Summoning the Peak of the Three Kingdoms

Chapter 2943: The war in Yingzhou escalates, luring Shu and Chu to their fate (Part )

Chapter 2939: The war in Yingzhou escalates, luring Shu and Chu to their fate (Part )

As we all know, Shu and Chu are powerful countries second only to Qin, but what exactly make these two countries so strong?

It is definitely not because of the large number of soldiers and generals. After all, in terms of the number of troops and the quality of generals, the three kingdoms in the Central Plains are no inferior to Shu and Chu.

Toyotomi Hideyoshi thought about this problem for two days and finally came to the conclusion that Shu and Chu were strong in geographical advantages.

Among the four poles of the Central Plains, Shu Kingdom occupied the southwest and possessed the dangerous Shu Road, which allowed it to attack when advancing and defend when retreating.

As for the State of Chu, although its geographical location was not as advantageous as that of the State of Shu, it was about to destroy the State of Wu. By then, it would occupy the southeast, one of the four poles, and occupy the entire defense line of the Yangtze River. In a nutshell, it could attack or defend.

The first reason why Shu and Chu dared to challenge the Qin Dynasty repeatedly was their geographical advantage. After all, geographical advantage plays a very important role for a big country.

Just look at Cao Wei and you will know that it was obviously a powerful country, but because of its poor geographical location and being surrounded on three sides by the Qin army, it was defeated so quickly and so miserably.

However, even though Shu and Chu had superior geographical locations, the cost of going against the Qin was still very high.

The Shu Kingdom first lost Hanzhong for this reason, and was later severely attacked by the Nanman supported by the Qin Dynasty. Not only did it lose the two counties in southern Shu, but it also lost nearly 100,000 soldiers, so it has been recuperating until now.

Although the losses of Chu were not as great as those of Shu, it also experienced many defeats. The city of Jiangling alone was fought over three times, which consumed a lot of national strength.

But it was precisely because of this that Toyotomi Hideyoshi was confident that he could drag the two countries into the water.

Hearing Toyotomi Hideyoshi's words, Yuan Luzhi was completely confused and said puzzledly: "If what you said is true, Shu is busy recuperating and Chu is busy swallowing up Wu, it is impossible for them to send troops to intervene in Yingzhou."

Toyotomi Hideyoshi smiled when he heard this, but did not immediately explain. Instead, Emperor Shitian pondered for a while and asked, "Could the breakthrough point be in Shu?"

"Yes."

Toyotomi Hideyoshi smiled and nodded, then said: "Chu is now busy destroying Wu. If we go alone, they will definitely ignore us. But if we persuade Shu to send troops first, Chu will definitely follow suit. After all, the two countries are iron allies."

"But the Kingdom of Shu is also busy recuperating. Why would it send troops overseas at such a critical time?" Yuan Luzhi asked in confusion.

"Before Chu sent troops to destroy Wu, it also suffered a defeat in the Nanman. The situation was equally bad, but it still withstood the pressure and mobilized the entire country's troops to attack Wu. Why did it do so?"

Toyotomi Hideyoshi asked back, but Enryuchi was stumped and could not say anything. Instead, Emperor Shitian took over and said, "The Chu State will take the risk of sending troops to swallow Wu this time. First, it is indeed a rare opportunity. Second, it is also a last resort, because only by occupying the Yangtze River defense line can we continue to fight against the Qin army."

"That's right. Chu can still strengthen its national strength through external expansion. On the surface, Shu, which has the natural barrier of Shu Road, seems to be safer than Chu. But in reality, it has been trapped in a situation where it is attacked from both the north and south by the Qin army in Hanzhong and the Nanman army in southern Shu, and there is no room for external expansion.

If the State of Chu wants to expand outward now, it can only go to war with the Qin and the Nanman. However, they have suffered losses at the hands of these two countries, so naturally they dare not provoke them again in the short term.

For the current Shu Kingdom, the only way to recover from the war damage is to recuperate, but this is still too slow.

But if we take the initiative to contact Shu at this time and provide it with a new direction for expansion, I believe that Shu will not miss this opportunity."

When Toyotomi Hideyoshi said this, not only Emperor Shakuten, but even Enrochi understood.

Of course they would not let it go. After all, the gold and silver mines in Yingzhou could bring new vitality to Shu's domestic market and quickly restore the country's national strength.

In fact, it was not just Shu, but also Wei, Song, Ming and Chu. Their own countries' markets were huge. After all, they had no shortage of food or supplies. The only thing they lacked was funds to activate and expand the existing market.

When there is sufficient capital as support, the country's market can be activated and expanded, economic development will become more prosperous, and national strength will naturally increase.

This is also the main reason why the national finances of the four kingdoms of Wei, Song, Ming and Wu grew rapidly after they colonized Yingzhou.

Daqin also earned huge amounts of money through maritime trade, military purchases, and other means, and invested it in the development and construction of its own country, thereby completely activating its own market, so it did not worry about lack of money.

Naturally, Shu and Chu wanted to follow suit, but Shu did not even have a navy and could not pursue overseas colonization.

As for the path of colonization, it was blocked by the Southern Country, and the army was unable to go to Southeast Asia to plunder.

In comparison, the situation of Chu was much better. Whether on land or at sea, Chu could recover through colonization, but the blockade of Chu by Qin was too tight.

Although Chu was forced to send troops to the South Seas when it went to war with them, the Qin State, having tasted some benefits from the South Seas, united all the forces in the South Seas and even pulled the Southern Barbarians into it.

Liu Xiu naturally did not take the Nanyang countries seriously, but he had to pay attention to Chi You of the southern barbarians.

In order to avoid conflict between the two parties and let the Qin Dynasty gain the upper hand, Liu Xiucai stopped his strategy of attacking Southeast Asia and turned his focus to attacking and destroying the Wu State.

Whether it was the Qin Dynasty, or the Wei, Song, Ming, Wu, and Chu, they all embarked on the path of colonization and were able to increase their fiscal revenue through colonies.

This naturally made Shu Kingdom envious, but unfortunately, Shu Kingdom had no access to the sea and no navy, so it had no way to colonize even if it wanted to.

Since he could not take the path of colonization, Liu Yu had to seek other ways and could only hope to find new gold mines in the country to ease the financial pressure.

Although Shu is mountainous and rich in mineral resources, gold and silver mines are rare, and the existing ones are being vigorously developed. It is obviously not easy to find a new one, which can be said to be completely based on luck. Not to mention, Liu Yu's luck is still good. After wasting a lot of manpower, he really found a small gold mine in the mountains near Chengdu.

In order to develop this gold mine, Liu Yu conscripted 100,000 laborers, who worked in shifts day and night to dig. This not only offset the financial hole after the loss of the two counties of Yinan, but also greatly accelerated the recovery from the war damage.

  But this is just a small gold mine after all. The amount of gold extracted is destined to be limited. Moreover, with such high-intensity mining, the mountain will be hollowed out in a year or two. What should we do then?

Therefore, while Liu Yu was digging for gold, he was also lobbying various countries to join the overseas colonial team of Wei, Song, Ming and Wu. After all, the news that Yingzhou was full of gold and silver mines was no longer a secret. He did not ask for a share of the pie, but just wanted to have a drink of soup.

But Cao Cao, Zhu Di and Zhao Kuangyin were not stupid. The colonial plate was so small and the bulk of it was taken by the Qin Dynasty. If Shu Kingdom joined in, their interests would be reduced.

Therefore, Shu Kingdom was eager to join in overseas colonization, but Wei, Song, Ming and Wu did not want to play with it.

Under such circumstances, if the Toyotomi family contacted Shu and took the initiative to invite the other party to enter Yingzhou, it would be unlikely that Shu would refuse.

Seeing that Emperor Shitian and Yuan Luzhi understood what he meant, Toyotomi Hideyoshi immediately took advantage of the situation and continued, "There is another great benefit of bringing Shu into Yingzhou."

"What benefits?" Indra asked.

"Shu is different from the Three Kingdoms of Song, Ming and the Three Kingdoms. These four kingdoms all have the ability to occupy permanently, so once they come, they don't want to leave. They all want to completely annex Yingzhou.

The Shu Kingdom had no navy and no access to the sea. After coming to Yingzhou, no matter how much territory it conquered, it was ultimately like a rootless duckweed, and all it could get was money.

When faced with two evils, choose the lesser one. Therefore, compared to the still powerful Song, Ming and Three Kingdoms, the Wei and Wu countries, which were on the verge of destruction, and the Shu Kingdom, which was unable to take root, were more suitable for cooperation.

Similarly, if Shu Kingdom comes to Yingzhou, if they don’t want to be completely taken advantage of by the Three Kingdoms, they can only cooperate with us as the host and take us as the main force. Only in this way can they protect their interests.”

Hearing this, Emperor Shitian finally smiled and said, "Great! Shu State urgently needs Yingzhou's financial resources to restore its national strength, and Yingzhou needs Shu State's military power to drive out the Qin army. Cooperation between the two sides is indeed the best of both worlds.

But my disciple, no matter how much Shu wants to enter Yingzhou, as long as we rush to ask them, they will definitely put forward conditions. What are you going to rely on to impress Shu?"

Toyotomi Hideyoshi had naturally anticipated this. If possible, he did not want to be slaughtered by Shu. After all, the current situation of the Toyotomi family was not good. But if he did not take the initiative to contact Shu, they would not come. Once they took the initiative to contact, it would be tantamount to asking to be slaughtered. It was impossible not to pay something.

After a moment of contemplation, Toyotomi Hideyoshi said, "Master, I am prepared to use 30% of the output of Iwami Silver Mine as a condition in exchange for the support of Shu Kingdom."

"Iwami Ginzan?"

Indra and Enryuchi were both stunned. It was not that he was reluctant to give up Iwami Silver Mine, but that the Iwami Silver Mine was not in the hands of the Toyotomi family, but in the hands of Cao Wei.

As the largest silver mine in Yingzhou, Shijian Silver Mine naturally contains huge profits. The Qin Dynasty has employed 30,000 miners in this silver mountain alone.

Therefore, after the outbreak of the Yingzhou War, the five families of Wei, Song, Ming, Wu, and Toyotomi all set their sights on the eight counties of Xihai County.

  Facing the fierce offensive of the five countries, Wang Jian had a premonition that the Iwami Silver Mine could not be saved, so he not only moved all the miners away before the coalition forces arrived, but also destroyed the silver mine, making it impossible to mine in the short term. However, even so, it did not give up the five countries' fight for the silver mine.

After a fierce competition, Cao Zhang was the first to occupy Iwami Silver Mine, and Cao Pi lobbied various countries to recognize Cao Wei's ownership of Iwami Silver Mine.

Considering the threat from the Qin Dynasty was still there, Song, Ming, Wu and Toyotomi recognized Cao Wei's occupation of the silver mountain in order to prevent the intensification of conflicts. The only condition was that after the excavation was resumed, the four families would get 10% of the silver produced.

Cao Pi naturally accepted this with pleasure, and immediately gathered people to reopen the mine. However, due to the thorough destruction caused by the Qin Dynasty when they left, all the equipment could no longer be used. It would naturally take time to rebuild from scratch, so even now Iwami Silver Mine has not resumed mining.

However, under the leadership of Cao Pi, Iwami Silver Mine recovered very quickly and would be restored in at most half a month.

How could Cao Pi be willing to hand over the Ishimi Silver Mine at this time?

"There's no way Cao Pi would agree to that." Emperor Shitian shook his head.

Toyotomi Hideyoshi sneered, "Even if Cao Pi disagrees, he has to agree. The families agreed to Cao Wei's occupation of Iwami Silver Mine because Cao Wei was still strong at that time. But now Cao Wei is about to perish, and Cao Pi alone cannot defend Iwami Silver Mine.

If Cao Pi gave up at this time, he could still keep 30% of his gains, but once Cao Wei was destroyed, he would really lose everything.

Cao Pi is a smart man, he knows how to choose. "

Although this is reasonable, Emperor Shitian still didn't think that Cao Pi would agree. What he never expected was that when he and Toyotomi Hideyoshi found Cao Pi and explained their intentions, Cao Pi not only agreed without any hesitation, but also asked to jointly send envoys to Shu and Chu.

Toyotomi Hideyoshi would naturally not refuse this. As for the envoys who needed to be sent, it was naturally impossible for them to be sent from Yingzhou.

Yingzhou and Yizhou are thousands of miles apart, and by the time the envoys get there, the opportunity is gone. So the envoy sent by the Toyotomi family this time is the Xu family's hidden man in the Central Plains, who is in Yizhou. After receiving the pigeon letter, he met up with Cao Wei's secret agent in Yizhou, and then the two of them went directly to Shu as envoys.

When Liu Yu learned that envoys from Cao Wei and Toyotomi wanted to see him, he was a little confused. After all, Cao Wei was in a difficult situation now, and the Toyotomi family was thousands of miles away. He really couldn't imagine what the connection between the two families was, or why they came to see him.

(End of this chapter)