Originally, Ximen Ruoen was planning to appoint Chen Xiaomu as Prince of Charge and Privy Council Envoy. However, Chen Xiaomu disagreed, so he asked for a self-made consultant position. He explained to Ximen Ruoen and Du Fengxian that the purpose of this consultant was to follow him. The emperor later came up with ideas and helped him make suggestions. As for whether he listened to them or accepted them, that was the emperor's business. Originally, Ximen Ruoen had planned to make Chen Xiaomu the prince-in-charge and wanted to keep him by his side. Listen. The consultant position introduced by Chen Xiaomu also followed him all day long. Ximen Ruoen was also happy to see Chen Xiaomu become her follower in the future, which was similar to what he wanted, so he granted his wish and granted him the title of There seems to be a nondescript position as a consultant to Lao Shizi, but in terms of rank, he enjoys the first-class treatment from the imperial court.
After the temporary team of the imperial court was set up, the next step was to select a location to build the capital. Since Chen Xiaomu didn't know much about Hubei, he couldn't intervene. As a result, Du Feng first proposed a city in Hubei called Lincheng, and Ximen Ruo En proposed a county named Liangzhou as a candidate for the new capital of Hubei. Because these two cities are relatively prosperous among the remaining 140 cities in Hubei, the original The city construction foundation is good. If one of the two cities is chosen as the capital of the E Kingdom, a lot of money will be spent less on building the capital city. After all, in addition to the total of 12 million taels of silver in compensation and lease from the Chu State, , there is no other way to make money. There are still millions of people down there waiting for food, so save whatever you can, but don’t dare to spend a tael of silver by mistake!
After determining the two candidate sites for Hubei, the next step was to go to the two candidate sites for on-site inspections to determine the final location for Hubei. Originally, Ximen Ruoen was going to let Chen Xiaomu and Du Fengxian go together to select the site for the capital, but Chen Xiaomu had no choice but to do so. He is not interested in these things at all. He only wants to make money now. He has long wanted to try out the financial system of later generations, so he avoided it in every possible way and did not want to go with Ximen Ruoen and Du Fengxian to select a site for Hubei. .
In the end, Ximen Ruoen really couldn't defeat him, so he had to give up. As soon as Ximen Ruoen, Du Fengxian and others left, Chen Xiaomu immediately ordered Li Gui, "Captain Li, go and find some good seal carvers for me. Don't be afraid of the labor fees he wants." High, the higher the labor cost, the better!”
As soon as Li Gui left, Xiao Cheng walked into the tent from outside with a letter bag in his hand. When he saw Chen Xiaomu, he smiled and said, "Mr. Chen, do you have any old friends in the court of Qi?"
Chen Xiaomu was stunned by Xiao Cheng's question, then shook his head and said with a smile: "I have never even been to Qi State, and the old friends who came there are from the imperial court."
"Is that weird?" Xiao Cheng held up the letter bag in his hand and said, "Look, this is an urgent document written to you by a man named Wang Zhan in the Qi court. Look, this letter bag is not only written with fire paint but It’s sealed tightly, and there are three bird feathers stuck to the upper corners, indicating that this is an urgent letter!”
Chen Xiaomu reached out and took the letter bag from Xiao Cheng. Sure enough, there were three feathers from an unknown bird stuck to the upper left corner of the letter bag. This was the first time Chen Xiaomu saw such a formal urgent letter after coming to this world. When later generations were in school, they learned in history classes that the ancients used this method of sticking bird feathers to convey urgent letters. He took the letter bag in his hand and turned it over to look at the front. Sure enough, it was clearly written in block letters on it, "The letter from Qi State Lieutenant Wang Zhan was personally received by General Chen Xiaomu." He then raised his head and asked Xiao Cheng, "General Xiao, what is the name of this letter?" Who gave it to you?"
Xiao Cheng pointed his hand towards the outside of the tent, "A messenger sent him here. He was stopped by the soldiers on guard at the entrance of the camp. The soldiers refused to let him enter the camp, but he insisted on the soldiers on guard coming in to report. There was a stalemate. At that time, I happened to be discussing the withdrawal of troops with Chu General Pan Yi over there in Yecheng. I came back and passed by. After asking about the situation, I brought the person in. This is not at the entrance of your tent. I asked him to stay outside the tent. While waiting to sign and receive the receipt, he handed me the envelope and brought it in."
With a "la la" sound, Chen Xiaomu tore open the letter bag, reached out and took out the letter, raised it to his eyes and looked at it. The words on the letter were also written in block letters. They were beautifully written and easy to read. The entire letter Probably more than a hundred words.
"General Chen Xiaomu personally announced that Qi and Chu are still brotherly states. Today, the general led his subordinates to invade their capital. This is really something that our country of Qi, from the emperor to the people, does not want to see. My emperor, for It is difficult to sleep and eat well. My emperor has summoned the civil and military officials of the Manchu Dynasty to agree that General Chen will withdraw from Chu within ten days from the date of receiving the letter. If he does not obey, my emperor will send troops to Zheng. Don't say no to him then. Pre-ye!"
After reading the letter, Chen Xiaomu laughed angrily. He handed the letter to Xiao Cheng and said with a smile: "Did these bastards take the wrong medicine? Zheng Guo was almost beaten until it was almost destroyed, and they were not seen." Come out and say something fair, but now you have jumped out, I am afraid that even Chu State does not know about this, otherwise it will not successfully sign a peace treaty with us!"
Xiao Cheng received the letter, but his expression became more solemn as he read it. He slowly put the letter on the table in front of Chen Xiaomu and said in a deep voice: "Mr. Chen, judging from the content of this letter, the people of Qi clearly want to take advantage of the situation." !”
Chen Xiaomu nodded and said calmly: "Okay, let's fight. Anyway, since they are here, it's not a matter of whether you want to fight or not."
''I'm just afraid that if the people of Chu know about this, they may change the peace treaty signed with us. "Xiao Cheng said worriedly.
"Yes." Chen Xiaomu nodded to agree with Xiao Cheng's view, and said at the same time: "If you want to fight, you must be fast, accurate, and ruthless. Strike first to gain the upper hand, and strike later to suffer disaster. I am preparing to organize an expeditionary force to launch a surprise attack on Qi State!"
"Mr. Chen, as far as I know, the strength of the Qi State is far greater than that of the Chu State. If Qin State hadn't been checking and balancing these years, Qi State would have taken action against small countries like us. Now we are seeing Qin State's The strength is getting stronger and stronger. In order to counter the Qin State, the Qi State pretends that no one can offend the peacemaker, and attempts to unite some small countries below to jointly fight against the Qin State. But I can’t figure it out. This time we and the Chu State War, why did Qi State openly intervene in this war? This has never happened before!" Xiao Cheng said blankly.
"I don't want to think about that much anymore." Chen Xiaomu waved his hand and pulled a piece of cut rice paper from the table. He picked up the brush awkwardly, licked the tip of the pen into the ink on the inkstone, and then wrote five words crookedly on the white rice paper. A big character, "Guan Er, what are you waiting for?" Xiao Cheng's eyes hurt when he looked at it, but Chen Xiaomu picked up the rice paper without caring, raised it to his mouth, blew on it, and then carefully put the paper into the envelope and sealed it. He handed it to Xiao Cheng and said, "General Xiao, please give this reply from me to the Qi State post envoy waiting outside to take it back for delivery."
Xiao Cheng hesitated for a moment, then took the letter bag, turned around and walked out of the tent.
Chen Xiaomu asked He Quan to find Zhang Yun and Zhang Jian respectively, and gave them the letter written by Wang Zhan, the Taiwei of Qi State, to read it over. After reading it, both of them remained silent for a long time. The expressions on their faces were the same as those of Xiao Cheng. The expressions on this letter were similar.
Chen Xiaomu smiled and said: "What? Are you two afraid too?"
Zhang Jian shook his head, "Mr. Chen, it's not that we are afraid, but the disparity in strength is too great. Because Qi and Zheng are neighboring countries, I know more about Qi. Qi's current population alone is two thousand. There are over 1.2 million troops in the army. If we really fight them, we may not even have a chance of winning!"
Chen Xiaomu walked a few steps back and forth in front of the two of them with his hands behind his head. He suddenly raised his head and said with a smile, "General Zhang, I bet that even if Qi wants to fight with us, it will not dare to fight. At most, it will send some elite troops." Just cross the border and occupy some of our towns!”
"You mean they will send out the Tengjia Army to fight us?" Zhang Jian asked in surprise.
Chen Xiaomu nodded, "It is very possible that Teng Jia's army is highly mobile, small but elite, and does not need to mobilize large-scale logistical support. It can be withdrawn immediately if something happens on the Qi-Qin border.
Zhang Jian couldn't help but take a breath, "Oh my god, isn't this enough, Mr. Chen? Don't forget, Qi's Teng Jia army with only 20,000 people once destroyed more than 400 cities by himself. , a country of Lu with a population of nearly 10 million and a military strength of nearly 500,000!"
Chen Xiaomu smiled coldly, "So what? The State of Lu is the State of Lu, and I am me. As long as he dares to come out, I will dare to beat him. Didn't the black-armored army of the Chu State boast of it all be killed? Besides, , What's the use of being afraid, are you afraid that people will not hit you? Isn't there a saying that when soldiers come, they will be defeated, and when water comes, the soil will cover you."
Zhang Jian sighed silently and fell silent, but Chen Xiaomu pulled him to the table with great interest, picked up a brush and put it into his hand, and asked him to draw some towns and terrain at the border between Zheng and Qi on rice paper.
With no choice but to take the brush from Chen Xiaomu's hand, Zhang Jian leaned over the table and sketched out some topography and town names at the junction of Zheng and Qi according to Chen Xiaomu's request.
As Zhang Jian wrote down the first county name, Chen Xiaomu couldn't help but be startled. It was Tianquan County again. It turned out that there were only two counties on the border between Zheng State and Qi State, one was Tianquan County and the other was Linghe County. That's it. In terms of area and population, these two counties are among the largest counties in Zheng State. If Qi State wants to use troops against Zheng State, it can only invade from these two counties.
Judging from Chen Xiaomu's current position, if he wants to fight Qi, he can only lead his troops to turn around and return to Tianquan County from Zheng State along the road he used to fight out of Tianquan County.
