Destiny Only Han

"That's right, I've improved a lot. Okay, I'm testing you today, let me tell you what you think..."

Seeing Zhang Liang's smiling face and Liu Bang's seemingly nonchalant but pricked up ears, Liu Ying was silent for a moment and said:

"If it is said that most of my big men are a battleground for military strategists, then Minyue Kingdom can be called an indisputable ground for military strategists..."

"The reason is very simple. The traffic there is blocked, there are many mountains and few plains, and the rivers in the territory are short and swift. There is a saying that there are eight mountains, one water and one field."

"Specifically, this place is bounded by the sea in the east, bounded by Kuaiji and Zhangjun (Zhejiang) in the north by the vast mountains, bordered by Yuzhang County (Jiangxi) in the west by the Wuyi Mountains that stretch for thousands of miles, and bordered by Nanhai County (Guangdong) in the south. ) at the junction is still hills and hills..."

"Not only the border is mountainous, but the territory is also full of mountains and peaks. The terrain is high and dangerous. There are many mountain ranges such as Taimu Mountain, Jiufeng Mountain, Daiyun Mountain, Boping Mountain, and Tortoise Mountain. Therefore, there is a saying in Shu County that 'the road to Shu is difficult, and it is difficult to go to the blue sky'. , while the country of Minyue is "the road to Fujian is more difficult than the road to Shu"..."

"If you want to strengthen the management and control of such an indisputable land, and set up counties and counties, it may be very difficult..."

Liu Bang nodded slightly. In fact, he knew very little about the Minyue Kingdom. Even the Gemyu Global Map collected in the palace can be accurate to the li for many counties and counties north of the Yangtze River, that is, every lifang is marked. But only for the Minyue Kingdom, it only roughly marked the counties and the simple direction of mountains, rivers and rivers.

This is mainly because Liu Ying said that Minyue State has many mountains and few plains, so it can support a small population. It is a region similar in size to Qi State, but the population controlled by the government is only 13 households, which is less than 60 people. , after leaving the jurisdiction of the county seat, it was immediately shrouded in the fog of war...

Liu Bang looked at Liu Ying and asked: "According to what you said, since Minyue Kingdom doesn't shit, why don't they just ignore it and let them govern themselves as before?"

Hearing Liu Bang's question, Liu Ying immediately kept silent, but looked at Liu Bang as if asking him if he understood the rules?
After all, it was agreed at the beginning that he was being tested by Zhang Liang, it was a dialogue between teachers and students, not the emperor and prince discussing national policy.

As a result, Liu Bang's face darkened immediately. Although he didn't say anything, he bit his back molars lightly, determined to leave his little boy a whole while he was running fast and his arm wielding the scabbard was still strong. childhood...

Seeing this, Zhang Liang said with a smile: "Okay, the 'disadvantages' of Minyue Kingdom are over, it's time to talk about the 'benefits'."

What he meant was very clear. He wanted Liu Ying to count the details of Minyue Kingdom in detail, and then discuss another issue, that is, who should be the king of Minyue, such as the adult Zou Ying, or Liu Jiao. The underage Zou Yao who mentioned a word vaguely.

After all, although Zou Ying now seems to have a heart for Han, he did not hesitate to assassinate his own king to show his loyalty to Han.

But children only distinguish between right and wrong, and adults only look at the pros and cons. Will a person who even killed his own king always be the loyal dog of the Han Kingdom?

But Zou Yao is different, he is still a child, and the power in the country must be temporarily controlled by the Minyue royal family and the prime minister sent by the court. With mutual checks and balances, the Minyue Kingdom can be stable for at least 20 years!
But the crux of the problem is that Zou Ying is the Prime Minister of Minyue, and Zou Yao is still a child. If the Han Dynasty forces Zou Yao to become king, Minyue must be cleaned up first, so that the forces of all parties can maintain a balance.

So, who does the dirty work?

Therefore, everything depends on whether the benefit is big enough, just like "Sun Tzu's Art of War" said, move when it suits the benefit, and stop if it doesn't suit the benefit!

Hearing Zhang Liang's words, Liu Ying cast her eyes on Zhang Liang, and then said:

"Teacher, you know that the country of Minyue is extremely suitable for growing tea due to its geography and climate. And tea is no longer eaten as vegetables such as sunflower (winter amaranth) and Huo (soybean leaves) in many places, but A drink that is used to soak in water."

Zhang Liang nodded lightly. He himself is a fan of tea, especially when he got a copy of the "Tea Classic" said to be written by ancient sages from Liu Ying's Hongwen Museum, which is where the "Encyclopedia of the Han Dynasty" was compiled. , I can’t put it down even more, and spent a lot of money to let people collect the tea varieties and tea-making utensils mentioned in it...

"Among last year's taxes, the tea tax collected by the tea market in various places was more than 4000 million yuan. If the commercial tax collected from the domestic sale of tea is included, the sum of the two is probably close to [-] million yuan!"

Liu Ying raised two fingers and said: "Teas from Fujian and Yue account for about [-] percent. The tea trees planted in many places are still in the seedling stage and are not suitable for picking. If it takes another three to five years, it will at least account for [-] percent of the tea. than half!"

Well, the tea tax was a kind of tax only in the Tang Dynasty. Officials such as "salt tea ceremony" and "salt iron envoy" were successively set up to be responsible. The annual income reaches 80 Guan!

You must know that the tea tax is cash. When the Tang Dynasty levied taxes, it was mainly in kind, such as grain and cloth.

In the most prosperous Tianbao years of the Tang Dynasty, such as the third year of Tianbao, the annual tax was more than 980 million yuan in rent, more than 740 million dendrobium millet, 35 million pieces of Yong and Tiaojuan silk, and more than [-] million tons of cotton. There are more than [-] pieces of cloth.

Tie and Guan refer to ropes for wearing money, and generally one thousand copper coins are Yiguan or Yitui.

Therefore, the tea tax is 80 guan, which is a major tax that can be paralleled with salt, iron and other taxes!
As for Liu Ying asking the local Yue people to grow tea in Fujian and Yue state religions, the main reason was that the Yue people there were in abject poverty.

But the poverty of the Yue people is very good for Liu Ying. After all, the poor do not have the bargaining power of the labor force, and they can be hired to work with far cheaper wages than those in the Central Plains.

Well, you don’t even need to send money, you just need to give them a little food that is just enough to eat, and the cloth that barely covers their bodies can make them feel grateful and work extra hard...

Therefore, Liu Ying did not want to see turmoil in Minyue Kingdom.

When he heard the big cake drawn by Liu Ying, Liu Bang's eyes lit up. Although he wanted to ask, he still held back, and just frequently signaled Zhang Liang with his eyes to let him be his "mouth substitute"...

Zhang Liang smiled lightly, looked at Liu Ying and asked, "Since the advantages of Minyue Kingdom outweigh the disadvantages, do you think Minyue Kingdom should be controlled by counties or counties, or should it still be controlled by the royal family with the Zou surname?"

Liu Ying replied: "Of course it is the king. As I said before, the current Minyue Kingdom does not yet have the conditions for the Han court to directly control it."

Well, wait until he teaches the local Yue people to speak Guanzhong dialect and know Chinese characters, and then trick them into building roads that connect every village in order to better transport tea, grain, cloth, books and medicine, and then move to the south of the Yangtze River on a large scale to breed After the population of Minyue is officially established as a county, it is a good time to officially establish counties.

So Zhang Liang nodded slightly, and continued to ask: "In your opinion, who should be the king of Minyue? The country's prime minister, Zou Ying? Or the little boy Zou Yao?"

Liu Ying raised her fists and said with a smile: "Children only make choices, and adults naturally want them all!"

Liu Bang was stunned for a moment, and finally couldn't hold back, and asked with his head: "What?"

Liu Ying pretended not to hear, and still looked at Zhang Liang who motioned him to continue, and continued, "The Minyue Kingdom is thousands of miles away. Although the population is small, it can accommodate two kings!"

"I have an immature idea, that is to seal Zouying as the king of northern Fujian, and still be the king (wàng) Yecheng, rule the area north of the Minjiang River, and cut off a southern Fujian country in the south of the Minjiang River. Make Zou Wuzhu's son Zou Yao the King of Minnan, change Licheng (Quanzhou) to Dong'an County, and use it as the capital of Donghai Kingdom!"

"And I heard that the army of the Eastern Ou Kingdom has arrived in the land of Fujian and Yue, and they will join forces with the Chu army to suppress the Minyue rebellion, so we might as well resolve the disputes between Eastern Ou and Minyue at one time, and officially confer the title of Ou Zhenfu, the king of Eastern Ou Wang, the Eastern Ou Kingdom is a vassal state of the Han Dynasty, let Uncle Liu Jiao stay in the Minyue Kingdom for a while longer, and clarify the borders between the Eastern Ou Kingdom and the Minyue Kingdom..." (Note 1)

Well, in the past, Minyue Kingdom always wanted to attack Dongou Kingdom because the two countries never drew a clear border. From the map, the entire Dongou Kingdom belongs to Minzhong County, which is within the scope of Minyue Kingdom.

After all, the former Dongou Kingdom and Minyue Kingdom were both descendants of Yue King Goujian. It was only because of low productivity and inconvenient transportation in the mountains and mountains of Minzhong County that they separated. Yu Shan was the surname, and the other accepted the canonization of the Qin Dynasty and took Zou as the surname.

Zhang Liang thought about it for a while, and felt that what Liu Ying said was somewhat feasible.

Zou Ying killed Zou Wuzhu. If he wanted to go further and become the king of Minyue Kingdom, he had to rely on the power of the Han Kingdom. Since he had something to ask for from the Han Kingdom, it was easy to handle.

If Zou Yao wanted to succeed to the throne, not only did he not say that his father was a sinner who sent troops to fight against Han, but he was just a child, and he could only accept Han's arrangements.

Therefore, although it sounds absurd that the Minyue Kingdom is divided into three, and the three kings are respectively in charge, it is actually not difficult to implement.

So he looked at Liu Bang and nodded slightly.

Naturally, Liu Ying was not surprised. After all, the geographer Gu Zuyu in the Qing Dynasty once said that Fujian was located in a remote corner of the sea and the terrain was difficult. If Fujian competed for the world, Fujian's military strength, money and food were not enough to achieve this goal.

And in fact it is.

During the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms period, all other places were in a mess, except that the Min Kingdom established by the Wang family in Fujian had no sense of existence. Even after the Northern Song Dynasty quelled those warlords who either established the country independently or separated one side, the Wuyue Kingdom and the control The Qingyuan army in Fujian did not use a single soldier from the Northern Song Dynasty at all, and surrendered directly...

Therefore, as long as most of the south of the Yangtze River is pacified, Minyue will take over.

Note 1: According to the history books, Zou Yao was the king of the Eastern Ou Kingdom, and his son was Ou Zhaoxiang. Ou Zhaoxiang reigned for nine years and passed the throne to his son Ou Zhenfu after his death.Here I assume that Zou Yao is the son of Zou Wuzhu, but with the same name. Because of the dispute between the two families, Zou Wuzhu's son should be like Sun Zhongmou'