Chapter 378： The arrow has a range of 200 meters

The huge tree trunk was dragged by the crowd and deer to the icy pier, where the big tree is waiting for further processing.

The trestle bridge of the wharf is covered with snow, the vast river is covered with ice, and a large amount of snow is attached to a group of ships on the shore. It seems that this is a deadly scene? In fact, this is not the case at all.

The wharf has become not only a storage place for timber, but also a log processing place.

The tree was only towed to the dock, and Rurik turned his head to fulfill his promise.

The promised laborer's three pounds of wheat rewards immediately turned into reality. This favor is not only aimed at the Ross people and mercenaries, but especially at the tribal people who are fighting.

The scope of the blessing has expanded. With this dinner alone, the entire current residents of Fort Elon have consumed up to 500 pounds of oats. For the first time in their lives, the children of the tribe have their little stomachs filled with a lot of wheat, so the feeling of fullness is what they think is happiness.

This is just the wheat that people eat, the reindeer who worked so hard, they simply consumed nearly a thousand pounds!

Only when Rurik really counted the consumption of grains did he realize that his previous estimates were naive.

It is true that 70,000 pounds of grain has arrived here, and it weighs more than 25 tons.

A thousand years later, only a heavy truck is needed to transfer grains of this order of magnitude.

In the current era, the Ross people used a lot of cargo sleds to transport them. The sled is generally made recently, and the material used is mostly oak, so the overall structure is quite strong. Sledges can generally carry up to two tons of materials, and there is no problem in transporting food by them.

The current problem is that even if there is so much food, the people in the settlement will be ordered to do high-intensity winter material production, especially the logging, transportation, and deep processing of wood. The food can be completely consumed in two to three months. .

Although a large amount of food arrived in order to provide sufficient protection for the labor force, they need to do more, that is, the surplus food for the residents of Fort Elon, which can be regarded as a kind of useful feedback after taking away a large amount of iron from their hands.

The extreme logging behavior should come to an end.

The tree still needs to be cut, but certain restrictions must be made.

No, those ordinary small trees no longer need to continue to be felled, digesting the trunks all over the ground is a arduous job for Elonburg.

The focus of the felling was completely focused on the tall spruce that stood out from the crowd. In order to get them, Rurik had to send a large number of strong men and the strongest batch of reindeer to provide a large amount of wheat as their strong backing. This was the eve of Hanukkah in the Rus, when five large cedar trees were cut down and transported away.

Their heights vary a little, but the shortest tree has more than 20 stikas.

On the whole, their height is still too extreme.

While the brave are cutting down the tallest tree, others are doing a very delicate work.

It must start with the arrival of the transportation team.

The deer breeders have taken part of the deer herd for winter grazing, and they will not consume a little of Elonburg's supplies. The people who stayed in the settlements, their active logging was essentially hired by Rurik, and it became natural to provide wheat as a reward.

Life has added challenges, and the feeling of boredom seems to be diluted a lot.

On a quiet night, there were only a group of mercenaries in rotation, lighting bonfires outside the gates of the wooden walls of Fort Elon. They were ordered to be night watchmen, and a fierce bonfire dispelled the chill.

Rurik did not want to go to bed earlier this night.

A bundle of gray tree trunks with thick thighs of adult men under the light of oil lamps was resisted by mercenaries to the chamber of Rurik's mansion.

Mechasta, the leader of the tribe, naturally also sat here. Today, he was asked to sit down by Rurik, who was ordered to witness these trees.

Rurik didn't know whether this person was like Jeflo, who knew the "ash tree" very well.

"Do you recognize this tree?"

"This... is it cut down from the forest?" Mezzasta's expression fully demonstrated that he didn't know.

"Huh? You really don't know?"

"Yes. These tree trunks look very special, like those pebbles in a stream, mostly gray."

"My mercenary captain told me that this is an ash tree, the best material for making bows." Rurik asked again: "I thought you knew it. Unexpectedly..."

"It's the best material for bows? To be honest, I haven't seen it. Master, can I touch it."

Rurik shrugged: "Of course, do it yourself."

Ash tree is ash tree. Its bark is grayish in brown. People who are more sensitive to color can easily find it in the woods. In addition, a major feature of wild ash trees is that their trunks are very straight.

It is indeed the first time Metzasta has seen an ash tree in his life. Since this is a good material for bows, it must at least show good elasticity. He untied the twine, found a wooden pole that was much thicker than his forearm, and tried to step on it with his foot to bend it desperately.

The results of it? The trunk has a very obvious bend, and when Mezzasta slackens, the trunk instantly returns to its original shape.

This magical trunk called the "ash tree" completely refreshed Mezzasta's cognition, and the whole person's face changed from prudence to ecstasy.

"It's really a good material for bows. It's much better than the oak we usually use."

"Of course." Rurik shrugged, "I think your choice of oak is also an expedient measure. Oak is very hard and should be used for shipbuilding. You Kewen people are very good at archery. Now I order you to make a batch of these woods. Longbow. For this, I will not ask you to have other tributes. After you make the bow, it is your weapon. My only requirement is that if my army will fight the enemy, you must send some archers for me. war."

Mezzasta understood at once that the wood used to make bows was not as simple as a reward. His tribe has handed in thousands of hand-axes and spearheads, and the tribe bears a heavy burden for this. As a result, while receiving the tribute, Rülik also gave a batch of wheat and these bow-making materials as feedback. There really is a sense of business dealings with each other, even if Rurik didn't say so.

The more Mezzasta thought about it, the happier he couldn't help asking: "My master, where did you get these precious woods?"

"From a magical island."

"Oh..." Metzastad's cheerful old face was a little stiff, he felt that this was a secret kept by the Ross people, so he didn't continue to question.

The fact is that Rurik told the truth.

Although it is not suitable for the use of compound bows with tendons in this region of Europe, in the 15th century, a batch of compound crossbows made of wood and tendon have been put on the battlefield. Of course, with the mass production of the steel arm crossbow and its relatively low maintenance cost, the steel arm crossbow has become the mainstream of long-range weapons in an era.

The longbow made of red sandalwood has almost become exclusive to the British residents. In order to get the yew produced in the warm Mediterranean, they paid a lot of money.

Many single bows in other parts of Europe are made of various oaks. In the final analysis, this is also a stopgap measure. If you shoot five hundred arrows, it is inevitable to lose pounds.

They are not ignorant of the exquisiteness of ash rods for bows, but the distribution of ash trees in Europe is also very peculiar. They mainly grow in the southern region. Even if the species can tolerate the extreme cold of minus 20 degrees, it does not mean that it can It grows on a large scale in areas such as Finland.

For example, in the Oulu River Basin where the Corvins once settled, the ash tree does not exist, so it does not exist in the Kemi River Basin further north. Even the saplings were manually moved to Elronburg for planting, but they were frozen to death in the winter.

Rurik believes that the "hard stone island", that is, Gogran Island, is because of geographical reasons that the Finns and Estonians are not able to take possession of it. The island is by no means a trivial ash tree. Continue to explore, there must be There is an ash forest.

The longbow made of ash wood, of course, is still not as good as yew, which also performs much better than oak bows.

Rurik asked the key question: "Now that the wood is handed over to you, how many can you make? Remember, I don't want a short wooden bow. I want you to make a batch of long bows that are similar to your height."

This made Mezzasta a little bit difficult.

"Well, probably... twenty photos are all right."

Rurik knocked **** the wooden floor and asked loudly, "How many men do you have who can draw a bow? Are there thirty?"

"Yes! If you count some of the boys who are about to grow up, there must be 30 of them."

"That is thirty bows, which must be the same length as your height."

"Ah this! Isn't it too extreme?"

"Not extreme. Listen, only a longbow can shoot a long arrow to make the arrow go further. You just do as I ask, and when you're done, we have to hunt down a few bears to try the effect."

In this way, Mezzasta began to organize manpower to process extreme length bows with the latest high-quality wood materials.

They use the traditional method of cutting the wood first. Since the hard and sharp scrapers, cuts, axes and saws made of ferrochrome, the efficiency of processing wood has reached an unprecedented level.

The wood is cut into nearly cylindrical sticks with children's forearms. After processing, the bow's excellent elasticity and good hardness are both manifested. It's just that it is a cylinder, and Rurik gave another big order, that is, the Kewen who made a bow, scraped it flat with a spatula, that is, it became exactly like a pole.

They have never processed bows in this way, but they just don't know the benefits of doing so.

In this era, the arm of a single European bow is a cylindrical wooden stick, and its poor structure makes its power storage capacity wasted seriously. Only flat bow arms are correct.

The flat bow arms are roasted on the flames. This is a heat treatment operation that uses wood to be bent by heat, and then a rough bowstring made of hemp rope is tightened, and stones are dropped for bow training.

There are exactly as many as thirty bows for processing, which is already a mass production operation. Mezzasta’s men were originally forest hunters. Their bows were made by themselves. Due to the quality of the oak short bows in their hands, they often had to make new bows, so everyone has a wealth of experience in bow making. .

It took them more than ten days to complete the thirty bows, but just so they were rushing to work.

The length is fixed at 1.6stika, which is actually 157cm. Thirty longbows are of this length, and they are all guided by the maximum length of Mezzasta.

Yes, the man Mezzasta is a dwarf himself, and his people are all dwarves. They are far not as tall and strong as the Rosses, and they are well aware of their innate disadvantages, so they are very attentive in archery training.

The pewter longbow was completed. On November 11 of the Julian calendar, when the time of day was so short that it was almost a “divine alms”, Rurik gave it to the bored residents of Fort Elon in public. , Showing the style of these new longbows.

No, a thirty-man archer team suddenly appeared, among them were Corvin, Rus, Merlaren mercenaries, and even the Fen of Yevro.

The arrow shafts are all made by women, and the material is pine. The arrow feathers come from the birds caught in the trap. The flying feathers are glued to the shaft of the arrow with rosin. As usual, it also has three tail feathers. In order to pursue a gyroscopic effect stability, the adhesion of the arrow feathers is slightly inclined to the shaft of the arrow.

As for the arrow cluster, it is also very high-end, it is made of chrome iron by a Kewen blacksmith, and finally pine resin and twine are tied to the arrow shaft.

The iron cluster arrows, which were extremely precious to them in the past, are now standard.

Thirty people hold longbows, and every bower feels the unprecedented power of this bow.

Because once their short wooden bow weighed only twenty pounds at most, what about this long bow? The pounds all reached forty pounds.

Even the Kewen people are short in stature, they have done a lot of heavy manual labor in the past, and the food arrangements are much better than before. They have become stronger, and it is natural to draw the bow with double strength.

Of course, even if it is a forty-pound single bow, don't expect it to fire armor-piercing arrows that can actually break armor, but its arrows do have the ability to penetrate the fur of a polar bear. There is a saying that the strength does not need to be too great, just the right amount.

A shooting range appeared in Fort Elon. Thirty people were ordered by Lurik to line up in a dense formation and shoot at a rough wooden wall 50 meters away.

As Jeflo took the lead and roared, they let go of their arrows.

These rotating arrows left beautiful and shocking rules in the air. They formed a rain of arrows. Each arrow flew crazily in a parabolic cluster to the target, and soon the target came out with a crackling arrow.

They all have a good ability to handle short wooden bows. Now that they use long bows, they generally feel that their skills have improved. This was not how they felt, because when checking which arrows hit, Rurik saw the cluster of arrows submerged in the pine tree trunk. To pull it out, it would require a strong man to pull the arrow with his hands. Many arrow shafts were broken in this way at a time.

Do you still have any questions about the longbow? Rurik was even very impressed by their excellent eyesight, and even the excellent archery ability that was suppressed by the inferior short wooden bow.

After that, these thirty people stood outdoors and cast a 45° angle to the distant ice surface. Afterwards, it was found that most of the arrows flew over an astonishing 200 stika, which means they reached 200 meters. The killing distance of this projectile is already more than twice the ability of the oak shortbow! Didn't it shock the Ross people?

Because two hundred meters is already an astonishing distance, it is possible for the Rus to occupy a huge tactical advantage. If this is used in conjunction with the crossbow, it will be an Eastern tactical means.

People's cognition of arrows has been refreshed.

After another five days, a hunting team led by Jeflo, holding a longbow and steel-armed crossbow, killed two wandering polar bears in an unexplored forest further north from the mine. . Only the long arrows fired by the longbow have achieved results, and the powerful steel-armed crossbow is not necessary at all.

Jeflo's main purpose is to improve his life by hunting, and his secondary purpose is to find big fir trees. Even if you don't cut the tree down and take it away immediately, you can get it again after you make the mark.

The equipment of the ash rod longbow once again enhanced the strength of the Iron Squirrel Tribe.

It was precisely because of this work that Rurik thoroughly figured out the combat power that the tribe could still possess at the moment.

It can be said that the fighting power of those Covin women needs to be ignored, because they will become big belly one after another, and the fathers of their children are generally Ross people. Every child will look for his own position, is it a Corvin or a Russian? For the sake of honor, economic status, and even future, they are still very simple descent. They can't deny that their parents are Ross people, and their homeland is also one of the many settlements in Ross.

After a disastrous military defeat, there are only more than 30 people in the steel squirrel tribe, and these people are destined to make up a small fraction even as a servant army.

This Kewen tribe has an absolute demographic disadvantage, and it does not take too long to be assimilated by the Rus.

Making excellent longbows makes the days before Hanukkah a little more fun. People in the entire settlement see those who hold longbows and use shooting targets as a game. They are also eager to try.

The Hanukkah of the Rus has finally arrived. In fact, on the day of "completely dark night", the Rus of Aron used a large number of bonfires to celebrate the most important festival of the tribe each year.

The Corvins are also making sacrifices, especially the priestess Parla dressed as an owl. She beats a small drum and plays the harmonica. The strange and solemn voice makes the ceremony complicated and diverse. Hua Yes, Rurik likes to see two ethnic groups doing sacrifices on the same day. As usual, he killed a stag as a sacrifice with a sword, showed the deer blood to the northern lights, and cut open the liver of the deer. , Publicly announced: "Odin, who guards Ross, wishes Aaron Orava Fort to be stable, and people will be rich."

Everyone was cheering, and Rurik knew that he had stabilized the hearts of the settled Ross fishermen. He also understood the oracle of the priestess of Kewen, that is, "The gray squirrel tribe surrendered to the Rus and got the permission of the mountain **** and river god." In fact, the words of the priestess had political considerations. After all, the noble Rurik understood their language, and the words were also spoken to Rurik, which was a clear expression of surrender.

Rurik naturally tacitly told her with a wink of her comfort.

"Now that Hanukkah is over, I also made a cameo as a priest. Otto, your winter hunter should be back. When you come back, I will control the sledge, pull all my prefabricated wood, and take me. The people from here have returned to their hometown.” The next thing, Rurik, has already been calculated. The first ship, the Aphrora, the first ship to imitate the Caravel, must be the most critical mast installed early. , It must be launched after the sea has thawed.

No, it is not a trial voyage anymore, but put into use, becoming the best transport ship and the most combative warship.