September 24, the fourth year of Chongzhen.
At the foot of the towering snow-capped mountains, two riders rode south from the vast grassland.
The leader of the team was twenty-six or seven years old and his name was Mo Fuli.
He was from Haibao, Zhenxi, Xining, where all the frontier troops were in the area, and he was no exception. Among his distant relatives, there was an uncle named Mo Yujing, who was appointed as the general of Gansu Jinglu Guard Lutang Camp.
Mo Fuli worked as a frontier soldier in Zhenhai Fort for several years. He originally wanted to change his destiny and become a scholar and go to work for his uncle Mo Yujing. However, during this period of time, the situation in Xining changed greatly.
The stationing of the Lion Army has made the local people feel in danger. How can a clan, no matter how big it is, be bigger than the chieftain? Even the chieftain bowed to Qinghai Xuanwei Envoy Si under the temptation of real money. In the three-acre land of Xiningwei, what could escape Liu Chengzong.
In order to protect the local security of the clan, Mo Fuli, who was admitted as a scholar, gave up his plan to defect to his uncle and defected to Liu Chengzu, the commander of the Xining Guard.
Liu Chengzu loved talents very much, especially this kind of young, powerful and educated scholar. After keeping him by his side for two months, he gave him a mission to go to Kangning Mansion to deliver a letter to Liu Chengzong. If Liu Chengzong needed it, he would Just stay around and help.
This road was not easy to walk, so Mo Fuli was accompanied by a guide named Du Mao.
Du Mao was an old scholar who failed to pass the exam four times. He was a ruthless character who refused to accept his fate. In his early years, he found out that he was not destined to be a civil servant. He sold his house and land, collected the money and went overseas to do business. He collected it in Nangqian. He had a lot of leathers, but they were all robbed by horse bandits on the way back. He lost everything, so he became a teacher in Zhenhai camp.
The two rode two horses and two mules for twenty days. They took the right road and met the lion soldiers who were driving stone piles along the road from south to north in the Yushu Baihu territory.
The Lion Soldiers said that this was the order of the Generalissimo. They set off from Nangqian and set up four stone tablets along the road to the north. On the stone tablet they saw at that time, it was written on the north side that this is two hundred and ninety-eight miles away from Nangqian.
From Nangqian to the north, although the chieftains from various places were forced to leave their hands, their territories were still there. Therefore, the lion soldiers asked the nobles from various places for these four-square steles. When they walked to this place, the nobles in the next place were ready to dig out the stone steles and set up the stone steles. Later, the stonemason who carried it would carve the words on the spot.
Because the road was uneven and winding, the distance was measured by these lion soldiers on horseback. They carried several wooden stakes and several ropes 500 paces long and spread them along the road. After walking the distance of one rope, they laid down a rope and Knee-high stone piles.
After walking ten miles, a stone pile as high as the waist is dug; after walking a hundred miles, a stone pile as tall as a person is dug.
According to the lion soldiers who completed this mission, these stone monuments were erected to facilitate the dispatch of corvees, calculation of wages, and setting up of paving stations.
They have to drive the stone piles all the way to Curwan, and then backtrack mile by mile from the Curwan side. The only difference is that from north to south, they look at the north side of the stone piles; from south to north, they look at the north side of the stone piles. The one is to the south of the stone pile.
In the future, the directions and distances will be engraved on the roads connecting the east and west sides, so it is called the Grand Marshal's Square Monument.
However, this work cannot be completed this year. The weather has turned cold, the ground is frozen, and the process is getting slower and slower. It may take another two and three months to reach Cowan in the spring of next year. It is expected to be completed in August next year.
However, as long as this work is done, there will be no delay in setting up express shops and inns along the way.
Du Mao led Mo Fuli to Nangqian and everyone was dumbfounded. This place had changed so much. Genbeng Temple, which had been bustling with people in the past, was gone. Only the remains of a large pillar were left. He thought it had been demolished by Liu Chengzong. After asking, I found out that it was an army named Dunyue Duoji who burned it.
Several large villages were formed near the manor on the bank of the Zaqu River. In the middle of the large villages were begging monks wandering in groups.
After asking the lion soldiers on duty, people said that these monks came from other places to defect to King Nangqian, and their temples were destroyed in King Baili's war.
However, after Genbeng Temple was burned down, due to the prophecy of the eminent monk who built the temple hundreds of years ago, the temple would not be rebuilt. The surrounding temples were also destroyed by war, and they lost their livelihood.
To put it bluntly, monks with higher status would not and did not dare to defect here. Those people had properties outside and accumulated a lot of wealth. They fled elsewhere before the war came.
So the monks gathered in Nangqian right now are all poor people from poor families. They used to work in the temple as odd jobs to barely make ends meet. Many of them have lost their homes and have nowhere to go.
"They all heard that the marshal was allocating fields to slaves in Nangqian, so they came in droves." The artillerymen stationed in Nangqian sat on the wooden boxes containing the shells and looked at the monks begging in the distance with a complicated expression: " It’s not their turn to be separated, there’s no way to say that.”
"Why can't you say it?" Mo Fuli crossed his arms and asked: "I heard in Xining that the commander-in-chief wants to turn slaves into civilians. They are suffering from labor in the temple, so they are no different from slaves, right? "
The artilleryman shook his head and looked at the soldier who spoke: "The commander-in-chief likes slaves, not monks, and likes talented people, not trash."
Mo Fuli understood that this artilleryman was quite philosophical in his words.
Useful slaves, useful monks, and useless slaves can all benefit from the Marshal.
It was very unfortunate that these monks had two characteristics that the commander did not like.
Mo Fuli sighed. In the farmland not far away, groups of slaves were following the officials to mark out the ownership of the land. Yang Dingrui stood in the group with an interpreter, shouting a few words from time to time, Sometimes there will be cheers, sometimes there will be silence.
To be precise, these people are no longer slaves. They are soldiers who followed Basang on the Eastern Expedition. Even just walking from one territory to another greatly expanded their experience.
Especially after conquering aristocratic manors and climbing up to the three floors that the noble masters had never allowed them to see in the past, they all had desires after seeing those rare treasures that they had never heard of or seen before.
With the help of the soldiers' great enthusiasm for dividing the land, Yang Dingrui was able to promote the laws and regulations he established among them.
Yang Dingrui's regulations were originally very lengthy, with 380 articles and a single opening chapter of more than 4,000 words, describing Liu Chengzong's immeasurable merits in expelling the powerful and punishing the people.
After the inspection of the Baizha Salt Field, Article 494 was changed, and many nobles in Nangqian gathered together, and everyone unanimously agreed to implement it. Fortunately, at this time, Liu Chengzong asked him to ask the attitude of the slaves.
There was no response at all, and the slaves couldn't understand it. Even with an interpreter, it was difficult to understand, so he used a "stupid" method. He and Master Chen stood among the slaves and read out the regulations, and decided based on the slaves' response attitude. The removal, retention, and modification of legal provisions.
For Yang Dingrui, whether it is the distribution of land or grain, there is enough time and opportunity to revise this legal provision.
Among the seven counties in Kangning Prefecture, other places are fine. Only Nangqian County has experienced a long war, and the fields have basically failed to harvest this year. In those places where there are no nobles, the government needs to gather refugees and open porridge and tsampa factories. shop.
Although the Lion Army does not have much food reserves, there are not many refugees here, and they are very economical with food. One person only needs to prepare two tsampa every day to survive the winter while satisfying the happiness index.
This kind of appetite is twice what they used to eat under the nobles, and it is basically equivalent to half of the breakfast of a soldier in the Lion Army.
It's not that Liu Chengzong didn't want them to eat better. The tsampa he handed out was delicious with a little butter, a little salt and sugar.
At first, Liu Chengzong had people add cooked minced meat to it. As a result, hundreds of refugees suffered from stomach upset at the same time. One person even had a disease and died from stomach upset.
The occurrence of this incident made Liu Chengzong feel guilty and greatly impacted his thinking.
At first, he thought that serfs were people of low status. Later, he believed that serfs had the same status as livestock.
Later he realized that yaks could eat grass and bask in the sun, horses could lick salt bricks, dogs could enter the house and eat meat, but serfs could not and could only do hard labor day and night.
Nothing can be taken away but shadows, nothing left but footprints.
When Mo Fuli and Du Mao arrived at Zaqu Manor, they waited for a long time, and it was not until dark that they saw the excited Liu Chengzong and Chengyun returning hand in hand.
They went to watch Huang Shengxiao's camp drills and inspected Huang Shengxiao's new artillery.
As early as when he was stationed in Nangsuo Qianmo Palace, Liu Chengzong was afraid that Huang Shengxiao would be too idle, so he arranged a job for him to collect copper materials and cast lion cannons. However, the casting process was not interesting, and the cannons were never suitable for use.
Later, Huang Shengxiao led local craftsmen to build a six-rod, three-foot-short-barreled bird gun... He actually built it on a scale of one hundred rods, but the skills of the blacksmith here are too high to be described in words.
Under the whip of the slave owner, even a forged iron spear head could be bent, not to mention that Huang Shengxiao did not have a whip.
The extremely simple coiled pipe welding process has become very complicated to do well here. The required process craftsmen are all familiar with it. Pipe making is pipe making, and forging welding is forging welding. There is no problem in the steps. When they are put together, the gun pipe is Crooked.
On the contrary, when it comes to processing small copper and iron parts such as gun machines and faucet rods, the craftsmen are very skilled and can make very good precision parts.
It took Huang Shengxiao a long time to understand the reason... Due to the language barrier, the craftsmen still maintained their long-standing habit of working as slaves. It was enough to make weapons that could be used without spending too much effort. They were for slaves anyway.
As for those small accessories, the craftsmen believed that they were the jewelry needed by the nobles. If they didn't pay attention to them, they would be punished, so they strived for excellence.
Understanding the reason, Huang Shengxiao felt confident enough to lead the craftsmen to build a musket, but he wanted to try making a musket again. This time it was a complete failure. Although the musket looked like an enlarged version of the musket, when it was made, no matter how hard it was, Irvine is also in more than a little trouble.
Let alone here, even if a ready-made gun is placed next to it, it cannot be made exactly the same.
But cannon casting is different. Huang Shengxiao was able to cast a cannon from the beginning, but not a lion cannon.
The manufacturing process of the lion cannon was no different from other artillery, but the size requirements were extremely strict. Huang Shengxiao didn't understand the module, so he could only order the craftsmen to make exactly the same one.
This is difficult for the craftsman.
Because the lion cannon is a bit big, although the lion cannon is a small size among the artillery Liu Chengzong has seen, it is a bit big for the casting level here.
The craftsmen who are more experienced are those objects that are about the same size as those commonly used by nobles to worship Buddha.
Later, based on the craftsmen's experience and advantages in casting small objects, Huang Shengxiao used his brains and designed a Hongyi-style pearl cannon based on the lion cannon. The cannon weighed seventy kilograms and fired ninety-two iron bullets.
He believed that this kind of gun was suitable for the offense and defense of the narrow mountain fort in Kangning Mansion. Soldiers could carry it to attack the mountain, and it could also be placed on the mountain road or in the mountain fort as a defensive device.
Huang Shengxiao did not dare to cast more, and only cast twenty-four to re-equip his 1,200 troops stationed in Nangsuo Qianmo Palace and the Zaqu River to replace those wooden cannons that could not be used for a long time.
Liu Chengzong thought this cannon was very good and the name was simple.
No need for big or small lions, this thing is just a lynx grandchild, a lynx cannon.
From these cannons, Liu Chengzong saw that Huang Shengxiao still wanted to fight.
The lion cannons transported to the mountain fort are enough to defend the city. Just lock the small platform of Qianmo Palace and fire the four lion cannons alternately to prevent the heavenly soldiers and generals from coming up. The best use of this cannon is not to defend the fort. The advantage lies in attacking the mountain.
However, there is no battle to fight here, unless Baiyan is frustrated in entering Tibet, and they may need to provide some help from the rear to build a line of defense.
In the pretense of entering Tibet, Liu Chengzong had no intention of exerting any force... He did his best, and even if he didn't want anything in return, his subordinates still needed to repay him. So could he spit out what he had eaten into the lion's belly?
At that time, if Baiyan wants territory again, he may have to go to India to find it.
Of course, this is not a bad thing. It is good to pretend that it is really going to India. The key point is that if Liu Chengzong enters Tibet, he may not be able to come out in this life. Resisting the temptation to become a slave owner in Kham is quite difficult for the Lion Army. They are already far away from Shaanxi. further and further.
But the arrival of Mo Fuli and his brother's letter brought Liu Chengzong's mind back to Shaanxi.
Liu Chengzu sent two letters. One short message told about Mo Fuli's situation, and the other long letter explained the recent changes in Xining Wei.
To be precise, what the long letter mentioned was the policy change of the imperial court.
At the beginning of Emperor Chongzhen's accession to the throne, in view of Wei Zhongxian's incident, he withdrew all the garrison officials. However, on the ninth day of September this year, he sent eunuchs to monitor Ji, Liao, Guan, Ning and other border areas. , the admiral oversees the military administration of the capital camp and supervises the military pay on all frontiers.
Xining is also under surveillance.
Liu Chengzu said in the letter that when he sent this letter, the court's order had been issued, and an eunuch named Zhang set out from the capital to go to Xining to monitor the tea horses.
Liu Chengzong clutched the letter and calculated the journey in his mind. It would take about twenty-two days to get from the capital to Xining. Because the road facilities were perfect, it was even several days faster than Mo Fuli's trip to Nangqian.
It's too late. Eunuch Zhang's people should have arrived in Xining by now. According to the eldest brother's character, he probably won't rob and kill the envoy on the way.
Liu Chengzong asked Mo Yingli and others to find a place to sit down first, and he started writing letters. Not only to his brother, but also to Li Wanqing, Liu Guoneng and others, reminding them to pay attention to safety and take precautions.
In addition, he asked his brother to send someone to tell the eunuch to come to Nangqian to see him.
He took a deep breath, tilted his head and scratched his neck. He never expected that after experiencing Cao Huachun, there would still be eunuchs who would dare to come to Xining?
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