Great Wei Overlord

Chapter 919

Chapter 925
Neither the ministers nor the military generals of the Jin Dynasty supported the Northern Expedition, and Sima Dan was also very helpless. Even if he wanted to fight, he had no strength.But he still has a bit of face, and he doesn't dare to lose his reputation easily.It's just that the ideal is good, but the reality is very cruel.

As the saying goes, the face of a child in April is even more so on the muddy land of the Jianghuai River.It was sunny and cloudless just now, and it started to rain in a blink of an eye, and the rain became heavier and heavier, which seemed to be continuous.

The raindrops hit the eaves of the jade cymbals, making a ticking sound; the raindrops hitting the cold spears made a clanging sound; the raindrops hitting the armor on the shield made a muffled crackling sound.When Ran Mingyu was walking slowly north, everything was very quiet, only the sound of nature echoed.

Ran Ming entered Jiangxia, Jingzhou via the Yangtze River, and then took the way to Xiangyang, preparing to return north.Along the way, Ran Ming really felt Xi Chiuchi's ability. In just over a month, the newly attached Jingzhou seemed so calm and orderly.Jingzhou didn't build expressways on a large scale like Xu Yang did, but the original official roads were much stronger from the wilderness like ghosts and monsters.One by one, the people consciously braved the rain to dredge the ditches and strengthen the embankments to prepare for the coming rainy season.

Every village along the way has built Huang En Pavilions at the most eye-catching positions at the entrance of the village.In fact, this is not a pavilion, but a number of temples. What they worship is not a statue of a god, but a stele of the emperor's grace that Ran Ming promulgated to abolish corvee and never add gifts.Local officials are very concerned about this work, this is where they have made the most political achievements. If some people complain to them about the greatness of the emperor's grace, if the local officials are light, they will be dismissed from office, and if the serious ones are ransacked and killed, no one will dare to do so. reckless.

In a village along the official road, the Huang En Pavilion at the entrance of the village has just been completed, and five animals, fruits, and incense are offered at the main entrance.Four majestic Xiangyong guarded the door with big ring knives, like a statue.

In front of the Emperor's Grace Monument, there were kneeling people all over the place, and the leaders were all old folks and famous elders.They kowtowed and offered incense devoutly. I am afraid that the Jade Emperor would not enjoy such treatment.

A young scribe gently lifted the oldest old man up, and the old man stood up and said to the people around: "The emperor's grace is mighty, the emperor's grace is mighty, now it's over, our good days are coming. Thirty tax one, every day The family can have surplus food every year, no tax increase, no corvee, what we have left over, the old man thinks, we should build an ethnology, train the young, and serve the Great Wei in the future!"

The young scribe opened his mouth to speak, but the old man saw this scene and asked in puzzlement, "Xiu'er, did grandfather say something wrong?"

"Of course my grandfather is right, it's just...just..."

"...It's just something, don't hesitate!" The old man said angrily, "If you want to say something, just say it, and remember in the future, no one is allowed to make noise in the Huang En Pavilion, and those who violate it will be expelled from the house!"

The young scribe took a deep breath, and then murmured: "Grandfather, my grandson heard the discussion of my classmates yesterday, it seems that there is also a rebellion in Wei, and someone sent troops to attack Yedu during His Majesty's southern expedition!"

"What, there is such a thing?" The old man and all the villagers were shocked.The old patriarch asked: "Tell me quickly, what's going on?"

The young scribe said: "As soon as I ascended the throne, I will promulgate and implement the emperor's grace decree that will never be added, and I will also exempt the people of the common people from the corvee, and the privileges of the gentry will be abolished. Only those of the common people who are talented can become Officials. In this way, the interests of the gentry and the powerful will be harmed, and they will naturally rebel. In order to conquer the south and unify the world, His Majesty almost mobilized all the troops near Yedu. Pushed out by those gentry families, they rebelled. The situation in Yecheng is very critical now. In order to defend Yedu, it is said that the empress and the two princes climbed on the city wall. But they beat the drums to cheer and encouraged the soldiers to fight the enemy bravely. Even the palace guards of the two princes also participated in the battle, so one can imagine how dangerous the situation is."

The old man said: "So His Majesty is in danger? We can't keep this Huang En Pavilion either!"

The young scribe said: "This is natural. Didn't Your Majesty say it? The Great Wei will never perish, the Ran family will never cease, and will never add gifts. But if the Wei Kingdom perishes, then no one will obey this imperial order." gone."

"How can this be done, how can this be done!" All the people were anxious.

"Stop arguing!" The old man was usually very authoritative, and he yelled angrily, and everyone was shocked.The old man took a deep breath and said, "I haven't seen such a good emperor in 60 years. We have to find a way to protect this good emperor and prevent those rebels from succeeding."

"Yes, we are going to help the emperor fight the rebels."

"Help the emperor fight the rebels!"

"Whoever rebels against the emperor, we will fight him?"

The old man is also from the Huang family in Jiangxia, and is a descendant of Huang Xiang, one of the famous ministers of the Eastern Han Dynasty 24 filial piety, the protagonist of the fan pillow warm quilt.But it's just a remote branch.However, the Jiangxia Huang family did not have any outstanding figures in the Southern and Northern Dynasties, so the Jiangxia Huang family did not make a statement.

However, the Jiangxia Huang family is a big family in Jiangxia.

Following Jiangxia Huang's urgent convening of clan meetings of various branches and branches to discuss the matter of King Qin's petition.As a result, not only the Jiangxia Huang clan, but also Jiangxia's Chen clan, Zhu clan, Cai clan, Luo clan, Zhang clan, Chang clan and other hundreds of Shu clans responded one after another.However, Jiangxia and even the whole of Jingzhou are all attached to Wei Guoxin, and even the government offices at all levels are mostly temporarily appointed, barely exercising government functions. As for the three-level armament system, it is impossible to talk about it.

These huge groups of Jiangxia people appealed to Jiangxia prefect Cai Xi.It turned out that this was originally only because of the petition of the people of Jiangxia County. After the news came out, the people who were recruited by the governor of Jingzhou in Wei State, Xi Zouchi, to build roads and dredge ditches heard about it. Petition to Xi Chiu Chi.

Facing the excited common people, Xi Zouchi had never seen such a formation before. Just when Xi Zouchi was feeling dizzy, he accidentally learned that Ran Ming had secretly arrived in Xiangyang.

Ran Ming withdrew from Jingkou, but did not retreat with Shi Yue's troops. He ordered Shi Yue's troops to retreat across the river and set up a commanding account of the Southern Conquest Army in Yangzhou as the command center of the Southern Conquest Army to guard the Jiangbei area.At the same time, after Ran Ming entered Jiangxia County, he separated from Ji Wei, Chief of the General Staff Department, and let the imperial guards advance with Kong Yuren, and let Ji Wei lead the guards to Qujing through Jiangxia, Yiyang, and Anlu. Enter Ruyin, and then enter Lechang County controlled by the Anbei Army rebels led by Ji Polu, and prepare to disintegrate Ran Zhi's rear guard.

And Ran Ming led Lin Heishan and other personal guards to sneak all the way in light clothes, preparing to enter Nanyang from Xiangyang, join the troops led by Zhang Ai, and end the rebellion launched by Ran Zhi.

Although Xi Zouchi is a leader of Shilin and a literary figure in Jingzhou, it is a pity that since he became an official, he has never been a single-handed chief official, and he will be in chaos when encountering emergencies.When he saw it, he hurriedly told the people in Jingzhou that they knew about the shocking changes in Yecheng. The people were furious and asked King Qin to save him.

In fact, Ran Ming could hear the voices of petitions on the street like a tsunami without using the secret channels of the royal guards.

Ran Ming smiled and said, "That's very good. The people of Jingzhou behaved like this. Isn't this the result of the enlightenment of you, the governor? Since they choose to be loyal to Wei and swear to be the people of Wei, they should be encouraged."

Xi Zouchi said with a lot of worries: "If someone with ulterior motives provokes a little, I'm afraid Jingzhou will be in big trouble!"

"Oh!" Ran Ming finally felt disappointed with Xi Zouchi at this moment, this is another person with outstanding knowledge but a mess in government affairs.It's not impossible to let such a person be an official, but it is absolutely impossible to be a chief official, only an auxiliary official.At this time, Ran Ming made up his mind to transfer Xi Zouchi to the Hongwen Museum as a doctor in the future.

Ran Ming felt that he should come forward to solve this matter, and then Ran Ming took a bath and changed clothes, put on the emperor's crown, put on the emperor's guard of honor, and came to Xiangyang's city gate tower openly.

With a confident smile, Ran Ming spoke slowly, his tone full of confidence and courage: "Thank you for still choosing to follow me! Long live Wei!"

Ran Ming's voice is actually not loud. In the era without microphone speakers, Ran Ming's voice could only be faintly heard by hundreds or thousands of people at best.However, when Ran Ming appeared, as soon as his words fell, cheers like landslides and tsunami erupted from below. The sound was louder and louder, and it lasted for a long time before it gradually subsided.

Regardless of Lin Heishan's obstruction, Ran Ming smiled and waited for the cheers to pass, then slowly walked down the city gate and stood with the people before he continued: "A few days ago, I held firm against the rebel army's siege of Yecheng. I became silent because I don't know whether I can continue to be your emperor, and now I know your choice, so I must respond to the shameless rebellion as I should."

Ran Ming paused, cleared his throat, and said the last sentence of his short speech: "The Great Wei has millions of powerful generals, the rebellion has no future, all the rebels, please listen carefully—the heavens have I can’t bear to see people burn to death because of the virtue of good life. I only eliminate the first evil, do whatever it takes in time, and forget the past. Resist strictly, and when my heavenly soldiers arrive, resistance is a dead end.”

"Long live Great Wei!" "Long live Your Majesty!" After a few seconds of silence, the crowd below burst into earth-shattering cheers again.

The southernmost county in Jingzhou is Guiyang County, which was established in the Western Han Dynasty and continued to be established in successive dynasties.The territory under its jurisdiction is roughly equivalent to southern Hunan and northern Guangdong. It has eleven counties under its jurisdiction, namely Chen, Linwu, Bian (now Yongxing), Nanping (now Lanshan), Leiyang, Guiyang (now Lianxian), Yang Shan, Qujiang, Hansui, Zhenyang, and Yinshan.

Sima Xiu was the prefect of Guiyang in the Eastern Jin Dynasty (there was a mistake in the previous article, Sima Xiu did not take over the vassal state Zhang Wu Wang at this time, the current Zhang Wu Wang) Sima Xiu is the Eastern Jin clan, the son of Zhang Wu Wang Sima Fanzhi, Zhang Wu Kingdom’s original clan is Sima Hong lineage.Sima Hong is the grandson of Sima Fu, Sima Yi's third brother.In terms of blood relationship, in fact, Emperor Wu of Jin is only counted as the same great-grandfather.Only one generation away, five servers can be released.What's more, when Zhangwu Kingdom Cangzhou was established in the Eastern Jin Dynasty, the feudal state had long been lost.Emperor Sima Rui of the Eastern Jin Dynasty established the Eastern Jin Dynasty. In order to appease the clan, he did not abolish the Zhangwu Kingdom.However, the territory of Zhangwu Kingdom is gone, and Zhangwu's lineage is also a remote branch, so it is extremely ignored. Not only can it not enter the center, but it is displaced in Guiyang County.

At this time, Guiyang County is not like later generations.In later generations, Guangguiyang has a population of more than 700 million and a total economic volume of more than 8000 billion yuan.It is almost equal to that of Guizhou Province and slightly lower than that of Gansu.But in this era, there are only 14 households in the eleven counties of Guiyang County, with a population of less than 340.Moreover, in this era, the forest coverage rate is very high, coupled with mountainous hills and unsuitable land for cultivation, the entire mature field in Guiyang County, including the upper field (neither fallow), middle field (three-year fallow and one-year fallow), and lower field (one-year fallow every other year) ) is only more than [-] acres, or about [-] million mu, and more than [-]% of them are fields that fall fallow every other year.At this time, Guiyang County was not only not a source of wealth for the Eastern Jin Dynasty, but a burden for the Eastern Jin Dynasty.

Due to the lack of land, the tax revenues that can be collected are limited, and there is no money and food to support a large number of troops. The entire Guiyang County has only three thousand old and weak soldiers. County towns, looting villages and towns.Being a prefect in this place is almost like Liufa.This is equivalent to the cruel punishment of being sent to Lingnan in the Tang and Song Dynasties.When Sima Xiu heard that the state of Wei had attacked You County, Sima Xiu felt that his hard days were over, so he hurriedly sent his confidants to submit a letter of surrender to Zhang Zhe and Zhang Wensu.

There are three styles of Jiangshu in ancient times, that is, "face-tied", which means that the hands are tied behind the back, and the face forward expresses surrender.The second is to carry the coffin, which means that sin deserves death.Generally, when a general is defeated and surrenders in a battle, the general chooses to beg for death to appease the opponent's anger and keep the whole song.The third is "surrender". It can be said that before the Three Kingdoms, there were two main methods of surrender, face-to-face and public opinion, but surrender was in the hands of Liu Adou, and it was a flower.Liu Chan presented a letter to Deng Ai with the advice of Dr. Guanglu Qiao Zhou, saying: "Please order and tell the truth, respect the loyalty money, and give it to life or death, but what is recorded is close by and will not be repeated."

The meaning of this sentence is that I have surrendered and expressed my loyalty to you. Whether it is life or death, it is all in your mind.If you want me to die, I have prepared the coffin.This kind of downgrading belongs to the method of unconditional surrender, which is to let the opponent slaughter.Sima Xiu was handsome and talented. He saw Liu Chan surrendered in a way of devotion, and was named An Le Gong, which had been passed down in An Le Gong for 83 years. This made Sima Xiu very envious, so he desperately adopted the same surrender method .

Originally, Zhang Zhe should accept Sima Xiu's surrender in person, and then bring Sima Xiu back to Yecheng to meet Wei Emperor Ran Ming.But Sima Xiu waited and waited, but no one came to accept his surrender.Followed by his confidant Pengcheng Liu Qianxuan to go to You County with a lot of money.When Liu Qianxuan took four days to arrive in You County, it happened that Zhang Zhe received Zhang Wen's order to attack Bashu.

At this time, Zhang Wensu, who wanted to perform well in front of his new master, immediately organized staff to formulate a westward plan.You County is located in the southeast of Hunan, on the east bank of the Xiangjiang River.If you want to turn to attack westward, you must cross the Xiangjiang River.At this time, there was no bridge on the Xiangjiang River, and even Zhang Zhao, who was born in Jingzhou, did not know the hydrology of the Xiangjiang River.Zhang Zhao ordered the scouts to scout around the Xiangjiang River where the pontoon bridge could be built. He also planned to organize leading soldiers to scout the deployment of Jianning County (now Zhuzhou), west of You County.

Zhang Zhe had to be busy adjusting his military deployment, making arrangements to raise food and military resources, and temporarily appointing local officials.However, Zhang Zhao's authority is not that great. All appointed officials have the word "quan" in front of their positions.That is the job of an agent.

Zhang Zhao almost forgot that he had received Sima Xiu's letter of surrender, but Liu Qianxuan was too loyal to Sima Xiu, he couldn't see Zhang Zhao, and You County began to transfer supplies, and the army moved out one after another. The strong atmosphere before the battle, Liu Qianxuan can still felt.Now Liu Qianxuan was in a hurry. He distributed a large amount of gold and silver treasures and bribed Zhang Zhao's soldiers and followers.

When he saw Liu Qianxuan again, Zhang Zhao remembered Sima Xiu's letter of surrender to him.Now that Zhang Zhao received the order to advance the whole army westward, how could Zhang Zhao still have the energy to accept Sima Xiu's surrender.However, adhering to the thought that no matter how small a mosquito is, it is still meat, so Zhang Zhe ordered Yuan Kui, the former recorder of the Wuling State of Jin State, to be responsible for accepting Sima Xiu's surrender.This Yuan Kui is a member of the Xie clan in Yuanling. When Zhang Zhao led an army to Wuling Kingdom, the entire Wuling Kingdom surrendered from the internal history (equivalent to the prefect), the prime minister, and the lieutenant.

Everyone bribed Zhang Zhao, but Yuan Kui remained indifferent.When Zhang Zhao was very curious, he asked: "Everyone bribes me and asks for an official position. Why are you alone?"

Yuan Kui said calmly: "The imperial court has its own laws. There is no king of Wuling in Wei, so the country must be abolished as a county. The prefects of the counties are appointed by the imperial court, and even the county magistrates are appointed by the imperial court. , when a new prefect is appointed. Why does Kui need to work hard?"

Zhang Zhe laughed when he heard the words. As a new minister, he didn't dare to be domineering, even the appointed officials were all in power.But this temporary official position was looted.After talking with Yuan Kui, Zhang Zhe found that he was a man of great talent and knowledge.Zhang Zhe enlisted him to be the official recorder of Changsha County.

(End of this chapter)