Late Tang

Near noon, Li Jing, who was talking with Li Rui, received a report that Dengzhou governor Shi Wang Jingwen, Dengzhou navy envoy You Yi Wang Jin, and Daxie village envoy Feng Zhang brought hundreds of People and horses have arrived on the island.

Li Jing quickly told Song Wen the news. Song Wen frowned a few times after hearing this, but was silent for a while before saying: "Since Wang Changshi, General Wang and General Feng are also here, let's send a few people Go pick it up."

Wang Jingwen and his party soon arrived outside the castle, and there were quite a few people, there must have been more than two hundred people.When Wang Jingwen wore a light crimson official robe with a round collar, both Wang Jin and Feng Zhang wore mountain armor, a phoenix-winged helmet, a lion belt around their waists, a shoulder-swallowing unicorn animal head, and a long red silk dress. Cloak, with a ring-shouyi sword hanging from his waist.The pier is only a short distance from the castle, but several people are riding on the war horses that were transported together on the boat.

Li Jing led the main officers in the town to greet them, paid homage, and then led them to Song Wenwen and Li Rui.Although Song Wen and Wang Jingwen were at odds the most, they still maintained a hypocritical manner and saluted each other in front of everyone at this time.This time, Feng Zhang and Wang Jin not only came by themselves, but also brought their main officers.Feng Xun, who came to Daxie village before, was the deputy soldier and horse envoy, and now he brought the generals from the five forts and seven garrisons of Daxie village, and Wang Jin also brought all the generals from the navy battalion.

Except for the last time I met Feng Zhang after Cui Yunqing's departure banquet, this time it was Li Jing who officially met Feng Zhang.When Li Jing came up to meet him, Feng Zhang had a smile on his face, and he personally stepped forward to help Li Jing up.He also personally introduced the main officers of Daxie village one by one, and the officers of each fort also greeted Li Jing very politely.If people who are not familiar with each other meet, they really think it is a harmonious relationship between superiors and subordinates and friendly brothers. No one would think that the two sides have been secretly plotting against each other for a long time.

Only when Wang Jin met Li Jing, the corners of his eyes twitched a few times, which seemed a little unnatural.

Civil and military officials from Dengzhou gathered on Salmon Island, and the island was full of people for a while.Under the leadership of Li Jing, all the officers followed to visit the town of Salmonella.The crowd visited the four temporary camps that burned the city outside the city, the thousand-man pit dug at the foot of Phoenix Mountain, and the pile of headless corpses of pirates that had just been thrown in and not yet returned.Afterwards, they also looked at the western city wall that was completely destroyed in the battle last night, seeing the huge gap that was flattened to the ground, and the black and red blood stains scattered all over the ground. Everyone reacted differently.

Song Wen, Li Rui and others naturally praised Li Jing and others, praising the soldiers and common people in Shamen Township for their bravery and toughness. With hundreds of recruits and some young and strong commoners, they not only resisted the attack of nearly a thousand pirates in the end The sneak attack also wiped out the pirates.

Listening to their praise, Li Jing and the others felt a little proud, especially Lin Wei and Wang Zhong, who almost couldn't bear to tell everyone the real battle situation yesterday.Fortunately, Li Jing kept staring at them, seeing this, he hurriedly and carefully stopped them, so as to avoid causing big trouble.If they knew that more than 500 pirates attacked yesterday, and there were more than 200 guards from the royal family together, the matter would be aggravated.Don't say whether it will be possible or not. Song Wen and others will fight with Wang Jin and the others directly on this island, but at least it is conceivable that the hundreds of captives will definitely not be able to keep them.Besides, if the matter is really made public, Li Jing may not be able to keep the property that Li Jing embezzled from the Wang family and the craftsmen in the underground workshop.

Since Song Wen had previously stated that he would not touch Wang Jin for the time being, why would Li Jing ask for trouble.

Everyone looked at the layout of the city again, and when Li Jing pointed to the dilapidated city wall and said that a new city wall was going to be rebuilt, the new city would be three times the size of the original city, and the city wall would use new drawings.When they saw the rough renderings of the new town, they were very surprised.Especially when Song Wen heard that this new city would only cost [-] yuan for the two new city walls originally planned, he was very moved.Now Li Jing said that he would simply tear down the broken west city wall, and also the north wall, and expand the area of ​​the new city again. In the end, the new city would be a city with a length of [-] steps from north to south and [-] steps from east to west. , The city with a circumference of four thousand steps was shocked.

Hearing the plan introduced by Li Jing, even Song Wen showed a strange expression.The meaning is obviously to say, you are a small town general, you can just build a small castle, why are you building such a big city?Dengzhou City, a prefecture's seat, is only nearly nine miles in circumference.Daxie Village is still the superior of Shamen Town, but it is only [-] steps a week. For a level like Shamen Town, the average castle is only about [-] steps.Now Li Jing actually wants to get one with a circumference of [-] steps, which is ten times the original area.It is even bigger than the one in Dengzhou City.

Song Wen opened his mouth, but in the end he still didn't say it in public.

When Wang Jin, Feng Zhang and the others heard the news, they obviously had expressions of gloating and watching a joke on their faces.If Li Jing really wanted to build such a city, and still use his drawings that cost twice as much as ordinary city walls, then it would definitely be interesting.They wanted to see where Li Jing got so much money and so many people to build such a city.

Li Jing saw the expressions of these people, just smiled and said nothing.Of course he couldn't really build such a city.He did plan to simply tear down all four old walls and rebuild them like the walls of the bastion.However, although there are plans to expand the area of ​​the castle, it has only expanded from the original [-] steps to [-] steps, which is only [-] steps more than the original plan.The reason why he said this suddenly was that he had such an idea suddenly, and then said it casually, just to see everyone's reaction.

After seeing the layout of the residents' map, barracks area, office area, and workshop area preset on Li Jing's drawings, Song Wen and the others frowned even more. built.It turned out that everyone was shocked by Li Jing's ability when they saw that Li Jing had killed the one-eyed flood dragon all by himself.But now after seeing Li Jing in person and seeing Li Jing's taken-for-granted plans, everyone thinks that Li Jing is nothing more than that, a headstrong guy with no brains at all.Everyone was thinking, maybe it wasn't that Li Jing was too powerful to defeat the pirate, but that the one-eyed Jiaolang was too useless because of his false reputation.

After seeing the new city plan of the castle, Song Wen took everyone to visit the wounded in the medical team and the families of the soldiers who were temporarily placed in various places in the city.A group of people also pooled [-] guan as a condolence pension. Originally, Song Wen and others expected that the wounded and the common people would thank them after receiving the money, but the actual result was that when everyone received an average of [-] guan, they only received [-] guan. When we were writing money, what everyone looked at these civil servants and generals was not gratitude, but contempt.This made Song Wen and others very depressed, and even a little angry, but they were too embarrassed to argue with these ordinary people, so they had to pretend to be angry in the end.They didn't know that the pensions, rewards, and relief funds that Li Jing just distributed to everyone, whatever they got, were calculated in real terms.Compared with that, a mere fifty cents is not as good as everyone's wages in the workshop for a day.

Song Wen had to think of a new topic on the road. He asked Li Jing, "This time your department has suffered such a heavy loss, and you will have to recruit the garrison again. Are there any shortages in terms of personnel and weapons?"

Li Jing replied: "Although the soldiers suffered heavy losses, there are still many people who are willing to carry guns and eat food in the famine years. The personnel are not bad. However, we are seriously short of armaments. Many brothers used to carry poles, bamboo poles, The wooden sticks and the pirates were desperate, if not for this, the casualties would not be so great."

Song Wen looked surprised, and asked, "Didn't you go to Daxie village to collect armaments when you took office?"

Li Jing hurriedly told in detail about the hundreds of broken spears and knives he brought back from Daxie Village last time. After hearing this, Song Wen frowned urgently and his face was black and blue.He turned to Feng Zhang and said, "Shamen Town belongs to Daxie Village, so the ordnance should naturally be distributed by Daxie Village. Li Zhen recruited his own people to take up the post, so why should he bring his own weapons to take up the post? Why do you have to explain this matter? If you can’t give a reason, then the hundreds of innocent souls who died in the battle in Shamen Town will all be blamed on you.”

Feng Zhang's face was a little ugly. Although he was under Song Wen's official position, he was actually not directly under Song Wen's management.Now Song Wen completely treats him as a subordinate, which makes him very happy, but now that this matter is said, he still has some shortcomings, so he can only say: "I just heard about this matter. I went to other islands to inspect the defense, and only a Sicang was left at home, and he was not sensible." After a pause, he gritted his teeth and said, "I think so, I'll have someone pull out [-] sets of ordnance when I go back. .In addition, as a compensation for the dead and injured brothers, each war dead subsidizes five guan, and each wounded subsidizes two guan, rounding up the whole number, I will give [-] guan to Shamen Town."

The issue of pensions was originally the responsibility of Daxie Village, but if Song Wen hadn't raised it in public today, intending to take the opportunity to make trouble, Feng Zhang would never have pulled out a copper coin.Pulling out the money now may seem generous, but in fact it is just a duty to do.

Song Wen ignored Feng Zhang, but said coldly: "I remember that when Shamen Town was still Shamen Garrison, the defense area also included the three subsidiary islands of Niutuozi Island, Yangtuozi Island, and Shaofan Island. Now the Shamen Garrison has been upgraded. For Shamen Town, I think the defense of these three islands should continue to be handed over to them. Let them send some troops to garrison the three islands, so that there will be no situation where pirates come to the islands and no one finds out in advance. "

Hearing these meaningful words, Feng Zhang's face was completely darkened, but he couldn't come up with any strong words to fight back. Originally, he had hoped that Wang Jin would join him and help him.Unexpectedly, since Wang Jin came to the island, he has been absent-minded and distracted.In the end, Feng Zhang had no choice but to agree to hand over the three islands of Yangtuozi Island, Niutuozi Island and Shaobing Island to Shamen Town under Song Wen's persecution.

Song Wen looked around the crowd with satisfaction, and pointedly said: "Ji Yu is a talented person. He killed nearly a thousand thieves in the first battle. Such feats are beyond the reach of ordinary people. Such a brave general is the blessing of our Dengzhou. From now on, everyone will help as much as they can.”

Everyone agrees, with different thoughts.But today Song Wen is so tough on Li Jing, and he also brought soldiers and horses from the three battalions of Longshan Camp, Dongmou Shouzhuo, and Dengzhou Zhizhou Bing, which fully shows that Li Jing is a fierce pawn of Jieshuai Song Wei. .In the future, when dealing with Li Jing, you will have to worry about it.

(To be continued)