Elegy of Tang Dynasty

Chapter 558 Golden Wheel Dharma King
This was Fang Chongyong's first time going out to sea since coming to this world. At this moment, he was standing at the bow of the ship, feeling very excited.

At the same time, he also felt that the ancients were truly fearless in their efforts to explore the new world.

Even the route they are sailing on now has been developed since the Three Kingdoms period. Sailing along the way is extremely safe. Some people even travel on sampans between Dengzhou and Bohai Kingdom.

However, sitting on the ship at this moment, one can also feel the power of nature, which is not something humans can contend with.

It's shaking so badly.

"Marshal Fang, this route goes along the coast, so there's no chance of getting lost. If we encounter a storm, we can also go ashore to survive."

Liu Yan was worried that Fang Chongyong was worried about something happening on the road, so he began to comfort him.

Fang Chongyong led the Silver Spear Xiaojie Army and marched for dozens of miles to the seaport at the exit of the Haihe River (the predecessor of Tianjin Wei), where he easily found a sufficient number of large sea ships.

In fact, this was an important stronghold for trade between the Bohai Kingdom and the Tang Dynasty. Business was very prosperous and much more lively than ordinary provincial capitals. There was no such ridiculous thing as "unfrequented" here.

The furs, ginseng, deer antlers, herbs and other products from Liaodong, and the porcelain, writing brushes, inkstones, handicrafts, silk fabrics and other products from the Tang Dynasty (mainly from Hebei Province) were all shipped to and from the sea from here. Although there were no other county towns around, a number of market towns closely linked to maritime trade had been formed.

Its customs and practices are quite different from those in the inland areas of the Tang Dynasty.

Of course, trading these routine items is not enough to form a fixed trade route.

There were even slave traders here selling the "hard currency" of the Bohai Kingdom: Silla slaves!
The profits involved were huge enough to attract slave traders on both sides and even government officials to participate.

After Fang Chongyong and his men arrived at the harbor, they easily "borrowed" ten large sea ships with their knives, and also "rescued" more than a hundred Silla maids.

In order to thank the soldiers of the Silver Spear Filial Piety Army for their strict military discipline and their non-violation of any rules, the sea merchants voluntarily offered a lot of specialties from Liaodong to express their goodwill.

Among them were hundreds of fine horses.

Of course, how could Fang Chongyong accept such warm courtesy for no reason? He quickly ordered Liu Yan to write IOUs to many sea merchants and asked them to go to the Ministry of War in Chang'an to collect the money when it was convenient for them.

General Fang Jie and the Silver Spear Xiaojie Army, as well as Xuanwu Town, would never do such a thing as taking things from others without paying. Everything would be paid for by the Emperor of Chang'an.

"I'm not worried about the return trip, but about military supplies."

Facing the salty sea breeze, Fang Zhongyong sighed. Seeing that Liu Yan didn't seem to understand, he explained:
"The Silver Spear Filial Piety Army must expand to 10,000 soldiers, with six states under its jurisdiction, and each state must have at least 5,000 soldiers. Bianzhou and other places do not produce weapons, and only Luoyang, Chang'an, Yangzhou and other places have large-scale military workshops.

That's fine, we can still find a way to solve it.

But there is no way to deal with the loss of horses. Judge Liu (Liu Yan is now appointed by him as the Judge of the Ministry of Revenue, in charge of money) can you teach me how to solve this problem?"

Fang Chongyong glanced at Liu Yan and asked.

“There is a way to do this.”

Liu Yan nodded and smiled slightly, not feeling embarrassed.

"any idea?"

Fang Chongyong asked doubtfully.

Don't think that the Tang Dynasty had sufficient military equipment, that was in the past. Now, after so many wars and being robbed so many times, many weapons have been lost to the public. With a large-scale military expansion, it is very likely that some of the required military equipment will be missing, and those that are insufficient will need to be produced by themselves.

The so-called military supplies are very complicated, not just a sword, even if a farmer is armed as a soldier. The contents of the military uniform alone are very complicated. Depending on the combat area and combat method, there are several types of military boots to prepare.

These things all need people to produce, which alone is annoying enough, not to mention the issue of raw materials.

Even if all these were accomplished, horses would still be unavailable. Xuanwu Town, with Bianzhou as its core, had no place to produce horses around it.

How to obtain horses in the future is also a big problem.

"With the disturbance caused by the governor, there will certainly be many disaster victims who will cross the river to the south. Accepting them, building military workshops, and using work as relief can solve the manpower problem of military supplies.

As for materials, they are nothing more than money and silk. I have already worked out a method of using salt as an anchor to issue Jiaozi, in parallel with the salt tax.

With the benefit of the canal, there is no need to worry about transportation, so this method is feasible."

Liu Yan said confidently.

In fact, when Li Linfu was in power, he had already studied the issue of "monetary taxes", requiring that taxes be collected mainly in the form of "light goods", that is, silk that is easy to transport, and then allowing the government to use these silks to purchase grain.

Of course, this approach had very poor effects due to the lack of supporting policies, and it also touched upon the interests of the powerful, so it encountered resistance.

Referring to the experience of later generations, the Qing Dynasty collected salt taxes to the extreme, and then reduced land rents at the national level to make up for the deficit, which actually increased the tax-paying population and also fleeced the landlord class.

This can be considered a remedy to break the traditional tax dilemma in the feudal era.

Therefore, Liu Yan's proposal of "lightening land rent and increasing salt tax" was a good way to improve finances. In particular, Bianzhou had the advantage of the canal, and could collect grain with silk, facilitating transportation, so that there were no physical barriers to the circulation of goods.

Of course, there is a core problem in his suggestions: there is no large-scale salt production in the six states under Xuanwu Town! There is no place in the surrounding states and counties!

As expected, Fang Zhongyong held the mast with one hand, and then stretched out his other hand to Liu Yan and asked, "Where does the salt come from?"

"Dengzhou has salt and horses."

Liu Yan said calmly.

Fang Zhongyong was also shocked. He said in disbelief, "Alas, I am ignorant. I just found out today that horses can be raised by the sea."

Hearing this, Liu Yan was so upset that he couldn't help but "popularize science" and said, "General Jie, horses cannot be raised by the sea, and Dengzhou doesn't produce horses locally. But Bohai has horses, and a lot of them. We can buy horses from the King of Bohai, on a large scale."

On the route from Dengzhou to Bohai Kingdom, the main "commodity" traded in bulk on the Bohai Kingdom's side, in addition to "hard currency" such as Silla slaves, another major item was horses from Liaodong.

Of course, in order to "eliminate" the "detestable" illegal trade of Silla slaves, the Tang Dynasty established the "Silla Office" in Dengzhou, which was an official agency specifically responsible for managing maritime trade in Liaodong (mainly the Bohai Kingdom).

Other normal commodities do not require any "management" at all. Everyone in this industry knows what needs to be managed, and the Tang Dynasty government naturally knows it as well.

The joint management of the maritime trade between Dengzhou and Bohai was a certain Tang official who served there and a local dignitary sent by Bohai. If there was a dispute, each country would take care of its own affairs.

Because the rebellious Bohai King Da Wuyi was beaten to the palace by Fang Youde and frightened to death, the new Bohai King Da Menyi (who once served as Ji Ge's palace guard) served Datang very respectfully.

Because of this, although Dengzhou's maritime trade is prosperous, there has been no trouble and it seems relatively calm.

Fang Zhongyong glanced at Liu Yan, nodded slightly and said, "Judge Liu seems to know Dengzhou very well."

This was quite meaningful. Liu Yan was afraid that Fang Chongyong might misunderstand him, so he quickly explained, "I wanted to leave Changlu Salt Field for a long time, and I inquired about many things about Dengzhou. The dignitary in charge of maritime trade in Bohai State is Daqinmao, the son of Da Wuyi. And he..."

Liu Yan thought about it, then sighed and said:

“After your father’s surprise attack on Bohai State, Daqinmao served as his attendant for two years.

This was arranged by the retired emperor. During these two years, he had no freedom at all and was like a slave. Two years later, Daqinmao was pardoned by the retired emperor and placed in Dengzhou to be in charge of maritime trade.

It is hard to say whether we will have a conflict with Daqinmao during this trip to Dengzhou.

Damen Yi is now very famous in Bohai State and is revered as the Golden Wheel Dharma King. The commander should at least give Daqin Mao some face. A falling out is a lose-lose situation and will do more harm to us. "

Liu Yan explained patiently, fearing that Fang Chongyong would start looting as soon as he arrived in Dengzhou, and then accidentally kill Daqinmao without knowing it.

Daqinmao is the nephew of Damenyi, the current ruler of Bohai State. Damenyi used to be Jige's guard and had been in Xingqing Palace.

So Ji Ge let Da Qinmao serve as Fang Youde's attendant for two years, but in fact the latter was only implicated by Da Wuyi. In Ji Ge's view, Da Qinmao's failure to persuade his father (including his inability to persuade him) was the original sin.

But Daqinmao's crime did not deserve the death penalty.

After two years of persuasion, Ji Ge's anger subsided, and the next ruler of Bohai was very obedient to the Tang Dynasty, so he could not offend Da Qinmao. So he arranged a lucrative job for Da Qinmao.

This is consistent with Ji Ge's style of being obsessed with power and liking to manipulate people's hearts.

The question now is, during the two years that Daqinmao followed Fang Youde, did he feel resentment and want to seek revenge after meeting him, or did he feel grateful and want to repay Fang Chongyong when he met him?
This is what Liu Yan is worried about, because although he knows a lot, it is only on the surface. People's hearts are hidden in their stomachs. Liu Yan doesn't know what kind of person Daqinmao is, and he can't find out.

"We'll talk about Daqinmao later. You just said that Dengzhou is very important to us, right?"

Fang Zhongyong asked with a slight frown.

"That's right, the Marshal needs an outlet to the sea, and Dengzhou has the largest seaport in the north.

If we cannot take Dengzhou, the commander must immediately lead his troops south to Yangzhou and seize it."

Liu Yan said very seriously.

In his opinion, the difficulty for Fang Chongyong to capture Dengzhou was more than a hundred times easier than that of capturing Yangzhou!

Yangzhou is an important city, not only strategically important, but also rich and with developed handicraft industry. Taking it would arouse hostility from many people.

Taking Yangzhou now is only a theoretical possibility.

As for taking Dengzhou, Fang Chongyong currently has only one obstacle, and that is Yongwang Li Lin, who is entrenched in Qizhou (Jinan) and other places.

Liu Yan didn't mention this because Li Lin was a prince and there were many things he couldn't say. What Fang Zhongyong was thinking and how the world was going to change, these things, just understand in your heart, silence is golden.

Smart people won’t bring it up directly.

"Dengzhou..."

Fang Chongyong repeated it over and over again as if muttering to himself.

In fact, Che Guangqian had suggested to him before that he must take either Dengzhou or Laizhou. Of course, Dengzhou was the first choice, as the port facilities, supporting towns, and reasonable and mature shipping routes were all ready.

Once you get it, you can use it directly.

Laizhou’s seaport conditions are slightly poor, so it is not the first choice and needs to be developed slowly by ourselves.

Of course, taking Dengzhou is not the end. In fact, there is another hidden condition, which is to establish a stable and close trade relationship with the Bohai Kingdom.

Among these, it is necessary to obtain recognition from the Bohai Kingdom and even reach cooperation at the political level.

Otherwise, how could maritime trade be developed? It would be useless to occupy a seaport with a blocked trade route!
These things are not something that "financial expert" Liu Yan can see.

When Fang Zhongyong thought of these troubles, he felt powerless. Liu Yan's idea seemed to solve the problem, but it also raised new problems.

It's like starting a new land, you need to keep breaking through obstacles.

In the past, under the framework of the Tang Dynasty, the army was ready, the logistics were ready, the strongholds and supplies were ready, and the diplomatic achievements were also ready.

The general only needs to command the battle.

At that time, Fang Chongyong felt that he was almost omnipotent and could beat anyone he caught!

However, once he lost the Tang Dynasty as his backdrop, and now had to do everything himself, he found that those trivial matters that were not problems before became huge problems that gave him a headache.

“The road ahead is long and arduous, but I will continue to search for it.”

Fang Zhongyong sighed. What the hell is going on! His scumbag dad is digging a hole for him again!
Fortunately, the boatman said that it would only take two days to sail down to Dengzhou with the wind. This route, with its high safety factor and high speed, has dramatically increased the strategic value of Dengzhou.

At the beginning of the founding of the Tang Dynasty, the brothers Chun Yu Nan and Chun Yu Lang gathered people in Dengzhou and led troops to resist the rebellion. Although they were later recruited, the imperial court obviously had a sympathy for this place and directly abolished the state.

It was not until the end of the Wu Dynasty that it was reopened due to the needs of maritime trade.

This is enough to show that the Tang Dynasty court has always been wary of anyone taking the sea route from Hebei or Liaodong to Dengzhou, and then threatening the Henan flank.

Dengzhou, Bohai Kingdom, Daqinmao, Yongwang Li Lin, Li Baochen, Luoyang... one name after another flashed through Fang Chongyong's mind.

The new strategy of Xuanwu Town seems to be about to emerge.

……

In the iconic circular Mingtang of the Luoyang Imperial Palace, Li Wan, the "fake emperor" who was not recognized by the central government in Chang'an, looked in horror at the so-called "courtiers" headed by Wei Jian in the hall, and then looked at An Shouzhong who brought back the news of the annihilation of the entire army.

The whole person is not good!
"General An, did Marshal Huangfu really lose? He had over 70,000 elite soldiers!"

Li Wan's voice trembled when she spoke.

Seventy thousand people! If we include the odds and ends, there should be more than that!

How come it was destroyed in just one battle?
"Your Majesty, it is true. The troops from Guanzhong came in overwhelming numbers, and Marshal Huangfu died in the chaotic battle. Only one of them escaped back to Luoyang."

An Shouzhong said this without blushing or beating his heart, his face was very calm.

The army in the front has been almost wiped out. Now do Li Wan and the bunch of losers here dare to touch me?
After the action, who will clean up the mess?

He is now in a state of fearlessness.

As expected, Wei Jian suggested to Li Wan: "Your Majesty, why not let General An gather the defeated soldiers and select young and strong men in Luoyang City to form a new army."

"That's right."

Li Wan uttered two words in a tone as calm as possible.

(End of this chapter)