However, when he turned the camera north, a blue-gray castle with a distinct Central Plains style sandwiched with a swamped Don River Delta opposite the gray-white stone castle.

Dongxing City.

It was later Rostov-on-Don, which was built during the Dongxing period (1651-), so it was simply named Dongxing City.

With the population size of the Great Xia Kingdom in Crimea, there was no need to build a castle here, but due to the existence of Azov and the strategic thinking of the Ottoman Empire to build this city into a big city outside the land, the city was finally built.

In the past decade, the Ottomans activated tens of thousands of white slaves and transported a large number of stones from the Crimean Khanate with large galleons, which not only expanded the area of ​​Azov, but also greatly enhanced the city's defensive power.

Since the Kingdom of Daxia has maritime power in the Sea of ​​Azov for the past two or three years, it was the Ottomans before, and the Crimeans were dominant, Daxia actually watched them build the castle.

However, when Nikan learned about this, he just smiled indifferently.

"Let them build it"

Although this is said, the current city of Azov is larger than the castle that the Tsarist and Ottomans competed for in history. The way they built the castle was completely in the Greek style, with stones mostly used. The city walls were generally more than ten meters thick. In recent years, the Ottomans have strengthened the city wall to fifteen meters, and the height of the city wall has also increased from the previous ten meters to fifteen meters. Although the shape of a castle was not adopted, there were strongholds that were protruding out of the city walls in the places where the city walls were stationed. Cannons and muskets could be used to echo them, and it was not easy to deal with.

Not to mention Azov, even the Haikou Castle wall that was built by the Spanish to protect Manila was twenty meters thick. At that time, the fleet of the Daxia Kingdom, which had begun to take shape, avoided the castle when it moved south.

The castle is not square like the Great Xia Kingdom, but is irregular polygonal and has a distinct Genoese style, because the castle was first built by Genoese merchants.

If the circumference reaches nine miles, you can station more than 20,000 troops.

Although his expression was a bit complicated, Adrian said: "There are currently 15,000 elite troops stationed in the city, and 5,000 slaves serving the castle. Among the military forces, 10,000 are purely composed of Turks, Arabs, and European people who believe in the Tianfang Sect. The combat power is still above Jenicheri, and the five thousand slaves are all white people who believe in Christianity."

"Ten thousand soldiers have families. Now this castle is actually a military fort, a huge military fort. There were originally a large amount of farmland around the castle, but since last year they gradually moved the farmers away, so this place became a simple military fort."

Sun Xiuning thought to himself: "Ten thousand people, plus slaves and family members, the population must be around 50,000. Such a castle that is not suitable for production is simply a gold-swalking monster."

So he asked, "Who will support this castle?"

As a member of the Protectorate, although he was not engaged in military affairs, he still knew the surrounding situation. In the territory of the Ottoman Empire, most of the Balkans were mountainous, and the food produced was only enough for local military and civilians to feed other places. However, there was a lot of food produced near Istanbul, the Anatolian Plateau, the Mesopotamian Basin of Iraq, and the Bulgaria occupied by the Bulgars.

However, there was a rebellion by Turkic generals a few years ago, and it was definitely not supported by other places. So there were only Istanbul, Bulgaria, and the Mesopotamian Basin. The food in the Mesopotamian Basin should support the battle against Persia, Bulgaria should support the battle against Europe, and the food in Istanbul and near the Aegean Sea should be supplied to the local area. He really couldn't remember that there was still excess food there.

In this world, in this era, places with a large amount of grain storage do not exist at all. Except for the Daxia Kingdom, whether in Europe or Asia, the grain yield is not high, and the other is that all countries are generally corrupt. In addition, since the Age of Discovery, the idea of ​​pursuing commercial profits brought by Europeans has also spread to West Asia. All countries generally do not pay much attention to food cultivation. Fortunately, the population of various countries is not large at present, otherwise the food will be tighter. The Ottoman Empire occupied such a large area with a population of only 20 million, which is almost the same as France.

"Of course it's the Crimean Khanate," Adrian replied. After he finished speaking, the situation where he was sent to the Scouts camp in Jenicheri when he was very young could not stop rushing to his heart. It was a cruel training that incorporated the Turkic Gurlam model and the Greek Spartan model. Although they were all forced, this country allowed them to master some survival skills after all.

"Their parents were sold to Egypt where the Ottomans belonged to, and Damascus was used as slaves. Why did they still speak for them?"

He thought again: "Due to the intervention of the Great Xia Kingdom, the Crimean Khanate went deep into Russia, Ukraine and Romania to rob white slaves greatly reduced. Only the arrival of the Great Xia Kingdom has turned the originally sparsely populated Black Sea and Caspian Sea coast into large areas of fertile fields and pastures."

Sun Xiuning continued to ask: "Crimean Khanate? They are now cramped on a small peninsula, and they still have such great strength?"

"Of course there is no more. In the past, most of their war horses were raised north of the isthmus of the peninsula. Since they were defeated by the Daxia Kingdom, they all retreated to the south of the isthmus. Due to insufficient land, they could only convert part of the farmland into pastures. In this way, they still retained about half of the cultivated land. Not long after they were defeated by the Daxia Kingdom, the Great Khan Greed III died of illness. Now the one who inherited the Khan throne was Greed IV."

"After this man took office, he made all the cavalry independent and became a professional military branch. In this way, he retained 30,000 elite cavalry, and all the grass needed for war horses was provided by serfs in the territory. Then he formed 20,000 Jenicheri infantry. Although the peninsula was cramped, the fertile fields were spread and the climate was mild. After planting a season of grain, forage grass was planted in winter. First, it could be fattened fields, and second, it could be provided with forage for war horses."

"The Grey family has accumulated a lot of wealth through robbery of Europeans and slave trade in the past two hundred years. He can also buy food from his sect leader Ottomans. Therefore, he has also stored a lot of food and can barely support Azov."

"When our country built warships in New Tianjin, the Crimeans did not come to harass me?"

"He dares? If he dares to do this, our country can completely cross the isthmus and completely destroy the Khanate."

"In other words, the Ottomans' idea was to use Azo City as a buffer. Although it is an isolated city, it can restrain a lot of our energy. Then it is the Crimean Peninsula and finally the southern coast of the Black Sea."

Adrian glanced at Sun Xiuning and thought to himself: "Everyone said that this boy is not familiar with military affairs, but this idea is exactly the same as what the Protectorate thought."

Sun Xiuning looked at Dongxing City opposite again.

It was a big city with an area of ​​eight miles. Unlike Azov, the castle was surrounded by fertile fields that could not be seen at first sight.

The blue-gray castle is still a conventional Central Plains style. It has bricks on the outside and rammed earth inside. The base is three zhang wide, one zhang wide on the top, three zhang high, four square edges, and four gates. The tallest building in the city is a pagoda, which naturally has a military role in emergency situations.

"In the jurisdiction of the Governor General of Crimea, Lord Luo Jizhi has four mobile legions under his command. The first legion, which he also serves as the commander, is stationed in Xintianjin. This is Ji Jiajie's Second Legion. In addition, there is Zhao Liangdong's Third Legion in the north of the isthmus, and finally the fourth legion in Poltava. Each legion is a cavalry-based legion, with about 12,000 people, which is close to 50,000 people."

"But Tulichen's Fourth Legion must be protecting the direction of Russia. In fact, Governor Luo Jizhi can use three legions. Oh, by the way, a legion dominated by infantry was just transferred from the country. The commander was Sun Degang, the first principal of the Lishucheng Cavalry School. His Majesty transferred him here, which must be of great use..."

"His Majesty?"

Adrian looked at him again, and finally watched the ice boat sail into the Azov Sea before saying, "At this time, I will not be mysterious. All of this was planned by His Majesty himself, allowing the Frostwolf Cavalry to appear in the West Siberian forest, and Turichen to make up a Cossack cavalry to appear in the Don River from time to time, just to make the Crimeans and the Ottomans convinced that our country would not attack them in the next step, but to deal with the Russians."

"His Majesty takes a stronghold in North Africa and accepts the advice of the Venetians to occupy Heraklion, for one thing."

"Take Crimea?"

"By the way, there are four huge castles in Crimea alone, each one is no less than Azo City. If you want to take Crimea, just thinking about luring the enemy into the depths, it is impossible to siege the city and attack aid. Because the Ottomans as foreign aid can also transport materials through the Black Sea, the Crimeans can completely rely on the tall and thick castles to deal with our army. When our army cannot capture it for a long time, their cavalry can leave the city to carry out the last strike, or the Ottomans will take a boat to the peninsula to carry out this strike."

"I understand that the Koprolu family, who actually in charge of the Ottoman power, distributed 200,000 elite troops in the Bulgar area, and looked like they wanted to attack Romania. In fact, they were preparing to set out from Varna Port to support the Crimean Khanate at any time."

"That's true. About fifty miles southwest of Bekchisale, the capital of the Crimean Khanate, is close to the Black Sea. There is a big port. It was originally a big city built by Europeans. It was later destroyed by the Mongols. It was called Sess Rathos. After the rise of the Khanate, it ignored it. However, after being defeated by our country, it was restored. It was still called Sess Rathos. Now it has surpassed Kafa and has become the largest port of the Khanate. Ottoman supplies and troops can be transported here continuously from Varna and Istanbul."

(Sess Ratios, the largest military port in Russia/Ukraine in later generations Sevastopol)

"Sess Ratso, the abyssal city of Dankoy, which originally belonged to Khalachituayibey in the south of the isthmus, the capital Bekchisarai, and the Kafa in the southeast of the peninsula. These are the four major castles, all built in imitation of European castles. Do you know that the Ottomans attacked Heraklion and had not yet been defeated. These four major castles, plus Azo, are larger than Heraklion. According to the Ottomans and Crimeans, the Great Xia Kingdom is in a strong field battle, and it is not so easy to completely capture the Crimean Peninsula."

(Cafa City, later Fiodocia City)

"In other words, they want to turn the peninsula into a meat grinder and completely drag down the Great Xia Kingdom? It's just that they're overthinking it." After hearing this, Sun Xiuning curled his lips.

But Adrian said: "Don't be careless. These castles are all stone castles. The buildings in the city are either made of stone or made of rammed earth. They all have wells. They can't even attack with their own thermal bombs."

In this way, the two of them walked while whispering about Crimea while watching the scenery of the Azov Sea. They arrived in New Tianjin within a few days.

When he arrived at Xin Tianjin Port, Sun Xiuning also met someone.

Luo Jizhi!

He actually came to the port in person to welcome the supplies.
Chapter completed!