The Imperial Age with the Resurgence of Han Style

Chapter 312: Warm-hearted Liang Guo

"Snapped……"

"Moo..."

"Yoho! ... You beast, get out of here!"

On January 1733, 1, in the dense jungle of northern Annam, a timber transport team of more than ten people were waving whips, driving a dozen elephants, dragging precious yellow pear wood, winding along the rugged mountain road.

At this time, several thick logs were stuck between the trees in the forest. A guy kept giving commands, trying to make the elephant swing back and forth and left and right to avoid the stuck tree stumps.

But after working under heavy load for a long time and without food or water for a long time, the elephant seemed very tired and its reactions were a little slow. It just gasped and kicked its feet in vain but could not move at all.

The furious man swung the whip angrily and beat the elephant hard.

Perhaps because he thought the elephant had thick skin and would not react to the whipping, the guy got angry and pulled out a machete from his waist and chopped it hard on the elephant's butt.

"Moo..."

A deep bloody wound immediately appeared, and the elephant let out a shrill roar in pain. Its four thick legs pushed hard on the soil on the ground and kept arching forward, as if trying its best to get rid of the chains on its body and find the free air it once had.

"Click..."

A tree as thick as a bowl was pulled apart from the bottom by a tremendous force, and a piece of yellow pear wood strung with several iron chains was immediately dragged over and slammed into the elephant with great force.

"Moo..." The elephant fell to its knees on the ground, howling helplessly.

"It's bad!" The clerk went forward carefully to check, and found that one of the elephant's hind legs had been broken by the falling wood. He felt distressed and angry, "Damn it, this elephant is useless."

"It's broken?" Several guys behind immediately stopped their elephants, stopped walking, and came over to check. "Since it's broken, quickly move it to the side and don't block the road. Otherwise, we won't be able to reach the river before dark, and we will have to spend the night in the mountains."

"How can I move such a huge elephant?" the clerk said angrily, "Damn it, this elephant is useless, how can I get the logs it is dragging down the mountain? If I miss the delivery deadline of Manager Liu, he will deduct my money!"

"We can't let your useless elephant delay our efforts!... Hurry up and find a way to move aside and make way. Everyone has five or six people to feed. If you miss the delivery date and get your money deducted, you'll have to eat porridge for a few days."

"Alright, alright, stop arguing. You, you, unload the wood behind the two elephants, then hurry over and drag this elephant aside. You guys, we're all eating from the same pot, so if we run into trouble, we have to help each other out. What's the point of all you whining like old women here?"

"What Liu said is true. Come on... Let's get started quickly and clear the road as soon as possible so that we can get down the mountain and put the wood into the river. If these twenty or thirty pieces of wood can be successfully transported to Xinzheng (now Hongji Port in Vietnam), they can at least be exchanged for several hundred silver dollars. We can't delay on the road!"

Timber, especially precious mahogany, nanmu and yellow pear wood, is one of the most important export products of Liang State. Every year, a large number of merchants from Qi, Qin, Northern Ming, Siam, Luzon, Wei and other countries and regions flock to Xinzheng Port with handfuls of gold and silver and drive large ships to take away the precious timber cut from the deep mountains and forests. The timber is then processed into various furniture, or used as beams to protect the houses and sold to the homes of high-ranking officials and dignitaries.

As logging intensified, precious timber in coastal areas was almost completely harvested within a few decades, forcing timber merchants to turn their attention to inland mountainous areas far from the coast.

The mountainous terrain is steep and there are no roads for vehicles at all. In order to transport the precious timber they had cut down, the timber merchants captured and trained a large number of elephants. They put iron chains on one end of the timber and tied them to the elephants. These land overlords would drag the thick timber down the mountain and throw it into the river, following the direction of the river straight to the estuary.

When going down the mountain, elephants sometimes have to crawl forward on their knees to keep their balance. In order to ensure the quality of the wood, many logs are simply stripped of treetops and branches, which results in the situation that the wood is too long to turn in the forest when transporting it in the mountains. At this time, the elephants have to use their heads and long trunks to clear the way.

When encountering huge and heavy wood, elephants can only move forward for more than ten meters before stopping to rest and then continue. Once the wood is stuck by trees or boulders in the forest, the elephant's owner will recklessly issue commands to make the elephant toss back and forth. If the elephant is slow to react, it will immediately be whipped, or even violently chopped and beaten with axes or machetes...

From the top of the mountain to the mountain stream, and then to the river, these are the three stages of elephants pulling wood. Each section of the road is left with endless blood and sweat of the elephants, and even their remains of flesh and blood.

However, in order to earn a lot of money from transporting timber, the elephant porters do not care about their health or even their lives, and drive them back and forth between the mountains and the valleys again and again, dragging the precious felled timber to the riverside.

Who made the entire Liang Kingdom have no decent industry after decades of development and could only rely on the wood from the mountains to exchange for precious gold, silver and materials?
After years of expansion, the territory of the Kingdom of Lang Son has been successively occupied by Lang Son, Quang Ninh, Bac Gian (now in Bac Kan Province, Vietnam), Bac Ha (now in Ha Giang Province, Vietnam) and other areas. In 1702, it also swallowed up the remnants of the Mac Dynasty in Cao Bang area, almost blocking the land communication between Annan and Daqin.

In order to consolidate and enhance the strength of its own base, the State of Liang actively recruited the people of Daqin to immigrate to its territory in the border areas, and even offered preferential policies such as free distribution of large amounts of land and exemption of miscellaneous labor and taxes for several years to attract Han immigrants.

By 1730, the number of Han Chinese in Liang State had reached more than . If the nearly Annamites were added, the total population would be close to , divided into three prefectures, one direct-controlled prefecture, and counties in the country, which meant that the country had basically established a firm foothold.

However, the geopolitical situation of Liang State was extremely dangerous. To the north was the huge Qin State, and to the south was the Annan Li Dynasty, which was determined to recover lost territory. If both sides exerted their strength and attacked from both the north and the south, the entire Liang State would be crushed to pieces in an instant, with no room for maneuver at all.

There was no other reason. The strategic space was too small and there was no room for maneuver. The enemy only needed to raise their feet to kill us at the doorstep. After taking two more steps, they would immediately attack the city of Xinjing (now Lang Son City, Vietnam) and start a direct battle to defend the capital.

However, since Liang State clung to Qi State and established a vassal relationship more than 60 years ago, the security situation of the entire kingdom has immediately undergone a fundamental change.

Fearing the powerful military deterrence of Qi, Annan did not dare to gather troops to continue the northern attack after two consecutive failed "Northern Expeditions". Even the Qin Dynasty gradually stopped all kinds of threats against Liang State and strictly blocked the border. With the support of Qi, Liang State occupied all the land in northern Vietnam through continuous encroachment and invasion, and gradually developed and strengthened its own strength.

However, Liang State seemed to lack the stamina to further expand its power.

This is because the land in northern Vietnam occupied by the Kingdom of Liang was quite "rotten", with all terrain being mountainous and jungle.

Looking down from the air, you will find that the entire northern Vietnam region is full of steep mountains, deep valleys and narrow valleys. Most of it is mountainous, with an altitude of more than 500 to 600 meters. The main mountain range runs from northwest to southeast, with branches crisscrossing each other. There are deep valleys and valleys between the two mountains, with valleys tens to hundreds of meters deep.

Only the several dams (small basins) in the mountains can accommodate the gathering of people and large-scale agricultural planting activities.

The hillsides along the ravines and rivers were mostly covered with bamboo forests or shrub forests, which were not suitable for farming. Under the guidance of Qi's advisers, they could barely be developed into rubber forests.

Because of its location in the mountains, the transportation facilities of the whole country are extremely backward. There are not only few roads, but also poor road conditions. The pack roads and paths in the mountains are few and narrow, mostly along the ridges, jungles, and river valleys. In most places, only people can walk together, and horses have difficulty walking. They are often blocked. In the rainy season, the simple roads are even more muddy and the track is unclear. They are often washed away by mountain torrents or covered with weeds, making it difficult to travel.

What is even more troubling to the people of Lang Suk is that there are many ethnic groups in northern Vietnam with complex composition. In addition to hundreds of thousands of Annamites, there are also indigenous ethnic groups such as Miao, Yao, Sa, Tay, Nung, etc., with different languages ​​and customs, profound influence of religious superstition, many taboos, and extremely backward economy and culture.

More than 100,000 Han people were spread across this vast mountainous area like pepper, and could only control the key river valleys, plains, and important pass towns. As for those deep in the mountains where roads were inconvenient, the Liang government could only let them do as they pleased and there was no question of actual control.

Therefore, after slightly consolidating its rule in northern Vietnam, the Kingdom of Lang Kok had been patrolling the flat and fertile Red River Plain area, planning all day long to rush down from the mountains, destroy the Annan Le Dynasty, and swallow up the rich Red River Delta.

But for some reason, the Great Qi, as the overlord, never showed any signs of taking action against the Le Dynasty. It just relied on its own strong national strength and economic advantages to continuously infiltrate it politically and economically, as if it wanted to slowly corrode and soften the Le Dynasty in a subtle way, and transform it into a submissive vassal state like Guangnan, devoted to serving the Great Qi.

Of course, the fear of Qin's fierce reaction may also be one of the reasons why Qi did not directly conquer the Annan Li Dynasty by force. If the two great Chinese countries with the same ancestry and origin directly fought over the issue of Annan, it would cause a lot of trouble, and perhaps all the surrounding countries and regions would be involved.

Despite this, the king and his ministers of Liang State were still very excited and looked forward to Qi State taking action against Annan one day in the future so that they could follow behind and gain some benefits. Even if they could not completely destroy the country and swallow up its land, they would at least weaken Annan's strength to the greatest extent to avoid posing a threat to their own safety.

Otherwise, it would not be a problem for a country as small as mine to always maintain a military force of nearly 10,000 people!

Almost 70% to 80% of the kingdom's income was invested in military construction, leaving no room for improvement in people's livelihood.

Although, as a vassal of Qi, you can obtain Qi's military protection when facing major military threats, but you must always have available weapons when war breaks out and carry out a certain degree of self-defense resistance first.

Otherwise, when Qi's reinforcements were being mobilized, the entire kingdom was defeated by one blow and finally wiped out, which would be an unjust death.

Although Qi had troops stationed in Liang State, they were deployed in the two coastal ports of Xinzheng and Yanchuan (now the northern Vietnamese city of Mong Cai). If they wanted to rush to the inland hinterland for assistance, it would probably take more than ten days or half a month to get there.

Therefore, within the territory of Liang, the military obtains the most resources and has the greatest power. It can forcibly requisition civilian labor and social materials on the grounds of emergency military affairs, and all people must cooperate.

When the timber transport team, driving a dozen elephants, arrived at a simple dock on the Qingxi River (now the Tien An River in northeastern Vietnam) before dark, they suddenly saw several Liang Guo officers and soldiers stationed there and immediately became nervous.

In this remote place, would these soldiers take the opportunity to extort some money from them?
"Are these elephants tamed and managed by you?" an officer asked coldly.

"Yes, sir." The leader Liu nodded and said, "What... do you want us to do?"

"Haha..." The officer smiled brightly. "You know what? I really need your help to do something! It's getting late now, so you should rest for a night. Come with us tomorrow morning."

"Master, this is not appropriate." Liu Tou said in embarrassment, "Look, we are transporting wood here. If we follow you and delay the transportation of wood, the shopkeeper above will blame us. Don't you think this will delay our food for nothing? ... Master, please be kind and let us go."

As he spoke, Liu Tou took out a silver dollar from his pocket and handed it over with great reluctance.

"Don't talk nonsense to me!" The officer took the silver dollar without hesitation and stuffed it into his pocket. "Didn't I explain this to you clearly? ... For urgent military affairs, all of you and the elephants have been requisitioned. Tomorrow morning, follow us to transport military equipment and supplies. Hey, these dozen elephants can at least tow seven or eight cannons, which saves a lot of effort!"

"Ah?..." Upon hearing this, everyone looked bitter.

"Excuse me, sir, what kind of emergency is this that requires the use of us and these elephants?"

"Hey, what? Do you think I'm trying to trick you?" The officer glared at everyone with a fierce look on his face. "According to the order of my king and the order of the general staff, from today on, my Liang Kingdom will carry out a full military mobilization. Don't even think about requisitioning a few of you or a few large livestock. Even if I point guns at you and send you to the battlefield, you must obey me obediently. ... Let me tell you, our Liang Kingdom is going to fight a big war!"

"Ah? ...A big war? Who are we going to fight against?"

"Who else can we fight with? ...Of course, the Annan barbarians in the south!"

(End of this chapter)