Start with the humble bridegroom

Chapter 359
In the winter of Zhanghua's 43rd year, at the North Gate of Chang'an.

In the snow-powdered sky, several chariots and horses broke through the ice and headed northwest.

Zhang Zhe, who was preparing to spend the winter in Wuling, recalled Chang'an with an urgent edict.At the same time he was recalled to Chang'an, there were more than 20 officials, and he was the youngest of them.

Most of the meetings in previous years were one-on-one, but this year, everyone met together.

The old emperor had been lecturing for a full hour, but Zhang Zhe didn't understand what it meant. He only found that the old emperor stood with them for an entire hour.

Including Zhang Zhe, there are a total of more than ten Beijing officials and more than 20 local officials, all of whom are core members of the kings' forces.They all got new posts, and the location can be described by the four words "ends of the earth".

"Must go to office before the year!"

All officials who were urgently summoned received such orders.Among these officials, the highest one was a third-rank official, but at the end of the meeting, the old emperor only called Zhang Xinzhi's name.

"Zhang Xinzhi, I'm going to the northwest, and I can do it myself! Before leaving, you might as well go to Lanxiu Palace to have a look."

Zhang Zhe was expressionless at the time, but bowed deeply and retreated.

The old emperor's words sounded like exhortations, but he was actually warning Zhang Xinzhi not to cause any trouble in Dazheng's economy. If he had any conditions, he could speak directly to the imperial concubine.

Zhang Zhe did go to Lanxiu Palace afterwards, and chatted with the old lady for a long time without losing his smile. Most of the conversation between the two of them was about the interesting story of Miss Mi's first birthday. From the beginning to the end, Zhang Zhe didn't mention a single request.

The next day, Zhang Zhe embarked on a journey to the northwest.

When he came to the capital, only Geng Liang and Gao Deshu were with him, while Zhang Sanqi and twenty soldiers were waiting at the Shangqiao Station twenty miles away.Xie Lun took the rest of the guards and went directly from Wuling to the northwest checkpoint.

The emperor's urgent order forced Zhang Zhe to change his plan.

He can only go to Yunshang County first, while Meng Xiaowan, the child, the old Leitou's horses and others have to wait until next summer to arrive in Yunshang County before the cool autumn.

After joining the crowd at Shangqiao Station, Zhang Zhe abandoned his cart and got on his horse.He pulled the rein and looked back in the direction of Chang'an.

If something goes wrong, there must be a demon. The old emperor stood with them for an hour. This kind of behavior is too abnormal.The old man just wanted to let them know that he was still in good health.

But the act of urgently dispatching the princes' cronies to the corners of the country years ago, coupled with the act of the old emperor standing abnormally for an hour, made Zhang Zhe understand one thing.

This meeting will probably be the last time Mr. Jiang will meet him.

The old emperor's body may not be able to survive this winter, and at the beginning of spring, the country may change its master.

"Let's go~!" Bai Yuqi smashed the ice and snow, and followed Zhang Zhe to the deepest part of the wind and snow.

A hundred miles to the northwest of Chang'an is Changhe Pass, which is the barrier to the northwest of the capital.After passing the Changhe Pass, crossing the Yellow River (not the modern Yellow River), and going two hundred miles northwest is Longyang County.

Zhang Zhe and his entourage passed through Longyang County, Hezhong County and Qishan County. Apart from staying at the top of the hotel, they were not afraid of the wind and snow all the way without stopping.It only took six days to reach the most westward pass in Dazheng——Qin Pass!
Qinguan is towering, framed between two mountains, the city wall is as high as thirteen feet (nearly 40 meters), and the whole body is made of huge rocks.Five thousand elites have been stationed here for a long time, in order to prevent the Hu people from coveting Da Zheng.

This army, even when Dairen invaded Yanbei, was not mobilized to reinforce it.

In previous years, there were very few people who left Qinguan, because after leaving Qinguan, it was the area where the four tribes of the wasteland haunted.What these few Hu people loved most was to plunder the caravans and people coming out of Qinguan. They robbed their property, and the people were plundered as slaves and sold to the depths of the northern grasslands.

Zhang Zhe arrived at Qinguan and met Xie Lun and others, but found that many caravans were going through the formalities of exiting the customs.

He asked Ganxiu to inquire about it, and only then did he know the whole story.

"On the northern grasslands, there are hundreds of tribes, among which three tribes are the strongest, namely the Beibei, the Wunu and the Waqiang people. Last year, there was little snow on the grassland in winter, which resulted in the lack of water and grass in the whole grassland this year. Fengrun. In order to compete for the grassland, more than 20 small tribes were wiped out by the three major tribes this year. In this summer, the entire grassland has not received any rain, and the livestock have starved to death. "

Ganxiu paused at this point, carefully recalling the awkward names he had just found out, and then continued to report to Zhang Zhe, "The merchants said that this drought is a disaster that has never happened in the prairie in a hundred years. At the end of the period, Tehe Khan, who was located in the northwest of the prairie, took the main force of the Wunu people to the west, saying that they were going to plunder the countries of the Western Regions; Take them to rob the Twelve Kingdoms of Ammu; our Central Plains Seven Kingdoms are facing the Beibei people in the southern part of the prairie. At the end of autumn, the Beibei army gathered more than a hundred tribes and began to march towards the borders of Dai, Chen and Wei. Gather. It is said that in order not to allow me, Dazheng, to clamp down on the forces of the Three Kingdoms, Iba what Khan of the Beibei people ordered the Fourth Department of the Wilderness to open the ancient northwest road to Dazheng, and set up a negotiating field twenty miles outside the pass. These merchants are all Hurry up and go to the market to trade!"

Ganxiu inquired very carefully, but the names of those Hu people were too long and awkward, and he remembered them all wrongly.

Zhang Zhe read information about grasslands in Chang'an.

The grassland is not inferior to the seven countries of the Central Plains. As far as the people of the Central Plains know, there are more than 300 tribes, large and small, scattered.Among them, those who can gather 20 cavalry are the three overlords of the grassland, the Beibei, Wunu and Waqiang people.

The Khan who ruled these three tribes is the Suibaqilan Khan of the Beibei people, which means "Khan who touches the starry sky", and the people of the three northern countries call him "Starry Sky Khan" for short; The Tehanbula Khan of the Chinese people, which means "Mountain Khan"; the last is the Hato Sashumi Khan of the Waqiang people, which means "Eagle Khan".

The northern defense lines of the three countries in the northern part of the Central Plains are basically within the attack range of Sui Bachilan Khan.

And obviously this time, after the grassland suffered an unprecedented drought, Xing Kong Khan put all his hopes of surviving the winter on the three kingdoms in the northern part of the Central Plains.The Beibei people even contacted Da Zheng very rarely, hoping that Da Zheng would not relax the pressure on the Three Kingdoms.

Opening up the ancient roads and discussing places, and allowing Zheng Guo officials to go to Yunshang County to take up their posts are all Beibei people's wooing strategies.

"Chen people are in trouble!" After Zhang Zhe heard the report, he immediately thought of the main force of Chen who was blocked by Nangong Xie. If he was Khan in the Starry Sky, he would definitely concentrate on attacking Chen who lacked mobile forces.

Officials are different from businessmen and ordinary people. Zhang Zhe and his party went through the official channel when they left the customs for inspection.Hearing that Zhang Xinzhi, who is famous all over the world, was leaving the customs to take up his post, the gate guard Long Yuancheng even came to see him off in person.

A group of people traveled twenty miles from Qinguan, and they found a huge negotiating field in a wasteland.

This is a very barbarian-style barnyard. The fences are some tree branches inserted randomly. The barbarians sit anywhere in the barbarian barn, and the aisles formed are also wide and narrow, with twists and turns.

Zhang Zhe arrived with a hundred soldiers, and soon alarmed the barbarian cavalry guarding the field. More than 300 Hu cavalry roared out from behind a hill, but after seeing the Central Plains costumes of Zhang Zhe and others, the leading Hu man gave a mouthful of disappointment.

"If it weren't for the strict order of the Great Khan, I really wanted to rob you Zheng slaves!" The leader of the Hu people rode his horse to ten meters in front of Zhang Zhema, and spoke his heart in the Central Plains dialect that he was not familiar with, and said viciously. Staring at Zhang Zhe, hoping to scare the thin-skinned and tender-skinned Zhang Zhe.

Zhang Zhe really didn't like this trick.

"We are here to buy horses. According to the rules of the grassland, we are also your guests. This is how you treat guests? As an official, maybe I should let our emperor know your true thoughts. What do you think?" Zhang Zhe knew that the other party's Central Plains dialect was not reliable, so he deliberately slowed down his speech, and tried to use words that they could understand.

Seeing that Zhang Zhe was not frightened by him, and hearing that Zhang Zhe started threatening him instead, the leader of the Hu people turned cold.

"Zheng Ren who is riding a mare, please cherish the opportunity given to you by the great Star Khan to obtain a horse! No one can go against the will of the Great Khan, including Tamer, who is as brave as me."

But then the barbarian leader started to laugh loudly: "But you have to remember, little boy! This place doesn't recognize your pieces of paper. Since you made the brave Tamer feel unhappy, the price you trade here will be higher than Twenty percent! This is the price you pay for offending Tamer! Hahahaha~!"

The Hu cavalrymen laughed together, and Geng Liang and the others were about to step forward to scold them, but they were stopped by Zhang Zhe with a wave.

"Are you sure you have the right to set a price for me in this market?"

"Yes! In this forum, no one dares to disobey Tamer's words, otherwise I will hang his head on the gate of the forum!"

"Then, please send someone to go to the forum with us, and tell those people your decision in front of us. I'm sorry for the authority you said, but I want to see it with my own eyes! Otherwise, you Walk with us yourself?"

"Hehehe," Tamer sneered, "The brave wild wolf doesn't have the pleasure of accompanying the rabbit. I want to take care of everything here. Barto!"

Tamer greeted him, and a tall cavalry rode out from behind him.

"You take these Zheng people to the forum, and then tell everyone in the venue my decision! If anyone dares to disobey me, you will kill him on the spot!"

"Yes, my lord!" The tall cavalry replied in a low voice.

"Don't think about playing tricks," Tamer smiled at Zhang Zhe, "Bato is the most honest person in my thousand-man team, no one can bribe him, and no one can intercede in front of him!"

Zhang Zhe nodded, and took the lead in riding his horse towards the market.

Sure enough, his guess was correct, Tamer was a commander of a thousand, and his thousand-man cavalry also had the task of monitoring Qin Guan's activities.Of course, there are no idiots who can be sent by Xingkong Khan to manage the battle field, and as a qualified general, he will naturally not go to the battle field with him in a fit of anger.

What if Zheng Ren made him leave his thousand-man team?
In the market, 80.00% of the people are Hu people from various tribes, and the rest are bold Central Plains businessmen in Guan.

Just after entering the gate of the market, almost everyone noticed Zhang Zhe and his party, because they were very familiar with Barto, who rode at the front on horseback.

Zhang Zhe spoke loudly to everyone before Barto.

"I'm an official from Dazheng. I just negotiated with Master Tamer. He decided: If the horses here are sold to me, they will only be [-]% higher than your price! Brave Barto, don't you think so?"

The upright Barto patted his head, what this little boy said was fine.

"It is indeed Master Tamer's order. The price of the horse sold to this person must be like this. Anyone who violates the order, I will take his head off on the spot!"

The Hu people who sold the horses suddenly became sad. No one had ever heard that Master Tamer was still a good friend in the Central Plains.It can only be [-]% higher than the market price. Isn't this blocking everyone's way to make a fortune?
It's a pity that no one dared to question it.

The rules on the prairie, if you can draw a knife and kill Tamer's 1000 troops, you don't have to follow his rules.

In exchange for much-needed winter food, there are many horse sellers in the market.Moreover, many of these horses are good adult horses that can be used as war horses. Because of the drought in the grassland, most of these horses look a little malnourished.

"Unfortunately, there are very few stallions!" Geng Liang looked at the horses while talking to Zhang Zhe in a low voice, "They are all gelded. I'm afraid you can't buy real stallions here."

"Tell everyone, buy all mares, according to the standard of one person and two horses, don't save me money!"

When Zhang Zhe left Chang'an, he exchanged a lot of gold, because he had already guessed that the Dazheng official ticket would be useless after leaving Qinguan.

The market price in the market is about 120 guan for a war horse, and a slightly lower price for a mare, which costs [-] guan.

Barto counted with ten fingers for a long time, but a member of the same tribe couldn't stand it, so he helped him calculate the price of a mare.

According to Master Tamer's order, the price of selling a mare to Zhang Zhe should be 120 guan.

This price made the Central Plains merchants present extremely jealous, which is why Zhang Zhe deliberately added "you" in front of the price.Few of the Hu people who came to sell horses were idiots, and they often sold them to Central Plains merchants for more than 200 yuan a horse.

One hundred crowns, that's the price they paid to Tamer's tax returns.

Zhang Zhe asked Geng Liang to transfer the more than 20 riding horses that accompanied him to several Central Plains merchants at a low price, and then bought 210 two prairie mares and corresponding saddles in one go.

Riding on the most handsome black mare, Zhang Zhe found that this kind of horse was more aggressive than ordinary riding horses.As soon as he sat firmly, the horse that sat down had the urge to gallop out immediately.

"Patriarch, each of us has almost spent all the gold we carry, can we go?" Geng Liang came over nervously on a big chestnut horse, and he also knew that the patriarch had wiped out that barbarian general .

"Let's go! Tonight, let's find a place to spend the night in the ancient road~!" Zhang Zhe clamped his legs slightly, and the black war horse galloped excitedly, far faster than the previous riding horse.

(End of this chapter)