniu continued, ”Let me share some good news: although the Prince is still in Ling’an City, he has already sent a message by carrier pigeon, appointing me as the new guardian of Yong’an City. The Prince has instructed me to work earnestly with the Princess Consort, and you all must unite to build the fortress well!”

The soldiers cheered again, congratulating Li Erniu on his promotion to the guardian of Yong’an City.

After celebrating for a bit, Li Erniu personally arranged accommodations for Han Lei and her entourage.

”Princess Consort, you’ve had a tiring journey, please rest for a while. We’ll discuss the details later.”

Han Lei nodded in thanks and led the craftsmen into their respective tents. The interiors were neat and comfortable, clearly prepared with care.

By evening, as the glow of the setting sun shone over the camp, Mr. He came over with a cheerful smile and said to Han Lei and the others, ”Master, supper is ready, please follow me.”

Everyone followed Mr. He to the central command tent, where the tent was brightly lit, and Li Erniu along with several Colonels and Deputy Generals had been waiting for a long time.

When Han Lei and her group arrived, Xiao Zhengfei and Ma Zi, along with their trusted aides, were testing and selecting soldiers for the assault and city defense teams within the camp, and they too appeared in the tent.

Zhao Zun had accepted Han Lei’s suggestion, which was to rearrange the formation in the Beiguan Camp once the bastion was completed.

This would include the city defense team, the assault team, the ordnance management team, the logistics team, and the sentry team.

For now, the court was still unaware that Zhao Zun had taken over the Beiguan Army. Therefore, the Beiguan Army’s provisions were temporarily still supplied by the court.

However, with the integration of modern weaponry, aside from the necessary personnel for the aforementioned formations, the other ordinary soldiers could be freed up.

These soldiers, together with the common folk, would engage in farming on the outskirts of the city using the Tuntian system, allowing them to become self-sufficient in the future.

In the event of war, these soldiers could be summoned back immediately.

As Han Lei entered, everyone in the tent rose to greet her.

”Greetings to the Princess Consort.”

”Princess Consort, you’ve had a long journey.”

Li Erniu stepped forward, cupping his hands, and said, ”Princess Consort, everyone, please take your seats.”

After everyone was seated, Li Erniu raised his glass first and said aloud, ”Today, we celebrate my promotion to the guardian of Yong’an City, and secondly, we thank the Princess Consort for traveling a long way to offer us her advice in building the fortress. Come, let’s all drink to this!”

Everyone raised their glasses and drank together, the atmosphere was lively.

After several rounds, a slight blush appeared on Han Lei’s charming face.

Li Erniu put down his glass and said solemnly, ”Princess Consort, regarding the construction of the fortress, do you have any insights?”

Han Lei smiled slightly, took a blueprint from her sleeve, and handed it to Li Erniu.

This was a design Han Lei came up with after studying many ancient bastion constructions based on the terrain of Yong’an City, one that could enhance the power of cold weapons while perfectly integrating with hot weapons.

The so-called bastion was an invention by the peaceful-loving Italians in the early sixteenth century.

The essence of a bastion was to transform a fortress from a convex polygon into a concave polygon, an improvement that exposed the attacker to more than one face of the bastion regardless of the point of attack.

This allowed the defenders to use crossfire for multiple strikes. Sun Tzu’s Art of War says, ’When ten, surround him.’ When faced with a bastion, an attacker would need a tenfold number of troops and still might not fill the breach.

Before the era of gunpowder cannons, the bastion’s design was nearly undefeatable; even in the age transitioning between cold and hot weapons, it remained formidable.

Li Erniu took the blueprint and examined it closely, his eyes filled with admiration.

”Brilliant! This bastion drawn by the Princess Consort is flawless, with this bastion, the brothers will have a much easier time.”

The Colonels nearby also gathered to look, one Deputy General praised, ”The Princess Consort is indeed exceptionally talented. Behind the bastion, there’s also a Weng City. Once the bastion is built, any enemy attacks will end in utter failure.”

Han Lei smiled sweetly and said, ”By that time, I will equip the brothers with even more advanced weapons, and we will have a significant advantage in force over the enemy.”

One Colonel’s eyes lit up, enviously glancing at the M16 automatic rifles slung on the backs of Xiao Zhenfei and his trusted aides.

”Princess Consort, the advanced weapons you mentioned, are they the same as the guns Commander Xiao and his men are using? If we could defend the city with such powerful weapons, that would be great.”

Is this considered formidable?

Han Lei pursed her lips to suppress a laugh. She stood up and focused her gaze on the bastion blueprint.

”Look at the annotations on this blueprint.”