To the west of Puzhou City, the Yellow River rolls.
Next to the big iron ox at Pujin Ferry, there stood a sturdy man with a telescope in his hand and looking at the other side. There were many soldiers, craftsmen and civilians busy around him.
This person is Chang Yu's good brother, Gao Jie, the commander-in-chief of Xuzhou.
After the peace talks between the imperial court and the Li Chuang Group, Li Yan returned to Beijing to report on his work, and Gao Jie came to change defenses. The reason why he was asked to come was because the imperial court and Chang Yu had repeatedly considered it.
First of all, Gao Jie and Li Zicheng have a personal feud, the hatred of taking away his wife, and the new hatred of chasing people thousands of miles away. In addition, Gao Jie is also one of the few warriors in the world who dares to kill and fight, and he has a close personal relationship with Chang Yu. Well, absolutely no problem with loyalty.
What's more, Chang Yu blew the wind intentionally or unintentionally before coming here. You are just one gong away from being knighted!
As a military commander, he is also a military commander with a background of thieves. Who doesn’t want to be promoted to an official or a title? They all want it, and even more!
Therefore, Gao Jie was stationed at the Yellow River defense line this time and only did two things. The first was to guard the border, and the second was to build the Pujin Crossing.
According to the agreement in the peace talks, the Li Chuang Group and the imperial court were bounded by the Yellow River. However, before the peace talks, Li Yan had destroyed the four cities on the other side. During the peace talks, Li Chuang's side demanded return, but Chang Yu's side refused to let go. In the end, Li Chuang and Unable to do so.
In other words, although the Yellow River is used as the boundary, there are still four cities on the other side under the control of the imperial court. In order to facilitate various exchanges between the two sides, it is imperative to build the Pujin Ferry.
Gao Jie is not afraid of fighting even if he is good at it. In Chang Yu's words, Gao Jie is not educated, but he is not afraid of fighting.
But it was really difficult for him to build the ferry and the bridge.
It is not a technical problem, but a financial difficulty.
The court said, "Repair," but they didn't allocate any money!
Gao Jie was dumbfounded, so he went to ask Chang Yu to urge the court to allocate money. However, Chang Yu was a bitch and said directly to him, "You are stupid, the court is looking for you." Do you dare to ask for this money?
Gao Jie suddenly realized that he was really a fool. His good brother had warned him a long time ago that it only took one merit to become a knight. If there was no war on the Yellow River, he would not get much merit, but building a ferry would still count. Well, at least it can be considered a bonus.
So, he started to make preparations everywhere, collect donations, and even asked his soldiers to work as laborers in order to save money. Anyway, they would get paid even if they were not fighting, and they would be idle and go to work.
Fortunately, he had a good brother who was always there to remind him. Looking at the busy ferry construction site, Gao Jie was thinking about whether to go for a walk on the other side when a horse flew up.
A letter came from Li Yan from Jinan.
Gao Jie couldn't read a few Chinese characters. His staff looked surprised and whispered, "Liu Zongmin's army will be crossing the border soon!"
Gao Jie was shocked when he heard this. This bitch wanted to come over and fuck him!
The staff quickly added that he was not crossing the border to invade, but was going east to Ryukyu.
Where is Ryukyu? Go there. Gao Jie looked confused. His staff also said it was above the East China Sea, on the side of Japan.
Gao Jie still didn't understand why he went so far away. His aides said that Li Yan didn't make it clear in his mind, but only said that he would be monitored when he was crossing the border and any offenders would be severely punished. Gao Jie's eyes lit up, meaning that if this guy misbehaves along the way, we can beat him!
The staff glanced at him and swallowed again. This was probably what he meant, but General Li said that the commander-in-chief should have nothing to do.
Gao Jie was startled, what did Li Yan mean by this? Is this the kind of person I am?
The staff was silent.
Liu Zongmin is really leaving, and it will only happen in the past few days.
Li Zicheng in Prince Qin's Mansion turned pale after hearing the news, frowning and being lost in thought for a long time. Niu Jinxing looked anxious next to him, "My lord, if you want to take action, hurry up!"
Li Zicheng walked to the yard and looked up at the sky, and after a long time he took a long breath.
There were some things that he couldn't figure out. During the peace talks, the chief eunuch deliberately revealed that he wanted to kill Liu Zongmin. He also had the intention to kill Liu Zongmin. He had always had it, but because he was afraid of his power and strength, he could not do it openly.
But now, the imperial court actually reached an agreement with Liu Zongmin and let him go.
He figured out some things again.
The imperial court is also determined to kill him, so he has given him a break, or he has only given him a break temporarily. Unless, as the great eunuch said, he either performs great deeds to atone for his sins or goes overseas to fight for his crimes. The imperial court expanded its territory!
He chose this suggestion.
Now Liu Zongmin seems to have chosen this advice to save his life.
At first, he thought that Liu Zongmin wanted to separate his family, establish his own mountain, and leave the Jingxiang area. However, judging from the current information, although his destination was unknown, it seemed that he was overseas.
The ambition of the imperial court is really quite big!
Thinking about this, I couldn't help but smile bitterly. After more than ten years of hard work, I finally had to work hard for the court!
That's all, this can be considered a kind of atonement.
In exchange for the rest of your life!
Besides, it’s a blessing in disguise. The imperial court will definitely not allow him to become king with peace of mind. Sooner or later, he will be killed, and it will be the kind of death that will affect the nine tribes. Then he will be infamous in the history books for thousands of years, and he will go overseas. , an independent country can continue for generations to come, and the inscriptions after death will be of great achievements.
Let's go, let him go, we are all brothers in adversity who have been through life and death together to fight against the world. We are looking for a way to survive ourselves, why should we cut off his way of life.
Letting Liu Zongmin leave peacefully was Li Zicheng's final word on the decades-old friendship between the two of them.
Some people may wonder whether it was Li Yan who had the final say in such a big matter as letting Liu Zongmin go overseas, not through the imperial court?
Naturally, he alone will not have the final say, but the imperial court will definitely not interfere, at least not openly, and there are very few people in the imperial court who know about this matter. Except for Emperor Chongzhen, only a few in the cabinet know about it. He is a big boss, and they will never leak such a thing.
The reason is simple, this is dirty work, and it is very confidential dirty work.
The essence of this matter is to borrow a knife to kill someone, whether it is borrowing Liu Zongmin to kill a Japanese, or borrowing a Japanese to kill Liu Zongmin, it has nothing to do with the court and is purely a personal act.
If Liu Zongmin lands in Ryukyu and takes over the magpie's nest, and the Ryukyu people protest, the court will also say that it is a bandit who has no place in the Central Plains, and it has nothing to do with me to cross the sea.
But if Liu Zongmin accomplishes something there, such as helping Ryukyu resist the Japanese invasion, the court can naturally say, I sent him, and you have to be grateful to me, or if Liu Zongmin goes there and resists the Japanese first, and then overthrows the King of Ryukyu. If he establishes himself as king, the imperial court will naturally give him a title and make him my godson overseas.
But Liu Zongmin hasn't gone yet, and he doesn't know what will happen there. Naturally, the court won't admit anything and doesn't know anything. To put it simply, there is no official record, no knowledge, no involvement, and of course no publicity, just like Tian Mixiu suddenly appeared in North Korea without knowing what was going on.
Since it is not convenient for the court to come forward, this kind of thing will naturally fall on Dongchang, and the most suitable and best person to do this kind of thing must be Chang Yu.
It's just that Chang Yu came out of seclusion at this time, and handed over the matter to Li Yan long before he came out of seclusion.
Li Yan is very trustworthy in his work.
Coincidentally, Emperor Chongzhen also trusted Li Yan quite a bit and felt that he was very suitable. After several months of various operations, Li Yan lived up to his trust and finally made this happen.
Although his original intention was to let Liu Zongmin go and have a fight with Li Zicheng.
But everything is difficult, and Li Zicheng and Liu Zongmin finally restrained themselves, leaving Li Yan with regrets, but he had no choice but to let it go.
